human
What to do! said L'Ouverture to Christophe, as they entered his apartment at Le Dondon.
gpt
What to do? Everything, this year and for the future, may depend on what we decide on for our next step. And we must decide before we leave this room, say your thoughts, Henri.
human
I am for a truce.
gpt
I am for a retreat in the mountains. Now for our reasons! Why do you desire a truce?
human
Because I see that Leclerc so earnestly wishes it, that I am confident we may make good terms, for the interval of waiting till we recover altogether our power, our territory, and our people. Leclerc will revoke our outlawry. That done, you will be the virtual rider of our people till August; after which no foes will be left upon our soil. What have you to say against this?
gpt
That it is yielding, unnecessarily and fatally, to the invaders. Where are our censures of Clerveaux and Maurepas, if we, too, yield to Leclerc, and make terms with him?
human
Every one of our people will understand the difference in the cases. Every one of them sees the difference between falling at the feet of Leclerc, like Clerveaux; or joining him on the very field on which you were about to oppose him, like Maurepas; and making a truce, for a short interval, when you are almost destitute of ammunition, and the enemy so exhausted with the heats as to decline coming into the field; while, at the same time, fresh troops are pouring in upon the coast, in such numbers as to prevent your regaining your independence by remaining in arms. If every man of the negroes has not wit enough to understand this for himself, who is better able than you to inform them of whatsoever you desire them to know? Be assured, Toussaint, powerful as your influence is this day among our people, it will be more so when you are no longer an outlaw. It is worth a large sacrifice of our feelings to have our outlawry revoked.
gpt
Have you more reasons to give for accepting a truce; or, as the French understand it, a peace?
human
Let me first hear your reasons for a retreat in the mountains.
gpt
A retreat in the mountains is the more honest proceeding of the two, Henri. If we make terms with the French, it will be knowing that that which goes by the name of peace is no more than a truce till August.
human
And will not they know that as well as we? Is it necessary to tell the whites, at this day, that they are liable to the fever in the heats, and that any army, however glorious in its strength previously, becomes a skeleton at that season? This is a matter that is perfectly understood by all the parties.
gpt
We must look forward, Henri, to the days to come, when August itself is past. The influence of myself or my successor will be injured by my having, even apparently, yielded to the invaders. My power over our people's minds will be immeasurably greater, if I shall have consistently refused to tolerate the foe, from the moment of their first hostile act to the end of the struggle. Am I not right?
human
That character of consistency will be purchased at a price too dear;-- at the cost of your characteristic of mercy, Toussaint--of reverence for human life. You will be ranked with Dessalines, if you keep up, for four months, the disturbance and devastation of war, when every one knows that your end will be as certainly gained after these four months have been spent in peace. What a grief it would be to see you changed in all eyes from the adored L'Ouverture to Toussaint the bandit! Pardon my freedom.
gpt
I required it of you, my friend; so do not speak of pardon. We are agreed that the moral influence of my conduct is the main consideration, as the destruction of the French army is certain, sooner or later--our independence secure, if we so will it. If we remain in the mountains, cutting off in detail the grasp which France shall attempt to lay on any part of our territory or our system; training our people, meantime, for another campaign, if France should attempt another; replenishing gradually our stores with perpetual small captures from the enemy, allowing them no asylum, discountenancing their presence, in every possible way--we shall be taking the shortest, and therefore the most merciful method of convincing the French and the blacks at once that their empire here is at an end, and slavery henceforth impossible for the negroes of Saint Domingo. But, if I make a peace or truce, how dim and perplexed will be the impression of my conduct! I cannot hold office, civil or military, under the French. Henri, you would not have me do so!
human
Certainly not. Till August, retire to your estate, that every office in the colony may thereafter be in your hand.
gpt
If I co-operate with the French, even in the faintest appearance, my moral influence will be all on their side, and a second year of warfare will find us farther from peace or independence than the first. If I act, more or less, for the blacks, Leclerc will send me to France as a traitor. If I do nothing, neither party will believe in my doing nothing: each will suspect me of secret dealings with the other. It is also true that I cannot, if I would, be inoperative. Every glance of my eye, every word of my lips, in my own piazza at Pongaudin, would be made to bear its interpretation, and go to disturb the single and distinct image which I now stand before every eye and in every mind.
human
I do not agree with you, said Henri.
gpt
While the image of August is distinct in the minds of the Saint Domingo people, it will keep your influence single and intelligible to them. As for what the French think, that is their own affair. They have the means of knowledge. Let them use them. There is one fact which no one can misunderstand, the while--that after the defections under which you have suffered, and under your known want of military stores, an incursive war from the mountains appears ferocious--both revengeful and cruel--when every one knows that time will render it unnecessary.
human
These defections do not discourage me as they do you, Henri. Full one third of my forces are faithful--are proved so by trial. These, with the goodness of our cause, are enough for my hopes--almost for my desires. There is no ferocity, but rather mercy, in hastening on the day of our independence and peace, by using a force so respectable--so honoured, as this tried remnant of my army.
gpt
You reckon fallaciously, Toussaint. You include my troops in the force you speak of.
human
Henri! exclaimed L'Ouverture, stopping in his walk up the apartment;
gpt
Never will I desert you or our cause, Toussaint. Never will I intermit my enmity to our invaders; never will I live for any other object than the liberties of our people. But the time may be come for us to pursue our common object by different paths. I cannot go and play the bandit in the mountains.
human
Why did you not call me a bandit when I was at the Plateaux?
gpt
Because you were then waging an honourable war. War, not peace, was then beckoning you on to freedom. A state of voluntary outlawry, a practice of needless ravage, will make a different man of you. Say no more of it, Toussaint: I cannot be lieutenant to--Do not make me utter the word.
human
You have always hitherto obeyed me, Henri.
gpt
I have; and when _we_ are in a state of war, I will obey you again. Do not class me with La Plume and Clerveaux--or, rather, do, if you will, and when August is past I will prove to you the difference.
human
Do not you see, Henri, that you not only cease to aid me at a great crisis but that you put a force upon me?
gpt
I cannot help it; I must do so, rather than go and be a butcher in the mornes with Dessalines.
human
Say with me, too: call me a butcher, too! After the long years that you have known my heart, call me a butcher too.
gpt
Let us talk sense, Toussaint: this is no time for trifling. After August, I shall join you again--to fight, if it be necessary: but I hope it will not.
human
Not if heaven strengthens me to do my work without you, Christophe. After the fever, it is much for the sick to walk: we do not expect the dead to rise.
gpt
When I join you, after August, resumed Christophe,
human
I was thinking that you _will_ join us, Henri. You _will_ labour till our great work is done. You may err; and you may injure our cause by your error; but you will never be seduced from the rectitude of your own intentions. That is what I was thinking. I would fain keep my judgment of you undisturbed by a grieving heart.
gpt
You are more than generous, Toussaint: you are just. I was neither. Pardon me. But I am unhappy--I am wretched that you are about to forfeit your greatness, when--Oh, Toussaint! nothing should ever grieve me again, if we could but agree to-day--if I could but see you retire, with your wonted magnanimity, to Pongaudin, there, with your wonted piety, to await the leadings from above. Where is your wonted faith, that you do not see them now, through the clouds that are about us?
human
I cannot but see them now, said Toussaint, sighing;
gpt
I am wholly resolved to do so.
human
Then you compel me to do the same. Without you, I have not force sufficient to maintain an effectual resistance.
gpt
Thank God! then we shall see you again L'Ouverture, and no longer Toussaint, the outlaw. You will--
human
Hear me, Henri! You put this constraint upon me. What are you prepared to do, if the French prove treacherous, after our peace is made?
gpt
To drive them into the sea, to be sure. You do not suppose I shall regard them as friends the more for making a truce with them! We will keep our eyes upon them. We will preserve an understanding with the whole island, as to the vigilance which the blacks must exercise, day and night, over their invaders. The first treacherous thought in Leclerc's mind is a breach of the truce; and dearly shall he rue it.
human
This is all well-planned, Henri. If the cunning of Leclerc proves deeper than yours--
gpt
Say ours, Toussaint.
human
No. I have no part in this arrangement. I act under your compulsion, and under my own protest; as I require of you, Henri, to remember. If we are not deep enough, vigilant enough, active enough, for Leclerc and his council--if he injures us before August, and Bonaparte ordains a second campaign after it, are you ready to endure the responsibility of whatever may befall?
gpt
I am.
human
Have you looked well forward into the future, and detected every mischief that may arise from our present temporising, and resolved that it was a less evil than losing the rest of this season, putting a compulsion upon your best friend, and fettering the deliverer of your people?
gpt
I have so looked forward--repudiating the charge of undutiful compulsion. I act for myself, and those under my command.
human
Virtually compelling me to act with you, by reducing me from being the General of an army to be the leader of a troop; and by exposing our cause to the peril--the greatest of all--of a declared division between you and me. I yield, Christophe; but what I am going to do, I do under protest. Order in the French prisoners.
gpt
Yet one moment, said Henri.
human
Let me reason with you a little further. Be satisfied of the goodness of the act before you do it.
gpt
I do not need satisfaction on that. I do not quarrel with the terms we are to make. I do not protest against any of the provisions of the treaty. I protest against the necessity of treating. Summon the prisoners.
human
Can you, said Christophe, still delaying,
gpt
About anything more than the mere terms of the treaty?
human
About the conditions--and about the conditions only.
gpt
Your self-distrust is misplaced, and comes too late. Order the prisoners to be brought in.