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And by virtue of them it is, White-Jacket, that, without a hearing and without a trial, you may, at a wink from the Captain, be condemned to the scourge. Speak you true? Then let me fly! Nay, White-Jacket, the landless horizon hoops you in. Some tempest, then, surge all the sea against us! hidden reefs and rocks, arise and dash the ships to chips! I was not born a serf, and will not live a slave!
In this quarter destructive wars were succeeded but by brief truces, which were scarcely less hurtful: far and wide the land lay waste, while the injured serf had to complain equally of his enemy and his protector. Into these countries also the Reformation had penetrated; and protected by the freedom of the States, and under the cover of the internal disorders, had made a noticeable progress.
Was his departed soul coherent? Where was it? Did it hover in this room, visible still to the boy? Did it stand there beside what was left of Tryst the laborer, that humblest of all creatures who dared to make revolt serf, descendant of serfs, who, since the beginning, had hewn wood, drawn water, and done the will of others? Or was it winged, and calling in space to the souls of the oppressed?
What it all had to do with the tariff was not quite clear. Yet nobody seemed to miss the connection. We were all of us most concerned, of course, about the working-man and his dinner pail, whom the Democrats had wantonly thrown out of employment for the sake of a doctrinaire theory. They had put him in competition with the serf of Europe.
When the noble entered the service he had not the same immunity from restraint on the contrary, his position resembled rather that of the serf but he breathed an atmosphere of peculation and jobbery, little conducive to moral purity and uprightness.
But Brown-Cloak, the English serf, found somewhere the notion that here was an opportunity to rehearse once more the service which was his sole claim upon his new masters' indulgence, and he got on his legs accordingly. "I can say soothly that you will not have to bear it much longer, Lord Dale," he reassured.
The convict's place is lower than the most degraded menial; he must ask for permission even to get a drink of water. No serf of earth, no slave, however wretched, has a sadder lot. These unhappy mortals have yielded to temptation, have fallen, and are paying the penalty of violated law.
It was hard for the hungry serf to see the fat deer venturing into his very dooryard, and to remember that the master of the mansion house was so fond of the chase that he would not allow his game to be killed for food for vulgar plowmen. But these and similar vexations sank into insignificance in comparison with the burdens of the taxes paid to lord, to church, and to king.
My dear Peter," said Saveliitch, "what does he want with your touloup? He will drink its price, the dog, at the first inn." "That, my good old man, is none of your business," said the vagabond; "his lordship following the custom of royalty to vassals, gives me a coat from his own back, and your duty as serf is not to dispute, but to obey."
And she cast so sad a look on the good burgess that his heart sank within him. "How is this?" he resumed, and he touched the bracelet, whereon were engraven the arms of the Abbey of St. Germain. "My lord, I am the daughter of a serf. Thus, whoever should unite himself to me in marriage would become a serf himself, were he a burgess of Paris, and would belong, body and goods, to the abbey.
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