or theft. If he should avoid these extremes, and follow some regular course of industry, still the habits of thoughtless improvidence which he contracted while a slave himself, or has caught from the slaves, among whom he is forced to live, who, of necessity, are his companions and associates, prevent him from making any permanent provision for his support, by prudent foresight and economy; and in case of sickness, or bodily disability from any other cause, send him to live as a pauper, at the expense of the community." This description is intended for the emancipated slave under our present institutions: the emancipation of more than two millions would, of course, greatly heighten the evils mentioned by Mr. Harper, and add others still more formidable.

The consequences of the emancipation of slaves, when unfit for freedom, have uniformly been calamitous to those emancipated. The following instances we derive from Dew's work on this subject.

"We have already said, in the course of this review, that if we were to liberate the slaves, we could not, in fact, alter their condition-they would still be virtually slaves; talent, habit and wealth, would make the white the master still, and the emancipation would only have the tendency to deprive him of those sympathies and kind feelings for the black, which now characterize him. Liberty has been the heaviest curse to the slave, when given too soon; we have already spoken of the eagerness and joy, with which the negroes of Mr. Steele, of Barbadoes, returned to a state of slavery. The East of Europe affords hundreds of similar instances. In 1791, Stanislaus Augustus, preparing a hopeless resistance to the threatened attack of Russia, in concert with the states, gave to Poland a constitution which established the complete personal free

dom of the peasantry. The boon has never been recalled, and what was the consequence? Finding, says Jones, in his volume on Rents, their dependence on their proprietors for subsistence remained undiminished, the peasants showed no very grateful sense of the boon bestowed on them; they feared they should now be deprived of all claim upon their proprietors for assistance, when calamity or infirmity overtook them. It is only since they have discovered that the connection between them and the owners of the estates, on which they reside, is little altered in practice, and that their old masters, very generally, continue, from expediency or humanity, the occasional aid they formerly lent them, that they have become reconciled to their new character of freemen. "The Polish boors are, therefore, in fact still slaves," says Bennet, in his view of the Present State of Poland, "and relatively to their political existence, absolutely subject to the will of their lords as in all the barbarism of the feudal times.

"In Livonia, likewise, the serfs were prematurely liberated; and mark the consequence. Van Halen, who travelled through Livonia, in 1819, observes, "along the high road through Livonia, are found, at short distances, filthy public houses, called in the country Rhatcharuas, before the doors of which are usually seen, a multitude of wretched carts and sledges, belonging to the peasants, who are so addicted to brandy and strong liquors, that they spend whole hours in those places. Nothing proves so much the state of barbarism, in which these men are sunk, as the manner in which they received the decree issued about this time. These savages, unwilling to depend upon their own exertions for support, made all the resistance in their power

to that decree, the execution of which was, at length, entrusted to an armed force."

The following picture of Guatemala, extracted from "Dunn's Sketches of Guatemala, in 182728," will exhibit the effects of emancipation in that place. "With a Lazaroni in rags and filth, a coloured population drunken and revengeful, her females licentious, and her males shameless, she ranks as a true child of that accursed city which still remains as a living monument of the fulfilment of prophecy, and the forbearance of God, the hole of every foul spirit, the cage of every unclean and hateful bird. The pure and simple sweets of domestic life, with its thousand tendernesses, and its gentle affections, are here exchanged for the feverish joys of a dissipated hour; and the peaceable home of love is converted into a theatre of mutual accusations and recriminations. This leads to violent excesses; men carry a large knife in a belt; women, one fastened in the garter. Not a day passes without murder. On fast days, and on Sundays, the average number killed is from four to five. From the number admitted into the hospital of St. Juan Dios, it appears that in the year 1827, near fifteen hundred were stabbed; of whom, from three to four hundred died. Nor is the freed African one degree raised in the scale-under fewer restraints, his vices display themselves more disgustingly; insolent and proud, indolent and a liar, he imitates only the vices of his superiors; and, to the catalogue of his former crimes, adds drunkenness and theft.'

But the wretchedness which results from destitution and vice, would not be the only evil that would wait upon the emancipated slave. Collision with his master would take place. Under the circumstances, we conceive it to be inevitable. Can the

abolitionist suppose, for one moment, that the results of such a conflict would be favourable to the slave? A philosophical writer has justly observed, that "power can never be dislodged from the hands of the intelligent, the wealthy, and the courageous, by any plans that can be formed by the poor, the ignorant, and the habitually subservient; history scarce furnishes such an example." The slaves might ravage the South, and murder hecatombs of victims-but they would be at length subdued. And would their situation be improved? Would their masters feel more kindly to them after such a contest? Would their privileges be extended, or their condition improved? Would their cruelties plead in their favour? Would the remembrance of violated purity, and slaughtered feebleness stir up the gentle affections of the slaveholder; and, standing upon his blackened hearth-stone, would his breast flow out in kindness to the demons who had effected the ruin? A war with the whites must produce horrors unutterable. The whites would suffer terribly—but awful would be their retribution; and if the negroes survived the contest, it would be to curse the traitors who fomented the quarrel.

CHAPTER XXI.

St. Domingo before the revolution-Insurrection originated in the policy of France-Amis des Noirs-Agitation of the Colony by the French -Domestic Dissensions-Ogé-Insurrection French Commissioners proclaim abolition of Slavery-Massacres-Cruelty of revolted Slaves-Touissant-Le Clerc lands-Evacuates the Island — Dessalines Massacres Christophe-Petion-Boyer-Present state of Hayti-Government--Population-Character of Inhabitants-Agriculture-CommerceFree Labour-Finances-Army, &c.

In the present chapter, we will be enabled only to present the prominent features of the history of the revolution of Hayti, and its consequences as developed in the present condition of that island. It is to be regretted, that our citizens are not generally more familiar with that history. It abounds in truths highly important in the present political state of this country; and would do much, if understood, to dissipate the disastrous and malign influence of the abolitionists.

"The question," said Mr. Canning, when arguing this subject in the English parliament, "to be decided is, how civil rights, moral improvement, and general happiness are to be communicated to this overpowering multitude of slaves, with safety to the lives, and security to the interests of the white po