ments, he had never tried the effect of wages on the slave, nor endeavoured to ascertain whether he might not work for remuneration as well as from compulsion. This is a remarkable fact, and at least explains Mr. Simpson's prejudice against free labour. He says, canehole digging and the whole work of a sugar estate is far from laborious; for women perform it as well as men: and yet he is quite confident that Negroes, when free, will never be prevailed upon, by any inducement, to cultivate sugar (p. 400)!

Mr. Simpson is again examined about night work and spell keeping in crop, and again puzzles himself and the committee most completely. It is evident that Mr. Simpson never kept spell himself, or he would have been able to make the matter intelligible.

Mr. Simpson states the fact of a naval officer having gone on an estate as a guest, and having drawn up a long string of questions, which he addressed to one of the book-keepers to be answered, and the book-keeper answered many of them; and this fact is produced as proving the liberality of the planters of Jamaica (p. 402). Mr. Simpson, however, ought in fairness to have given the sequel of this affair, which the reader will find in a note below.*

Mr. Simpson affirms (quest. 6011) that he, the attorney of 7000 slaves, never knew of any whip being used in the field in Jamaica.— This is certainly a most extraordinary assertion; and it proves most incontestibly either that Mr. Simpson has lost his memory or that he is determined at all hazards to whitewash slavery. The assertion, we

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* The book-keeper in question lived in the year 1824 on Yarmouth, in Vere, an estate belonging to Lord Dudley, and was a very warm partizan of the proslavery cause. He wrote many papers in the Royal Gazette, during the years 1823 and 1824, under the assumed signature of "The Hermit in Vere," for which Mr. Simpson may refer to the files of those Gazettes at the Colonial club-room. A naval officer visited Yarmouth, and certainly gave to this book-keeper a long list of very pertinent questions, which the book-keeper undertook to answer. copy of those questions is now in this country. They were brought hither by the book-keeper himself, who was deprived of his employment, and forced to quit Jamaica, for having dared to listen for one moment to such an application. His previous services to the pro-slavery cause availed him nothing; and he was actually persecuted to such a degree that he was forced to return to England, in consequence of the determination of the planters to refuse him employment. He convinced some planter in this country, we believe Mr. Watson Taylor, that all

take it upon us to say, is so manifestly untrue as of itself to render the whole of his evidence absolutely valueless.*

VI.-WILLIAM MIER, Esq.

Mr. MIER is a native of the United States. He possessed in Georgia 500 slaves; and, from his knowledge of the Negro character, is led to doubt whether they would be disposed to work for wages. Slaves are very seldom emancipated in Georgia. The Americans are very tenacious of this species of property. They value it more than gold itself. No publications relative to slavery are permitted in Georgia. Though half of the Georgia slaves are Africans, yet they increase at the rate of 2 per cent. per annum; and the increase continued to 1822. The labour of growing and pounding rice was particularly hard (p. 366–369).

this persecution was unmerited, and he was sent back by him to one of his estates, where he soon after died. And this is Mr. Simpson's exemplification of the liberality of Jamaica planters!

* We need go no further to prove the utter falsehood of Mr. Simpson's statements on this point than the pages of the Royal Gazette, and other papers of Jamaica, during the session of the Assembly in 1826, when the disallowed slave act of that year was under discussion. It was not even proposed on that occasion that the driving-whip in the field should be abolished, but merely that the cat should be substituted for the cart-whip in the ccercion of labour. "If we adopt such an innovation," said Mr. Hilton, "in the established usages of the colony, now that the Duke of Manchester is about to leave the island, the slaves will imagine that our conduct has been disapproved by the king, and that we have been compelled to relinquish the whip, and with it every means of punishment and restraint." Mr. Mair declared that the slaves preferred "the cart-whip" to every other instrument of punishment, as being more manly, switches, &c., being only fit for children. Others confirmed the fact of the preference of " the cart-whip" to switches, as in the case of that instrument there were limits, but not to the use of switches. Many of our readers will recollect Mr. Barrett's speech on that occasion. The whole of it turns on the use of the "cart-whip,' which he declares to be a horrid instrument. Mr. Barrett is now in England, and he and Mr. Simpson may settle the matter between them. Mr. Simpson's words are, "I never knew of the cart-whip being used." This is a most complete stultification both of Mr. Barrett and of the Jamaica Assembly, if it be not rather a complete stultification of Mr. Simpson himself.

VII. THE REV. JOHN SHIPMAN.

VII. The Rev. JOHN SHIPMAN, a Wesleyan Missionary. The whole of this gentleman's examination turned on the wholly unimportant resolutions adopted by some of the Wesleyan Missionaries in Jamaica in 1824, and afterwards disallowed by their superiors at home (p. 405-416).

VIII. THE REV. ROBERT YOUNG.

The Rev. ROBERT YOUNG, another Wesleyan Missionary.. This gentleman's examination is also chiefly directed to that which forms the subject of Mr. Shipman's examination. Mr. Young gives it as his opinion that the justice, mercy, brotherly kindness, and charity of the Gospel are unfriendly to slavery, and in their full developement must put an end to every system of oppression, and liberate every slave. He did not think that, with the knowledge the slaves now possessed, they could be detained in bondage much longer. Slavery is the parent of numberless vices; it corrupts both the master and the slave; the principles of Christianity are therefore directly opposed to it, and without abolishing slavery altogether he did not think its evils could be obviated. At the time that he was in the island there was perfect impunity for any outrage committed on a slave, if there was no evidence to prove it but that of slaves. He was five years in Jamaica, and left it in 1826. The flogging of females he regards as an outrage on all decency, directly opposed to every feeling of Christianity, and calculated to sour and brutalize the minds of all concerned.

IX.-WILLIAM SHAND, Esq.

WILLIAM SHAND, Esq., went first to Jamaica in 1791, left it in 1823, returned in January 1825, and quitted it finally in May 1826. The number of slaves under his charge was from 18,000 to 20,000, on estates in almost every parish in the island. He resided for a considerable part of the time in Vere, Clarendon, St. Andrew's, and St. Catherine's. He was long engaged in the management of estates and had therefore an opportunity of being acquainted with the Negro character. Mr. Shand begins with affirming that six days are quite sufficient to enable the slave to raise more than is necessary for

him for the whole year, so that he has twenty week days, three holidays, and all the Sundays, to do what he pleases with. The allowance of salt fish is about 450 or 500 barrels for 1230 Negroes.* The old and infirm are generally attended to by their own families. If they have no families, the master provides.

Mr. Shand mystifies the subject of spell and night work in the same extraordinary way in which we have seen it already done by his brother planters; but we need not recur to that topic (p. 430).

Mr. Shand never saw any gloom in the slaves. They are more contented and better provided for than the lower classes in this country and Scotland, and their labour is much lighter. The great mass of emancipated slaves are very idle, frequently keep slave women, and are in a great measure supported by them. They generally remain on the master's estate, living with women upon it. He never knew any of them work in the field. He knew no instance of freed slaves working for wages. They live very much by pilfering their neighbours' coffee. A man of observation in three years may learn a good deal; but Mr. Taylor's plans were not much liked in Jamaica. He thought differently of slaves from all around him, and treated them differently. He was not, in Mr. Shand's opinion, competent to be a witness respecting the Negro's situation and character. He had not been regularly bred a planter (p. 431-434).

In many situations the Negro, after he has established a certain quantity of provisions, may rear food for himself by one day's labour in the year, and he knew of no situations where he might not do so by a week's labour or even less. A Negro, indeed, may almost subsist on what nature produces, with merely the slight trouble of collecting it. Every Negro may have all kinds of articles if he chooses to be industrious, but very few have the luxuries they might have. They would not be generally disposed to work in order to gratify artificial wants. Emancipated Negroes do not, either in Jamaica, or in St. Domingo, or in Trinidad, acquire industrious habits, nor are they useful and industrious. In Jamaica, some are tradesmen; some live with slave women on estates, and are extremely idle; and others by receiving stolen goods. If the slaves were made free, they would be exactly in the state of the Negroes of St. Domingo. He never knew any

* That is only, on the average, four or five herrings a week to each.

Negro work in the field after being made free: nothing useful is to be expected from them, and least of all sugar planting. Those who live in towns acquire no property: what they have has been bequeathed to them. He does not recollect an instance of any who have acquired property by their own exertions. If the blacks are made free, neither white nor coloured persons can remain there. Nothing could be done by a police to preserve due subordination (p. 434-437).

Several years ago the established church was doubled in Jamaica, and many places of worship, both of the churches of England and Scotland and of dissenters, built. He believes the motives for doing so were very sincere. The slave population of Jamaica have since made very great advances. He knew none of the missionaries, and was not for encouraging them; some of them he believed to be bad men, though there may be good men among them. It is most impolitic for the slave to be of one religion and the master of another. He employed the curate of Clarendon, at £100 a year, to teach the people on his two properties and to read prayers twice a week. He does not believe it is much the practice to employ curates in this way, but he always told his overseers to bring up the Negroes when the clergyman chose to come. The planters are well disposed to give religious instruction to the slaves, but their means are very limited. The imposts on them are so heavy that they cannot afford additional expense. He objects, however, to any but oral instruction. If prudently conducted, religion would not be hostile to slavery. He himself gave no encouragement to missionaries, or to any but duly authorized teachers. Negroes are so prone to complain, that it was necessary to restrain his feelings lest mischief should follow from encouraging them. He found it scarcely possible to carry into effect any plan of task work. Sugar land is not applicable to any other purpose, and, as for converting it to pasture, there would be no demand for cattle without sugar to occasion it. The infirm slaves are generally provided for by their relations, who act very kindly to each other, and are willing to work for their support. If relations cannot support them, then the master supports them (p. 438---440).

When Mr. Shand was a book-keeper, he had to be on duty in croptime for eighteen hours and a half. Even though in crop-time the Negro should work six hours of each night as well as all day, this does not equal the labour performed by people in this country, who work much harder than in Jamaica. The boatswain of the mill carries his