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THE RIGHT WAY THE SAFE WAY,
PROVED BY

EMANCIPATION IN THE BRITISH WEST INDIES, AND ELSEWHERE.


BY L. MARIA CHILD.


"The world is beginning to understand, that injuring one class, for
the immediate benefit of another, is ultimately injurious to that other;
and that to secure prosperity to a community, _all_ interests must be
consulted."--_Dr. Davy._


NEW YORK:
PUBLISHED AND FOR SALE AT 5 BEEKMAN STREET.
1862.




CHAPTER I.

THE WEST INDIES BEFORE THE ABOLITION OF SLAVERY.


It is a common idea that the British West Indies were a mine of wealth
before the abolition of slavery, and since that event have been sinking
into ruin. To correct those erroneous impressions, I have carefully
collected the following facts from authentic sources:--

Official Reports, returned to the British Parliament, prove that the
outcry about ruin in the West Indies began long _before_ the abolition
of slavery, and even before the abolition of the slave _trade_; and we
ought, moreover, never to forget that this outcry related solely to the
ruin of the _masters_; nobody expended a thought upon the ruin of their
800,000 laborers.

As early as 1792, a Report to Parliament stated that, in the course of
the preceding twenty years, one hundred and seventy-seven estates in
Jamaica had been sold for the payment of debts; the cultivation of
fifty-five had been abandoned; ninety-two were in the hands of
creditors; and 80,021 executions, amounting to £22,500,000 sterling
($109,012,500), had been lodged in the provost marshal's office. In
1805, the Reports described the condition of the West India planters as
one of "increasing embarrassment, and impending ruin." The Reports in
1807, 1808, 1812, 1830, and 1832, were still more lamentable. In 1830,
four years before emancipation, Lord Chandos presented to Parliament a
petition from West India planters and merchants, setting forth "the
extreme distress under which they labored." In his speech, in support of
the petition, he said, "They are reduced to a state in which they are
obliged earnestly to solicit relief from Parliament. It is not possible
for them to stand up against such a pressure any longer." Mr. Bright
said: "The distress of the West India Colonies is unparalleled in the
country. Many families, who formerly lived in comparative affluence, are
reduced to absolute penury." The West India Reporter also quoted thus
from a Report on the commercial state of the Colonies: "There are strong
concurrent testimonies and proofs that, unless some speedy and efficient
measures of relief are adopted, the ruin of a great number of the
planters must inevitably take place." An able writer in the _Edinburgh
Review_ informs us that, "In the small island of St. Lucia an Encumbered
Estate Court was established in 1833, and, small as that island is,[1]
in the first eighteen months, liabilities were recorded to the enormous
amount of £1,089,965 ($5,280,880); _all debts incurred under slavery_.
Nor did that island stand alone. In each one of them the same state of
things prevailed." The laborers were decreasing rapidly. The _Edinburgh
Review_ declares: "What gave the death-blow to slavery, in the minds of
British statesmen, was the appalling fact that the Population Returns,
from only eleven of the Colonies, showed that, in the course of twelve
years, the slaves had decreased 60,219. Had similar returns been
procured from the other seven Colonies, they must have shown a decrease
of little, if at all, less than 100,000. Had the same rate of decrease
gone on, one century would have seen the extinction of slavery by the
extinction of the slaves."[2] Production was also decreasing. A table of
exports, in the Appendix to Mr. Bigelow's work on Jamaica, shows that,
in the ten years ending 1830, there was a decrease in that island, of
201,843 hogsheads of sugar, from the amount in the ten years ending with
1820. In view of these, and similar facts, the _Edinburgh Review_ says:
"Plainly, the artificial, arbitrary interference of law with the freedom
of man, and freedom of trade, was bringing about the extinction of the
working-class, and was whirling their masters along to utter ruin."

At the time when the planters were complaining of such excessive
embarrassments, they had a monopoly of the sugar market in Great
Britain, so close that not even the East India Colonies were allowed to
compete with them; a monopoly, which cost the consumers $25,000,000
annually. They paid no wages to their laborers; and furnished them
merely with rags to tie about their loins, and enough of coarse food to
keep them in working condition. Yet while they produced from a prolific
soil the great staples of commerce, without paying for the labor, and
with an enormous premium from the consumers in Great Britain, they were
so nearly reduced to "ruin," that they were compelled "earnestly to
solicit relief from Parliament."

A few facts will help to explain this apparent anomaly. In the first
place, the system of slavery contravenes all the laws of human nature,
and therefore contains within itself the seed of ultimate ruin. It takes
away the motive power from the laborers, who naturally desire to shirk
as much as possible of the work, which brings them no pay; consequently,
overseers and drivers must be hired to force out of them their unwilling
toil. It makes them indifferent to the destruction of property on
estates, in whose prosperity they have no interest. It stimulates them
to theft, by perpetual privations, from which they have no prospect of
relief. It kills their ingenuity and enterprise, by rendering them
utterly unavailing for any improvement in their own condition; while all
their faculties are stupefied by the extreme ignorance in which they
must necessarily be kept in order to be held in slavery. The effects on
the white population are quite as injurious, though in a different way.
Slavery unavoidably renders labor a degradation, and consequently, it is
a matter of pride with them to live in idleness. Extravagance and
dissipation follow of course. All, who have examined into the subject,
are aware that intemperance, licentiousness, and gambling, are fearfully
prevalent in slave-holding countries. One hint will suffice to suggest
the immoral condition of the West Indies, during slavery. It is a
well-known fact that the white subordinates employed by planters were
very liable to lose their situations if they married; because it was for
the interest of the proprietors to have them live with slaves, and raise
up laborers for the estates. As for the slaves, being regarded as
animals, and treated like live-stock, they unavoidably lived like
animals. Modesty and self-respect were impossible to their brutalized
condition. In this Tract, I merely aim at presenting a _business_-view
of the subject. Therefore, I will not describe the cruelties, which were
continually practised, and which kept the worst passions of both masters
and slaves in perpetual excitement. The barbarities recorded were the
same that always _must_ prevail, under a system of coerced labor and
irresponsible power.

In addition to the unavoidable expenses, and inevitable deterioration
involved in the very nature of slavery, the West India planters had
another difficulty to contend with. "Nearly the whole of the sugar
estates were owned by absentees, the greater part of whom never set foot
in the islands." This involved the necessity of hiring managers and
attorneys to look after the property. Mr. Bigelow computes the average
annual expense of an estate to have been $3,000, solely to pay for the
absence of the proprietor. The Rev. Henry Bleby, who was a missionary in
the West Indies before emancipation, and has resided there ever since,
says: "Let us look at the condition of a West India estate under
slavery. There were four or five hundred slaves. True, there was little
expended for their food; but their masters had to supply them with so
many yards of cloth a year, and several other small articles. That was
one item of expense. Then, to superintend the labor of these slaves,
there must be four bookkeepers, as they were called; one to superintend
the still, another the boiling-house, another the cattle on the estate,
and another, sometimes two or three others, to superintend the people in
the field. All these had to be fed and salaried. Then there was the
overseer, with his harem, living at considerable expense out of the
estate, and at a high salary. Over all these was the attorney, who took
his commission out of every thing the estate produced, and lived in the
great house with his servants and harem. Then there was the proprietor
living with his family in princely style, in France or England. All this
was to be drawn out of the produce of one estate! I should like to know
whether there is any property that would not be brought to ruin, with so
many living upon it, and out of it."

Everybody knows how property is cared for, when there are none but
hirelings to look after it. All accounts of the West Indies abound with
the complaints of proprietors concerning the neglect, wastefulness, and
fraud of their subordinates. Accumulation of salaries being the
principal object in view, one manager often superintended many estates.
Dr. Davy, in his work on the West Indies, speaks of twenty-three estates
in Montserrat, managed by one agent. He reports nineteen of them as
"imperfectly cultivated," or "abandoned;" which is by no means
surprising, under the circumstances. Mr. Bigelow met in Jamaica, a
gentleman who had come from England to ascertain why he was always
sinking more and more money upon his estate. Upon inquiry, he discovered
that his manager lived sixty miles from the property, and had never seen
it.

With such drains upon their income, the proprietors were, of course,
obliged to borrow money continually. Year after year, a gambling game
was carried on between them and the merchants of London. The merchant
would advance money to the planter, on condition that all the produce of
the estate should be consigned to his house, and that whatever was
needed on the estate, in his line of business, should be bought of him.
The merchant charged what price he pleased for his own articles, and
took what commission he pleased for selling the produce. "Thus," says
Mr. Bigelow, "the planter's candle was burning at both ends." If there
was a hurricane, or a severe drought, or an insurrection of the slaves,
which caused a failure of the crops, the proprietor was obliged to
mortgage his lands to get the necessary supply of money. Thus a great
many of the estates passed into the hands of British merchants, and had
a heavy interest to pay in addition to other expenses.

Such was the state of things, when the British people, ignorant of this
financial chaos, and actuated solely by motives of justice and humanity,
started the idea of abolishing slavery. When the planters became aware
that the measure might be carried, they met it with a furious storm of
opposition. They characterized it as an "impertinent interference with
their rights," and threatened to withdraw from the British government,
unless the project were relinquished. Still they petitioned for relief;
any kind of relief, except from the destructive system, which had
brought them to the verge of ruin. To _that_ they swore they never would
submit. Missionaries, who went to the West Indies to impart religious
instruction to the slaves, were assaulted with brickbats and imprisoned
on false pretences. Their houses were attacked, and their chapels
demolished. A Colonial Union was formed, the object of which was to
drive away every instructor of the negroes. Those in England, who sought
to help on the cause of emancipation, were hated with inconceivable
intensity. Women in the West Indies expressed a wish to get hold of
Wilberforce "that they might pull his heart out." With these wrathful
vociferations were mingled every form of lamentable prediction
concerning the ruin "fanatical philanthropists" were bringing on the
Colonies. They said if their mad designs were carried into execution,
the masters would all have their throats cut, and their houses burned.
What they seemed especially concerned about was that "the negroes could
not possibly take care of themselves." They were too lazy to work
without the whip. They would abscond to the woods, and live there like
animals. The few, who might be willing to work, would be robbed by the
others; that would lead to continual fighting, and there would be
prodigious slaughter. Thousands also would die of disease, from want of
the fostering care of their masters. In short, blacks and whites would
all be swallowed up in one great gulf of swift destruction.

The Colonial press was, of course, on the side of slavery. There was all
manner of suppression of truth, and propagation of every sort of
falsehood on the subject. But through all these obstacles, the work of
reform went slowly and steadily on. It took twenty years of hard labor
and violent agitation to abolish the slave-_trade_; then eleven years,
still more stormy, to abolish the _system_. But, at last, the Act of
Emancipation was passed, and went into effect in 1834. The slaves
received nothing from the British government for centuries of unrequited
toil. But £20,000,000 ($96,900,000) were paid to the masters, for
ceasing to extort labor by the lash. That was called Compensation. With
the idea of preparing the bondmen for freedom, the Act of Emancipation
was unfortunately clogged with an Apprenticeship System, by which it
was ordained that the emancipated laborers were to work six years for
their masters, without wages, as before. But they were to work nine
hours a day, instead of twelve; and were to have half of Friday, and the
whole of Saturday, for themselves. The power of punishing was also taken
from masters, and transferred to magistrates. Household slaves were to
become entirely free in 1838, and field slaves in 1840.

Men long accustomed to arbitrary power are not easily convinced that it
is both right and politic to relinquish the exercise of it. Moreover we
are all, more or less, the creatures of custom and prejudice. Therefore,
it is not surprising that the great body of the planters were opposed to
emancipation, until the eventful crisis had actually passed. Up to the
last month, they remonstrated, and threatened, and entreated the Home
Government not to consign them to such inevitable destruction. Many
judicious and kindly men among them thought otherwise. They were
convinced that the present system was certainly bringing ruin upon the
Colonies, and they felt persuaded that nothing worse could come in its
place. Their belief in the safety of emancipation was partly founded
upon general principles of human nature, and partly upon their
experimental knowledge of the docility of the negroes, when justly and
humanely treated. But very few of these individuals dared, however, to
express such opinions; for the community was in such an excited state,
that they were sure to suffer for it, in some form or other.

Mr. James Scotland, of St. John's, Antigua, said to Mr. Thome: "Whoever
was known or suspected of being an advocate for freedom, became an
object of vengeance, and was sure to suffer by a loss of business, if in
no other way. Every attempt was made to deprive my son of business, as a
lawyer; and I was thrown into prison, without any form of trial, or any
opportunity of saying one word in my own defence. There I remained, till
discharged by the peremptory orders of the Colonial Secretary, to whom I
appealed for relief. The opinions of the clergymen and missionaries,
with the exception of a few of the clergy, were favorable to
emancipation; but neither in their conduct, preaching, nor prayers, did
they declare themselves openly, until the measure of abolition was
determined on. The missionaries felt restrained by their instructions
from home; and the clergy thought it did not comport with their order to
take part in politics. I never heard of a single planter, who was
favorable, until about three months before emancipation took place; when
some few of them began to perceive that it would be advantageous to
their interest."

Mr. Thome, in his work on the West Indies, says: "We were informed that,
some time previous to the abolition of slavery, a meeting of the
influential men in Antigua was called at St. John's, to memorialize
Parliament against the measure of abolition. When the meeting convened,
the Hon. Samuel O. Baijer, who had been the champion of the opposition,
was called upon to propose a plan of procedure. To the consternation of
the pro-slavery meeting, their leader rose and spoke to the following
effect: 'Gentlemen, my previous sentiments on this subject are well
known to you all. Be not surprised to learn that they have undergone an
entire change. I have not altered my views without deliberation. For
several days past I have been making calculations with regard to the
probable results of emancipation; and I have ascertained, beyond a
doubt, that I can cultivate my estate at least one-third cheaper by free
labor, than by slave labor.' The honorable gentleman proceeded to draw
out the details of his calculations, and he presented an array of
pecuniary considerations altogether new and imposing to the majority of
the assembly. After he had finished his remarks, Mr. S. Shands, Member
of Assembly, and a wealthy proprietor, observed that he entertained
precisely the same views with those just expressed; but he thought the
honorable gentleman had been unwise to utter them in so public a manner;
for should these sentiments reach the ear of Parliament, it might induce
them to withhold compensation. Colonel Edwards, Member of Assembly, rose
and said he had long been opposed to slavery, but had not dared to avow
his sentiments."

When the question came before the Colonial Assembly similar discussions
ensued. The abolition of slavery was now seen to be inevitable. The only
alternative presented to the colonists was the apprenticeship system, or
immediate, unconditional emancipation. When the question came to this
issue in the Antigua Assembly, both bodies _unanimously_ passed a bill
in favor of _immediate emancipation_; on the ground that it was the
wisest _policy_.

The first of August, 1834, was the day fixed by Parliament for the
Abolition Act to go into effect. As the time approached, a heavy cloud
lowered over the minds of most of the white population. A merchant of
St. John's told Mr. Thome that several American vessels which had lain
in the harbor, weighed anchor on the 31st of July, through actual fear
that the island would be destroyed on the following day; and they
earnestly entreated the merchant to escape with them, if he valued his
life. Many planters believed it would be unsafe to go out in the
evening, after emancipation. Some timid families did not venture to go
to bed on the night of the 31st. They waited anxiously for the hour of
midnight, fearing that the same bell which proclaimed "Liberty
throughout the land, to _all_ the inhabitants thereof," would prove the
signal for general conflagration, and massacre of the white
inhabitants.[3]

FOOTNOTES:

[1] It is about as large as eight common New England towns.

[2] It must not be inferred from this statement that the system of
slavery was more cruel in the West Indies, than in other sugar-growing
Colonies and States. Wherever _sugar_ is produced by slave-labor, there
is always an awful destruction of negro life, owing to the severely hard
pressure of work, continued night and day, during one particular season
of the crops.

[3] There were in Antigua, at that time, 1,980 whites; 29,537 slaves;
and 3,895 free colored people.




CHAPTER II.

ANTIGUA, AFTER IMMEDIATE, UNCONDITIONAL EMANCIPATION.


When the clock _began_ to strike twelve, on the 31st of July, 1834,
there were nearly 30,000 slaves in the island of Antigua; when it
_ceased_ to strike, they were all freemen!

I extract from Thome's West Indies the following account of that
glorious transition: "The Wesleyans kept 'watch-night' in all their
chapels. One of the missionaries gave us an account of the watch-meeting
at the chapel in St. John's. The spacious house was filled with the
candidates for liberty. All was animation and eagerness. A mighty chorus
of voices swelled the song of expectation and joy; and, as they united
in prayer, the voice of the leader was drowned in the universal
acclamations of thanksgiving, and praise, and blessing, and honor, and
glory to God, who had come down for their deliverance. In such exercises
the evening was spent, until the hour of twelve approached. The
missionary then proposed that when the cathedral clock should begin to
strike, the whole congregation should fall on their knees, and receive
the boon of freedom in silence. Accordingly, as the loud bell tolled its
first note, the crowded assembly prostrated themselves. All was silence!
save the quivering, half-stifled breath of the struggling spirit. Slowly
the tones of the clock fell upon the waiting multitude. Peal on peal,
peal on peal, rolled over the prostrate throng, like angels' voices,
thrilling their weary heart-strings. Scarcely had the _last_ tone
sounded, when lightning flashed vividly, and a loud peal of thunder
rolled through the sky. It was God's pillar of fire! His trump of
Jubilee! It was followed by a moment of profound silence. Then came the
outburst! They shouted 'Glory! Hallelujah!' They clapped their hands,
they leaped up, they fell down, they clasped each other in their free
arms, they cried, they laughed, they went to and fro, throwing upward
their unfettered hands. High above all, a mighty sound ever and anon
swelled up. It was the utterance of gratitude to God, in broken negro
dialect.

"After this gush of excitement had spent itself, the congregation became
calm, and religious exercises were resumed. The remainder of the night
was spent in singing and prayer, in reading the Bible, and in addresses
from the missionaries, explaining the nature of the freedom just
received, and exhorting the people to be industrious, steady, and
obedient to the laws, and to show themselves in all things worthy of the
high boon God had conferred upon them.

"The first of August came on Friday; and a release from all work was
proclaimed, until the next Monday. The great mass of the negroes spent
the day chiefly in the churches and chapels. The clergy and
missionaries, throughout the island, actively seized the opportunity to
enlighten the people on all the duties and responsibilities of their new
relation. We were assured that, in every quarter, the day was like a
sabbath. A sabbath indeed! when 'the wicked ceased from troubling, and
the weary were at rest.' Many of the planters informed us that they went
to the chapels where their own people were assembled, and shook hands
with them, and exchanged hearty good wishes.

"At Grace Hill, a Moravian missionary station, the emancipated negroes
begged to have a sunrise meeting on the first of August, as they had
been accustomed to have at Easter; and as it was the Easter Morning of
their freedom, the request was granted. The people all dressed in white,
and walked arm in arm to the chapel. There a hymn of thanksgiving was
sung by the whole congregation kneeling. The singing was frequently
interrupted by the tears and sobs of the melted people, until finally,
they were overwhelmed by a tumult of emotion. The missionary, who was
present, said the scene was indescribable.

"Planters and missionaries, in every part of the island, told us there
was not a single dance, by night or day; not even so much as a fiddle
played. There were no drunken carousals, no riotous assemblies. The
emancipated were as far from dissipation and debauchery, as they were
from violence and carnage. Gratitude was the absorbing emotion. From the
hill-tops and the valleys, the cry of a disenthralled people went
upward, like the sound of many waters: 'Glory to God! Glory to God!'

"Dr. Daniell, who has been long resident in Antigua, and has the
management of several estates, told us that after such a prodigious
change in the condition of the negroes, he expected some irregularities
would ensue. He anticipated some relaxation from labor, during the week
that followed emancipation. But on Monday morning, he found all his
hands in the field; not one missing. The same day, he received a message
from another estate, of which he was proprietor, that the negroes, to a
man, had refused to go into the field. He immediately rode to the
estate, and found the laborers, with hoes in their hands, doing nothing.
Accosting them in a friendly manner, he inquired, 'What is the meaning
of this? How is it that you are not at work this morning?' They
immediately replied, 'It's not because we don't want to work, massa; but
we wanted to see you, first and foremost, to know what the _bargain_
would be.' As soon as that matter was settled, the whole body of negroes
turned out cheerfully, without a moment's cavil. Mr. Bourne, manager of
Millar's estate, informed us that the largest gang he had ever seen in
the field, on his property, turned out the week after the emancipation."

In the days of slavery, it had always been customary to order out the
militia, during the Christmas holidays, when the negroes were in the
habit of congregating in large numbers, to enjoy the festivities of the
season. But the December after emancipation, the Governor issued a
proclamation, that, "_in consequence of the abolition of slavery_,"
there was no further need of taking that precaution. And it is a fact
that there have been no soldiers out at Christmas, from that day to
this. The Legislature of Antigua subsequently passed "an Act for the
better organizing of the militia," the preamble of which reads thus:
"Whereas _the abolition of slavery_, in this island, renders it
expedient to provide against an _unnecessary augmentation_ of the
militia," etc. The public security and confidence were also strikingly
indicated by the following military advertisement in 1836: "Recruits
wanted! The freed men of Antigua are now called upon to show their
gratitude to King William, for the benefits he has conferred on them and
their families, by volunteering their services as soldiers in his First
West India Regiment. By doing this, they will acquire a still higher
rank in society, by being placed on a footing of perfect equality with
the other troops in his majesty's service, and receive the same bounty,
pay, clothing, rations, and allowances."


TESTIMONY OF PLANTERS IN ANTIGUA, IN 1837.

The Rev. James A. Thome, son of a slaveholder in Kentucky, visited the
British West Indies in the autumn of 1836, and returned to this country
in the summer of 1837. He published a book, soon after, from which I
quote the following extracts:--

"We delivered a letter of introduction to Mr. James Howell, manager of
Thibou Jarvis' estate. He told us that before emancipation took place,
he had been strongly opposed to it; being exceedingly unwilling to give
up his power of command. 'But,' said he, 'I shall never forget how
differently I felt when freedom took place. I rose from my bed
exclaiming, "I am free! I am free! I was the greatest slave on the
estate; and now I am free."' He said that planters, who retained their
harsh manner, did not succeed under the new system; but he never had any
difficulty in managing his people. He found by experience that kindness
and forbearance armed him with sufficient authority. The laborers on the
estates he managed had been considerably reduced,[4] but the grounds had
never been in a finer state of cultivation than at present. He said
there would be a failure of crops, not from any fault of the laborers,
but on account of a drought more prolonged, than he had known for
thirty-six years. He said, 'When my work is backward, I give it out in
jobs; and it is always done in half the usual time. Emancipation has
almost wholly put an end to sulking, or pretending to be sick. That was
a thing which caused a vast deal of trouble during slavery. Every
Monday morning, regularly, I used to find ten or a dozen round the door,
waiting for my first appearance, to beg that they might be let off from
work, on account of sickness. It was seldom that one-fourth of them were
really unwell; but every one maintained he was sick; and, as it was hard
to contend with them, they were sent off to the sick-house. Now, that is
done away with. The hospitals on many estates are put to other uses.
Mine is converted into a chapel. At first, the negroes showed some
disposition to put on airs of independence; but that soon disappeared.
They are always respectful in their manners. In that particular, there
has been mutual improvement. Planters treat their laborers more like
fellow-men, and that leads them to be respectful, in their turn. They
have now a growing regard for character; a feeling unknown to them in
the days of slavery. Their religious and moral condition was formerly
very low, notwithstanding the efforts of the missionaries; but now it is
rapidly improving.

"Mr. Armstrong, manager of Fitch's Creek estate, said to us: 'During
slavery, I often used to lie sleepless in my bed, thinking of my
dangerous situation; the only white person on the premises, far from
help and surrounded by slaves. I have spent hours devising plans of
defence, in case my house should be attacked by the negroes. I said to
myself it would be useless to fire upon them. My only hope was to
frighten the superstitious fellows, by covering myself with a white
sheet, and rushing into the midst of them, like a ghost. But now I have
the utmost confidence in my people. They have no _motive_ now to prompt
them to insurrection. They show great shrewdness in every thing that
concerns their own interest. They are very exact in keeping their
accounts with the manager. To a stranger, it must be incredible how they
contrive to live on such small wages.' Mr. A. informed us that the
spirit of enterprise, formerly dormant in Antigua, had been roused since
emancipation. Planters were now beginning to inquire as to the best
modes of cultivation, and to propose measures of general improvement.
One of these measures was the establishment of Free Villages, in which
the laborers from all the neighboring estates might dwell, by paying a
small rent. Real estate has risen, and mercantile business greatly
improved. Several missionaries were present while we talked with Mr. A.;
and the whole company heartily joined in assuring us that a knowledge of
the actual working of abolition in Antigua would be altogether favorable
to the cause of freedom. They all agreed that the more thorough was our
knowledge of the facts in the case, the more perfect would be our
confidence in _immediate_ emancipation.

"Dr. Ferguson, of St. John's called on us. He is a Member of Assembly,
and one of the first physicians on the island. He said it had always
appeared to him that if a man is peaceable while he is a slave, he would
certainly be so when he was a freeman. But though he had anticipated
beneficial results from the abolition of slavery, the reality had
exceeded his most sanguine expectations. Had it not been for the
unprecedented drought, the island would now be in a state of prosperity
unequalled in any period of its history. The mercantile business of the
town had increased astonishingly. He thought stores and shops had
multiplied in a ratio of ten to one. Mechanical pursuits were likewise
in a flourishing condition. A general spirit of enterprise was pervading
the island. The streets and roads, in town and county, were much
improved. The moral character of the white population was brightening;
one proof of it was that the old custom of concubinage was becoming
disreputable. Emancipation was working admirably; especially for the
planters. The credit of the island had decidedly improved. Immediate
freedom was infinitely better policy than slavery, or the apprenticeship
either.

"We visited Green Castle estate, about three miles from St. John's. The
manager, Samuel Barnard Esq., received us kindly. He had been on the
island forty-four years, engaged in the management of estates. He is now
the owner of one estate, the manager of two, and attorney for six. He
has grown old in the practice of slave-holding, and has survived the
wreck of the system. Stripped of arbitrary power, he now lives among the
freed people, who were once his slaves, in the house where his
grandfather was murdered in his bed by his slaves. The testimony of such
a man is invaluable. He said the transition from slavery to freedom was
like passing suddenly out of a dark dungeon into the sunlight. He
thought the Assembly had acted wisely in adopting _immediate_
emancipation. The endless altercations and troubles of the
apprenticeship system had thus been avoided. The negroes made no riot or
disturbance when they received their freedom; and he had no difficulty
about their working. Some estates had suffered for a short time. There
was a pretty general fluctuation, for a month or two, owing to the
laborers leaving one estate and going to another; but that was because
the planters overbid each other, to get the best hands. The negroes had
a very strong attachment to their homes, and would rarely leave them,
unless harshly treated. Very few of his people had left him. There were
some inconveniences connected with the present system, but they were
incomparably less than those connected with slavery.

"Dr. Daniell, manager of the Weatherill estate, has long been a resident
of Antigua, and is thoroughly acquainted with its internal policy. He is
a Member of the Council, owns an estate, manages another, and is
attorney for six. Being a prominent member of one branch of the body
which gave immediate emancipation to the slaves, his testimony is
entitled to great weight. He said, 'We all violently resisted abolition,
when it began to be agitated in England. We regarded it as an outrageous
interference with our property and our rights. But now we are rejoiced
that slavery is abolished.' He did not think the system of
apprenticeship had any tendency to prepare the slaves for freedom. The
arbitrary control of a master could never be a preparation for freedom.
Sound, wholesome legal restraints were the only preparation.
Apprenticeship vexed and harrassed the negroes, and kept them in a state
of suspense. The reflection that they had been cheated out of their
expected liberty six years would sour their minds; and when they at last
obtained freedom, they would be less likely to be grateful. The planters
in Antigua had secured the attachment of their people by conferring upon
them immediate emancipation. There had been no deficiency of labor.
Estates throughout the island were never in more advanced condition.
Nothing was wanted but rain. He frequently employed his people by the
job, for short periods, and always with gratifying results. The negroes
accomplished twice as much as when they worked for daily wages, because
they made more money. On some days they made three shillings; three
times the ordinary wages. He managed them altogether by mildness, and
found it extremely easy. He had quite as much influence over them, as he
ever had during slavery. But where managers persisted in habits of
arbitrary command, they failed. He had been obliged to discharge a
manager from one of his estates, on account of his overbearing
disposition. If he had not dismissed him, the people would have
abandoned the estate. Love of home was such a passion with negroes, that
nothing but bad treatment could force them away. He did not know of more
than one or two planters on the whole island, who did not consider
emancipation a decided advantage to all parties.

"Dr. Nugent, manager of Lyon's estate, has long been Speaker of the
Assembly, and is favorably known in Europe as a man of science. No man
in Antigua stands higher. He owns one estate and manages another. He
told us that, previous to emancipation, no man dared to express
opposition to slavery, if he wished to maintain a respectable standing.
Planters might have their hopes but they could not make them public,
without incurring general odium, and being denounced as enemies of their
country. The most general prediction was that the negroes would not work
after they were free; but time had proved there was no foundation for
that apprehension. The estates were never in better order than at
present. On account of the stimulus of wages, there was far less feigned
sickness, than during slavery. The sick-house used to be thronged with
real or pretended invalids; now the negroes don't go near it. The one on
his estate was now used for a stable. He thought the capabilities of the
blacks for education and for trades, were conspicuous. Emancipation had
proved a blessing to the masters, and as for the advantages to the
slave, they were too obvious to need to be pointed out. Insurrection or
revenge was in no case dreaded; not even by those planters who had been
most cruel. After slavery was abolished, there remained no _motive_ for
rebellion. The expenses of cultivation were greatly diminished, and
machinery and cattle more generally used than formerly.

"Mr. Hatly, manager of Frey's estate, told us the improved industry and
efficiency of his people had encouraged him to bring several additional
acres under cultivation. They did not require such constant watching as
formerly. They took much more interest in the prosperity of the estate,
than they did when they were slaves. He showed us his accounts for the
last year of slavery, and the first year of freedom; they proved a
reduction of expenses more than one-third. He said, 'The old habit of
feigning sickness is broken up. During slavery, this was more or less
the case every week, sometimes every day, and it was exceedingly
annoying. One would come, carrying his arm on his hand, declaring it had
such a mighty pain in it, he couldn't use the hoe no way; another would
make his appearance with both hands on his breast, and, with a rueful
look, complain of a great pain in his stomach; a third came limping
along, with a dreadful _rheumatiz_ in his knees; and so on, for a dozen
or more. It was in vain to dispute with them, though it was often
manifest that nothing on earth ailed them. They would say, "Ah, me,
massa, you no tink how bad me feel. It's deep _in_, massa." But we have
no feigned sickness now, and much less actual illness than formerly. My
people now say they have no time to be sick. We formerly had strong
prejudices against the plough; but now it is beginning to be extensively
used, and we find it greatly reduces the necessary amount of labor. I
have already seen such decided benefits growing out of the free labor
system, that I never wish to see the face of slavery again. We are
relieved from the painful task of flogging. Formerly, it was nothing but
whip, whip, whip. Now we know no more of the lash.'

"David Cranstoun, Esq., manager of Athill's estate, and a magistrate,
said to us: 'I get my work done better than formerly, and with
incomparably more cheerfulness. I employ fewer laborers, but my estate
was never in a finer state of cultivation. My people are always ready
and willing to work. I occasionally employ them at jobs, and always with
great success. When I give out a job, it is accomplished in half the
time it would have taken, if paid by the day. On such occasions, I have
known them turn out before three o'clock in the morning, and work by
moonlight: and when the moon was not shining, they sometimes kindled
fires among the dry cane leaves to work by. They would continue working
all day, till four o'clock; stopping only for breakfast, and dispensing
with the usual intermission from twelve to two. During slavery, the
weekly expenses on the estate averaged £45 ($218.02). After
emancipation, they averaged £20 ($96.90). The negroes are a remarkably
temperate people. I have rarely seen one intoxicated. We have no cause
to fear insurrections now. Emancipation has freed us from all danger on
that score. Among the advantages of the present system is the greater
facility of managing estates. It saves us from a world of trouble and
perplexity. I have found that the negroes are easily controlled by law;
more so, perhaps, than the laboring classes in other countries. I do not
know of a single planter, who would be willing to have slavery restored.
We feel that it was a great curse; a curse to the planter, as well as
the slave.'

"We breakfasted at the Villa estate, within half a mile of St. John's.
We found the manager less sanguine in his views of emancipation, than
the planters generally were. This is easily accounted for. The estate is
situated so near the seaport town, that his people have many temptations
to leave their work, from which those on more distant estates are
exempt. He admitted, however, that the danger of insurrection was
removed, that crime was lessened, and the moral condition of society
rapidly improving.

"Mr. Bourne, manager of Millar's estate, said: 'Fearing the consequences
of emancipation, I reduced my cultivation in 1834; but soon finding that
my people would work as well as ever, I brought it up to the customary
extent, the next year; and this year, I have added fifteen acres of new
land. I have no hesitation in saying that, if I have a supply of cash, I
can take off any crop it may please God to send. Nothing but bad
treatment ever makes the negroes leave estates on which they have been
accustomed to live; and in such cases, a change of management has almost
uniformly proved sufficient to induce them to return. They are decidedly
less prone to be insolent now, than during slavery. The expense of
managing estates has diminished one-third. Before emancipation, very
little was thought about expedients for saving manual labor; but many
improvements have already been introduced, and more are suggested.
Emancipation has proved an incalculable blessing to the planters, by
releasing them from an endless complication of responsibilities,
perplexities, temptations, and anxieties; especially, because it has
relieved them from the bondage of the whip. It was hard work to be a
Christian in the days of slavery. Yes, I assure you, sir, it was _very_
hard to be a Christian in those days.'

"Ralph Higinbotham, Esq., U. S. Consul at Antigua, in 1837, bore the
following testimony: 'The general conduct of the negroes has been worthy
of much praise; especially considering the sudden transition from
slavery to unrestricted freedom. Their demeanor is peaceable and
orderly. Whatever may have been the dissatisfaction of the planters at
the commencement of the present system, they are now well satisfied that
their properties are better worked, and their laborers more contented
and cheerful, than in the time of slavery.'"

Some difficulties always attend every change in the structure of
society; but if the change is based on true principles, the difficulties
are always temporary. They are like a stony pathway from a cavern into
sunlight. So it proved in Antigua. Mr. James Scotland, the venerable
merchant already alluded to, said to Mr. Thome: "The troubles attending
emancipation resulted almost entirely from the perseverance of the
planters in their old habits of dominion. Their pride was wounded by
seeing their slaves elevated to equal rights, and they were jealous lest
they should aspire to be on the same footing in all respects. In the
early stage of freedom, they frequently used their power as employers to
the annoyance and injury of their laborers. For the slightest
misconduct, and sometimes without any reason whatever, the poor negroes
were dragged before magistrates (who were planters, or the friends of
planters), mulcted in their wages, fined otherwise, and committed to
jail, or the house of correction. Yet those harrassed people remained
patient, orderly, and submissive. Their treatment has now much improved;
for the planters have happily discovered that they sacrificed their own
interests by keeping the cultivators of their lands in agitation and
suffering."


TESTIMONY OF MAGISTRATES AND TEACHERS, IN ANTIGUA, IN 1837.

Mr. Thome says: "The governor spoke to us unreservedly of the past and
present condition of Antigua, and stated various particulars in which
the Colony had been greatly improved by emancipation. He said planters
from every part of the island assured him that the negroes were
industriously disposed. They all conceded that emancipation had proved a
blessing to the island, and he did not know a single individual who
wished to return to the old system. He said that, during the recent
Christmas holidays, the Police Reports did not return a single case of
arrest. He had been acquainted with the country districts in England,
and travelled extensively in Europe; and he had never yet found such a
peaceable, orderly, law-abiding peasantry, as those of Antigua. The
great crime of the island, and indeed, of all the West India Colonies,
had been licentiousness; but they were certainly fast improving in that
particular.

"By invitation of the Governor, we attended him to the annual
examination of the parochial school in St. John's. He requested that all
the children emancipated on the first of August, 1834, might be called
up. It was a most interesting and beautiful sight. Nearly one hundred
children, from black to the clearest white, who two years ago were
slaves, stood there before us free. When we spoke to them of
emancipation, their animated looks and gestures, and their lively tones
in answering our questions, showed that they felt it was a blessing to
be free. There was as much respectfulness, attention, and general
intelligence, as we ever saw in scholars of the same age. His Excellency
expressed himself highly pleased with the appearance and proficiency of
the school. Turning to us, he said, in a tone of pleasantry, 'You see,
gentlemen, these children have _souls_.'

"Teachers, missionaries, clergymen, and planters, uniformly testified
that the negroes were as capable of receiving instruction as any people
in the world; and it was confirmed beyond all doubt by facts we
ourselves witnessed. We were happy to learn that the emancipated negroes
manifested great anxiety for the education of their children. They
encouraged them to go to school, and labored to support them, though
they had strong temptation to detain them at home to work. They also
contributed a small weekly sum for the maintenance of schools."

Concerning the moral condition of Antigua, Mr. Thome furnishes a
quantity of Police Reports, from which I quote the following, as fair
samples of the whole: "St. John's, Sept. 1835. Capital offences have
much decreased in number, as well as all minor ones. The principal
crimes lately submitted for the investigation of the magistrates seem to
consist chiefly in trifling offences, and breaches of contract.

"Oct. 1835. Although instances do occur of breaches of contract, they
are not very frequent; and, in many cases, I have been induced to
believe that the offence has originated more in want of a proper
understanding of the time, intent, and meaning of the contract into
which the laborers have entered, than from the actual existence of any
dissatisfaction on their part.

"Jan. 1836. (Immediately after the Christmas holidays.) At this period,
when several successive days of idleness occur among the laboring
classes, I cannot but congratulate your Honor on the quiet demeanor and
general good order, which has happily been maintained throughout the
island. During the holidays I had only one prisoner committed to my
charge, and his offence was of a minor nature.

"Feb. 1836. I beg leave to congratulate your Honor on the vast
diminution of all minor misdemeanors, and the total absence of capital
offences.

"Sept. 1836. The agricultural laborers continue a steady and uniform
line of conduct, and, with some few exceptions, afford general
satisfaction to their employers. Every friend to this country, and to
the liberties of the world, must view with satisfaction the gradual
improvement in the character and behavior of this class of the
community, under the constant operation of the local enactments.

"Jan. 1837. (After the Christmas holidays.) I cordially congratulate
your Excellency on the regular and steady behavior maintained by all
ranks of society, at this particular season of the year. Not one crime
of a heinous nature has been discovered. I proudly venture to declare my
opinion that in no part of his Majesty's dominions has a population of
30,000 conducted themselves with more strict propriety, at this annual
festival, or been more peaceably obedient to the laws.

"Feb. 1837. Crimes of any heinous nature are very rare among the
laborers. I may venture to say that petty thefts, breaking sugar canes
to eat, and offences of the like description, principally swell the
calendars of our Quarterly Courts of Sessions. In general, the laborers
are peaceable, orderly, and civil; not only to those who move in higher
spheres of life, but also to each other."

The foregoing Reports are all signed by "Richard S. Wickham,
Superintendent of Police."


TESTIMONY OF CLERGY AND MISSIONARIES IN ANTIGUA IN 1837.

Rev. Mr. Jones, Rector of St. Phillips, said to Mr. Thome:--"The
planters have always been opposed to improvements, until they were
effected, and the good results became manifest. They first said that the
abolition of the slave-_trade_ would ruin the Colonies; next they said
the abolition of _slavery_ would be the certain destruction of the
islands; and now they deprecate the _education_ of the emancipated
children, as a measure fraught with disastrous consequences. But
emancipation has proved a great blessing to the people, and the planters
in this part of the island are gratified with the working of the system.
The benefits of education are extending, and religious privileges
greatly increasing. There has been manifest improvement in the morals
and manners of the children, since education has become general. With
regard to marriage, there has been a complete revolution in the habits
of the people.

"The Superintendent of the Wesleyan Mission informed us that the
collection in the several Wesleyan Chapels, in 1836, independent of
occasional contributions to Sunday Schools, missionary objects, etc.,
amounted to more than $6,000. Besides giving liberally, according to
their small means, to the Bible Society, the emancipated slaves formed
several Branch Associations among themselves, for the circulation of the
Scriptures. The contributions from Antigua and Bermuda, the only two
islands which had then adopted _entire_ freedom, were _double_ those
from any other two islands. Among the Wesleyans, the freed negroes had
formed four Friendly Societies, to help the aged and infirm, nurse the
sick, and encourage sobriety and industry. In 1836, they raised money
themselves and expended for those objects £700 currency ($2,100). In
1837, they had £600 ($1,800) in their treasury." To estimate this
liberality properly, it must be remembered that the wages of these poor
people was only a shilling a day, about twenty-four cents: and that they
boarded themselves; also, that, until the last three years, they had
received no wages at all for their labor. There was no public poorhouse
in Antigua; a fact highly creditable to the emancipated people.

A Report published by the Wesleyan Brethren, alluding to the emancipated
slaves, says: "They always show a readiness to contribute to the support
of the Gospel. With the present low wages, and the entire charge of
self-maintenance, they have but little to spare. Parham and Sion Hill
(taken as specimens) have societies composed almost entirely of rural
blacks; about 1,350 in number. In 1836, these contributed above $1,650,
in little weekly subscriptions; besides giving to special objects
occasionally, and contributing for the support of schools."

The West India Association for Advancement of Christian Faith, in its
Report for 1836, makes a statement which shows that marriages in _one_
year, at that time, were _twice_ as numerous as in _ten_ years, during
slavery.


TESTIMONY OF THE EMANCIPATED SLAVES IN ANTIGUA, IN 1837.

Mr. Thome says: "A young negro, who had been a slave, rowed us across
the harbor of St. John's. We asked him about the first of August, 1834.
He said: 'Dar was more religious on dat day, dan you can tink of.' When
we questioned him about the laws, he said the law was his friend. If
there was no law to take his part, a strong man might knock him down;
but now everybody feared the law. The masters _would_ sometimes slash a
fellow, let him do his _best_; but the law never hurt anybody that
behaved well.

"We asked an old negro what he did on the first of August. He replied:
'Massa, we went to church, and tank de Lord for make a we all free.'

"We asked two men, who were masons on an estate, how they liked liberty.
They replied: 'O sir, it is very comfortable; very comfortable indeed.
The day when freedom come, we was as happy as though we was just going
to Heaven. We used to think very much about being free; but we did not
hope it would ever be, till death delivered us from bondage. Now we've
got free, we wouldn't sell ourselves for any money. The money would soon
be gone; but freedom will last as long as we live.' We asked if they
wouldn't be willing to sell themselves to a man they were sure would
treat them well. They immediately replied: 'We should be willing to
_serve_ such a man; but we wouldn't _sell_ ourselves to the best man in
the world.' They said they were very desirous to have their children
learn all they could, while they were young; for education was a great
thing.

"On our way to Grace Bay, we met some negro men at work on the road, and
stopped to chat with them. We asked them if they danced on the first of
August. They quickly replied, 'Oh! oh! no fiddling _den_! No, me massa.
All go to church _dat_ day.' One of them said, 'I always thought much
about freedom, but I no hope eber to be free. One morning, bout four
o'clock, I was walking along de road, all lone, and I prayed dat de
Saviour would make me free; for den I could be _so_ happy! I don't know
what made me pray so; for I wasn't looking for de free; but in one month
de free come.' They told us they worked a great deal better, since they
were paid for it. I asked one of them whether he wouldn't be willing to
be a slave again, if he could always be sure of a good master. He
exclaimed: 'Heigh! me massa! Me nebber be slave, no more! A good massa a
bery good ting; but freedom till better.' They told us it was a great
blessing to have their children go to school.

"An intelligent colored gentleman informed us that while the negroes
were slaves, they used to spend, during the Christmas holidays, all the
money they got during the year; but now they saved it carefully, to buy
small tracts of land for their own cultivation."

At the examination of one of the schools, several women who worked on
the estates, who had children in the school, put on their Sunday's best,
and went to hear the classes recite. When Mr. Thome spoke to one of them
about the privileges her children enjoyed, her eyes filled with tears,
and she replied, "Yes, massa, we do tank de good Lord for bring de free.
Never can be too tankful." She said she had seven children present, and
it made her feel happy to have them learn to read. Another said, when
she heard the children reading so well, she wanted "to take de words out
of da mouts, and put 'em in her own." She added, "I tell you, massa, it
do my old heart good to come here."

"Old Grandfather Jacob, who had been a deacon in one of the Moravian
churches, told us of the dungeons in which the slaves used to be
confined; and with much feeling, said his wife had once been put into a
damp dungeon. Some got sick there, and were never well afterward. He
knew one that died there. He had been flogged twice for leaving his work
to bury the dead. 'Can't put we in dungeon _now_!' exclaimed Grandfather
Jacob, with a triumphant look. 'No lick we! If dey no like we, tell we
to go away; dat's all.' We asked if he was provided for by the manager.
He said no, his children supported him. 'Now, when ole man die, him
children make coffin, and put him in de ground!' We asked whether it was
not better for an old man to be a slave, so as to get food and clothing
from the manager. He darted a quick look at us, and said, 'Radder be
free.'

"Mr. and Mrs. Möhne, Moravian missionaries, told us that, though the low
rate of wages was scarcely sufficient to support life, they had never
seen a single individual, who desired to be a slave again. Even the aged
and infirm, who sometimes suffered, from neglect of the planters, and
the inability of their relatives to provide adequately for them,
expressed the liveliest gratitude for the great blessing the Lord had
given them. They would often say, 'Missus, ole sinner just sinkin in de
grave; but de good Lord let me ole eyes see dis blessed sun."'

FOOTNOTE:

[4] This is accounted for, in many instances, by the women being
withdrawn from field labor, to attend to their households; and by
children being sent to school.




CHAPTER III.

THE WINDWARD ISLANDS, DURING THE APPRENTICESHIP--TESTIMONY OF PLANTERS
IN BARBADOES, IN 1837.[5]


Mr. Thome says: "Soon after we arrived in Barbadoes we visited Mr. C.,
manager of Lear's estate, about four miles from Bridgetown. He had been
a planter for thirty-six years. He was attorney for two other large
estates, and had under his superintendence more than a thousand
apprenticed laborers. He said, 'I often wished that slavery might be
abolished, and other planters of my acquaintance had the same feelings;
but we did not dare to express them. Most of the planters were so
violently opposed to emancipation, that even up to the 31st of July,
they declared it could not and should not take place. Now, these very
men see and acknowledge the benefits which are resulting from the new
system. Slavery was a reign of terror. I have often started up from a
dream in which I thought my room was filled with armed slaves. But all
such fears have passed away. There is no _motive_ for insurrection now.
On the first of August, 1834, the people labored on the estates the same
as usual. If a stranger had gone over the island, he would not have
suspected that any change had taken place. I told my people, the day
before, that under the new laws they were to turn out at six o'clock in
the morning, instead of at five, as formerly. I did not expect they
would go to work that day; but, at the appointed hour, they were all in
the field; not one was missing. They do more work in the nine hours
required by present laws, than they did in the twelve hours, exacted
under slavery. They are more faithful, than when they were slaves. They
take more interest in the prosperity of the estate, and in seeing that
things are not destroyed. There is less theft, because they begin to
have some respect for character. They can now appeal to the law for
protection; and their respect for law is very great. They are always
willing to work for me during their own time, for which I pay them
twenty-five cents a day. I have planted thirty additional acres this
year, and have taken a larger crop than I have ever taken. The island
has never been under such good cultivation, and it is becoming better
every year. Real estate has increased in value more than thirty per
cent. Emancipation was a great blessing, to the master, as well as the
slave. It was emancipation to _me_. You cannot imagine the
responsibilities and anxieties that were swept away with the extinction
of slavery. There are many annoying circumstances connected with
slavery, which have a pernicious effect on the master. There is
continual jealousy and suspicion between him and his slaves. They look
upon each other as natural enemies. A perpetual system of plotting and
counterplotting is kept up. Flogging was a matter of course throughout
the island, while slavery existed. It was as common to strike a slave,
as to strike a horse. Very often, it was merely because the master
happened to be in an irritable mood, and the slave had no idea what he
was punished for. I have myself, more than once, ordered slaves to be
flogged, when I was in a passion, and after I was cool I would have
given guineas not to have done it. I believe emancipation will save the
souls of many planters. If it is hard for a rich man to enter the
kingdom of heaven, it is much harder for a planter. I sometimes wonder
at myself, when I think how long I was connected with slavery; but
self-interest and custom blinded me to its enormities. I lately met with
a planter, who, up to the last of July, had maintained that the mother
country could not be so mad as to take a step that would inevitably ruin
her Colonies. Now, he would be the last man to vote for the restoration
of slavery. He even wants to get rid of the apprenticeship, and adopt
immediate, unconditional emancipation, as they did in Antigua. Such
changes of opinion are very common among the planters. I think the
expenses under apprenticeship are about the same as during slavery; but
calculations I have made convince me that under an entirely free
system, I could cultivate this estate for $3,000 a year less than it
formerly cost. I have no doubt the negroes will work, when their freedom
comes in 1840. There may be a little excited, experimenting feeling, for
a short time, but I am confident that things generally will move on
peaceably and prosperously. The slaves were well acquainted with the
efforts made in England for their emancipation. They used to watch the
arrival of every packet with extreme anxiety. If Parliament had refused
to abolish slavery, there would have been a general insurrection. While
there was hope, they waited peaceably for release; but if hope had been
destroyed, slavery would have been buried in blood. The apprenticeship
caused some dissatisfaction among them. They thought they ought to be
entirely free, and they suspected that their masters were deceiving
them. At first, they could not understand the conditions of the new
system; and there was some murmuring among them; but they concluded it
was better to wait six years more for the desired boon, than to lose it
by revolt.'

"Samuel Hinkston, Esq., manager of Colliton estate, and one of the local
magistrates, gave an account similar in all respects, to that given by
the manager of Lear's. He had been a planter for thirty-six years, and
was universally esteemed for his humane character, and close attention
to business. He said his apprentices never refused to work in the hours
required by law, and during their own time, they were always ready to
work for him, for wages, whenever he needed them. When he had no
occasion for them, they often let themselves out to work on other
people's grounds. Real estate had risen very much, and it was
universally conceded that the island had never been under better
cultivation. In every respect, the new system worked better than the
old; but he looked forward with pleasure to the still better change that
would come in 1840. He believed unconditional freedom would remove all
annoyances. His only regret was that it could not come sooner.

"We were invited to visit Col. Ashby, an aged and experienced planter,
who resides in the southernmost part of the island. He told us he had
been a practical planter ever since 1795. He had violently opposed
abolition, and regarded the anti-slavery members of Parliament with
unmingled hatred. He thought no punishment, either in this life, or the
life to come, was too bad for Wilberforce. When he told us this, he
exclaimed, 'But, oh, how mistaken I was about that man! I am convinced
of it now. The abolition of slavery has proved an incalculable
blessing.' He dwelt much on the trustiness and strong attachment of the
negroes, when they were well treated. They were never disposed to leave
their employer, unless he was intolerably passionate and hard with them.
He said he avoided, as much as possible, carrying his apprentices before
a special magistrate; and he always found it easy to settle difficulties
himself by a conciliatory course."

Mr. Thome was introduced to one planter, whose name he does not mention,
probably because his neighbors gave him the character of having been a
cruel master, during slavery. He retained the prejudices natural to that
class of men. "He complained that the negroes were an ungrateful,
perverse set; the more they were indulged, the more lazy and insolent
they became. He said he knew that by his _own_ experience. One fault he
had to find with all his apprentices, both in the house and in the
field; they all held him to the letter of the _law_, and were always
ready to arraign him before a special magistrate for any infraction of
it. He also considered it a great grievance that women with young babies
were unwilling to work in the field, as they did formerly; now 'they
spent half their time taking care of their brats.' He however
acknowledged that his apprentices were willing to work, that his estates
were never under better cultivation, and that he could say the same for
estates all over the island."

Dr. Bell, a planter from Demerara, was on a visit to Barbadoes, and Mr.
Thome made some inquiries concerning the results of abolition there. "He
said the Colony was now suffering for want of laborers; but after the
apprentices were free, in 1840, there would doubtless be increased
emigration thither, from older and less productive Colonies. The
planters were making arrangements for cultivating sugar on a larger
scale than ever before, and estates were selling at very high prices.
Every thing indicated the fullest confidence that the prosperity of the
country would be permanent and progressive."

Mr. Thome says: "We had repeated interviews with gentlemen, who were
well acquainted with the adjacent islands; one of them was proprietor of
a sugar estate in St. Vincent's. They all assured us that in those
islands there reigned the same tranquillity that we saw in Barbadoes.
Sir Evan McGregor, Governor-General of all the Windward Colonies, and of
course thoroughly informed respecting their internal condition, gave us
the same assurances. From these authentic sources, we learned enough to
satisfy ourselves, that in all the Colonies, conciliatory and equitable
management has never failed to secure peace and industry."


TESTIMONY OF MAGISTRATES IN BARBADOES, IN 1837.

Mr. Thome says: "The Governor, Sir Evan McGregor, told us he had been
five years in the West Indies, and had resided at Antigua and Dominica
before he received his present appointment; he had also visited several
other islands. He said that in no place he had visited had things gone
on so quietly and satisfactorily, to all classes, as in Antigua. The
apprenticeship system was vexatious to both parties. It kept up a
constant state of warfare between master and apprentice, and engendered
bitter feeling on both sides. To some extent, that was the case in
Barbadoes; but it would doubtless pass away with the present impolitic
system. He was so well satisfied that unconditional freedom was better,
both for the masters and the laborers, that, if he had the power, he
would emancipate every apprentice to-morrow.

"Hon. R. B. Clarke, Solicitor General, candidly owned that while
abolition was pending in Parliament, he had declared, publicly and
repeatedly that it would ruin the Colonies; but the results had proved
so different, that he was ashamed of his forebodings. He said there were
many fears about the first of August. He rose early that morning, and
rode twelve miles over the most populous part of the island; and when he
saw all the negroes peaceably at their work, he felt satisfied that all
would go well."

Major Colthurst, Special Magistrate, gave a written testimony to Mr.
Thome, from which I extract the following: "The number of apprenticed
laborers in my district, is 9,480. In consequence of its vicinity to the
large seaport of Bridgetown, it is perhaps the most troublesome district
in the island. In the more rural districts, not above half as many
complaints are made to the magistrates. There has been no trouble in my
district, occasioned by the apprentices refusing to work. They work
manfully and cheerfully, wherever they are treated with humanity and
consideration. I have never known an instance to the contrary. When the
conductor of the estate is wanting in this respect, disinclination to
perform their duties is the natural consequence; but the interference of
the magistrate soon sets matters right. The number of complaints brought
before me are much fewer than last year, and their character is also
greatly improved. Nine complaints out of ten are for small impertinences
and saucy answers; which, considering the former and present condition
of the parties, is naturally to be expected; but the number even of such
complaints is much diminished. It is amazing how few material breaches
of the law occur in so extraordinary a community. Occasionally, there
are a few cases of crime; but when it is considered that the population
of this island is nearly as dense as that of any part of China, and
wholly uneducated, either by precept or example, this absence of
frequent crime excites our wonder, and is highly creditable to the
negroes. I do not hesitate to say that perfect tranquillity exists in
this Colony, though passing through one of the most momentous changes,
that ever took place in any age, or country; the passage of nearly
80,000 slaves from bondage to freedom. The apprentices are inclined to
purchase their discharge; especially when misunderstandings occur with
their masters. When they obtain it, they generally labor in the trades
and occupations, to which they were previously accustomed, and conduct
themselves well. They seldom take to drinking. Indeed, the black and
colored population are the most temperate people I ever knew. The
experience of nearly forty years, in various public situations, confirms
me in this very important fact."

Testimony similar to the above is adduced from a number of magistrates
and police officers. They all agreed that vice and crime had diminished,
and were diminishing; that the feeling of security was universal; that
land was rising; and that even the most prejudiced planters would not
return to the old system, if they could.


TESTIMONY OF CLERGY AND MISSIONARIES IN BARBADOES, IN 1837.

Mr. Thome says: "Rev. Edward Elliott, the Archdeacon at Barbadoes,
informed us that the number of clergymen and churches had increased
since emancipation; religious meetings were more fully attended, and the
instructions given manifestly had greater influence. Increased attention
was paid to education also. The clergy, and the Moravian and Wesleyan
Missionaries had put forth new efforts, and were opening schools in
various parts of the island. Before emancipation, the planters opposed
education, and, as far as possible, prevented teachers from coming on
their estates. Now, they encouraged it in many instances, and where they
did not directly encourage it, they made no opposition. He said the
number of marriages had very much increased. He was convinced that no
bad results would have followed, if entire freedom had been granted in
1834, as in Antigua. While slavery continued, people did fear
insurrections; but he did not think five planters on the island had any
fear now.

"Rev. Mr. Fidler, Superintendent of the Wesleyan Missions, told us the
Methodists had been violently persecuted in Barbadoes, during the reign
of slavery. Their chapel in Bridgetown had been utterly demolished by a
mob, and some of the missionaries obliged to fly for their lives. But
things had very much altered since emancipation. Several estates were
now open to the missionaries, and churches were being built in various
parts of the country. One man, who helped to pull down the chapel, had
now given land to build a new one, and had offered the free use of one
of his buildings, for religious meetings and a school, until it could be
erected.

"Rev. Mr. Cummins, Curate of St. Paul's, in Bridgetown, told us his
sabbath school had greatly increased since emancipation. The negroes
manifested an increasing desire for religious instruction, and he was
convinced they had as much capacity for learning, as the whites. All the
churches were now crowded, and there was an increasing demand for more.
Their morals had greatly improved; especially with respect to marriage.

"We visited an infant school, connected with the Episcopal church,
established two weeks previous, for the children of the apprenticed
laborers. The teacher, who has been for many years an instructor, told
us he found them as quick to learn, as any children he ever taught. He
had been surprised to see how soon the instructions of the schoolroom
were carried home to the parents. The very first night, after the school
closed, he heard the children repeating what they had been taught, and
the parents learning the songs from their lips.

"Rev. Mr. Walton, from Montserrat, told us the planters on that island
were getting tired of the apprenticeship, and, from mere considerations
of interest and comfort, were adopting free labor. There had been
repeated instances of planters emancipating all their apprentices. He
said a new impulse had been given to education. Schools were springing
up in all parts of the island. Marriages were occurring every week. The
planters now encouraged missionaries to labor among their people, and
were ready to give land for chapels, which were fast multiplying."


NEGRO TESTIMONY IN BARBADOES, IN 1837.

Mr. Thome says: "The tender of the sugar-mill at Lear's was an old
negro, with furrowed brow and thin gray locks. We asked him how they
were getting along under the new system. He replied, 'Bery well, massa,
tank God. All peaceable and good.' 'Then you like apprenticeship better
than slavery?' 'Great deal better, massa. We'se doing well, now.' 'You
like apprenticeship as well as freedom, don't you?' 'Oh, no, me massa.
Freedom till better.' 'What would you do, if you were entirely free?'
'We mus work, massa. All hab to work, when de free come. 'How are you
treated now?' 'Bery well, tank God. No flogging, no shutting up in
dungeon, now.' 'But what makes you want freedom? You are so old, you
couldn't enjoy it long.' 'Me want to _die_ free, massa. It good ting to
die free. And me want to see children free, too.'"

FOOTNOTE:

[5] The population of Barbadoes was 14,959 whites; 82,807 slaves; 5,146
free colored people.




CHAPTER IV.

TESTIMONY CONCERNING THE WEST INDIES, FROM 1840 TO 1859.


Joseph J. Gurney, of England, visited the British West Indies in 1840.
At St. Christopher's, the Solicitor General of the Colony told him that
a small estate on the island sold shortly before emancipation, with all
the slaves on it, for £2,000. He said, six years afterward, it would
sell, without the slaves for £6,000. Mr. Gurney adds: "This remarkable
rise in the value of property is by no means confined to particular
estates." "In this island, the negroes perform a far greater amount of
work in a given time, than could be obtained from them under slavery.
One of my informants said, 'They will do an infinity of work for
wages.'"

Sir William Colebrook, Governor of Antigua, and Mr. Gilbert, a
clergyman, both gave the following testimony to Mr. Gurney: "At the
lowest computation, the land, without a single slave upon it, is fully
as valuable now, as it was, including all the slaves, before
emancipation." Mr. Gilbert told Mr. Gurney that the compensation he
received for his slaves, from the British government, was "a mere
present put into his pocket; a gratuity, on which he had no reasonable
claim. For his land, _without_ the slaves, was at least of the same
value that it formerly was _with_ the slaves; and since emancipation,
his profits had increased."

At Dominica, Mr. Gurney found the emancipated laborers "working
cheerfully, and cheaply to their employers, as compared with slavery."

Concerning the islands he visited, Mr. Gurney says: "The change for the
better, in the dress, demeanor, and welfare of the people, is
prodigious. The imports are vastly increased. The duties on imports in
St. Christopher's were £1,000 more in 1838 than they were in 1837; and
in 1839, they were double what they were in 1838, within £150. This
surprising increase is owing to the demand, on the part of the freed
laborers for imported goods; especially for articles of dress."

In May, 1846, Dr. John Davy, author of a work on the West Indies, and
brother of the celebrated Sir Humphrey Davy, wrote from Barbadoes, where
he was residing, in official and professional employment, to the
well-known Mr. George Combe, of Edinburgh. The letter was published in
_The Liberty Bell_, for 1847, and I make the following extracts from
it:--

"I could wish that those who still approve of slavery, or who may
consider it a necessary evil, would pay a visit to the West Indies,
especially to this island, and witness the effects of emancipation. I am
much mistaken if they would not go back satisfied that the abolition of
slavery has here been, in every respect, advantageous; to the negroes,
to the planters, and to the population generally. I have been in
Barbadoes very nearly a year, and I have conversed on the subject with
proprietors of estates, who formerly owned slaves, with merchants, and
with colored people, who had been slaves. Among them all, there seemed
to be but one feeling; that emancipation was a blessing, and that were
it possible to bring back slavery, all would be opposed to it.

"When slavery existed, there was always fear of insurrection, especially
in times of danger, whether connected with war, or other calamities,
such as fires and hurricanes. Then, it was necessary to have a standing
militia, always ready to act. It was necessary to have beacons and
forts, to give the alarm and afford defence. Now, there is a perfect
feeling of security. The population is considered as one; bound together
by common rights and common interests. The militia has been disbanded,
and is not likely to be re-organized, except on a threatening of war.
Forts are no longer required. Some of them have been dismantled and are
forgotten. Some are converted into stations for the police; a body
chiefly composed of colored men. Prior to abolition, from what I can
learn, crime of every kind was more prevalent; especially robbery. Then,
there was always at large a certain number of runaway slaves, who
supported themselves by nightly depredations, and, occasionally
collecting into large parties, broke into and plundered the houses of
the opulent. Since the abolition of slavery, I have not heard of the
murder of a white man, nor of any instance of revenge taken by the
liberated for cruel treatment inflicted before liberation. I have not
heard of any instances of house breaking, or of robbery, except of a
petty kind, commonly designated as pilfering. The security, as to
property, in which the opulent live here is remarkable. But it is not
surprising, when we reflect on the easy condition of the people
generally. Want is almost unknown, beggars are almost unknown; yet there
are no poor laws, and no provision made by law for the support of
paupers.

"The freed laborers are contented with a shilling sterling (twenty-four
cents) a day for their work, men and women alike. This is sufficient to
supply their wants, and to enable them to have some comforts, and even
luxuries, where the ordinary articles of diet are cheap, and where most
laborers have a portion of land, for which they pay rent. Commonly, on
every estate requiring over a hundred laborers, there is a village,
where those who work on the estate reside. To be near their work is an
advantage to both laborers and proprietors; and it being for the
interest of the latter to attach the former to them, they are dealt with
kindly and liberally. If other treatment is experienced, the laborers
seek employment elsewhere, and have no difficulty in finding it. This,
it must be admitted, is a happy change, and worth some pecuniary
sacrifices; but it is doubtful whether it entailed any such. I have been
assured by many managers of estates, well acquainted with the minute
details of expenditure under the former and the present systems of slave
labor and free labor, that free labor is more economical. I admit that
in some of the islands, especially the smaller ones, the landed
proprietors have been great sufferers, and their estates have become
depreciated in a remarkable manner, owing to a new direction of labor.
But I am disposed to think that their misfortunes have, in great part,
been brought on themselves, by their injudicious conduct. In the first
instance, they paid the freed laborers at a low rate, and thus tempted
them to emigrate to the larger Colonies, where higher remuneration was
offered for labor; as in Trinidad and Demerara. Next, they endeavored to
keep them at home, by allowing them to have as much land as they chose,
and to keep as many cattle as they chose, without payment. This did,
indeed, keep them at home; but its tendency was to keep them from
laboring on the estates of the proprietors. They found it more for their
interest to cultivate land on their own account.

"Sometimes, a single fact will prove more convincing than a multiplicity
of arguments. I will state one fact, of which I am assured on the best
authority. _The value of land in Barbadoes is so much increased since
emancipation, that an estate will now sell for as much as it did
formerly, when the slaves necessary for its cultivation were included in
the purchase._ Who would have believed this to be possible, before
slavery was abolished?

"Now let us compare the moral condition of the population with what it
was previous to emancipation. It is admitted that, in the time of
slavery, planters, attorneys, managers, merchants, etc., were
licentious. Concubinage was common, and not held in discredit. There was
a looseness of conduct and conversation, which could not fail to have an
injurious effect on the mind. Youth was particularly exposed to this
degrading and enervating influence, when there was no check to
indulgence, no call to exercise control; when too often a gentleman's
house was a kind of brothel, and when instances occurred of planters
keeping in slavery their own offspring by slave mothers. From what I
have seen and heard, the higher classes of the white population now
appear to be exemplary in their conduct. A natural change has also taken
place with regard to the emancipated race. Formerly, a colored woman
esteemed it an honor to be the kept mistress of a white man. Now, she
considers it disreputable; and few such connections are found. Marriage
is more common among the black and colored people. The understanding is,
that marriage is right, and concubinage wrong. There is still a good
deal of irregular connection among them; the marriage tie is loose, and
the senses little under the control of principle. But these remarks
apply to the _older_ portion of the population, whose habits were formed
in slavery, when the marriage ceremony was not permitted, and when
chastity was not known, even by name. I believe they do not apply to the
rising generation, a certain proportion of whom have come under the
influence of moral and religious training. The children of the laborers
manifest great facility in learning at school; and the men have great
aptitude in learning whatever they take an interest in, belonging to
their trades and occupations; such as the use of implements in
husbandry, and improved methods in the useful arts."

Dr. Davy states that three-fourths of the laborers in Antigua had
cottages of their own, and small freeholds. Small as that island is,
there were, at the time he wrote, about eighty-seven villages, all built
by emancipated laborers, near the estates on which they were formerly
chattels. He says: "It is a mistake, often committed, to suppose the
African is by nature indolent, less inclined to work than the European.
He who has witnessed, as I have, their indefatigable and provident
industry, will be disposed perhaps to overrate, rather than underrate,
the activity of the negroes."

In 1857, the Governor of Tobago published this statement: "I deny that
the peasantry are abandoned to slothful habits. On the contrary, I
assert that a more industrious class does not exist in the world; at
least, when they are working for themselves."

When Louis Philippe sent Commissioners to the British West Indies, to
inquire into the state of things, with a view to emancipation in the
French Colonies, they published a Report, from which I translate the
following extract: "In Guiana, some planters declare the impossibility
of getting along with the existing system. Others, on the contrary,
assure us that they never want for laborers; they praise the assiduity
of the blacks, and say they produce as much as under the former system.
So much for the _old_ planters. But when we consult the _new_ planters,
men who know coerced labor only by tradition, we find among _them_
entire unanimity. They all tell us that the labor is satisfactory, and
that their agricultural operations succeed well."

Rev. Henry Bleby has been a missionary in the West Indies for thirty
years. He resided there before emancipation and since. On the 1st of
August, 1858, he delivered an address at Abington, Mass., from which I
extract the following: "Since I have been here, I have heard that
emancipation is understood to have been a failure. I am prepared to give
that statement an unqualified contradiction. In no sense whatever has
the emancipation of the slaves in the British Colonies proved a failure.
I am at present laboring as a minister among the colored churches in
Barbadoes, and I can tell you that never, even in the most palmy lays of
slavery, was there such prosperity as now. This year, a long drought has
lessened the crop of sugar; yet they have raised more than double the
amount of produce they ever raised under slavery; and with no greater
amount of labor, than in the time of slavery. You cannot get an acre of
land, in any part of the island, for less than four or five hundred
dollars. In my own neighborhood an estate of not more than two or three
hundred acres was sold for nearly $90,000 in your money; paid in cash.
The case is the same in Antigua, where I lived three years. A member of
my own church there bought an estate, which was sold under a decree of
Chancery for $24,225. He has taken off three valuable crops, which have
more than repaid the original purchase money; and he has been offered
$48,450 for the property, and refused to take it. _That_ is the kind of
ruin that has come upon the West Indies because of emancipation!

"As for the moral condition of Barbadoes, I believe the criminal
statistics, for the last five or six years, would compare, without
disadvantage, with any country under heaven. We seldom hear of any thing
like serious crimes. Intemperance is not prevalent among the people. I
have a membership of seventeen hundred colored persons, and, during the
last two years, I have not had one single case of intemperance reported
to me. Every sabbath our churches are crowded with people anxious to
receive instruction. I know of no people in the world who will make such
efforts, and exercise such self-denial, to obtain education for their
children, as the people of Barbadoes. One of my colored church members
had just finished manufacturing his little portion of sugar, grown on
part of the half-acre of land on which his house stood, and on which he
raised provisions for his family; and he brought me six dollars in
advance, as school fees for his four children the next twelve months.
It is the only instance I ever knew of a man in _his_ condition
pre-paying the education of his children for a year. It is a falsehood
that emancipation has failed to improve the condition of the colored
race. Throughout the West Indies, in every island, the condition of the
people is incomparably superior to what it was in slavery. Some say if
it has not ruined the laborers, it has ruined the planters. I deny that
statement, as plainly as I deny the other. Emancipation proved a
blessing, instead of a curse, to the proprietors. What I have told you
concerning the prices of land are facts that speak volumes in regard to
the sort of ruin brought upon British planters by emancipation."

Lord Stanley, now Earl of Derby, in a despatch, dated February, 1842,
says: "Experience has shown, what reason would anticipate, that the
industry of the negro, like that of all mankind, is drawn out just in
proportion to the interest he has in his labor." Lord John Russell
declared in one of his public speeches: "None of the most inveterate
opponents of our recent measures of emancipation allege that the negroes
have turned robbers, or plunderers, or bloodthirsty insurgents. What
appears from their statements is that they have become shopkeepers and
petty traders, hucksters, and small freeholders. A blessed change this,
which Providence has enabled us to accomplish!"

Sir Francis Hincks, formerly Prime Minister of Canada, is Governor of
the Windward Islands, which comprise Barbadoes, St. Vincent, Grenada,
St. Lucia, and Tobago. He is distinguished for financial ability, and
practical good sense as a statesman. Being on a visit to England, he was
present at an anniversary meeting in London, August 1st, 1859; on which
occasion, he offered the following resolution: "That, on the
twenty-fifth anniversary of the abolition of slavery in the British
Colonies, this meeting joyfully records its satisfaction in the
retrospect of that great act of national justice and sound policy; and
emphatically affirm that the emancipated population of those Colonies
have triumphantly vindicated their right to freedom, and the justice of
the Act of Emancipation, by the signal progress they have since made,
morally, religiously, and politically."

In speaking to this Resolution, His Excellency said: "It is not denied
by anybody in the West Indies that the good results of emancipation on
the social condition of the people have been very great. In Barbadoes,
the progress has been especially marked. I know of no people of the
laboring class anywhere, who have done so much for the education of
their children, as the people of Barbadoes; and results of the most
gratifying character are to be seen in the social habits and mental
acquirements of the people. I believe the planters themselves are
convinced of the good results of emancipation. There can be no doubt in
the minds of any, who investigate the subject, that slave labor is much
dearer than free labor. I wish it to be understood that I have formed my
opinion after full inquiry into the circumstances of every British
Colony, regarding which I could obtain information.

"Let me deal at once with the popular delusion that the African Creole
is naturally indolent; for that it _is_ a delusion, I have no doubt
whatever. My opinion is in accordance with all that I have heard from
the clergymen of the various Protestant churches, as well as from those
of the Church of Rome. It is likewise in accordance with the opinions
expressed by the stipendiary magistrates generally, as I have found them
in official documents. A Barbadoes proprietor, who stands high in the
estimation of all who know him, writes to me thus: 'There never was a
greater mistake, than to suppose the negro will not work for hire. No
man is more sensitive to that stimulus, or works more readily, more
cheerfully, or more effectually, for the hope of reward. It is perfectly
astonishing how much a negro can do, when he is under the influence of a
wholesome stimulus; and how little he will do, when that is removed.'"
Gov. Hincks said: "I willingly admit that there has been a considerable
withdrawal of labor from sugar cultivation in some of the Colonies,
owing to a variety of causes. Among those causes, I am inclined to think
that, next to the _tenure of land_, the _insolvency of the proprietors_
has been the chief. I have never been able to trace an instance in which
an estate has gone out of cultivation owing to want of _labor_; but I
have heard of many cases in which estates have been abandoned for want
of _capital_; and of some estates on which the laborers have been
dismissed with wages several months in arrear. The only wonder is, that
with such a land-tenure as that which exists in the West Indies, a
single laborer has remained on the sugar estates. It is a tenure by the
month, subject to ejectment by the owner. If the tenant has notice to
quit, while his crops are growing, he is obliged to take for them
whatever price the proprietor appraises them at. If the tenant himself
gives notice of intention to leave, he is obliged to sacrifice his crops
altogether. The obvious tendency of this is to drive laborers from sugar
cultivation to places where they can get land of their own. If I were
proprietor of a sugar estate, I would devote one-fourth, or one-third,
of the cane land on the estate to the laborers. I would give them a good
tenure; for instance, leases renewable forever, with a right to buy, at
such a number of years' purchase as might be agreed upon. I would make
it the interest of my laborers to occupy, or buy, land near my cane
lands, instead of at a distance. I would trust to their admitted
sagacity to cultivate the product that would _pay_ them best. I would
have a labor market at my door; and I would have the spare time of my
laborers employed in growing a a product, which must be brought to my
works to be manufactured. Even if the result should be that all my land
was rented or sold, I should still make ample profit by my manufactory.
Such, however, in my opinion, would not be the case. The large
proprietor would still be the principal cultivator of the land, and the
small one would combine labor on the estates with labor on his own land
in growing the cane; as is the case in Barbadoes. But this common-sense
view of the subject has not been generally taken. In Barbadoes alone so
far as my knowledge extends, the laborers on the large estates cultivate
the sugar cane on their own grounds; and this is one of the reasons why
the laborers in Barbadoes cannot be attracted elsewhere. There, the
laborer is dependent on the proprietor for the manufacture of his little
crop of canes, while the proprietor is dependent on him for labor, when
it is required. This mutual dependence has produced the best results."

When Gov. Hincks visited Canada, April, 1859, he received an address
from the Association for the Education of the Colored People. I make the
following extract from his reply: "While it is my own deliberate
opinion that a very large amount of labor now wasted in the West Indies,
or less profitably employed, could be obtained for the cultivation of
sugar, I am not prepared to admit that the success of the great measure
of emancipation is to be tested in this way. The true test, it seems to
me, is the progress of the African race. The best proof of the industry
of that race is that large numbers have acquired, and are acquiring,
large properties. They are amenable to the laws, anxious for the
education of their children, and good and loyal subjects to the queen.
There is still vast room for improvement; but I certainly concur in the
following statement by the Lord Bishop of Barbadoes, a prelate esteemed
and respected by all who have the advantage of his friendship: 'I
certainly think we have great reason to say, especially in Barbadoes,
that the advantages resulting from the abolition of slavery have been
quite as great as we could reasonably expect, in so short a time; much
greater, indeed, than the most sanguine among us, I believe, ever
anticipated.'"

Mr. Charles Tappan, of Boston, visited the West Indies, in the autumn of
1857; and in January, 1858, Gov. Hincks wrote him a letter, dated
Barbadoes, in answer to some questions that had been addressed to him.
It was published in the _National Era_, and some other papers. I make
the following extracts from it. "With regard to the complaint against
the negroes, that they are indolent, and have abandoned the sugar
plantations, I admit that, in several of the British Colonies, the
planters would generally vehemently maintain the correctness of the
charge. I am, however, bound to affirm that, after a most patient
investigation, I have been unable to arrive at such a conclusion. There
is no doubt that the condition of the laboring class in Barbadoes ought
to be worse than in any of the other Colonies; for land is exorbitantly
dear, being from $400 to $600 an acre; while wages are from tenpence to
a shilling (twenty-four cents) a day. There are only five working days
in the week, except during crop time. With all these disadvantages, the
small proprietors in Barbadoes, those holding less than five acres of
land, have increased in sixteen years, from about 1,100 to 3,537. I
doubt very much whether such a proof of industrious habits could be
furnished with regard to a similar class of laborers in any other
country in the world. I adduce this remarkable fact to prove that there
has been no want of industry in this island, on the part of the Creoles
of African descent.

"In all those Colonies where the sugar estates have been partially
abandoned, we must look to other causes than the indolence of the
laborers. In all those Colonies, land is abundant and comparatively
cheap; and I need not remind any one acquainted with the settlement of
land in America, that where land is abundant and cheap, labor will be
scarce and dear. The negroes in Guiana and Trinidad pursue the same
course as poor Irish emigrants in Canada, or the United States; they
endeavor to get land of their own, and to become proprietors instead of
laborers. Unfortunately, the planters have never adopted a policy
calculated to retain laborers on their plantations. At least, such is my
opinion. I am fully convinced that the abandonment of the estates is
more owing to the tenure, on which alone planters would lease land, than
to any other cause.

"In this island, there can be no doubt whatever, that emancipation has
been a great boon to all classes. The estates are much better
cultivated, and more economically. Real estate has increased in price,
and is a more certain and advantageous investment, than in the time of
slavery. The proprietor of an estate, containing three hundred acres of
land, twelve miles from the shipping port, informs me that the estate,
during slavery, required two hundred and thirty slaves, and produced on
an average, one hundred and forty hogheads of sugar. It is now worked by
ninety free laborers, and the average product the last seven years has
been one hundred and ninety hogheads. During slavery, this estate was
worth £15,000 ($72,675); under the apprenticeship, it was sold for
£25,000 ($121,125); the present proprietor purchased it a few years ago,
for £30,000 ($145,350), which I have no doubt he could obtain for it at
any moment. I could multiply instances, where the results have been
similar.

"The improvement which has taken place in the religious condition of all
classes, and the progress of education, are quite equal to what could
have been reasonably expected. You have yourself made the acquaintance
of men, who were once slaves, who are now in independent circumstances,
and enjoying a large share of public respect. It is impossible to
compare the present statistics of crime with those during slavery; for
then the great bulk of ordinary offences, such as petty thefts and
assaults, were not brought before magistrates, but summarily punished by
managers and overseers on the estates. That there is much greater
security for person and property now, than during slavery, does not
admit of a doubt."

Never was an experiment more severely tested, than that of emancipation
in the West Indies. It seems as if God intended to prove to the world
that the vitality of freedom was indestructible. In addition to the
general state of insolvency to which slavery had reduced the planters,
and the difficulties attending the commencement of all great changes in
the social system, there were an unusual number of fortuitous
calamities. In 1843, an earthquake made dreadful devastation in the
Leeward Islands. Out of one hundred and seventy-two sugar mills in
Antigua, one hundred and seventeen were demolished, or nearly so. A
third of the houses in St. John's were flung down, and the remainder too
much injured to be habitable. Then came a hurricane which blew down
churches, uprooted trees, destroyed a great many houses and huts, did
immense damage to the sugar canes. And the crowning misfortune of all,
was a series of severe droughts, year after year. Between 1840 and 1849,
there were only two seasons when the crops did not suffer terribly for
rain. Under such a combination of disasters the anxieties and sufferings
of West India proprietors must have been very severe indeed; and there,
as elsewhere, there were plenty of people ready and eager to attribute
all their troubles to emancipation. Yet such is the recuperative power
of freedom, that Commissioners who went to Guiana in 1850, to inquire
into the condition of things, reported: "Every symptom of change for the
better is apparent. Cultivation has extended and crops increased. The
laboring population are working more steadily, and evince signs of
speedy improvement."

In the first part of this Tract it has been mentioned that in twelve
years, during slavery, the laboring class in eleven of the islands had
_decreased_ more than 60,000. In the twelve years following
emancipation, in ten Colonies there was an _increase_ of more than
54,000. That fact alone is a significant indication of the vast change
for the better in their condition.

The following statistics I copy from an able article in the _Edinburgh
Review_, April, 1859. They are quoted from the Colonial Reports:--


     _Barbadoes._ In ten years, "between 1842 and 1852, increase of
     sugar exported, is 27,240 hogheads." The Report for 1851, states,
     "There has been more sugar shipped from this island this year, than
     in any one year since it has been peopled; and it is a remarkable
     fact that there will be more _laborers_' sugar made this year, than
     previously. By laborers' sugar is meant that raised by the negroes
     on their own patches of ground, and sent to the proprietor's mill
     for manufacture." The Report for 1853 announces "vast increase in
     trade. So far the success of cultivation by free labor is
     unquestionable." Report for 1858: "A great increase in the value of
     the exports." "The large proportion of land acquired by the
     laboring classes furnishes striking evidence of their industry."

     _Bahamas._ In 1851, the Governor reports, "a great and important
     change for the better," in the condition of the people; which he
     mainly attributes to "improved education." The rapidity with which
     these islands are advancing is indicated by the fact that the
     exports and imports increased in one year, from 1854 to 1855,
     £102,924 ($498,666.78).

     _Grenada._ Returns in 1851 and 1852, show an increase of trade,
     amounting to £88,414 ($428,355.83). Report of 1858: "Contentment
     appears to pervade all classes of the community." "A proprietary
     body, of considerable magnitude and importance, has already risen
     from the laboring class." "State of the finances most
     satisfactory." "A greatly extended surface is covered by sugar
     cultivation." A considerable increase is noted in the exports of
     sugar, rum, and cocoa. Some remarks on the want of labor.

     _Antigua._--Reports for 1858: "Satisfactory evidence is afforded,
     by the Revenue Returns, of increase of trade and mercantile
     business, consequent upon the revival of agricultural prosperity."
     (There had been a depression in consequence of a great fall in the
     price of sugar in 1847.)

     _Dominica._--Report for 1853: "The steady maintenance of production
     is full of promise as to the future." Report for 1857: "The exports
     show a considerable increase." "Very considerable increase in
     revenue, and an equally marked improvement in the amount of
     imports." In the Report for 1858, the Governor speaks of the
     growing independence of the laborers, manifested "in the small
     patches of canes, and little wooden mills here and there dotting
     the plains around."

     _Guiana._--In 1852, the Governor reports that the fall in the price
     of sugar, in 1847 and 1848 (owing to the repeal of the tariff), was
     "so sudden and enormous, as to have almost annihilated the Colony,
     at that crisis." But he goes on to state that "the revenue is now
     flourishing, population augmenting, education spreading, crime
     diminishing, and trade increasing."

     _Montserrat._--In 1853, the Governor reports "increase of
     confidence, enterprise, and industry." "The improved and improving
     state of the community is allowed on all hands." "No island in
     these seas exhibits a more decisive tendency to social and moral
     regeneration and improvement. The rural population are quiet,
     contented, and orderly."

     _Nevis._--(This is a very small island; about the size of a common
     New England town.) Report for 1857: "The roads appear as if the
     greater part of the population had new clothed themselves; and in
     the harbor, so often deserted, I now count ten ships of
     considerable burden." "There appears now to be at work an
     industrious spirit of improvement."

     _St. Kitts._--Report for 1856: "A larger quantity of sugar is
     produced now than in the time of slavery" (though on a smaller
     area). Report for 1858: "The agricultural prospects of the island
     are most encouraging. Its financial condition continues
     satisfactory; so do the education returns. Attendance in schools is
     steadily increasing. Crime is steadily diminishing. In one year,
     from 1856 to 1857, trade increased £106,233" ($514,642.88).

     _St. Lucia._--Report for 1853: "At no period of her history, has
     there been a greater breadth of land under cultivation, than at the
     present moment." Between the four years ending 1842, and the four
     years ending 1856, the increase of sugar exported was 1,803,618
     pounds.

     _St. Vincent._--In 1857, the Governor describes "a really sound and
     healthy state of the Colony at present, and a cheering and
     promising prospect for the future." He describes the rising
     villages, the growing number of freeholders and leaseholders, and
     the steady progressive increase in the value of imports. In one
     year, from 1856 to 1857, imports and exports increased £156,633
     ($758,886.88); and he expressly attributes it to "increased
     cultivation and prosperity." In 1858, he describes the Colony as
     "in a most satisfactory state." "Agricultural operations largely
     extended." "Anticipations of continued progress and prosperity
     fully realized."

     _Tobago._--The accounts had been dismal in 1852 and 1853; but an
     improved financial system was adopted in 1856, the result of which
     was a Report in 1858 announcing a "marked improvement in the
     revenue returns." The Governor describes the laborers as
     "well-behaved and industrious."

     _Tortola._--This island, under slavery, exported 15,559 cwt. of
     sugar. Now it exports none at all. But the change is wholly an
     advantage. It is remarkably well adapted for the raising of stock.
     "The people, with few exceptions, are owners of cattle, which they
     dispose of to great advantage." "The laborers appear fully sensible
     of the advantages of education to their children, and the latter
     manifest a great desire to benefit by the opportunities offered
     them."

     _Trinidad_ is highly flourishing. In 1852, the crop was the largest
     ever shipped from the island; and it has been extending since. The
     whole trade greatly increased since slavery. The Report for 1853
     speaks of "marked improvement in the cultivation of the sugar
     estates." Export of sugar rose from an average of 310,797 cwt.
     under slavery, to 426,042 cwt. in the seven years ending 1854.


The writer in the _Edinburgh Review_ says: "These specific accounts of
the several islands are borne out by the statistics and Reports that
relate to our West Indies _en masse_. Lest it should be thought that
these extracts are carefully culled, to produce a particular impression,
and that if the reader had the _whole_ Reports before him, he would find
complaints and lamentations, we may at once say that they appear to us
to be fair samples of the views entertained by the Governors, and also
by other gentlemen acquainted with the West Indies. The language of
complaint is no longer heard. Throughout these Colonies, hope and
congratulation seem to have taken the place of irritation and despair.
In all cases, the later the Report, the more gratifying it is found to
be.

"To men of business, one fact will seem almost enough by itself to show
the sound commercial state of these Colonies; viz., that, in the year
1857, the Colonial Bank received bills from the West Indies to the
amount of more than £1,300,000 ($6,298,500); and less than £8,000
($38,760) were returned. Nor was there a single failure in the West
India trade, during the severe commercial crisis of that year.
Furthermore, coffee, cotton, wool, sugar, rum, and cocoa, are all
exported in increasing quantities. The total exports from Great Britain
to the West Indies in 1857 were valued at half a million more
($2,422,500) than the average of the preceding ten years."

Mr. C. Buxton made a speech in the British House of Commons, March,
1859, in which he said: "Because labor is free, and trade is free, the
West Indies are now rising to a pitch of wealth and happiness unknown
before. It would be impossible for me to lay before the House the
immense mass of evidence, which demonstrates that fact. I am assured of
it by mercantile men, I find it strongly set forth in the Reports from
the Governors of the Islands, and in the statistics furnished by the
Board of Trade. In the four years between 1853 and 1857, there has been
an increase in the exports and imports of the West Indies and Guiana of
£4,500,000 ($21,802,500). Considering what mere specks these islands
look on the map of America, it is astonishing that their trade to and
fro, in the year 1857, should actually amount to £10,735,000
($52,011,075). It is altogether absurd to suppose this prosperity is
owing to the immigration of a few thousand laborers; and in fact the
islands which have received no immigrants are quite as flourishing as
those that have. Interested parties describe the negroes as barbarous
and idle; but I find ample evidence that they are living in a high
degree of industry and comfort; though I admit that they somewhat prefer
working on freeholds they have purchased, to laboring for hire."

The _Edinburgh Review_ concludes its array of evidence, by saying: "A
long and thorough investigation of the case has borne us irresistibly to
the conclusion that, merely as a dry question of _economy_, emancipation
has _paid_; that it was an act of prudence, for which we, as a nation of
shopkeepers, need not blush before that golden god, whom we are thought
to worship so eagerly. Slavery and monopoly were bearing the West Indies
to ruin. Under free labor and free trade they are rising to wealth. They
are yearly enriching us more and more with the wealth of their fertile
soil. Instead of being the plague of statesmen and the disgrace of
England, they are becoming invaluable possessions of the British crown.
Never did any deed of any nation show more signally that to do right is
the truest _prudence_, than the great deed of Emancipation."




CHAPTER V.

JAMAICA.[6]


I have placed Jamaica in a section by itself, because emancipation has
there worked less prosperously than elsewhere, and the reasons for it
need some explanation. I have already mentioned causes which were
bringing all the West Indies to ruin, previous to emancipation. These
operated as powerfully in Jamaica as elsewhere. They were cursed with
the same coercive system, which seems ingeniously contrived to make
laborers lazy and shiftless, and to array them in the most stubborn
opposition to their employers. There was among the white population the
same haughty contempt for useful occupations, which inevitably brings
extravagance and dissipation in its train. There was the same expensive
retinue of attorneys, managers, and bookkeepers, with their mistresses,
servants, and horses, to be supported out of the estate. There was the
same neglect and fraud, arising from the absence of proprietors; for
"nine-tenths of the land in Jamaica was owned by absentees, mostly
residing in England." There was the same injudicious system of
apportioning the soil into large plantations, to the utter exclusion of
small farmers; for slavery always renders the existence of a middling
class impossible. There was the same desperate game of borrowing and
mortgaging, ending in universal insolvency. Mr. Bigelow, one of the
editors of the _New York Evening Post_, visited Jamaica in 1850, and
carefully examined into the state of things. He says: "The island was
utterly insolvent the day the Emancipation Bill passed. Nearly every
estate was mortgaged for more than it was worth, and was liable for more
interest than it could possibly pay. It will not be disputed by any,
who are at all informed on the subject, that the whole real estate under
culture in Jamaica, in 1832, would not have sold for enough to pay off
encumbrances. This fact must have been disclosed sooner or later, even
if slavery had been permitted to continue. Bankruptcy was inevitable;
and the rapid depreciation of real estate would, of course, have been
one of the first fruits of such a catastrophe. The Emancipation Act did
not cause, it only precipitated, a result, which was inevitable. It
compelled a balance to be struck between the debtors and the creditors,
which revealed, rather than begat, the poverty which now no effort can
conceal."

The Export Tables show a decrease of sugar, in ten years, ending 1830,
of 201,843 hogsheads.

These drawbacks Jamaica had in common with the other Colonies; except,
perhaps, that the load of debt was somewhat heavier there than
elsewhere. Why then have her complaints been so much louder and more
prolonged, than those of her neighbors? I think the strongest reason is
to be found in the fact that the spirit of slavery was more violent and
unyielding there than in the other Colonies. There was more bitter
hostility between masters and slaves; manifesting itself in shocking
barbarities on one side, and frequent riots and insurrections on the
other. There was a more furious opposition to abolition, and a more
stubborn determination to make it operate badly, if possible. The great
body of the planters had predicted ruin, and they seemed resolved that
they _would_ be ruined, rather than prove false prophets. Dr. Coke, one
of the missionaries, says: "The persecutions we have experienced in
Jamaica far exceed, _very_ far, all the persecutions we have experienced
in all the other islands unitedly considered." Those who opened their
houses to these religious teachers, in many instances, narrowly escaped
being stoned to death. Rev. Mr. Bleby says: "Being determined to
perpetuate slavery, they resolved to do all they could to get rid of
Christianity, and keep their people in heathen darkness. The whole white
population of Jamaica banded themselves together in an Association,
which they called The Colonial Union; the avowed object of which was to
drive every instructor of the negroes from the island. Eighteen of our
churches were levelled with the ground. They dragged the missionaries to
prison, got false witnesses to swear against them, treated them with
brutal violence, and did every thing they could to put an end to their
labors." One of the Methodist missionaries died in a dungeon, in
consequence of the brutal treatment he had received from violent
pro-slavery men.

Another cause for the slow progress of improvement in Jamaica is
assigned by the writer in the _Edinburgh Review_; viz., "the superlative
badness of its government." Taxation has been, and is oppressive, and
the financial arrangements are said to be very injudicious. As late as
1854, the Governor, Sir Charles Grey, declared, "There is no system or
consistency whatever in the conduct of the financial affairs of the
Colony; nor any recognized organ of government, or legislature, which
has the power to bring about effective and comprehensive changes."

There was a small minority of planters and merchants, who regretted the
violence and blind policy of the majority; but they would have risked
their property, if not their lives, by venturing to express
disapprobation. The excitement was prodigiously increased in 1832, by a
formidable attempt at insurrection, in consequence of the numerous
meetings and inflamed speeches of the planters, from which the slaves
got the idea that the British government had made them free, and that
their masters were acting in opposition to it.

Such was the community into which the modified freedom called
apprenticeship was ushered on the 1st of August, 1834. In an address
delivered in Massachusetts, 1858, the Rev. Mr. Bleby said: "I was in
Jamaica when slavery was abolished. This day, twenty-four years ago, I
stood up late at night in one of the churches under my charge. It was a
very large church; and the aisles, the gallery stairs, the communion
place, the pulpit stairs, were all crowded; and there were thousands of
people round the building, at every open door and window, looking in. It
was ten o'clock at night, on the 31st of July. We thought it right and
proper that our Christian people should receive their freedom, as a boon
from God, in the house of prayer; and we gathered them together in the
church for a midnight service. Our mouths had been closed about slavery
up to that time. We could not quote a passage that had reference even
to _spiritual_ emancipation, without endangering our lives. The planters
had a law of 'constructive treason,' that doomed any man to death, who
made use of language tending to excite a desire for liberty among the
slaves; and they found treason in the Bible, and sedition in the hymns
of Watts and Wesley; and we had to be very careful how we used them. You
may imagine with what feelings I saw myself emancipated from this
thraldom, and free to proclaim 'liberty to the captive, and the opening
of prison doors to them that were bound.' I took for my text, 'Proclaim
liberty throughout all the land, unto all the inhabitants thereof! It
shall be a jubilee unto you.' A few minutes before midnight, I requested
all the people to kneel down in silent prayer to God, as befitting the
solemnity of the hour. I looked down upon them as they knelt. The
silence was broken only by sobs of emotion, which it was impossible to
repress. The clock began to strike. It was the knell of slavery, in all
the British possessions! It proclaimed liberty to 800,000 human beings!
When I told them they might rise, what an outburst of joy there was
among that mass of people! The clock had ceased to strike, and they were
slaves no longer! Mothers were hugging their babes to their bosoms, old
white-headed men embracing their children, and husbands clasping their
wives in their arms. By and by, all was still again, and I gave out a
hymn. You may imagine the feelings with which these people, just
emerging into freedom, shouted--for they literally _shouted_,


     "'Send the glad tidings o'er the sea!
     His chains are broke, the slave is free!'"


THE PLANTERS' STATE OF MIND, IN 1837.

Three years after this event, Mr. Thome visited Jamaica. He constantly
encountered men full of the old slave-holding prejudices. They gave
doleful pictures of the ingratitude and laziness of the negroes. Things
were bad enough, they said, but they were sure they would be much worse
when the laborers were entirely free, in 1840. It was in vain to try to
comfort them by telling them how well immediate emancipation had worked
in Antigua. They listened incredulously, and returned to their old
statement, that negroes would not work, unless they were flogged. When
they were freed, they would, of course, rob, murder, starve, do any
thing, rather than labor. "There would be scenes of carnage and ruin,
unparalleled in modern times." Mr. Thomson, one of the local magistrates
of St. Andrews, belonged to this old school, who up to the last moment
had resisted any change of system. Yet he wound up his direful
predictions by denouncing slavery. He said man was naturally a tyrant,
and it could not be denied that under slavery the most horrible
cruelties had been practised. He admitted that he had formerly been very
averse to sleeping on any of his estates in the country. If
circumstances compelled him to spend a night there in the midst of his
slaves, he not only bolted the door, but took the precaution to
barricade it. Now, he had no fears. One thing he was ready to say in
favor of negroes; they were a very temperate people; it was a rare thing
to see one of them drunk. Similar admissions were made by other planters
of the old school; but they all persisted in the opinion that there
would be trouble, in 1840, when the masters lost what restraining power
they now had. The very best thing to be expected was that the negroes
"would all retire to the woods, plant merely yams enough to keep them
alive, and before long all retrograde into African barbarism."

It is obvious that men so completely under the dominion of passion and
prejudice were not likely to use power judiciously; and, unfortunately,
the apprenticeship system, which was intended as a salutary preparation
for freedom, proved nothing but a source of exasperation to both
parties. It took from the slaves certain privileges, which the laws and
customs had previously secured to them, and it did not compensate for
this by giving them the stimulus and the advantages of wages. On the
other hand, the new system fettered the masters, to a degree that kept
them in a state of irritation, while it left them power enough to
manifest their ill-temper by perpetual annoyances to their servants. In
the preceding pages I have given the opinion of various planters and
magistrates, that this system worked badly in all the Colonies; but it
was pre-eminently mischievous in Jamaica, because there the disease of
slavery was of a peculiarly malignant type. The laborers were no longer
_property_; and, with hard masters, no _other_ claim to consideration
remained when that was gone. They had made up their minds that the
negroes would all quit work in 1840, and all they cared for was to get
all they could out of their bones and sinews _before_ that time. All
children under six years old were unconditionally free. What consequence
was it to the planters, whether "the little black devils" (as they
called them) lived or died? Among the apprenticed laborers was a mother,
who was let out by her master. Her child became alarmingly ill; and her
employer said it was not his business to provide doctor or nurse. With
the little sufferer in her arms, she went to her master for aid; but he
turned her into the streets. It was the business of the people to take
care of their own "brats," now. She obtained shelter in the house of a
colored man, and there the child died before morning.

A continual system of provocation was kept up. Masters and their white
subordinates would take produce from the provision-grounds of the
apprentices without paying them. In fits of anger, they would sometimes
destroy their little gardens, or take them away when the crops were
growing. The magistrates were overwhelmed with complaints, most of them
of a petty character. An overseer would call out, "Work faster, you
black rascal! or I'll strike you." If the apprentice answered, "You
_can't_ strike me now," he was dragged before a magistrate, and punished
for insolence. The fact that the power of punishment was transferred by
law from master to magistrates proved very insufficient protection; for
the magistrates were generally planters, or the friends of planters. If
one of them manifested a disposition to be humane, or even just, toward
the apprentices, machinations were immediately on foot to get him turned
out of office. The result was, that a large proportion of them were
unprincipled men, the mere selfish tools of despotism. The negroes
expressed it concisely by saying: "If massa say flog 'em, he flog 'em;
if massa say send 'em to de tread-mill, he send 'em." Their common
complaint of magistrates was, "Dey be poisoned wid massa's turtle-soup;"
that being their way of defining the influence of good dinners. One of
the missionaries complained to Mr. Thome, of a whipping machine
ingeniously contrived for torture, and placed very near his house. He
said when news came that the Governor was about to visit the village,
the magistrate caused the machine to be removed and hidden among the
bushes. Mr. Thome was present at a weekly court, where a just and humane
magistrate presided. He says: "Managers, overseers, and bookkeepers, all
set upon him like bloodhounds on a stag. They seemed to gnash their
teeth upon him in their impotent rage. He assured us that he met with
similar indignities on most of the estates, every time he held his
courts. From what we saw that day, we were convinced that only very
fearless and conscientious men could be faithful magistrates in
Jamaica." Mr. Thome tells an anecdote related to him by the special
magistrate in whose presence it occurred. It shows how hard it was, for
men long accustomed to arbitrary power, to submit to the salutary
restraints of law. The magistrate had fined a manager $108 for various
acts of oppression complained of and proved by his apprentices. The
culprit requested permission to speak; which being granted, he broke
forth, in an agony of passion, "O my God! Has it come to this? Is my
conduct to be questioned by these people? Is my authority to be
interfered with by strangers? O my God! my God!" He fell back into the
arms of one of his bookkeepers, and was carried out of court in a
convulsion fit.

The Rev. James Phillippo, who was a Baptist Missionary in Jamaica for
twenty years, says: "During the short period of two years, 60,000
apprentices received in the aggregate one quarter of a million of
lashes; and fifty thousand other punishments by the tread-wheel, the
chain-gang, and other modes of legalized torture. Instead of diminution
of the miseries of the negro population, there was a frightful addition
to them; inducing a degree of discontent and exasperation never
manifested even under the previous system. Had it not been for the
influence of the Governor, the missionaries, and some of the special
magistrates, it would probably have broken out into open and general
rebellion."


THE NEGROES' STATE OF MIND, IN 1837.

While Mr. Thome was travelling in the rural districts, he talked with
many of the apprentices. He says: "They all thought the apprenticeship
very hard; but still, on the whole it was rather better than slavery.
Then they were 'killed _too_ bad.' It was all slash, slash! Now, they
couldn't be flogged unless the magistrate said so. Still, some masters
were very hard; and many of the apprentices were so badly used, that
they ran away into the woods. They should all be glad when freedom came.

"They gave a heart-sickening account of the cruelties of the tread-mill.
Sometimes their wives were tied on the wheel when they were in a state
of pregnancy. They suffered a great deal from that; but they couldn't
help it. We asked why they didn't complain to the magistrates. They
replied, that the magistrates wouldn't take any notice of their
complaints; and besides, it only made the masters treat them worse. One
of them said, 'We go to de magistrate, and den, when we come back, massa
do all him can to vex us. He wingle (tease) us, and wingle us, and
wingle us; de bookkeeper curse us and treaten us; de constable he scold
us and call us hard names; and dey all try to make we mad; so we
sometimes say someting wrong, and den dey take we to de magistrate for
insolence.'

"We asked them what they thought of the household slaves being free in
1838, while _they_ had to remain apprentices two years longer. They
said, 'It bad enough; but we know de _law_ make it so; and for peace'
sake, we will be satisfy. But we murmur in we minds.' One of the
magistrates told us that on several estates the house servants announced
their determination to remain apprentices until the field hands were all
free; giving as a reason, that they wanted all to have a jubilee
together.

"We inquired whether they expected to do as they pleased when they were
free. They answered, 'We couldn't live widout de _law_. In other
countries, where dey is free, don't _dey_ have de law?' We asked what
they expected to do with the old and infirm. They said, 'We will support
dem. Dey brought us up when we was pickaniny, and now we come trong, we
must take care of dem.' We asked whether they would work when they were
free. They replied, 'In slavery time, we work, _even_ wid de whip; _now_
we work till better; what tink we will do when we _free_? _Wont_ we work
when we get _paid_!' It was said so earnestly, we couldn't help
acknowledging ourselves convinced. Some of them had to travel too far to
market, to get back till Sunday. One of them said to us with tears in
his eyes, 'I declare to you, massa, if de Lord only spare we to be free,
we be much more 'ligious. We be wise to many more tings.'"


FAVORABLE TESTIMONY OF PLANTERS, IN 1837.

"At Amity Hall, Mr. Kirkland, the manager of the estate, introduced us
to his wife and several lovely children. It was the first and the last
_family circle_ we saw in that licentious Colony. The motley groups of
colored children which we found on other estates, revealed the domestic
manners of the planters. Mr. Kirkland considered the abolition of
slavery a great blessing to the Colony. He said the apprenticeship was a
wretchedly bad system; but things moved smoothly on his estate. He said
the negroes of Amity Hall had formerly borne the character of being the
worst gang in the parish; and when he came to the estate, he found that
half the truth had not been told of them. But they had become remarkably
peaceful and subordinate. He said he looked forward to 1840, with the
most sanguine hope. He believed complete freedom would be the
regeneration of the island. Forty freemen would accomplish as much as
eighty slaves. If any of the estates were abandoned by the laborers, it
would be on account of the harsh treatment they received. He knew many
cruel overseers, and he shouldn't be surprised if _they_ lost a part of
their laborers, or all of them.

"Mr. Gordon, the manager of Williamsfield estate, is among the fairest
specimens of planters. He has a naturally generous disposition, which,
like that of Mr. Kirkland, has outlived the witherings of slavery. He
informed us that his people worked as well as they had done under
slavery; and he had every reason to believe they would do still better
after they were completely free. He said he often hired his people on
Saturdays, and it was wonderful, with what increased vigor they worked
when they were to receive wages. Fifty free men would do as much as a
hundred slaves. He condemned the driving system, which was resorted to
by a great many planters.

"Andrew Wright, Esq., proprietor of Green Wall estate, was described to
us as a very amiable, kind man, who was never known to quarrel with any
person in his life. He had a hundred and sixty apprentices at work, and
said they were as peaceable and industrious as he could wish. He said
where there was trouble with the people, he believed it was owing to bad
management. He was quite confident that his laborers would not leave him
after 1840.

"Mr. Briant, manager of Belvidere estate, said he had had no trouble
with his apprentices. They did as much work, for the length of time, as
they did during slavery; but the law allowed them a day and a half for
themselves, and did not require them to work so early in the morning, or
so late at night. He said the apprentices were not willing to work for
their masters on Saturday, for the customary wages, which were about a
quarter of a dollar. Upon inquiry, we ascertained that the reason was,
they could make twice, or three times as much by cultivating their
provision-grounds and carrying the produce to market. At night, when
they couldn't work on their grounds, he said they worked very cheerfully
for their masters. Where there was mild management, he had no doubt the
negroes would remain and work well.

"In Bath, we met with the proprietor of a coffee estate, who gave a very
favorable account of his laborers. He said they were as orderly and
industrious as he could desire; he had their confidence, and had no
doubt he should retain it after they were entirely free. He felt assured
that if the planters would only conduct in a proper manner, emancipation
would prove a blessing to the whole Colony."


TESTIMONY OF MAGISTRATES IN 1837.

William H. Anderson, Esq., Solicitor General, made a written statement,
from which I extract the following: "A very material change for the
better has taken place in the sentiments of the community, since slavery
was abolished. Religion and education were formerly opposed, as
subversive of the security of _property_; now, they are encouraged, in
the most direct manner, as its best support. Many proprietors give land
for schools and chapels; also subscriptions to a large amount. Had the
negroes been entirely emancipated in 1834, they would have been much
further advanced in 1840, than they can be at the end of the
apprenticeship, through which both masters and servants are laboring
heavily. That the negroes will work, if moderately compensated, no
candid man can doubt. Their endurance for the sake of a very little gain
is quite amazing; and they are very desirous to procure for themselves
and families as large a share as possible of the comforts and decencies
of life. I have not heard one man assert that it would be an advantage
to return to slavery, even if it were practicable; and I believe the
public begin to be convinced that slave labor is not the cheapest. In my
opinion, the negroes are very acute in their perceptions of justice and
injustice. They fully appreciate the benefits of equitable legislation,
and would unreservedly submit to it, where they felt confidence in the
purity of its administration. They are ardently attached to the British
government, and would be so to the Colonial, were it to indicate any
purposes of kindness or protection toward them; but hitherto the
enactments with reference to them have been almost wholly coercive. They
are very desirous for education and religious instruction; no man who
has attended to the matter can gainsay that. Marriage was formerly
unknown among them. Their masters considered them as so many brutes for
labor and increase, and I fear they came to regard themselves so. But
now concubinage is becoming quite disreputable, and many are marrying
those with whom they formerly lived in that relation. The partial
modification of slavery has been attended with so much improvement in
all that constitutes the welfare and respectability of society, that I
cannot doubt there would be an increase of the benefits, if there were a
total abolition of all the old restrictions."

"Cheney Hamilton, Esq., one of the Special Magistrates for Port Royal,
said there were three thousand apprentices in his district. They were as
quiet and industrious as they ever were, and were always willing to work
in their own time for wages. The district was never under better
cultivation. The masters were doing nothing for the education of the
apprentices. Their only object seemed to be to get as much work out of
them as possible. The complaints brought before him mostly originated
with the planters and were of a trivial nature, such as petty thefts and
absence from work. He said if we would compare the complaints brought by
overseers and apprentices against each other, we should see for
ourselves which party was the most peaceable and law-abiding. Real
estate is more valuable than before emancipation. Property is more
secure, and capitalists, consequently, more ready to invest their
funds."

From the written testimony of E. B. Lyon, Esq., Special Justice, I
extract the following: "The estates of the Blue Mountain Valley, over
which I preside, contain 4,227 apprentices. When I assumed the duties of
a special magistrate, they were the most disorderly on the island. They
were almost desperate from disappointment in finding their trammels
under the new law nearly as burdensome as under the old, and their
condition in many respects much more intolerable. But they submitted, in
many instances, with the most extraordinary patience, to evils which
were the more onerous, because inflicted under the affected sanction of
a law, whose advent they expected would have been attended with a train
of blessings. I succeeded in making satisfactory arrangements between
the masters and apprentices; and no peasantry, in the most favored
country on the globe, can have been more irreproachable in morals and
conduct, than the majority of apprentices in that district, since the
beginning of 1835. It has been my pleasant duty to report to the
Governor, month after month, improvement in their manners and condition,
and a greater amount of work than during slavery. That proprietors have
confidence in the future is evinced by the expensive repair of buildings
on various estates, the enlargement of works, and the high prices given
for land, which would scarcely have commanded a purchaser at any price,
during slavery. In my district, the apprentices are invariably willing
to work on the estates for hire, during their own time. In no community
in the world, is crime less prevalent. The offences brought before me
are mostly of a trivial description; such as turning out late, or
answering impatiently. In fact, the majority of apprentices on estates
have quietly performed their duty and respected the laws. The
apprenticeship has, I fear, retarded the rapidity with which
civilization should have advanced, and sown the seeds of a feeling even
more bitter than that which slavery had engendered."


TESTIMONY OF MISSIONARIES, IN 1837.

Rev. Mr. Crookes, of the Wesleyan Mission, said to Mr. Thome: "In many
respects there has been a great improvement since the abolition of
slavery. The obstacles to religious effort have been considerably
diminished; but we owe that mainly to the protection of British law. I
believe many of the planters would still persecute the missionaries, and
tear down their chapels, if they dared. I abominate the apprentice
system. At best, it is only mitigated slavery. I am convinced that
immediate and entire emancipation would have been far better policy."
The Rev. Jonathan Edmonson, and Rev. Mr. Wooldridge agreed in testifying
that the planters generally, were doing "comparatively nothing to
prepare the negroes for freedom." "Their sole object seemed to be to get
as much work as possible out of them before 1840." "Their conduct was
calculated to make the apprentices their bitter enemies."

The Wesleyan Missionary at Bath said: "There are some bad characters
among the negroes, as there are everywhere, among all classes of people.
But generally they are docile and well behaved. They are eager for
instruction. After working all day, they come several miles to our
evening schools, and stay cheerfully till nine o'clock. Mothers with
sucking babes in their arms stand, night after night, in our classes,
learning the alphabet. If they can obtain even the leaf of a book they
make it their constant companion. They are very easily won by acts of
kindness. Sometimes they burst into tears and say to the missionaries,
'Massa _so_ kind! Me heart full.'"

Mr. Thome says: "While we were at Garden River Valley, we attended
service in the Baptist Chapel, on the summit of a high mountain,
overlooking the sea. Seen from the valley below, it appears to topple on
the brink of a frightful precipice. As we ascended the steep and
winding road, we saw throngs of apprentices, coming from many miles
round, in every direction. The men halted in the thick woods to put on
their shoes, which they brought in their hands up the mountain, and the
women to draw on their white stockings. Mr. Kingdon, the pastor asked us
to address his people, and we cannot soon forget the scene that
followed. We had scarcely uttered a sentence, expressive of our sympathy
with their condition, and our interest in their temporal and spiritual
welfare, before the whole audience began to weep. Some sobbed, others
cried aloud; insomuch that for a time we were unable to proceed. When we
spoke of it afterwards to their pastor, he said, 'The idea that a
stranger and a foreigner should take an interest in their welfare
stirred the deep fountains of their hearts. They are so unaccustomed to
hear such language from white people, that it fell upon them like rain
on the parched earth.'"


JAMAICA BETWEEN 1837 AND 1846.

As time passed on, the conviction deepened in the minds of magistrates,
missionaries, and the more reflecting among the planters, that slavery,
by its very nature, did not admit of any modification. The
apprenticeship system proved "hateful to the slave, obnoxious to the
master, and perplexing to the magistrates." Some of the apprentices
bought their time; and their orderly, industrious habits afterward
confirmed the growing impression that entire emancipation was the _best
policy_. The Marquis of Sligo, the humane and just Governor of Jamaica,
was a large proprietor, and he manifested his sentiments by liberating
all his apprentices. His example had great influence. Public opinion was
again roused in England. Petitions from all classes poured into
Parliament, begging that the apprenticeship might be abolished; on the
ground that the planters had violated the contract; that they did not
use the system as a preparation for freedom, but for purposes of
continued oppression. The result of these combined influences was that
the field-laborers were not held in apprenticeship till 1840, but were
entirely emancipated, with the household slaves, on the first day of
August, 1838. Rev. James Phillippo, Baptist Missionary in Jamaica, thus
describes the day: "On the preceding evening, the missionary stations
throughout the island were crowded with people, filling all the places
of worship. They remained at their devotions till the day of liberty
dawned, when they saluted it with joyous acclamations. Then they
dispersed through the towns and villages, singing 'God save the queen'
and rending the air with their shouts: 'Freedom's come!' 'We're free!
We're free!' 'Our wives and children are free!' During the day, the
places of worship were crowded to suffocation. The scenes presented
exceeded all description. Joyous excitement pervaded the whole island.
At Spanish Town, the Governor, Sir Lionel Smith, addressed the
emancipated people, who formed a procession of 7,000, and escorted the
children of the schools, about 2,000 in number, to the Government House.
They bore banners and flags with various inscriptions, of which the
following are samples. 'Education, Religion, and Social Order.' 'August
First, 1838; the Day of our Freedom.' 'Truth and Justice have at last
prevailed.' The children sang before the Government House, and His
Excellency made a speech characterized by simplicity and affection,
which was received with enthusiastic cheers. The procession then
escorted their pastor to his house. In front of the Baptist Chapel were
three triumphal arches, decorated with leaves and flowers, and
surmounted by flags, bearing the inscriptions, 'Freedom has come!'
'Slavery is no more!' 'The chains are broken, Africa is free!' The
enthusiasm of the multitude was wound up to the highest pitch. They
wanted to greet all the flags; many of which bore the names of their
benefactors, 'Sturge,' 'Brougham,' 'Sligo,' etc. The flags were
unfurled, and for nearly an hour the air rang with exulting shouts, in
which the shrill voices of the 2,000 children joined: 'We're free! We're
free!' 'Our wives and our children are free!'"

Several of the kindly disposed planters gave rural fêtes to the
laborers. Long tables were spread in the lawns; arches of evergreens
were festooned with flowers; and on the trees floated banners, bearing
the names of those who had been most conspicuous in bringing about this
blessed result. Songs were sung, speeches made, prayers offered, and a
plentiful repast eaten. Mr. Phillippo says: "The conduct of the newly
emancipated peasantry would have done credit to Christians of the most
civilized country in the world. They were clean in their persons, and
neat in their attire. Their behavior was modest, unassuming, and
decorous in a high degree. There was no crowding, no vulgar familiarity,
but all were courteous and obliging to each other, as members of one
harmonious family. There was no dancing, gambling, or carousing. All
seemed to have a sense of the obligations they owed to their masters, to
each other, and to the civil authorities. The masters who were present
at these fêtes congratulated their former dependents on the boon they
had received, and hopes were mutually expressed that all past
differences and wrongs might be forgiven. Harmony and cheerfulness
smiled on every countenance; and the demon of discord disappeared, for a
season. On some of the estates where these festivals were held, the
laborers, with few individual exceptions, went to work as usual on the
following day. _Many of them gave their first week of free labor as an
offering of good-will to their masters._ Thus the period, from which
many of the planters had apprehended the worst consequences, passed away
in peace and harmony. Not a single instance of violence or
insubordination, of serious disagreement or of intemperance, occurred in
any part of the island."

After this safe transition to a better state of things, the public were
informed of no troubles in Jamaica for several years, except deficiency
of labor, and diminished production of sugar. Pro-slavery presses, both
in England and America, eagerly proclaimed these deficiencies as the
results of emancipation. But enough has been already said to prove, to
any candid and reflecting mind, that these effects were attributable to
other causes. _First._ Emancipation found nearly all the estates on the
island heavily mortgaged; most of them for more than they were worth.
The compensation money, received from the British government, was soon
swallowed up, the planters hardly knew how. It helped them to pay off a
portion of their long-accumulating arrears, but left them still involved
in pecuniary difficulties. Many of them had not money to pay for labor;
and some, who had it, retained too much of the spirit of slave-holding
to be scrupulous about paying the negroes for their work. Rev. Mr.
Bleby says: "I know hundreds of colored laborers in Jamaica, who labored
on the sugar plantations, and were defrauded of their wages. I knew a
man who had a salary of one thousand pounds ($4,845) from an office
under government, who employed two or three hundred laborers several
months, then took the benefit of the Insolvent Act, and never paid them
a cent. One of those great planting attorneys, who had fifty or sixty
estates under his management, boasted to a friend of mine, that he made
them profitable, by cheating the laborers out of half their wages, by
one method or another. Is it surprising that the colored people should
prefer to raise produce on a few acres of their own, to working on the
plantations without wages? I was in Kingston when the railroad was made.
It was done entirely by the colored people. The manager told me he could
not desire laborers to work better. And what was the reason? Every
Saturday night he paid them their wages."

_Second._ The tenure by which land was held was very precarious, as has
already been explained by Governor Hincks. Planters in such a perverse
state of mind as many were in Jamaica, were, of course, not slow to
avail themselves of this instrument of oppression. When the emancipated
laborers hired a hut and a bit of land on the estates where they had
been accustomed to work, they were required to pay rent several times
over. According to the statement of the Rev. Mr. Bleby, "The employer,
would say to the husband, 'You must pay in labor, for the rent of your
house.' Then he would say the same to the wife; and perhaps to other
adult members of the family. Thus they managed to get rent paid twice,
and sometimes four times over." If the tenant expressed dissatisfaction,
or gave offence in any way, or if his capricious landlord merely wanted
to make him feel that he was still in his power, he was ejected at once,
and obliged to take for his crops whatever the despotic employer saw fit
to value them at. Such tyrannical proceedings were common all over the
island. If a majority of the planters had _intended_ to drive the
negroes away from their estates, and force them "to skulk in the woods
and live upon yams," as they had predicted, they could not have adopted
a policy better suited to their purpose. The negroes, notwithstanding
their strong local attachments, were driven from the sugar estates by
these persecutions; but they did far better than "skulk in the woods,
and retrograde to barbarism," as I shall presently show.

Rev. Mr. Phillippo, writing in 1843, says: "The planters persisted in
their designs, and, at last multitudes of laborers were compelled to
sacrifice their feelings of attachment to their domiciles, and to
establish themselves in freeholds of their own. Hence, and from no other
cause, arose those reports of insolence and idleness, so widely and
perseveringly circulated against the peasantry. It is delightful to add
that the injustice and impolicy of such conduct have now become
generally manifest; so that the causes of mutual dissatisfaction are
now, to a considerable extent, extinct."

An intelligent gentleman in St. Thomas said to Mr. Thome, "The planters
have set their hearts upon the ruin of the island, and they will be
sorely disappointed, if it shouldn't come." But this disappointment was
in reserve for them, and no ingenuity of theirs could prevent it. As
individuals, they suffered for their blind and narrow policy; but public
prosperity began to move steadily onward.

The Lord Bishop of Jamaica, in a circular recommending the establishment
of schools for the emancipated peasantry, dated November, 1838, makes
the following statement: "The peaceable demeanor of the objects of our
instruction, and their generally acknowledged good behavior, are the
natural fruits of being made better acquainted with the saving truths of
the gospel; and no stronger proof can be given of their desire to obtain
this knowledge than the fact that their choice in fixing their
settlements is often influenced by the opportunities afforded for
acquiring moral and religious instruction for themselves and their
children."

Early in 1839, Sir Lionel Smith, Governor of the island, made the
following statement, in an official document: "I have sent numerous
testimonies to England, to show that where labor has been encouraged by
fair remuneration and kind treatment, it has nowhere been wanting."

A part of the outcry concerning want of labor, and the depreciation of
property arose from managers and attorneys, who conducted affairs for
absentee proprietors. They wanted to buy estates themselves, at a low
price; therefore, they irritated and discouraged the laborers, with the
intention of driving them from the estates; and in some cases, they
burned the sugar cane after it was gathered; giving as a reason that,
from scarcity of labor, they could not convert it into sugar, except at
prices which would entail a loss. The statements of such interested and
unprincipled men were eagerly republished by pro-slavery papers in
England and America; but, in this country, it was impossible for friends
of freedom to procure any extensive republication of such testimony as
the following, from the Rev. D. S. Ingraham, pastor of a church near
Kingston, Jamaica, who visited the United States in 1840, and gave the
following written testimony for publication: "Emancipation has greatly
improved the value of all kinds of property. Land near my residence,
which sold for fifteen dollars an acre a short time before emancipation,
has been sold recently for sixty dollars an acre; and had there been ten
times as much for sale, it would have sold readily for that price. I
know of much land that now _leases_ for more money in one year, than it
would have _sold_ for under slavery. Peace and safety have been promoted
by emancipation. It was formerly thought necessary to have six regiments
of soldiers, to keep the slaves in subjection, and also for the militia
to meet monthly in each parish. Since freedom was declared, half of the
soldiers have been removed; and where I live, the militia have entirely
ceased to muster.[7] Emancipation has diminished crime. Jails formerly
well filled, and often crowded, now have few tenants. A part of the
house of correction in my parish is converted into a hospital, and the
bloody old tread-mill is incrusted with rust. Emancipation has promoted
industry. A gentleman, who has been a planter in Jamaica for twenty
years, told me there was undoubtedly far more work done in the island
now than ever before. Indeed, any one can see that such is the case.
Wherever you look, you see the forests giving place to gardens and
cornfields, and numbers of comfortable houses growing up under the hand
of industry and perseverance. Many villages have been built up entirely
since freedom by those who were formerly slaves. A spirit of improvement
has been called forth. Roads and streets are being McAdamized; there are
many new markets in different parts of the country. Agricultural
Societies are forming; and ploughs are coming into use. An overseer
lately told me that he now ploughed upland for canes at one dollar and
seventy-five cents per acre, instead of paying fifteen dollars an acre,
to have it dug up, as formerly. There is a universal desire for
knowledge among the emancipated people. They often send twenty miles in
search of a preacher, or teacher. They have come to me and pleaded with
an eloquence that no Christian could resist, saying: 'Minister, _do_
come and see we! We all ignorant; and so much big pickaniny, that don't
know nothing. _Do_ try for get we a teacher! We will take care of him.'"

Joseph J. Gurney, who visited Jamaica in 1840, says: "The imports of the
island are rapidly increasing; trade improving; towns thriving; new
villages rising up in every direction; property is much enhanced in
value; well-managed estates are productive and profitable; expenses of
management diminished; short methods of labor adopted; provisions
cultivated on a larger scale than ever; and the people, wherever they
are properly treated, are industrious, contented, and gradually
accumulating wealth. Above all, the morals of the community are
improving, and education is rapidly spreading.

"Under slavery, two hundred slaves were supported on the Papine estate;
it is now worked by forty-three laborers. The estate of Halberstadt used
to support one hundred and seventy slaves; now fifty-four laborers do
all the work required. The support of the slaves on this estate cost
£850 annually; the annual wages of the free laborers amount to £607
10s. 3d.

"'Do you see that excellent new stone wall round the field below us?'
said a young physician. 'The necessary labor could not have been hired
under slavery, or the apprenticeship, at less than thirteen dollars per
chain; under freedom it cost only four dollars per chain. Still more
remarkable is the fact that the whole of it was built, under the
stimulus of job-work, by an invalid negro, who, under slavery, had been
given up to total inaction.' Such was the fresh blood infused into the
veins of this decrepit person by the genial hand of freedom, that he had
executed a noble work, greatly improved his master's property, and
realized for himself a handsome sum of money."

Dr. Stewart said to Mr. Gurney, "I believe, in my conscience, that
property in Jamaica, _without_ the slaves, is as valuable as it formerly
was _with_ them; and I believe its value would be doubled by sincerely
turning away from all relics of slavery to the honest free working of a
free system."

A despatch from Sir Charles Metcalfe, read in the House of Commons,
1842, declares: "The present condition of the peasantry of Jamaica is
very striking. They are much improved in their habits, and are generally
well-ordered and free from crime. They subscribe for their respective
churches, and are constant in their attendance on divine worship,
wearing good clothes, and many of them riding on horses. They send their
children to school, and pay for their schooling." "It appears wonderful
how so much has been accomplished in the island, in building, planting,
digging, and making fences. The number of freeholders, who have become
freeholders by their own industry and accumulation, amounted in 1840 to
7,340."

The _Jamaica Morning Journal_ in February, 1843, says: "It is gratifying
to observe the impetus which has been given to agricultural and literary
societies. We do not recollect ever to have seen such vigorous efforts
put forth for the improvement of the people and of agriculture, as have
been within the last few months."

Rev. Mr. Phillippo, writing in the same year, says: "The term indolent
can only be applied to the black population in the absence of
remunerating employment; and even then they work on their own
provision-grounds. Jamaica peasants are seldom seen lounging about,
loitering along the roads, or spending their money at taverns and other
similar places of resort. As for the great bulk of the people, making
allowance for climate, no peasantry in the world can display more
cheerful and persevering industry. In the time of slavery, unrestrained
licentiousness was the order of the day. Every estate and every negro
hut was a brothel. Now, marriage is the rule and concubinage the
exception. Although every trifling infraction of the laws (contrary to
former usage) is now publicly known and punished by magistrates, empty
jails, and the absence of serious offences from the calendar of the
courts, are sufficient evidence of the general decrease of crime."

The _Jamaica Morning Journal_, March, 1843, says: "Our readers will be
surprised and pleased to learn that for the last five days not a single
prisoner has been committed to the cage in this city [Kingston]. We
record this fact with great pleasure, as we believe such a circumstance
never before occurred since the building of the city."

Rev. Mr. Bleby says: "Before I left Jamaica (which was previous to
1848), no less than 50,000 colored people had become freeholders, as the
fruit of their own industry. We are told these people will not work. How
did they obtain these freeholds then? Some of them have mahogany
bedsteads and side-boards in their houses. How do they get such
furniture, except as the result of their own toil?"


JAMAICA AFTER 1846.

Now we are coming upon sad times. It has been stated that the West
Indies had the monopoly of sugar in the British market, at an immense
cost to the consumers. This had frequently called out remonstrances from
the British people; and in 1846 government repealed the tariff, which
excluded other countries from competition. The result was a sudden and
great fall in the price of sugar. "In 1840, sugar sold in bond at 49s. a
cwt. ($11.86.) In 1848, it had sunk to 23s. 5d. ($5.65.") The result was
many millions of dollars less in the receipts for their crops; and that
was far from being the worst feature in the case. Business in the West
Indies had for generations been carried on upon credit; and now credit
was gone. The writer in the _Edinburgh_ thus states the case: "The vast
capital requisite for the production of sugar had been annually advanced
by merchants in London, on the security of the crops. But, of course,
when it was known that sugar had fallen so enormously in value, the
merchants took fright, and the credit of the planter was gone. He was
embarked in transactions on which a vast capital had been laid out, and
which required a vast capital to carry them on; and capital he could not
obtain." The suffering was dreadful. Thousands of families accustomed to
the luxuries of wealth were reduced to poverty, without any of the
habits that would have enabled them to bear it bravely. Their cry of
distress resounded through the world. Pro-slavery presses in England and
America exultingly proclaimed, "Behold the effects of emancipation?" and
people without examining the subject, echoed the railing accusation. But
one very important circumstance was overlooked; viz., that when this cry
of distress arose, _slavery had been abolished fourteen years, and the
apprenticeship had been abolished ten years_. By a little examination
they might have ascertained that, previous to the repeal of the tariff,
things were going on prosperously in the West Indies; which is
sufficiently indicated by the fact that just before the blow came, they
had been making an outlay to produce larger crops; a circumstance which
rendered the blow all the heavier. Even Jamaica, with all her wretched
mismanagement and financial disorders, was _beginning_ to be prosperous,
in consequence of emancipation, as we have shown.

Of the fall of property, subsequent to the repeal of the tariff some
estimate may be formed from the following item. In 1838, the La Grange
estate was sold for £25,000 ($121,125); and in 1840 the Windsor Forest
estate sold for £40,000 ($193,800). In 1850, both those estates sold
together for £11,000 ($53,295).

Mr. Bigelow, of the _New York Evening Post_, who visited Jamaica in
1850, says: "It is difficult to exaggerate, and still more difficult to
define the poverty and industrial prostration of Jamaica. The natural
wealth and spontaneous productiveness of the island are so great, that
no one can starve, and yet it seems as if the faculty of accumulation
were suspended. The productive power of the soil is running to waste;
the finest land in the world may be had almost for the asking; labor
receives no compensation; and the product of labor does not seem to know
the way to market."

The soil still continued to be owned chiefly by absentees; an
unincumbered estate of any size or value was hardly to be found; and
since the depreciation of property, it was impossible to borrow money,
to any considerable extent, on Jamaica estates.

Mr. Bigelow informs us that "Jamaica imports, annually, 70,000 barrels
of flour; 90,000 bushels of corn; 300,000 pounds of tobacco; and 10 or
12,000,000 feet of lumber and sawed stuff. They have magnificent
forests, but not a sawmill on the island. Even their bricks they import.
They pay extravagant prices for articles, which could be cultivated in
Jamaica with the utmost ease and abundance. Butter is 37½ cts. a pound;
milk 18¾ cts. a quart; flour from sixteen to eighteen dollars a barrel;
etc. Nothing apparently can be more unnatural than for the people of
this island, in their present poverty-stricken condition, to be paying
such prices for daily food; yet nothing is more inevitable, so long as
the land is held in such large quantities, and by absentee landlords.
Till recently, such a thing was never known as a small farm of fifty or
a hundred acres to be put under culture for profit."

As the planters and their advocates were continually complaining that
wages were ruinously high, Mr. Bigelow made it a subject of special
inquiry. He says: "To my utter surprise, I learned that the wages of men
on the sugar and coffee plantations ranged from eighteen to twenty-four
cents a day; and proportionably less for women and children. Out of
these wages the laborers have _to board themselves_. Now, when it is
considered that flour is eighteen dollars a barrel, eggs from three to
five cents a piece, and ham twenty-five cents a pound, does not this cry
of high wages appear absurd? Was the wolf's complaint of the lamb, for
muddying the stream below him, more unreasonable? Are wages lower in any
quarter of the civilized world? Four-fifths of all the grain consumed in
Jamaica is grown in the United States, on fields where labor costs more
than four times this price, and where every kind of provision, except
fruit, is less expensive. The fact is, the negro cannot live on such
wages, unless he ekes them out by stealing, or owns a lot of three or
five acres. He is driven by necessity to purchase land and cultivate it
for himself. He finds such labor so much better rewarded than that he
bestows on the lands of others, that he naturally takes care of his own
first, and gives his leisure to the properties of others.

"Of course, it requires no little energy and self-denial for a negro,
upon such wages, to lay up enough to purchase a little estate; but if he
does get one, he never parts with it, except for a larger or better one.
I was greatly surprised to find the number of these colored proprietors
already considerably over 100,000, and continually increasing. When one
reflects that only sixteen years ago there was scarcely a colored
landholder on the island, it is unnecessary to say that this class of
the population appreciate the privileges of free labor and a homestead
far more correctly than might be expected; more especially when it is
borne in mind that seven-tenths of them were born in slavery, and spent
many years as bondmen. Their properties average, I should think, about
three acres. They have a direct interest in cultivating them
economically and intelligently. The practice of planning their own
labor, encouraged by the privilege of reaping its rewards, exerts upon
them the most important educational influence; the results of which will
soon be much more apparent than they now are."

Pro-slavery writers declare that these negro farmers have not raised
five pounds of sugar a year for exportation. But does that prove they
are lazy? Where butter is 37½ cts. a pound, eggs from three to five
cents a piece, onions 12½ cts. a pound, and other provisions at the same
rate, they can turn their land to better account, than to enter into
competition with sugar makers. When the same system is introduced that
Gov. Hincks mentions in Barbadoes, they will doubtless turn their
attention to raising sugar canes.

There is much evidence that there is no actual want of labor in Jamaica,
though it has doubtless been alienated from the large sugar plantations.
Firstly, by the harsh and unjust treatment of many of the planters.
Secondly, by the state of bankruptcy in which emancipation found them,
and which rendered them unable to pay for work. Thirdly, and probably
the strongest cause for all, was the inability of the laborers to hire
land on their estates, with any degree of security. Mr. Charles Tappan,
of Boston, who visited Jamaica in 1858, says: "The alleged want of labor
is a false cry. Where labor is said to be deficient, it can be traced
to causes within the planters' control to remove. Of these, insufficient
wages, unpunctual payment of the same, or no payment at all, are stated
to be the chief." "In conversing with planters, I learned that laborers
can easily be obtained for a fair compensation and kind treatment. But
it is a fact that the emancipated much prefer to work on their own few
acres of land." Mr. S. B. Slack, an old native resident of Jamaica,
writes thus to Mr. Tappan in 1858: "With few exceptions the planters now
acknowledge that emancipation was a blessing. Some soreness was felt at
the commencement; and it was manifested in the injudicious acts of
ejecting laborers from the cottages they had occupied since infancy, and
destroying their provision-grounds, which led them to purchase freeholds
of their own, and thus become independent of their labor on the estates.
But if the negroes are as lazy as they are represented, how is it that
in the construction of a new road across the island more laborers can be
obtained than are required? How is it that the Water Works Company are
sure to have competitors for employment? How does it happen that the
Railway Company are equally well off for labor? The answer is, because
the laborers are liberally and punctually paid; and they are willing to
work, when they are sure to obtain the reward."

Sir Charles Grey, who was Governor of Jamaica, in 1850, says: "There are
few races of men who will work harder, or more perseveringly, than the
negroes, when they are sure of getting the produce of their labor."

The Free Villages, which have sprung up since emancipation are described
by all travellers as a new and most pleasing feature in the scenery of
the West Indies. In the days of slavery, laborers generally lived in
thatched hovels, with mud walls, thrown together without any order or
arrangement. A few calabashes, a water jar, and a mortar for pounding
corn, mainly constituted their furniture. As the women were driven into
the fields to toil early and late, they had no time for household
cleanliness. These negro dwellings looked picturesque in the distance,
nestling among palm-trees and tamarind groves; but, like slavery itself,
they would not bear a close inspection. As you came near them, the
senses were offended by decaying vegetables, and nauseous effluvia.
Now, the laborers live in Free Villages, regularly laid out. The houses
are small, many of them, built of stone or wood, with shingled roofs,
green blinds, and verandahs, to shield them from the sun. Most of them
are neatly thatched, and generally plastered and whitewashed outside and
in. They now have looking-glasses, chairs, and side-boards decorated
with pretty articles of glass and crockery. Each dwelling has its little
plot of vegetables, generally neatly kept, and many of them have
flower-gardens in front, glowing with all the bright hues of the
tropics. In 1843, Mr. Phillippo said that, by a rough estimate, the
number of these villages in Jamaica was about two hundred, and the
number of acres of land purchased was not less than 100,000. It was
estimated that in the course of four years, the emancipated apprentices
had paid £170,000 ($823,650) for land and buildings. And that was done
when wages were from eighteen to twenty-four cents a day, out of which
they boarded themselves! And these were the people who, the
slave-holders were so sure would "skulk in the woods, and live on yams,"
rather than work, after they ceased to be flogged!

The names of these villages give pleasant indication of the gratitude of
the colored people toward their benefactors. They are called Clarkson,
Wilberforce, Buxton, Brougham, Macaulay, Thompson, Gurney, Sligo, etc.
The names given to their own little homes have almost a poetic interest,
so touching and expressive is their simplicity. The following are
samples: "Happy Retreat;" "Thank God for it;" "A Little of my Own;"
"Liberty and Content;" "Thankful Hill;" "Come and See."

Joseph J. Gurney visited Clarkson Town in the winter of 1839, and has
recorded that he was "delighted with its appearance, and with the
manners, intelligence, and hospitality of the people." Mr. Phillippo,
who was familiar with these villages, says: "The groups often presented
are worthy of the painter's pencil, or the poet's song. Amid the
stillness of a Sabbath evening, many families, after their return from
the house of God, may be seen gathered together in the shadow of the
trees, which overhang their cottages, singing hymns, or listening to the
reading of the Scriptures, with none to molest or make them afraid."

Mr. Charles Tappan says: "On landing at Kingston, I must confess I was
half inclined to believe the story so industriously circulated, that the
emancipated slave is more idle and vicious than any other of God's
intelligent creatures; but when I rode through the valleys and over the
mountains, and found everywhere an industrious, sober people, I
concluded all the vagabonds of the island had moved to the sea-shore, to
pick up a precarious living by carrying baggage, begging, etc.; and
such, upon inquiry, I found to be the fact. Wherever I went in the rural
districts, I found contented men and women, cultivating sugar cane, and
numerous vegetables and fruits, on their own account. Their neat,
well-furnished cottages compared well with the dwellings of pioneers in
our own country. I found in them mahogany furniture, crockery and glass
ware, and shelves of useful books. I saw Africans, of unmixed blood,
grinding their own sugar cane in their own mills, and making their own
sugar. I attended a large meeting called to decide the question about
inviting a schoolmaster to settle among them. There was only one man who
doubted the expediency of taking the children from work and sending them
to school. One said: 'My little learning enabled me to see that a note,
given to me in payment for a horse, was not written according to
contract.' Another said: 'I should have been wronged out of forty pounds
of coffee I sold in Kingston, the other day, if I hadn't known how to
cipher.' Another said: 'I shall not have much property to leave my
children, but if they have learning, they can get property.' Another
said: 'Those that can read will be more likely to get religion.' All
these people had been slaves, or were the children of slaves. I saw no
intoxicated person in Jamaica; and when it is considered that every man
there can make rum, it strikes me as very remarkable."

Here we have the germ of that middling class, which is the best reliance
in every community, and which can never co-exist with slavery.

The fall of sugar as we have said prostrated the West Indies for a time;
and no Colony was so badly situated to sustain it as Jamaica, with her
overwhelming debts, her wretched management, her financial disorders,
and her laborers alienated from the sugar estates by persistence in
treating freemen as if they were slaves. Lord Sligo stated, in an
official report, that many of the planters threw estates out of
cultivation in 1832, because they were so sure that the negroes would
not work after the Act of Emancipation had passed. Then, when the fall
of sugar came in 1847 a great many planters were obliged to abandon
their estates, from inability to borrow money to carry them on. Mr.
Bigelow states that, in 1850, there were 400,000 acres of sugar and
coffee plantations abandoned to weeds and under-bush.

But there is a recuperative power in Free Trade, as there is in Free
Labor. The West Indies soon began to rise from the severe but temporary
pressure, occasioned by the repeal of the Tariff. In some cases property
passed out of the fettered hands of bankrupts to those, who being
unincumbered, could take a fair start; while some of the old proprietors
learned wisdom from experience, and managed more judiciously. Even
Jamaica is coming in for her share in these beneficial changes. That her
waste places are beginning to be restored is indicated by the following
article from the _Kingston Morning Journal_, 1857: "On Monday last, the
roads leading to Great Valley estate presented a lively appearance. Men
and women, old and young, strong and weak, were all hastening toward a
common point of attraction. Gaudy handkerchiefs were flying from
flagpoles, the people were singing and dancing, and every thing gave
token of a day much honored by the peasantry. It was no wedding or
merry-making. They were in working clothes, with hoes and pickaxes on
their shoulders. From every track and by-path came individuals to
increase the crowd. All seemed happy and in haste. All were sweeping
toward the gate of the Great Valley works. We said to an old man, whose
head was white with the frost of eighty winters: 'Hallo! where are all
these people going?' Taking off his cap, he answered, 'Me good buckra,
me neber expect to see him Great Valley da rise. Him goin' for 'tablish
cane; make sugar agin. Good for we all. Eberybody for help.' 'But you
are too old to do any thing.' 'Da true, me massa. Me no hab trong. But
me must do someting. Me fetch water. Me heart trong, do me han' weak.'
To another we said: 'Where are you taking that cart-load of cane-tops
to, my man?' 'To the Great Valley, sir. They are going to establish the
sugar estate again; and I am carrying them all the cane-tops I have, to
plant.' We said to a woman with a great bundle of cane-tops on her head,
'Are you going to the Great Valley, too?' 'Yes, sir. It's a great day
for us all. Everybody must help.' To another, who headed a group of
seventy or eighty children, we said, 'Where are you going, my friend?'
'I am the master of Pondside school, sir. The girls and boys all begged
a holiday, to carry cane-tops to the Great Valley, and help them dig
cane-holes. A new proprietor has bought the estate, and everybody wants
to help him.' 'But don't you think there will be difficulty in procuring
labor?' 'No, sir, not a bit; if the people are treated honestly and
kindly. The new proprietor has a kindly way with him, and treats the
people encouragingly; and a kind word goes a great way with our people.
But I must follow my scholars. You can hear by their noise that they
have already joined the digging party, there where the flags are
flying.' And sure enough the ringing sound of children's shouts and
laughter was borne joyously on the breeze.

"Great Valley is a noble estate of 4,000 acres, pleasantly situated
between hills. It was formerly considered the second estate in the
parish of Hanover. Now the works looked like some venerable ruin.
Windows broken, chimneys tumbling, roofs falling in, lightning-rod
swinging to and fro, carts and trucks rotting in the middle of the yard,
the noble tank filled up with weeds, among which wild ducks were
floating. But these ruined walls are to be rebuilt. The solitary places,
now musty with mould and decay, will soon be filled with a busy throng,
and the pleasant perfume of sugar-boiling will replace the unwholesome
vapors. It is a pleasant prospect; and seems an omen of more prosperous
days for our Island of Jamaica."

Between 1853 and 1855, there was an increase in exports to the amount of
£166,049 ($804,507.40).

The Governor, in his report for 1855, says: "I feel more confident of
the ultimate restoration of prosperity than I ever did before."

The Governor, in his speech at the opening of the Legislature, 1858,
says: "A still progressive increase, both in the quantity of the staple
exports, and in the amount of revenue derived from duties on articles of
consumption, indicate a gradual improvement in the productive industry
of the Colony." He alludes to a succession of dry seasons, that have
diminished the crops; and yet with that very serious drawback, the
exports were increasing. He admits that complaints still came from the
old plantations of a deficiency of continuous labor; which he says he
can readily believe, from the "admitted fact that the portion of the
agricultural peasantry, who, with their families, industriously and
systematically apply themselves to the independent production of sugar,
and other staples, is day by day increasing."

When Lord Belmore, the Governor in 1832, said to the Jamaica Assembly,
"Depend upon it, gentlemen, the resources of this fine island will never
be fully developed, until slavery is abolished," he gave them very great
offence. The grandsons of the men he offended will see his prediction
verified. Even amid all the desolation and discouragement in 1850, Mr.
Bigelow says: "I made extensive inquiry, but I did not find a man upon
the island who regretted the Emancipation Act, or who, if I may take
their own professions, would have restored slavery, if it had been in
their power."

Ernst Noel, who writes from Jamaica to the _New York Times_, in the
winter of 1860, says: "It is an undoubted fact that the exportation of
coffee in Jamaica has declined from twenty-five and thirty millions to
five and six millions; but it is also an undoubted fact that where one
pound was used in the island prior to emancipation ten are used now.
[Every laborer has his cup of coffee now.] It is my firm conviction that
there is no such great discrepancy between the amount _grown_ at the
time of emancipation, and the amount now grown; especially when the
extent of _exhausted_ coffee land is taken into account. The same
statement will apply with much greater force to provisions of every
description. It is undoubtedly true that most of the large coffee
properties formerly in cultivation have been abandoned, or turned to
other uses. Coffee requires new land; and the clearance of fifty acres
of wood is a Herculean enterprise for coffee planters, among whom want
of _capital_ prevails as much as among sugar planters. But whatever
_large_ coffee planters may say about their profits and losses, it is a
notorious fact that thousands and thousands of settlers grow the
delicious berry to advantage; as any merchant engaged in the trade will
be able to testify. They come to the towns and villages with one, two,
six, or a dozen bags, and in this way many a cargo is made up for
foreign ports."

The same writer says that several experienced planters, to whom he
proposed questions concerning investment of capital in that island,
assured him that profits from ten to twenty per cent might be securely
counted upon.


     NOTE.--In Mauritius, a fertile island in the Indian Ocean,
     belonging to Great Britain, the sugar crop, during the last ten
     years of slavery, averaged 68,741,120 lbs. annually. During four
     years, after emancipation, beginning with 1845, the average crop
     was 171,122,500 lbs.; an increase of 102 millions of pounds
     annually; nearly 150 per cent in favor of free labor.


FOOTNOTES:

[6] The population of Jamaica, at the time of emancipation, was 87,000
whites; 311,692 slaves; 55,000 free colored people.

[7] During slavery, the military defence of the West Indies annually
cost England £2,000,000 ($9,960,000). For the single insurrection of
1832, in Jamaica, it cost the government $800,000: and private property
was destroyed, to the amount of $6,000,000.




CHAPTER VI.

EMANCIPATION SAFE IN EVERY INSTANCE

     "Right _never_ comes wrong."

     --_Old Maxim._


Whenever immediate emancipation is urged, the "horrors of St. Domingo"
are always brought forward to prove it dangerous. This is one of
numerous misstatements originating in prejudice, and afterward taken for
granted by those who have not examined the subject. The first troubles
between the white and black races in St. Domingo were the result of
oppressive and unlawful treatment of the free colored population, who
were numerous, and many of them wealthy proprietors. The whites were
determined to wrest from them certain rights which the French government
had secured to them. The next troubles were occasioned by an attempt to
_restore slavery_, after it had been for some years abolished. It was
never the _granting_ of rights to the colored people that produced
bloodshed or disturbance. All the disasters to the whites came in
consequence of _withholding_ those rights, in the first instance, and
afterward from a forcible attempt to _take them away_, after they had
long been peacefully and prosperously enjoyed under the protection of
French laws.

In 1793, the National Assembly proclaimed liberty to all slaves under
the dominion of France; more than 600,000 in number; and history shows
that the measure proved safe. _In St. Domingo emancipation was both
peaceful and prosperous in its results._ Col. Malenfant, a slave-holder
resident in the island at the time, published "A Historical and
Political Memoir of the Colonies," in which he says: "After this public
act of emancipation the negroes remained quiet, both in the south and
west. There were estates which had neither owners nor managers upon
them; yet upon those estates, though abandoned, the negroes continued
their labors, where there were any of the inferior agents left to guide
them; and where there was no white man, in any capacity, to take
direction of affairs, they betook themselves to planting provisions.
Several of my neighbors, proprietors or managers, were in prison; and
the negroes on their plantations were in the habit of coming to me to
direct them in their work. If you will take care not to talk to them of
the restoration of slavery, but to talk to them of freedom, you may with
that word chain them to their labor. In the plain of the Cul de Sac, on
the plantation Gouraud, I managed four hundred and fifty laborers for
more than eight months after liberty had been granted them. Not one of
them refused to work. Yet that plantation was reputed to have been under
the worst discipline, and the slaves the most idle of any in the plain.
I inspired the same activity into three other plantations, of which I
had the management. Ninety-nine out of a hundred blacks are perfectly
well aware that labor is the process by which they can obtain means to
gratify their wants and their tastes; and therefore they are desirous to
work." In describing the latter part of 1796, Col. Malenfant says: "The
Colony is flourishing. The whites live peacefully and happily upon their
estates, and the negroes continue to work for them." Gen. Lecroix, who
published "Memoirs for a History of St. Domingo," speaks of wonderful
progress in agriculture in 1797. He says: "The Colony marched, as by
enchantment, toward its ancient splendor; cultivation prospered, and
every day furnished perceptible proofs of progress."

SUCH WAS THE EFFECT OF EMANCIPATION IN ST. DOMINGO!

In 1801, Gen. Vincent, a proprietor of estates in St. Domingo, went to
France to lay before the government the plan of a new Constitution for
the island. He found Napoleon Bonaparte, then First Consul, preparing to
send out an armament to restore slavery in St. Domingo. General Vincent
earnestly remonstrated against the expedition. He assured the Consul
that the negroes were orderly and industrious, and that every thing was
going on peacefully and prosperously for all parties; that it was
unnecessary, and therefore cruel, to attempt to reverse this happy
state of things. But there was a class of old despotic planters who
clamored for the restoration of the arbitrary power, which they had most
cruelly abused. Unfortunately, Bonaparte considered it good policy to
conciliate that class; and he persisted in his purpose. He tried to
_restore slavery_, by military force, and the consequence was that the
French were driven out of the island, with great bloodshed.

In Guadaloupe, where liberty was proclaimed at the same time as in St.
Domingo, the sudden transition took place with perfect safety. The
reports from the Governors, for successive years, bear testimony that
the emancipated laborers were universally industrious and submissive to
the laws.

Gen. Lafayette, the consistent friend of human freedom, made a practical
experiment of emancipation, as early as 1785. In the French Colony of
Cayenne, most of the soil belonged to the crown, and he was able to
obtain it on easy terms. He expended $30,000 in purchasing land and
slaves. He employed an amiable and judicious gentleman to take the
management. The first thing the agent did, when he arrived in Cayenne,
was to call the slaves together, and in their presence burn all the
whips and other instruments of punishment. He informed them that their
owner, Gen. Lafayette had bought them for the purpose of enabling them
to obtain their freedom. He then stated to them the laws and regulations
by which the estate would be governed, and the pecuniary advantages that
would be granted, according to degrees of industry. This stimulus
operated like a charm. The energy of the laborers redoubled, and they
were obedient to the wishes of their manager. He died from the effects
of the climate. But when the slaves in all the French Colonies were
emancipated in 1793, the laborers on this estate in Cayenne waited upon
the new agent, and said if the land still belonged to Gen. Lafayette
they wished to resume their labor for him on the old terms, giving as a
reason that they were "desirous to promote the interests of one who had
treated them like men, and cheered their toil by making it a certain
means of freedom."

In 1811 the British authorities emancipated all the slaves in Java. This
also proved a complete success; as any one can ascertain by examining
the account given by Sir Stamford Raffles, who was Governor of the
island.

At successive periods, between 1816 and 1828, the South American
Republics, Buenos Ayres, Chili, Bolivia, Peru, Colombia and Guatemala
emancipated all their slaves. In some of those States means were taken
for the instruction of young slaves, who were enfranchised on arriving
at a certain age. In other States, slaves of all ages were emancipated
after a certain date, fixed by law. In no one instance were these
changes productive of any injury to life or property.

In 1828 the British government emancipated all the slaves in Cape
Colony. 30,000 Hottentot Helots were admitted by law to all the rights
and privileges of the white inhabitants. The slave-holders in the Colony
remonstrated vehemently against this measure. They declared that the
Hottentots were stupid, sensual, brutal, vicious, and totally incapable
of taking care of themselves. They predicted awful outrages, as the
consequence of emancipating a horde of such degraded wretches. But the
event proved quite otherwise. The poor creatures were grateful for their
freedom, and tried to behave as well as they knew how. All went on as
peaceably as before, as concerned the white inhabitants, and much _more_
peaceably, as concerned the blacks, who had previously suffered shocking
barbarities at the hands of their masters. In the sunlight of freedom
even the Hottentots have been gradually emerging out of barbarism. Year
by year they pay more for British manufactures, because they wear calico
and woollen cloth, instead of sheepskin mantles. They have horses and
wagons, and flocks of their own, and their small weekly contributions to
the Missionary Societies at the Cape amount to many hundreds of dollars.

From the time that Mexico became independent of Spain, in 1821, there
was an increasing conviction in the public mind, that the existence of
slavery was inconsistent with their professed principles as a Republic.
This feeling soon manifested itself in laws. The prices of slaves were
fixed by magistrates, and they were required to work, at stipulated
wages, till they had paid for themselves. Protective laws were passed,
enabling the servants to work for others, if they were not justly and
humanely treated by their masters. Transfers of service might also take
place to accommodate the masters; but never without consent of the
servants. Mr. Ward, the British Minister to Mexico, in his work on that
country, speaks very highly of the beneficial effects produced by these
regulations. He says they gave a powerful stimulus to industry, and
rapidly increased agricultural prosperity. A Mississippi slave-holder,
who went to reside in Matamoras, was also so much pleased with the
results of this experiment, that he wrote of it with enthusiasm, as an
example highly important to the United States. He declared that the
value of plantations was soon increased by the introduction of free
labor. He says: "No one was made poor by it. It gave property to the
servant, and increased the riches of the master." Free labor commended
itself so much in this process, that on September 15th, 1829, President
Guerrero published the following decree: "Being desirous to signalize
the Anniversary of Mexican Independence by an act of national justice
and beneficence, we hereby declare slavery forever abolished in this
Republic. Consequently, all those individuals who, until this day, have
been considered slaves, are free!" No interruption of public peace or
prosperity followed this just decree.

In 1831, 3,000 prize negroes received freedom in South Africa; 400 in
one day. No difficulty or disorder occurred. All gained homes; and at
night scarcely an idler was to be seen.

In 1848, the French government, after careful examination into the state
of things in the British West Indies, decreed immediate emancipation to
all the slaves in their Colonies. M. Arago, formerly member of the
Provisional Government, wrote thus, in 1851: "Much has been said of the
ruin which the Act of Emancipation has scattered over our Colonies. But
it should be remembered that _they were in a deplorable condition for a
long time previous. The Chamber of Deputies resounded daily with their
lamentations._ Extreme and utterly inadmissible measures for their
_relief_ were continually proposed. The Act of Emancipation cut
peacefully one of the most complicated questions our social state
afforded. Free labor has taken the place of slave labor without much
resistance. So far, it has been attended with results sufficiently
favorable, and these cannot fail to grow better." O. Lafayette, grandson
of General Lafayette, member of the Chamber of Deputies, wrote thus, in
1851: "In one day, as by the stroke of a wand, 150,000 human beings were
snatched from the degradation, in which they had been held by former
legislation, and resumed their rank in the great human family. And this
great event occurred without any of those disorders and struggles, which
had been threatened, in order to perplex the consciences of the friends
of abolition."

In 1841, the Bey of Tunis prohibited the exportation or importation of
slaves, and declared all children free that should be born in his
dominions after December 8th, 1842. In 1846, he proclaimed that slavery
was abolished entirely, "for the honor of God, and to distinguish man
from the brute creation." To these measures he was greatly influenced by
the British Minister, Sir Thomas Reade.

Not far from the same date, Sweden proclaimed emancipation in the Island
of St. Bartholomew, the only place under her dominion where slavery
existed.

Christian VIII. of Denmark, and his Queen, Caroline, were so openly in
favor of emancipation, that the price of slaves in their dominions
became greatly reduced. The kind-hearted Queen obtained a promise from
the King that he would celebrate the anniversary of their Silver Wedding
by a decree of universal emancipation. Accordingly, on the 28th of July
1847, it was proclaimed that all children born on or after that day
should be free; and that all the slaves in the Danish possessions, about
30,000 in number, should receive their freedom in 1859. This was
intended to give time to prepare for the change; but it worked badly. It
made the negroes restless to hear of freedom without obtaining it; and
this feeling was increased by intercourse with the neighboring French
islands, where all had been proclaimed unconditionally free. The masters
were opposed to emancipation, and not at all disposed to conciliate
their laborers. In July, 1848, local insurrections broke out. A good
deal of property was destroyed, but few lives lost, except those of
slaves who were executed. The panic produced caused a proclamation of
immediate emancipation; since which there have been no insurrections,
nor any fear of them. Fifty dollars for each slave was awarded to the
masters, who have never ceased to grumble against the government and
against the negroes. Such a transition, of course, could not take place
without temporary evils and inconveniences. The effects of a system so
bad as slavery cannot be suddenly outgrown, either by masters or
servants. But improvement is more and more perceptible as years pass on.
A gentleman writing from St. Thomas to the _N. Y. Tribune_, September,
1854, says: "The former owners are constantly complaining of the
ignorance, faithlessness, and degradation of the negroes, without
seeming to have any consciousness of the fact that they themselves have
brought them to this very character and condition. Whether their state
is _at once_ bettered is not the decisive question, but whether they are
in a condition where there is a chance for improvement. And for my own
part, the respectability attained by many persons of color in this town,
and the industry and capacity manifested by large numbers, in various
employments, as artisans, clerks, bookkeepers, and public officials,
give me a hope I never before entertained, of the certain advancement of
the African race, wherever they shall become disembarrassed of the
shackles of slavery, and of an unjust social prejudice."

A Boston gentleman, who visited Santa Cruz in the spring of 1859, writes
thus: "You would be delighted with the effects of emancipation, as we
see them all round us, with abundant opportunities to examine them. The
pay which the Danish government has settled for voluntary labor sounds
very low [five dollars a month]. But the artificial wants of the
laborers are so few, and the necessaries of life are so easily supplied
in this perpetual summer, that the thrifty and industrious have already
succeeded in laying up enough to build comfortable little homes, and
bring up their children to trades. The vice which had always been
encouraged among them, for their masters' gain, carries its poison among
them yet; but they are gradually acquiring a pride of matrimony. A noble
young Episcopal minister is laboring unweariedly for their moral and
intellectual elevation, almost unaided by the white population, who look
coldly upon his labors. The progress made in two years has been
surprising indeed."

In 1857, the Dutch abolished slavery in their West India Colonies. The
government paid a certain sum to the masters, and took the entire
control of the slaves, who were to work till they repaid the sum
advanced for their freedom. Children under five years were free at once,
and moderate prices were fixed by law for all the slave population,
graduated according to their ages. As soon as the stipulated price was
offered by any slave, he became a freeman. Wages were also fixed by law;
and in case any planters refused to submit to the prescribed
regulations, rural settlements were formed where the colored people
could find employment, under the superintendence of managers appointed
by government, aided by colleagues who were elected by the laborers. Of
course, the success of this experiment will greatly depend on the
good-temper and good judgment of the men who manage it. I have no means
of ascertaining the degree of financial prosperity in the Dutch West
India Colonies since emancipation began to take effect; but I know that
_before the abolition of slavery, they were complaining of "ruin" and
begging for "relief."_ The Colony of Surinam, _under slavery_, made this
statement. "Out of nine hundred and seventeen, plantations, six hundred
and thirty-six have been totally abandoned. Of the remainder, sixty-five
grow nothing but wood and provisions." The small balance of estates not
included in this description, were declared to be on the road to
destruction. Whether free labor works better results, time will show.
But one thing is already certain; the transition was made with perfect
safety. In 1859, the Dutch abolished slavery in all their East India
possessions; where it had existed under a comparatively mild form. There
was one very remarkable and beautiful feature in this transaction. The
government offered an assessed compensation to the masters; but _many of
them refused to take it, while others took it and gave it to the
emancipated slaves, who had worked so many years without wages_.

History proves that emancipation has _always_ been safe. It is an
undeniable fact, that not one white person has ever been killed, or
wounded, or had life or property endangered by any violence attendant
upon immediate emancipation, in any of the many cases where the
experiment has been tried. On the contrary, it has always produced a
feeling of security in the public mind.




CHAPTER VII.

CONCLUDING REMARKS.


I appeal to candid readers whether I have not, in the preceding pages,
fairly made out a case in favor of immediate emancipation. I have not
advanced opinions, or theories; I have simply stated facts. In view of
these facts, is it not unjust and irrational to persist in calling
immediate emancipation a "fanatical" idea? Leaving the obvious
considerations of justice and humanity entirely out of the question, I
ask whether experience has not proved it to be a measure of plain,
practical good sense, and sound policy. The trouble in forming a correct
estimate on this subject arises mainly from our proneness to forget that
negroes are _men_, and, consequently, governed by the same laws of human
nature, which govern all men. Compulsion always excites resistance;
reward always stimulates exertion. Kindness has upon the human soul an
influence as renovating as sunshine upon the earth; and no race is so
much and so easily influenced by it as the negroes. Jamaica overseers,
blinded by the long habit of considering slaves as cattle, said to them,
after they became apprentices, "Work faster, you black rascal! or I'll
flog you." That excited the apprentice to remind them they had no power
to do it. The retort enraged the overseers; and the magistrate was
called upon to punish the laborer for his insolence in expressing the
feelings of a man. The Antigua planters acted with more enlightened
policy. They wisely gave up their power into the hands of the law. If
they chanced to see a laborer rather dilatory, they said, "We expect
better things of _freemen_:" and that simple appeal to their manhood, we
are told, invariably quickened their motions, while it gratified their
feelings.

Free labor has so obviously the advantage, in all respects, over slave
labor, that posterity will marvel to find in the history of the
nineteenth century any record of a system so barbarous, so clumsy, and
so wasteful. Let us make a very brief comparison. The slave is bought,
sometimes at a very high price; in free labor there is no such
investment of capital. The slave does not care how slowly or carelessly
he works; it is the freeman's interest to do his work well and quickly.
The slave is indifferent how many tools he spoils; the freeman has a
motive to be careful. The slave's clothing is indeed very cheap, but it
is provided by his master, and it is of no consequence to him how fast
it is destroyed; the hired laborer pays more for his garments, but he
has a motive for making them last six times as long. The slave contrives
to spend as much time as he can in the hospital; the free laborer has no
time to spare to be sick. Hopeless poverty and a sense of being unjustly
dealt by, impels the slave to steal from his master, and he has no
social standing to lose by indulging the impulse; with the freeman pride
of character is a powerful inducement to be honest. A salary must be
paid to an overseer to compel the slave to work; the freeman is impelled
by a desire to increase his property, and add to the comforts of himself
and family. We should question the sanity of a man who took the
main-spring out of his watch, and hired a boy to turn the hands round.
Yet he who takes from laborers the natural and healthy stimulus of
wages, and attempts to supply its place by the driver's whip, pursues a
course quite as irrational.

When immediate emancipation is proposed, those who think loosely are apt
to say, "But would you turn the slaves loose upon society?" There is no
sense in such a question. Emancipated slaves are restrained from crime
by the same laws that restrain other men; and experience proves that a
consciousness of being _protected_ by legislation inspires them with
_respect_ for the laws.

But of all common questions, it seems to me the most absurd one is,
"What would you _do_ with the slaves, if they were emancipated?" There
would be no occasion for doing _any_ thing with them. Their labor is
needed where they are; and if white people can get along with them,
under all the disadvantages and dangers of slavery, what should hinder
their getting along under a system that would make them work better and
faster, while it took from them all motive to rebellion?

It is often asked, "What is your plan?" It is a very simple one: but it
would prove as curative as the prophet's direction, "Go wash, and be
clean." It is merely to stimulate laborers by wages, instead of driving
them by the whip. When that plan is once adopted, education and
religious teaching, and agricultural improvements will soon follow, as
matters of course.

It is not to be supposed that the transition from slavery to freedom
would be unattended with inconveniences. All changes in society involve
some disadvantages, either to classes or individuals. Even the
introduction of a valuable machine disturbs for a while the relations of
labor and capital. But it is important to bear in mind that _whatever
difficulties might attend emancipation would be slight and temporary;
while the difficulties and dangers involved in the continuance of
slavery are permanent, and constantly increasing_. Do you ask in what
way it is to be accomplished? I answer. That must finally be decided by
legislators. It is _my_ business to use all my energies in creating the
_will_ to do it; because I know very well that "Where there is a _will_
there is a _way_;" and I earnestly entreat all who wish well to their
country to aid me in this work.




APPENDIX.

IN WHICH STATEMENTS ARE BROUGHT DOWN TO THE CLOSE OF 1860


Mr. Bigelow, of the _New York Evening Post_, whose book is often quoted
in the preceding pages, testifies to the condition of the British West
India Islands as late as 1850. Ten years later, Mr. William G. Sewell,
of the _New York Times_, visited those Islands, and on his return
published a book called, "THE ORDEAL OF FREE LABOR." It is written in a
very candid spirit, and evinces careful observation. He has no
disposition to conceal that temporary difficulties attend the transition
from one system of labor to another; but he proves conclusively, that
slavery brought increasing ruin, and freedom is bringing increasing
prosperity. We subjoin a few brief extracts:

IMPORTS. "Between 1820 and 1834, British Guiana imported annually to the
value of $3,700,000; in 1850, the imports of Guiana were valued at
$5,660,000. The annual imports of Trinidad, between 1820 and 1834,
averaged in value $1,600,000; in 1859, they were valued at $3,000,000.
The annual imports of Barbadoes, during the same period, averaged in
value $2,850,000; in 1859, they were valued at $4,660,000. The imports
of Antigua, during the same period, averaged $600,000; in 1859, they
were valued at $1,280,000. The total exhibit represents the annual
import trade, before emancipation, as valued at $8,840,000; and valued
at the present time at $14,600,000; or, _an excess of imports, under a
free system, of the value of five millions, seven hundred and sixty
thousand dollars_."

EXPORTS. "For four years prior to emancipation, British Guiana exported
an annual average of 98,000,000 lbs. of sugar; while from 1856 to 1860,
its annual average export rose to 100,600,000 lbs. For four years prior
to emancipation, Trinidad annually exported an average of 37,000,000
lbs. of sugar; while from 1856 to 1860, its annual average export rose
to 62,000,000 lbs. Four years prior to emancipation, Barbadoes annually
exported an average of 32,800,000 lbs. of sugar; from 1856 to 1860, its
annual average export rose to 78,000,000 lbs. Four years prior to
emancipation, Antigua exported an annual average of 19,500,000 lbs. of
sugar; from 1856 to 1860, its annual average export rose to 24,400,000
lbs. The total exhibit is 187,300,000 lbs. annually exported before
emancipation, and 265,000,000 lbs. annually exported now; or, _an excess
of exports, with free labor, of seventy-seven millions, seven hundred
thousand pounds of sugar_."

"In the exports, I have made mention of sugar only; but if all other
articles of commerce be included, and a comparison be instituted between
the import and export trade of Guiana, Trinidad, Barbadoes, and Antigua,
under slavery, and their trade under freedom, _the annual balance in
favor of freedom will be found to have reached already fifteen millions
of dollars, at the very lowest estimate_."

"The increase of imports is to be attributed to the improved condition
and ampler means of the peasantry developed by the dawn of freedom."


EFFECTS OF FREEDOM ON THE LABORERS.

"In Barbadoes, within the last fifteen years, in spite of the
extraordinary price of land and the low rate of wages, the small
proprietors, holding less than five acres, have increased from 1100 to
3537. A great majority of them were formerly slaves. This fact speaks
volumes. It is certainly an evidence of industrious habits, and is a
remarkable contradiction to the prevailing idea that the negro will work
only under compulsion. That idea was formed and fostered from the habits
of the negro as a _slave_. His habits as a _free man_, developed under a
wholesome stimulus and settled by time, are in striking contrast to his
habits as a slave. None are more ready than the planters themselves to
admit that the free laborer is a better, more cheerful, and more
industrious workman than the slave ever was under a system of
compulsion. These are the opinions of men, who were themselves once
violently opposed to freedom, and who still strive to keep the laboring
classes in complete dependence; and they are opinions so universal that
I have sought diligently, but in vain, to hear them contradicted."

"In St. Vincent, the returns for 1857 show that no less than 8209
persons were then living in their own houses, built by themselves since
emancipation. Within the last twelve years, from ten to twelve thousand
acres have been brought under cultivation by small proprietors, owning
from one to five acres, and growing arrow-root, provisions, and minor
articles for export. The statistical returns from which I gather these
figures further state that _there are no paupers on the island_."

"In Trinidad, there is, unquestionably, a certain amount of idleness and
vagabondism among the Creole laborers; but I see no evidence that these
vices exist in larger proportion among them, than they would exist
among any other class of laborers similarly situated. In leaving the
estates, the great majority were actuated by a desire to better their
circumstances, and to lead a more independent life. Land was cheap and
abundant, and they preferred to have their own property, rather than
labor at low wages in a condition of precarious servitude. Added to
this, the course of the planters contributed greatly to the very evil
which they dreaded, and from which they afterward so severely suffered.
Instead of endeavoring by liberal terms to induce the laborers to remain
on the estates, they commenced, shortly after emancipation, a system of
giving less wages, and exacting more work; and when the laborers retired
from estate to field work, they were summarily ejected from the houses
and lands they occupied on the estates, and their provision grounds were
destroyed. The emancipated laborers had, therefore, no resource left but
to separate themselves from the planting interest. Five-sixths of them
became proprietors of from one to ten acres, which they now own, and
which they grow in provisions for themselves and families. To supply
other wants, they give casual labor to the estates; but they are free of
the estates, and can work for whom they deem the best paymaster. If any
doubts that a very large number, a very astonishing number, of the
emancipated laborers have become independent proprietors, let him look
at the score of villages built up since abolition, and so thickly
scattered throughout the cultivated districts of Trinidad that it would
be superfluous in me to point them out."

"Antigua hastened in advance of all other colonies to emancipate her
slaves. She refused to believe in the virtues of an apprenticeship, or
in the doctrine that her bondmen needed a purgatory to prepare them for
freedom. Her rulers were wise in their generation. They foresaw that
with the substitution of free labor for slave labor much had to be
learned, and much to be unlearned; that the success of the new system
could only be determined by time and experience; and that an early start
in the race was a point to be gained, not to be neglected. Antigua has
never had any cause to regret the independent course she then thought
proper to pursue. * * * The improved condition of the peasantry is never
doubted or questioned in the island itself, and it is well shown by the
nature and extent of the imports during late years, as compared with
their nature and extent before emancipation. From 1822 to 1832, the
average annual value of goods imported by Antigua was £130,000 sterling;
in 1858, the island imported to the value of £266,364 sterling. During
ten years preceding emancipation, the average number of vessels that
annually entered the different ports of the island was 340, and the
tonnage 30,000. In 1858, the number of vessels was 668, and the tonnage
42,534. In 1846, there were in the island 67 villages, containing 3187
houses and 9033 inhabitants. All these villages were founded, and all
these houses built, since emancipation. In 1858, 2000 additional houses
had been built, and the number of village residents had risen to 15,644.
At the same period, there were only 299 paupers in the island. The
planters of Antigua avow, what is unquestionably true, that by the
introduction of a cheaper system of labor, the island was saved, in
1834, from impending ruin."

"With regard to Jamaica, I do not mean to say that the estates have
anything like a sufficiency of labor. I merely wish to give point-blank
denial to a very general impression, that the Jamaica negroes will not
work at all. Nine out of ten rely principally upon their own properties
for the support of themselves and their families; but they are willing,
nevertheless, to work for the estates, or on the roads, when it does not
interfere with necessary labor on their own lands. When the choice lies
between the roads and the estates, it is not surprising that they should
select the employer that _pays best and most regularly_. The Jamaica
negro gives as much labor, even to the sugar estates, as he consistently
can, and it is no fault of his if he cannot give enough. They are a
peaceable, law-abiding peasantry, with whom the remembrance of past
wrongs has had so little weight that, from the day of emancipation until
now, they have never dreamed of a hostile combination, either against
their old masters, or the government under which they live; though in
the time of slavery, insurrections were numerous and terrible. The
condition of the Jamaica peasants in 1860 is a standing rebuke to those
who, wittingly or unwittingly, encourage the vulgar lie, that the
African cannot possibly be elevated. The dissolute idlers, loafers, and
vagabonds, that congregate in Kingston and other towns, are as different
from their country brethren, as the rowdy of New York city is different
from the honest farmers of the State."


COMPARATIVE CHEAPNESS OF FREE LABOR.

"No Barbadian planter, in 1859, would hesitate to select free labor in
preference to slave labor, as in his belief the more economical of the
two. Every planter in Jamaica knows from his own books, if they go back
far enough, that free labor is cheaper than slave labor. He knows that
the cultivation of an acre of cane does not now cost him $40, when in
other times it cost him $80. He knows that under slavery, the digging an
acre of cane-holes cost from $35 to $45, while under freedom it is from
$8 to $15. He knows that under one system 30 per cent. of his laboring
force were non effectives, and had to be fed and clothed like the rest;
while under freedom no work is paid for that is not actually performed.
He knows that a free laborer is not bought, and that the sum he would
cost can be otherwise laid out at profitable interest. He knows that it
is no longer necessary to make allowance of ten or even fifteen per
cent. for death or depreciation. These are facts readily admitted, and
whoever takes the trouble to think will see their force."

"If I were asked to point out the chief obstruction to a satisfactory
solution of the West India labor question, I should answer, without
hesitation, want of confidence between employer and employed. The
planters cling unwittingly to the shreds of the system of coercion in
which they were once taught to believe. They do not yet recognize the
overwhelming advantages of perfectly free labor; for they have checked
its development, by imposing upon it some of the heaviest burdens of
feudalism and of serfdom. They do not seem to reflect for a moment that
the interest of a proprietor is to elevate, not to degrade, his laborer.
They have misjudged the negro throughout, and have put too much faith in
his supposed inferiority. After the important step of emancipation was
taken, they did little to turn it to the best account."

"I came to the West Indies imbued with the American idea, that African
freedom had been a curse to every branch of agricultural and commercial
industry. I shall leave these islands overwhelmed with a very opposite
conviction. I deny that the negroes lack industry, when by industry they
can add to their means, or advance their prosperity. The more I saw, the
more I became convinced that _debt and want of capital_, much more than
want of _labor_, had led to the abandonment of so many estates; and be
it always remembered, that _the burden of debt was incurred before
freedom was tested_. Freedom, when allowed fair play, has injured none
of these colonies. It saved them from a far deeper and more lasting
depression than any they have yet known. It was a boon conferred upon
all classes of society; upon planter and laborer; upon commerce and
agriculture; upon industry and education; upon morality and religion. If
a perfect measure of success remains to be achieved, let not freedom be
condemned; for the obstacles to overcome were great, and the workers
were few and unwilling. If I can stimulate inquiry on a subject so
important, and so widely misunderstood as the West India labor question,
I shall have achieved all the success at which I have aimed."


EMANCIPATION IN THE WEST INDIES.

A public meeting was held at Willis's Rooms, London, on Wednesday, Feb.
20th, 1861, to receive a report from E. B. Underhill, Esq., and the Rev.
J. T. Brown, the deputation of the Baptist Missionary Society, of their
recent visit to the West Indies. Charles Buxton, Esq., M. P., took the
chair at twelve o'clock.

The CHAIRMAN said it must be remembered that, in the time of slavery,
whatever the island produced was exported; the food of the slaves
consisting principally of salt fish and yams, their clothes and lodging
being of the most wretched description. At the present time, however,
the creoles were rapidly rising in their social and physical condition,
and appropriated, to a great extent, the productions of the country for
their own use. He would not anticipate the report of the deputation, but
would simply add that, in his opinion, notwithstanding every
discouragement, emancipation had proved itself, beyond all doubt, to be
a good thing for Jamaica, not only by producing glorious moral results,
but by enormously enhancing the prosperity of the island.

Mr. UNDERHILL said Mr. Brown and himself proceeded towards the close of
1859 to the West Indies. Mr. Brown spent, altogether, about six months
in Jamaica, and he (Mr. Underhill) about a year, in that and the other
islands of the West Indies; and therefore the statements they were
prepared to make were the result of no rapid and cursory view, but of
close investigation, followed out to the best of their ability. He would
not attempt to make a speech calculated to move their feelings; but,
having laid before them some bare facts, he would leave these facts to
tell their own tale. He must admit that, at the first show of things,
those who maintained that emancipation had failed had something in their
favor. There could be no question that, with regard to Jamaica, there
had been a very considerable diminution in the exportation of the staple
products of the country. The exportation of sugar had, for instance,
declined from 1,400,000 cwt. in 1831--three years before the passing of
the first Act of Emancipation--to 535,000 cwt. in 1858. The exportation
of rum also had declined from 35,000 puncheons in 1833 to 18,000 in
1858. In coffee the reduction was still more manifest, since whereas in
1830 the island exported 22,000,000 lbs., in 1858 it only exported
5,250,000 lbs. He must also admit that upon entering the island of
Jamaica, the representations as to its decline struck one as being very
truthful. On landing at Kingston, one found a large city, the streets of
which were either deep in mud or sand. The whole town appeared sadly
neglected, and many large warehouses were wholly unoccupied, whilst
beggars and drunkards abounded. The feeling of depression was still
further increased upon reading the newspapers, or going into the
country. Estates, once flourishing, were desolate and uncultivated, and
the buildings in every direction were rapidly falling into decay. But
there were one or two circumstances which materially altered the first
impression which this state of things produced on the mind. In the first
place, while Jamaica, to use a favorite expression, had been ruined, the
West Indies generally had prospered. It was a curious fact, for
instance, that while the exportation of sugar for three years before
emancipation had averaged from all the islands 3,600,000 cwts., in 1858
it amounted to 3,500,000 cwts., being only a diminution of 100,000
cwts., or about 2,000 hogsheads. It was obvious, therefore, that there
was some other cause for the decay of Jamaica. Then, with regard to
coffee, it must be remembered that Ceylon had thrown an immense quantity
of that commodity into the English market. For example, in 1839 Ceylon
exported 4,500,000 lbs. of coffee, whereas sixteen years afterwards it
actually exported 56,000,000 lbs. (Hear, hear.) That would partly
account for the decline of the production of that commodity in Jamaica.
With regard to Kingston, also, he learnt that instead of being, as it
once was, a kind of central market for the Spanish Main, the merchants
of the different ports in South America either stopped at St. Thomas's
island, or preferred to trade direct with Europe, which would account
largely for the appearance of Kingston. It must also be remembered that
the trade in Kingston had changed from being principally wholesale to a
retail character, so that while, on the one hand, it had suffered by the
diminution of the former, it had gained by the increase of the latter.
He would proceed to show what was the condition of the general
population in Jamaica. There were 380,000 people in the island, and
dependant to a great extent on the cultivation of the land. These people
were the slaves of former days, but were now the enfranchised peasantry,
and it was only right to consider how emancipation had affected their
interests. On this point he could at once say that their position had in
every respect immensely improved. It had been said that the negroes were
an idle lot of people, who squatted upon the land, and were quite
content if they got a pumpkin to eat. But this was quite false. The
first thing the negroes did was to leave the estates in great numbers.
There were now but few estates on which they resided, and in those cases
the planters had treated them as free men, and consequently secured
their affections and services. A contrary line of treatment was pursued
in the majority of instances, and that, together with want of capital
wherewith to pay the wages weekly, had the effect of driving them away.
The slaves who thus left the estates were compelled to seek other means
of subsistence, but they did not "squat upon the land," as had been
alleged--that is, settle upon it without paying rent. The circumstance
that nearly every inch of land in Jamaica was owned by some one made
such a thing impossible.

On the contrary, great numbers of the old slaves had purchased land, and
it was an amazing fact that, at this moment, three-fifths of the
cultivated land in Jamaica was the _bona fide_ property of the blacks.
(Applause.) He held in his hand a return of one mission congregation,
and there were some interesting facts contained in it which he would
take the liberty of quoting. In that congregation there were
seventy-three heads of families, of whom sixty-two were once slaves,
which should be charitably considered when looking at the progress they
have made in the arts of civilization and mental culture. It could not
be expected that in twenty-one years all the old feelings and passions
and moral taints of slavery would be removed from the land. These
seventy-three families possessed among them 342 acres of freehold land,
and rented an average of two acres each besides. They possessed amongst
them seventy horses or mules--a species of property negroes were very
anxious to have. Surely these facts proved that they were not
"squatters," in the sense in which that word was used. The report of the
Hanover Agricultural Society strongly supported him in the conclusions
to which he had arrived in reference to the negro population. That
report stated that in six districts of the parish, containing four or
five thousand people, there were 802 proprietors, holding about 4,200
acres amongst them, which would be about five and a-half acres to each
family. He valued the land possessed by the people at 3l. 10s. per acre,
which was a much lower estimate than he might fairly put upon it. This
would make 1,050,000l. as the price they had paid for the land. But they
had not only bought land--they had built houses upon it. The cottages in
which they lived during slavery had been destroyed, and he was thankful
it was so. The people had built for themselves a better class of houses,
at a cost which could not be less than 10l. per house, and he was very
glad to say it was very rare to find more than one family in a house.
That amounted at least to 600,000l. Their furniture would be very
moderately valued at 3l. per house--about half the real value--making an
additional 180,000l.; and their carts, horses, mules, pigs, &c., could
not be put at less than 50,000l., which was, in fact, much under the
mark. The next item was a very interesting one, namely, the value of the
sugar-mills, and implements used in the production of sugar. There were
143 sugar-mills in a portion of Hanover alone, and there could not be
less than 5,000 in the island of Jamaica. These mills were valued by the
Hanover Agricultural Society at 10l. each. Then, as to their clothes,
they were as well dressed as the agricultural laborers of England, and
every negro had at least one if not two suits. It was not true that the
moral and respectable people were gaudily dressed. Upon the whole, the
clothes would be cheaply valued at 1l. per head--making 380,000l. Then,
and lastly, there were deposits in the savings' banks to the extent of
49,395l. The sum total of all this property, which had been accumulated
since the emancipation, was 2,358,000l.--an estimate which he ventured
to say was much below the mark. Of course there were some idle and some
ragged people among them, as, indeed, there were in every country on the
face of the earth. But, at any rate, it would be very unfair to take
Kingston as a fair sample of the island. It only numbered 30,000 people
out of a population of 380,000, and it would never do to judge of a
people by the minority. The annual value of the exports from Jamaica,
taking an average of three years, was 1,057,000l., including sugar, rum,
coffee, and the other products of the island, but it must not be
supposed that the whole of that was grown by white people. It might be
purchased and owned by the whites, but the work had been done by black
hands, and directed by black heads. He found that each family cultivated
some land for itself--say an acre to each family. An acre would produce
from 15l. to 50l. worth per annum; he had estimated it at 20l. The
entire produce of this island would be 2,500,000l. per annum. Was that
an idle people? His calculations were checked in a very interesting way
by those of the Hanover Agricultural Society, to which he had previously
alluded. That society estimated the average earnings of each family at
30l. per annum. The number of families was 76,000, so that, according to
the society, the annual earnings of the negroes in Jamaica amounted to
2,280,000l., a conclusion nearly similar to his own, though he had
arrived at it by a totally different process of calculation. Another
interesting feature was the decrease which had taken place in the
importation of salt fish. In the days of slavery the yam and salt fish
constituted the chief food of the people, but now there was a growing
taste for fresh meat, and many planters were turning their property into
pens for the breeding and fattening of cattle. One black man, who was
formerly a slave, but who now carried on the business of butcher in one
of the towns, told him that in Christmas week he had killed nine head of
cattle, and the returns of his business amounted to 5,000l. a year,
though there were two other butchers in the same town. In one town--the
town which owed its existence almost entirely to Mr. Knibb--from five to
seven head of cattle were slaughtered every week. All these things
showed that the people were advancing in their social condition.

A few facts might not be uninteresting with reference to the religious
condition of the people. In the first place they had built 220 chapels,
quite independent of the Established Church, of which he could find no
record showing their number. In connection with these chapels there were
53,000 communicants, or about one-eighth of the entire population. This
itself was a very gratifying and rather unusual state of things. The
number of people regularly attending these chapels was 91,000, or about
a fourth part of the population, and the Sunday-schools contained about
22,000 children, or about a third of the children who were capable of
attending school. Lastly, they raised every year for religious purposes
about 22,000l.

Crime was rare in the West Indies--he meant crime which brought men to
the courts of law. He found from the published returns, that the number
of men in prison during 1854 was 908, whilst the number in prison at one
time in 1858 was only 600. That was not a very considerable number for
so large a population. The people were very fond of cutlasses, and there
was hardly a man who had not got one, but yet one scarcely ever heard of
a cutlass being used to the injury of another man. Men had been known to
throw away their cutlasses when they have been quarrelling, lest they
should be tempted to use them against each other--a circumstance which
showed a great amount of self-control, and accounted for the unfrequency
of great crimes. There was a rising feeling in favor of marriage, and an
increasing respect for the marriage tie amongst the negroes since the
abolition of slavery. True, the feeling was not yet so prevalent as
could be wished, but the missionaries were doing all they could to
encourage it. The question of education was one of vast importance in
relation to the negro. The progress made in the island in this respect
had been slight, but from a census taken by one of the missionaries at
an interval of twenty-five years, he found that whereas just before
freedom only three negroes in 5,000 could be found in one particular
district that could read and write, at the next census 1,700 were able
to do so. That showed that some progress had been made, but for all that
the great want of Jamaica was education. The conclusion he had come to
was this, that though emancipation might have occasioned some
difficulties to the planters, it had been an unmixed blessing to the
people. He did not know a single drawback or qualification that need be
made to that statement. Should the planters continue in their present
course, they also would reap the advantage in the general peace and
security of the country, and in their own increased pecuniary gains.
Last of all, he believed the tide in Jamaica was now turned, and that
ordinary foresight, prudence, and care might make the island even more
prosperous in years to come than it had ever been in the past. He
recalled his visit to Jamaica with sincere pleasure. He went with deep
trembling, but had come away with a gladdened heart, satisfied--as he
trusted the meeting was, after having the facts he had laid before
it--that Jamaica had not suffered from emancipation, but that its
results, both to the people and to their country, would prove to be of
the highest, most blessed, and most advantageous kind. (Applause.)

The REV. J. T. BROWN said he rose with a very great deal of pleasure to
add a few words to those which his friend and colleague had addressed to
the meeting. He concurred in the statements of his colleague as to the
social results which had flowed from emancipation; and he could, if he
had time, adduce many facts in their corroboration; but there were many
doubtless in that meeting who felt, with him, that whilst the social
welfare of a people was a good thing, yet that their religious welfare
was paramount, and that if they could not have brought good tidings in
that respect, they must have come home indeed with a heavy heart. One
source of difficulty in judging of the state of Jamaica was the fact
that false reports of the land were circulated by disappointed planters,
by bigots, by clever writers, and by disheartened missionaries. What the
_Times_ newspaper chose to say upon the subject was, to a great extent,
matter of indifference, because every one knew what worth to attach to
it; but when he saw a statement so utterly untrue as that contained in
the "Encyclopædia Britannica,"--he did not impute wilful falsehood to
the writer,--he was grieved indeed. That statement was to the effect
that, during slavery, the Dissenting ministers possessed great influence
over the negro, but that the latter now preferred the Established
Church, because it cost him nothing, though, in point of fact, he cared
but little for either. This was altogether a misrepresentation. (Great
cheering.) One of the last persons who had contributed to this popular
error was that clever writer of fiction, Mr. Trollope, who deserved to
be described as a writer of fiction, not only as the author of
"Barchester Towers" and "Framley Parsonage," but of the book he had
published on the West Indies. ("Hear, hear," and laughter.) Whenever
persons in Jamaica wished to represent a violent, prejudiced, and
obstinate person,--one who judged as hastily of a religious body as Mr.
Trollope judged of the Baptists,--who would rather dance with a Jew than
pray with a Baptist, when they wished to speak of a person of violent
and prejudiced character, looking only at one side of a question,
running and jumping through a country,--one, in fact, who was altogether
untrustworthy,--they would say of him that he had been "Trollopeing."
(Laughter.) That was the name Mr. Trollope had given to such a character
in Jamaica. But facts were facts, and, though Mr. Trollope avowed his
dislike for statistics, there were some very stubborn ones which stared
him in the face. In the first place, the people were orderly in their
conduct--well governed and well behaved; persons and property were
perfectly safe on the island, and serious crimes were very rare. The
marriage tie was respected, and children respected their parents. These
were facts which forcibly contrasted with the awful condition of society
before the emancipation. Again, the religious statistics of the country
spoke loudly in favor of emancipation. They contributed largely towards
the expenses of religious worship, and many attended punctually the
means of grace. The European Dissenting ministers on the island received
150l. per annum, and the native preachers, of whom there were sixteen,
from 100l. to 120l. per annum. There were seventy-seven churches
connected with the Baptist body in the island; these included 20,000
communicants and 2,000 anxious inquirers; and although there were at
times instances of false profession and cases of backsliding, yet the
discipline of the churches was good, and their condition altogether in
many respects furnished good examples for Christian congregations at
home. He could not forbear also paying a high tribute to the deacons and
elders, who, taken upon the whole, were a fine body of Christian
disciples, and true helpers of the ministry. He was aware that there was
a great deal of mental ignorance in the island, but even in that respect
its condition had materially improved since the emancipation. He wished
many of the persons now listening to him could have listened to the
speeches of some of the Christian negroes at some of their meetings in
Jamaica, and have marked the strong common sense and great intelligence
which tumbled awkwardly out of their mouths; or could have heard their
prayers, where beautiful thoughts and clear and holy aspirations
struggled through their broken speech--indications of a mental vigor
which only needed cultivation, and which even now commanded respect.

The REV. WILLIAM ARTHUR then moved the following resolution:--


     "That this meeting has heard with great pleasure the satisfactory
     account given by the deputation of the Baptist Missionary Society
     of the results of emancipation in the West Indies, and Jamaica in
     particular, and of the progress made by the negro population in
     civilization, intelligence, and piety, and deem the great Act of
     Emancipation of 800,000 slaves, an act just and right in itself, as
     amply vindicated by the success which has attended it."


He felt it to be a real honor to be asked to move this resolution, and
he congratulated the Baptist Missionary Society on having sent out so
able a deputation to the West Indies. Their report was a most important
one, and the more so at this juncture, when the attention of the people
of America was anxiously directed to the results of emancipation in the
West Indies, and especially in Jamaica. The friends of freedom had
reason to be deeply thankful to Mr. Underhill for his careful and
comprehensive inquiry into the real state of affairs.

The REV. EDWARD MATHEWS, in seconding the resolution, said that he could
testify from his own experience in the State of Ohio that the facts
adduced by the deputation would have much influence in America, and help
forward the cause of emancipation there.





End of Project Gutenberg's The Right Way the Safe Way, by Lydia Maria  Child