APPENDIX. ed to improve, if they have little or no fcope for the exercife of their faculties, and if every avenue, which directly leads to focial or intellectual improvement, be, in a great measure, fhut against them?

exemplified in the cotton manufacture,

751. Lord Kaimes fomewhere obferves, that on public roads being carried through fome of the lefs improved parts of Scotland, the neighbouring cottagers were feen gradually to transfer the regularity, neatness and patient labour with which they saw the work conducted, fucceffively into their gardens and little spots of land, their cottages, their furniture, and their apparel; infomuch that at laft the improvement reached their very minds. But, I apprehend, this falutary progreffion could not have taken place, if thofe cottagers had had no property of their own except money, no gardens, or fpots of land, nor any time to cultivate them. Had his Lordship, however, lived but a few years longer, he would have had the mortification of feeing this laft cafe, and it's confequences, verified in fome parts of his native land. He would have feen multitudes of males and females, promifcuously crowded into certain modern manufactories; cloathed indeed in cottons, inftead of their homegrown and home-fpun linens and woollens; drinking tea inftead of butter-milk, and whisky inftead of water or fmall-beer; eating, perhaps, wheaten bread instead of oaten bread and potatoes; and, above all, the very children earning so much money, as to render them completely independent of their parents, and confequently not very well prepared for focial reftraints. But I fear he would have looked in vain, for the wonted bloom of health or blush of innocence on their faces, or for that sobriety, intelligence and decency, which diftinguished the conversation and behaviour of their immediate progenitors. His Lordship would have found, however, that they confume and fabricate a great many excifeable commodities; that their labour, though destructive of their health and morals, caufes a great circulation of money; and that thus, in a financial and commercial view, they fulfil what fome politicians seem to confider as the great ends of their creation*.

and in that of 752. Now every fugar plantation, in the W. Indies, is no other than a great majugar, nufactory, in which 2 or 300 people are collected, and avowedly confidered and treated as mere paffive implements of labour, that have no intereft whatever in the produce; and this is one caufe of the ignorance, vice and diforder which prevail in the W. Indies. In this refpect, therefore, the fimilarity of the Company's plantation at S. Leona, to a W. Indian one, is likely, if continued, to lead to very bad confequences. But I would fain hope, that when the culture of fugar comes to be

The evils here hinted at, are perhaps not fo explicitly stated, in the statistical account of Scotland, as could be wished. But their introduction is well remembered, and much lamented by many worthy and truly patriotic perfons in that country.In Manchefter, the evils alluded to are of longer standing, and more inveterate. To enumerate inftances would be endless; but I shall mention one, which fell within my own notice. I knew a workmen there, who, when trade was brisk, earned his guinea a day by cutting fuftians. He regularly worked 4 days in the week, and, accompanied by his wife, spent the rest of his time, and all his money in the neighbouring public house.

feriously

seriously pursued at S. Leona, fome fuch plan as the annexed one described, by Mr. APPENDIX. Botham, which interefts the labourers in the produce, and does not collect and keep together fuch numbers of them, will be finally adopted by the Company.

between ma

nager and la

Leona.

753. (6.) In the W. Indies, there is an inceffant conflict between the managers and Differences the flaves, the former being interested in getting as much labour done, and the latter in doing as little, as poffible. At S. Leona too, it appears that "little differences may bourers at S. have occafionally arifen between the manager and the native labourers."-Far be it from me, to infinuate there is any prefent danger of fuch differences, being settled in the forcible W. Indian mode. I have too good an opinion of the present governor and council, especially of him who conducts the plantation, to harbour fuch a thought. Still I cannot diffemble the fact, that some gentlemen at S. Leona, have for years, been accustomed to fee the mode alluded to practifed in the W. Indies; and we all know the lasting force of education and habit, as well as the general frailty of human nature, when urged by ftrong temptation *.

754. (7.) I come now to what I think by far the ftrongest objection to the prefent mode of cultivation at S. Leona, namely, the handle that it may one day afford to defigning men, for the introduction of West Indian abuses.—In truth, the S. Leona planalready fo nearly refembles the W. Indian, that if any future governor and council could find means to withdraw the pittance of wages from the labourers, and to flip the whip into the hand of the overseer, the two fyftems would not only be similar, but actually the fame. And indeed there are too many reafons to fear, that the W. Indian system may, at some future, convenient time, be really compleated in that ill-fated colony. A ftrong tendency to abuse, has ever invariably prevailed in provinces diftant, as S. Leona is, from the feat of fupreme Government, a truth exemplified in all the British fugar colonies; in one inftance fo recently as 12 or 13 years ago, when a governor, in open defiance of all law, wrefted a confiderable fum of money from a certain ancient and respectable W. Indian colony, confifting of 18 or 20,000 white people,

The accounts I have uniformly heard of Mr. W. are highly favourable to that gentleman's general character, particularly for humanity. It is not denied, that a confiderable number of men, who well deserve the fame character, prefide over W. Indian plantations. But I own it fomewhat surprised me, to find the Directors expreffing disappointment in the character of the lower overseers, (§ 449.) whofe general depravity has been fo often mentioned as one cause of the sufferings of the poor flaves. Without fhocking the reader with their numerous babarities, ftated in evidence, I fhall refer him, for their general character, to Beckford's Hift. of Jamaica, printed in 1788, but which I have not now at hand. Mr. Long, however, tells us, that "many of them are the very dregs of the three kingdoms;" that they have commonly more vices, and much fewer good qualities, than the flaves over whom they are fet in authority;" in particular, that "they exhibit deteftable pictures of drunkenness," for which reafon he advises their "rum to be ferved out to them ready mixed with water." Hift. of Jamaica, Vol. II. p. 289, 409, 471.

Extreme danger of W.

Indian fyftem being compleated there.

many

APPENDIX. many of them men of property, education, and knowledge of the world. The arts by which W. Indian attornies or agents, and managers or overfeers, defraud and ruin abfentee planters, are too numerous and intricate to be here particularly explained, if not too well known to need explanation t. Now if thefe things can, and very often do happen, to the property of individuals, whofe all is at flake, what fecurity can there be, that fimilar arts fhall not be employed in defrauding a joint stock company, where the share of each partner, is too fmall to interest him much in it's fuccefs? Or, which is more to the purpose, what fecurity can the unreprefented colonists have, against the completion of the W. Indian plan, already begun at Sierra Leona? Indeed, when I confider the various caufes which may call the prefent Directors from their benevolent labours; that they may be fucceeded by men less attentive or less difinterested; that future Subscribers may become more indifferent than the present, to the grand objects of the inftitution, and less inquifitive as to it's management; that the affairs of the Company will naturally become more and more complex, and that the accounts sent home may be designedly perplexed (one of the W. Indian arts,) that the governor and council may find it to be their intereft to

* It is however but justice to the memory of the then Ministry to say, that this governor was recalled, with evident marks of difapprobation, not to fay difgrace.

"If we judge from experience, and the common conduct of Managers, in the absence of the Proprietors, an estate yields not half as much when the owner is abfent, as when he is living on the fpot." Answer to the 53d qu. of the British Privy Council, by Governor Orde of Dominica. See also the Anf. of Lieut. Governor Matthew of Grenada to the same query, with many fimilar paffages in that valuable body of information, and in Min. Evid. before the House of Commons. Mr. Long very explicitly describes one grand cause of these enormous defalcations." It is well known,” fays he," that a great many eftates of different abfentees, and lying in diftant parts of the island, are often given up to the charge of one agent only, who cannot possibly refide at them all, or visit them very frequently. Matters are then left to the discretion of overseers, whose chief aim it is, to raise to themselves a character as able planters, by increafing the produce of the respective estates ;" (on which produce a law of the island ordains, that their patrons, the attornies or agents, fhall be paid a commiffion of 6 per cent.) "This is too frequently attempted, by forcing the negroes to labour beyond their abilities. Of course they drop off, and if not recruited inceffantly, the gentleman fteals away, like a rat from a barn in flames, and carries the credit of great plantership and vaft crops in in his hand, to obtain advanced wages from fome new employer," (very often an attorney)" in another diftrict of the island. The abfentees are too often deceived, who measure the condition of their properties by the large remittances fent home for one or two years, without adverting to the heavy losses sustained in the production of them; and they find too late their incomes fuddenly abridged, and the finews of their eftates wafted far below their expectation." Hift. of Jamaica, Vol. II. p. 406. -" While by imprudent exertions, there may be a visible increase of crop, perhaps to 4 or £500 annual value, there is, at the fame time an annual decrease of working negroes, to more than double that value." Anf. by a Planter of 1068 acres in Barbadoes, in fupp. to the Privy Council's Report, p. 32.

force,

force, inftead of paying, the labourers; that not so much as a private letter can be APPENDIX. fent to England without their knowledge; and that the colonists, being without representation, will be without remedy*—I say, when I confider all these circumstances, not as an airy train of possibilities, but as events which seldom fail to happen in fimilar cafes, I cannot help expreffing my fears, that, at fome future period, the labourers may come to be paid their wages, with whips and chains, and thus the finishing stroke be given to the W. Indian system at S. Leona.

ог

tivation.

755. I have no fault to find with any of the articles planted, except the fugar-cane, Deplorable efthe cultivation of which is unquestionably too laborious for any new colony; efpe- fects of forcing fugar culcially for a new colony, intended to civilize a rude people, whom the fight of fuch exertion as is necessary on a fugar plantation, would be apt to difguft with regular labour. Indeed, the cultivation of fugar engrosses so much attention and labour, that I am clear, it should never be attempted, on any fyftem, till a colony abound with people, and cattle, and food for both. (See (727 n.) The premature introduction of that plant into the British colonies, especially into the Ceded Islands, about go years ago, destroyed fuch multitudes of flaves and cattle, in Dominica particularly, that it has been clearly proved, no capital was ever, upon the whole, so disadvantageously employed, as that vefted by the British in W. Indian estatest. In short, in no age country, was ever avarice more compleatly difappointed, or humanity more fhockingly outraged, than in the flattering but ill-judged introduction of the fugar cane into all or most of the British W. Indian Islands, especially the Ceded Islands. It has indeed been a root of bitterness to those colonies; and it's premature and forced cultivation has, within our own memory, swept masters and flaves, the oppreffors and the oppreffed, into one common grave. It was difficult for me to fuppofe, that the Directors were uninformed of thefe deplorable facts, or would fuffer themfelves to be mifled by the alluring eftimates which the W. Indians fo well know how to fabricate, when they wish to difpofe advantageoufly of a lofing property. My astonishment therefore was great, when I was ferioufly affured, that a compleat apparatus for making fugar, had been fent to S. Leona, by one of the firft fhips.

756. If

I hope what I have faid refpecting representation, may not be misunderstood. I only mean, that colonists, who are fufficiently enlightened to form a proper judgement of their own focial interests, should chuse representatives. (See § 161, II. 699.)

This has been irrefragably demonstrated, from the data of the prefent planters, and of their predeceffors, in Mr. Ramsay's Answers to Objections against the Abolition of the Slave-trade, and in a series of effays figned Terentius, published in Woodfall's Diary, in May, 1789.

In such estimates, the apparent profits of large crops are explicitly stated; but the loffes, if mentioned at all, are too often couched in general terms, from which perfons inexperienced in W. Indian affairs, can draw no just conclusion. Yet the loffes are at least as capable of explicit statement as the profits. Thus fome eftates require 6 new negroes, others 8, and othere even 10 or more, to keep up the

gang,

APPENDIX.

The author recommends another plan.

Defires of a rude people to be excited, and gratified

with innocent Juxuries.

756. If this last measure was dictated, as I am perfuaded it was, by a wifh to fupply the humane demand for fugar raifed by freemen, the motiv ewas laudable and excellent, but the attempt was nevertheless premature; and fo, I will venture to say, it was confidered, by a few of the Directors, who, though quite unconnected with the W. Indies, are known to be particularly well informed refpecting the laborious culture and manufacture of sugar, but who, I prefume, were in the minority when this refolution was taken.

757. Having thus taken the liberty to flate my chief objections to the plan of cultivation introduced, or under trial, at S. Leona, it may be expected that I should offer my fentiments refpecting the plan which ought to be adopted. This I fhall do, with all the deference justly due to gentlemen of whofe good intentions I am fo fully convinced, (fee § 329, 593, 594.) I fhall do this the more readily too, as I believe the plan of cultivation is not fo far advanced, or fo unalterably fixed, as not to admit of any change or modification which the Directors may deem expedient. Or, if my hints, which (exclufive of the Batavian plan of cultivating fugar, inferted below,) are few and fimple, fhould not have the good fortune to be attended to by the Directors, they may perhaps be useful to others who may hereafter attempt cultivation in Africa.

758. It appears to me then, that all human exertions are excited by human defires, or wants, natural or artificial, and confequentlythat real civilization is best promoted by raifing and properly directing, the defires or wants of a rude people. (See (33,708.) When every individual of a community can, independently of others, exchange his labour for the articles he wants, he is then happy and free. In other words, the happiness and liberty of the individual depend on the opportunities he has of ufing his own perfonal refources, to procure neceffaries or luxuries. (See § 734 n.) Hence, I think, it follows, that, if we intend to make a rude people happy, by training them to the innocent habits of civilized life, we should firft enquire, whether they defire, or feel the want of those articles, which in the civilized world, are thought abfolutely neceffary to comfortable fubfiftence. If they do not, thofe defires fhould, in the first place, be excited; and this being done, fome innocent luxuries fhould be exhibited to their view, for obtaining which they have no other means than their labour. (See § 36,

gang, and a proportionable number of cattle. I am happy, however, to add, that a confiderable number of eftates require no new negroes; but such seldom or never come into the market, because the humanity and prudence of their proprietors and managers, precludes the grand cause of the ruin of those citates, namely, the destruction of the negroes. Whether fomething of the obscurity alluded to, does not appear in the estimates given by certain W. Indian hiftorians, let thofe, who are capable, judge. Yet certain it is, that large crops have been made and even sworn to, purposely to enhance the price of eftates offered for fale, and on fuch crops fome W. Indian estimates are evidently founded. But neither affadavits nor estimates, contain any account of the negroes murdered, by producing fuch forced crops, nor of the cattle deftroyed by conveying them to the fhipping places.-See the note, p. 354.