manner in which all the colonists in all the islands act-in short, as manifesting the spirit of West 'Indian Society;' and we have no doubt that, as Mr. Brougham lately expressed himself, they 'feel deeply impressed with gratitude' to the rioters of Bridgetown for the outrage they committed.

Whatever was the provocation given, the conduct of the rioters was disgraceful, and merits every term of reprobation. But when the matter is taken up and dwelt on in a manner evidently calculated to injure the innocent rather than to punish the guilty, to inflame and exasperate public feeling against the white people in all the islands, by representing the act of the Bridgetown mob as a manifestation of the spirit of West Indian society in general,' or as 'affording 'a view of the character and temper of the colo'nists,' (p. 497,) it is impossible but every virtuous mind must feel indignation at such injustice; and some perhaps may think the spirit of the Review not much more amiable than that of the rioters. What says 'that benevolent sect the 'quakers' to such conduct? Does religion justify the visiting the iniquities of the few upon the many? or are these the means which philanthropy must employ to accomplish its ends?

'Nothing or worse than nothing' continues the Review in the same article, has been done by 'the colonial legislatures, to improve the condition ' of the slaves.' Of course the acts passed last

session (1824) by the assembly of Jamaica to remove impediments to manumissions, and to encourage a change of the negro market from Sunday to Saturday, are nothing or worse than nothing'-they are at all events passed over unnoticed.

'Some bishops and other dignitaries of the 'church have been sent out, as if gentlemen from 'Oxford or Cambridge were the fittest teachers ' and the best missionaries among those benighted 'heathens.' Can they give weight and influence to religion in the colonies? Can they be as fit to teach others as persons who are themselves only half educated? The Reviewers evidently think not. True it is, that, from the ignorance of the negroes, men of very moderate learning may be useful instructors to them; but it does appear somewhat strange that men should be disqualified · for teaching, by having got a superior education; and not very clear to common understandings, why sectarian teachers alone should be capable of instructing the negroes, as we are informed, p. 494. p.494. Yet, were this the case, is religion to be limited to one class in the colonies? Are the negroes every thing, and the white and coloured classes nothing? or are we to understand that gentlemen from Oxford or Cambridge are considered unfit to

teach these also?

We are not, however, left in the dark as to the cause of the prejudice against dignitaries of the 'church, and gentlemen from Oxford or Cam

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bridge: the reason why they are considered less fit teachers than sectarians, peeps out in the following paragraph.

'Bishop Lipscomb,' says the Review, after a 'few weeks' residence in Jamaica, transmitted a report as little marked by sound and sober sense, 'as his conduct had been by decorous impartiality.' p. 493. In other. words, he spoke rather favourably of the colonists,-an unpardonable sin in the eyes of a party of which this impartial Journal is the oracle; and whose maxim is disbelieve and vilify every person who shall speak favourably of the colonists; give implicit belief to, and extol every person, who shall speak unfavourably of them.

Thus, although the favourable report of a bishop is made the subject of ridicule, because written when he had been only five or six weeks in the island, there is no objection on this score to the unfavourable report of John Meabery. This young lad, the son of a tradesman in London, was sent out to Jamaica, about the beginning of 1822, to be a book-keeper on Bushy Park Estate, in the parish of St. Dorothy. He reached that place, labouring under a disgusting complaint, for which he had the advice of Dr. Inchbauld, who attended the property; and after remaining from 14 to 18 days on the estate, confined a great part of the time to bed, and not employed in any way, he returned to enjoy the pleasures of London, and inform the Abolition Society of the state

of things in Jamaica. His report of the oppressed condition of the negroes and the licentious manners of the white people, was published in a scandalous pamphlet, entitled Negro Slavery, and is highly extolled by the Reviewers, who class Mr. Meabery with Mr. Cooper and Mr. Bickell, or as one of the more unexceptionable witnesses against the colonists. Ed. Rev. No. 82. p. 488.

In the same article of the Review our attention is again directed to the flourishing state of Hayti; and the facts here given on official authority regarding the increase of its population, are as ' novel in the history of the species' as that told us in a former number, of its rude and barbarous people becoming in a few years civilized and even refined.' At the commencement of the French revolution in 1792, the population of St. Domingo (then certainly better known than it has been since) was estimated at 665,000 persons of all descriptions, including 40,000 whites. p. 499. The official return in 1805, quoted by the Review, estimates it at 400,000 making the decrease or destruction of people by the revolution and the subsequent wars between Petion and Christophe 265,000, considerably upwards of one third of the whole population of the country. By the census of 1824 it is said to be 935,335, shewing an increase of 535,335 upon a population of 400,000 in nineteen years!!! Unless we go back to the age of Deucalion and Pyrrha, when

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Saxa

Missa viri manibus, faciem traxere virilem;

Et de femineo reparata est femina jactu—

there certainly has never been in the world an instance of such rapid increase in any country from native sources, and it is not pretended that there has been in St. Domingo any accession of foreigners. If the increase goes on at the same rate, the population of the island will in less than a century be upwards of 60 millions. *

Forth also has come,' say the Reviewers triumphantly, a report of the trade of Port-auPrince, the chief, but very far from being the only port in the island, showing that from thence, ' in 1824, was exported—

In some of the new states of North America the population may be, as the Reviewers inform us (No. 82. p. 500), doubled, trebled, quadrupled, nay, increased elevenfold in ten or twelve years; but it is perfectly childish to bring forward such statements in a disquisition on the comparative increase or decrease of the negroes in our colonies and in St. Domingo. Do they actually believe that in those new states the population, even where they are all free inhabitants,' increases by breeding elevenfold in twenty years? So it would certainly appear!