send a stout servant boy, or hired slave of my own, to the workhouse for punishment (on account of stealing from a shopkeeper, who complained to me), and I desired he might be given only two dozen. Though he richly deserved the flogging, yet I was sorry to see him when he returned, for he crept and rolled about the yard for some time, crying aloud, and was so much marked, that he could scarcely sit or walk for several days. Being a mischievous lad, and inclined to theft, he deserved punishment several times afterwards, but I never sent him again, as I thought I had better give him a moderate punishment with my own hand.'-West Indies as they are. p. 26. What a humiliating sight it must have been to see holy men-men filling the sacred office, thus employed, foaming with passion, and belabouring poor creatures who were crying out to them for mercy! Yet these, and such as these, are the persons who alone are deemed worthy of credit in describing the West India colonies; and why? because their testimony falls in with popular prejudices, by pampering and ministering to which they strive to gain favour; while the favourable testimony of the Wesleyan missionaries, long resident in Jamaica, is contradicted by their committee at home;-the statements of a respectable Rector, Mr. Bridges, are termed a foul libel' on the person whose errors he attempted to point out and correct,*-and the report of the Bishop of Jamaica is laughed at and ridiculed within the walls of Parliament, because it is at variance with Mr. Bridges published a few strictures on Mr. Wilberforce's Appeal, whereby, according to the Edinburgh Reviewers, he was guilty of a foul libel' on the character of that gentleman! How many such foul libels have the Reviewers been guilty of? the reports of Mr. Bickell, and of men who, cast out of the pale of society in Jamaica, apply the soothing unction to their souls that not their misdeeds, but the ill-treatment of the colonists, had occasioned the disappointment of their hopes, and return to England ready and willing to retaliate by any means,-aware that The world is naturally averse To all the truth it sees or hears; But swallows nonsense and a lie But to return to Mr. Cooper. In reply to an assertion of his, that the slaves on Georgia estate, where he resided, had to work the half of each night during crop-time, which usually lasts four or five months, Mr. Oates, the manager, on his oath, declares, • That on Georgia estate the negroes are, and always have been, since he knew the property, divided into four spells, and not into two, as stated by Mr. Cooper, and each negro keeps spell only six hours in each alternate night, making the night labour of each negro in a week amount to eighteen hours, and not to three nights in the week, as stated in the pamphlet.' p. 36. On this Mr. Cooper observes: Unless a studied system of falsehood was practised upon me, the slaves employed in the night time were not divided into four spells when I was on the estate. I was assured, at least a hundred times, by the negroes themselves and the different white people on the estate, as well as by many of the neighbours engaged in the planting business, that the night-work was done by two gangs or spells, and I never heard four mentioned till I read Mr. Oates's assertion. I have often seen the lists of the two gangs on Georgia hung up in the boiling house: I have examined them with a book-keeper, who assured me that they contained all the negroes who were expected to take spell, which I could not doubt, from the number of names the lists contained. One spell was called John Crow Spell, and the other Quality Spell. In addition to this, I have, times without number, heard both negroes and book-keepers complain bitterly of being kept up at their spell the whole of every other night,' p. 37. Perhaps this will appear as convincing an answer as any Mr. C. has given to the affidavits of his opponents; yet I have no doubt that what Mr. Oates says is correct, and that Mr. Cooper may have been deceived, without any studied system of falsehood being practised upon him;' or even any intention existing any where to deceive him. On Holland Estate, where I resided, and kept spell myself, and on other properties with which I am acquainted, the negroes are divided in the same manner into two gangs or spells, one of which goes on duty each night; the lists are hung up in the boiling house in the manner Mr. C. states them to have been hung up at Georgia, and, as he says, they are commonly spoken of as the two spells: but each of these two spells is again subdivided into two parts, one of which takes the first half of the night, and the other the second, by which means each negro has only half the amount of night labour Mr. Cooper asserts, that is, eighteen hours in a week instead of three nights. The lists of the two spells, hung up in the boiling house, are arranged by the overseer or ma nager, and are each put under charge of a responsible negro, who, along with a book-keeper, regulates the subdivision according to circumstances: thus, if several people on the one should be unable to attend from sickness, a few would be taken out of the other to equalize them. With writers who, like Mr. C. aim at establishing the oppression of the negroes, spell-keeping is a favourite theme, and is represented as occupying not a part but the whole of the negroes, nearly as much as their labour by day. But the fact is, that upon an estate with 200 labourers, about 18 only are required at night to attend the mill and boiling-house; and so in and so in proportion for larger properties.* It would certainly be well if even these could be dispensed with; but in a country like England, where one sees the illumined manufactories occupying through the night so large a part of the population, and even of those in the tender years of youth as well as of manhood, it is rather strange that the benevolent should yet go so far, for a similar evil to mourn over, and dwell There will be in the mill 3 men or women carrying in the canes. 2 men feeding the mill. 4 women carrying away in baskets the ground canes. In the boiling-house 1. Man attending the clarifiers. 3 men attending the boilers. 1 man making fire. 3 women with baskets, carrying the dried ground canes, called trash, for fuel. so exclusively on the cruel hardship of spell-keeping in the sugar colonies. Has the negro manufacturer, returning to his house at midnight, when relieved from his half-night's task, in the mild climate of Jamaica, the same sacrifice of comfort, the same hardship or risk of injury to his health, as the manufacturer in England, leaving a heated atmosphere and going out into the cold of a winter night? Yet, among those whose compassion is so much alive to the night-work and other sufferings of the negro, that they cannot partake of the product of his industry, who ever thinks of the sleepless nights-the tender hands-the sallow and emaciated frame of the poor boys and girls, from whose labour they are furnished with all the most common articles of their clothing, and To whom the goodly earth and air Are bann'd and barr'd, forbidden fare.' It may further be remarked, with respect to spell-keeping, that, although the crop season lasts about five months, it is not constant for that length of time; intermissions of a week being occasionally required on all the estates to put in the cane plants, which must be done while the canes are cutting, as the top of the old cane constitutes the new plant. Regarding the time allowed the negroes to cultivate their provision grounds, the Manager of Georgia swears, 'That the negroes on Georgia, during Mr. Cooper's residence there, had from 28 to 30 week days in the year, besides Thurs ΕΣ |