ninety years. Nothing certain is known of the reasons the Spaniards had for abandoning it. The following are the names and sites of the Spanish settlements and harbours often mentioned by the Spanish historians: Sevilla Nueva, Melilla, Oristan, St. Jago de la Vega, Caguaya, Port Esquevel, S. E. of Mamee Bay. Port Royal. St. Anne's Bay. Old Harbour. I fear I have been giving you information of little importance; but the little that we do know of the early history of this island cannot be altogether devoid of interest. I am, my dear Madam, Your very obedient Servant, The late change which has taken place in the condition of the negro population of these islands, must necessarily lead to great alterations in the mode of managing plantations. It requires as little knowledge of human nature, as of political economy, to be assured that no man will labour without reward, who can avoid it. Hitherto, coercion was necessarily employed to obtain labour; but the new law, in making coercion the legal penalty of its infraction, instead of an arbitrary punishment, summarily inflicted, has deprived it of the character which chiefly constituted its terrors; for nothing, I apprehend, can be more productive of terror than the power of inflicting punishment in the heat of passion. That stimulus to labour is therefore in the hands of the special justice, not what it was in those of the overseer. In some cases in four years, in others in six years, it will not exist at all. In the intermediate time, conciliation, to a great extent, must be looked to, to effect what coercion formerly did. Is it to the persons who are only acquainted with the influence of the latter? is it to those whose feelings have been galled by the deprivation of that instrument of authority? is it to those who have not been intrusted with the temporary power of inflicting even the lessened punishment the law allows, and, consequently, whose objections to the remedial spirit of that law are not likely to be diminished, that the absent proprietors are to look for the introduction of conciliatory measures in the management of their estates, which will be a substitute for those whose influence is no longer to be exerted on the negro's fears? Previously to the introduction of the new system, I fully expected to see many of the absentees arrive, to enter on the new management of their estates; for previously to August, I was fully persuaded, as I now am, that a change of management is absolutely requisite to ensure a continuance of labour. There were many arrangements to be entered into by the masters with the negroes on their properties; and the first of August was an auspicious time for such accommodation of matters between master and labourer, as might be productive of present satisfaction and future advantage. But very few proprietors have come out; amongst those, however, who have lately arrived, is the nephew of M. G. Lewis, whose family holds two valuable properties here. The late well known M. G. Lewis occasionally sojourned here, but he resided chiefly on his estate, named Cornwall, in Westmoreland, and sometimes at another property, Hordley, in St. Thomas in the East. He visited Jamaica in 1815, and again in 1817. On his first arrival, he found his negroes discontented and almost rebellious, at Cornwall. On his second visit, he found his other negroes at Hordley in a still worse condition. By his two visits he saved his properties! Both of them are in the hands of his heirs, and not under the superintendence of the Court of Chancery. One of the proprietors, the son of Sir Henry Lushington, is now on the island, following the example of Lewis; seeing with his own eyes how the management of his properties is going on, and feeling the responsibility which rests. upon him of ascertaining, by actual observation, and not by communications from his planting attorney, how 580 human beings, that are dependent on his humanity for their welfare, (and who, not a great many years ago, were dependent on his predecessor's moderation for their limbs and lives) are treated on his properties. I am well aware I am addressing you on an unpromising subject, but I am also aware I am addressing myself to one to whom the incidents of a work of fiction are not of more importance than actual occurrences, which are connected with the interests of hundreds of families in England, and with those of 300,000 beings of the human species here. Lewis is not spoken of with much favour in Jamaica; -I mean by the whites, for it is not the fashion in the West Indies to take the sentiments of the negroes into any account. But I may just intimate, that whoever is popular with the negroes, must, of necessity, be in a degree of disfavour more than unpopular with the white people. Lewis very soon discovered the errors of the old system of management after his arrival. He abolished the barbarous practice of flogging females;-he abolished the use of the cart-whip in the field, and allowed no punishment to be inflicted till twenty-four hours after the commission of the offence; he gave every Saturday to the negroes;-he gave them an ad ditional yearly holiday, which he called the royal holiday. In fact, nearly eighteen years ago, Lewis anticipated the intentions of the framers of the recent measure for the amelioration of the condition of the slave. Honour be to his memory, for the humanity of his conduct! and well may his heirs be grateful to that memory, as often as they recollect that the preservation of the properties which they inherit is due to the wisdom of the measures he pursued, during.both his visits. Lewis was no favourite with the white people; he is spoken of-not as a man who granted unusual indulgences to his negroes, but as an author who wrote a work, the morality of which was of a questionable nature. But the negroes were, fortunately, blissfully ignorant that Massa was a maker of any books, good, bad, or indifferent: they only knew that he was the maker of their happiness on his estate; and most thankful to his memory, I can tell his impugners, are they to this day, for the advantages they still derive from the benevolent policy he adopted on his properties. In his last visit, so great was the jealousy occasioned by his reform in the management of his estates, that the Custos of an adjoining parish, in a charge to the grand jury, took occasion to point out the dangers the colony had to apprehend from the new spirit of innovation that had gone abroad. "Many," said this functionary, "out of this country, and some in it, had thought proper to interfere with our system, and, by their insidious practices, and dangerous doctrines, to call the peace of the island into question, and to promote disorder and confusion."* This is the common language of persons who have brought Jamaica to what it is. I would only ask to refute their assertions, by comparing their plantations with those of Lewis at the present time. One * A person subsequently came over from St. James's, to inform Mr. Lewis that only a part of the observations that fell from the Custos was intended to apply to him, the most offensive part being only for the Methodists. of the dangerous doctrines alluded to, was Lewis's opinion that the evidence of negroes ought to be heard against whites, though it might not be incumbent on a jury to believe it. The alteration in the management at first occasioned some diminution in the produce, which must have been very gratifying to those who were acquainted with his sentiments on the subject of the cart-whip. "If the estate," says Lewis, "must go to rack and ruin without its use, to rack and ruin the estate must go." But the estate has not gone to rack and ruin, though many a one around it has. The necessity for the alteration in the management is described in a few words, which every absentee-proprietor, who has an income to expect from Jamaica, should read with the most profound at tention. 3 At this time, its information is more important than ever; and that proprietor, I tell him, who sits down in the foolish security of other management of his plantation than his own, or, at least, in perfect confidence in a stranger's interest in its cultivation, and discretion in the adaptation of that management to the altered circumstances of the country, before three years will find that he has rested his security on a weak foundation. I tell that proprietor, that the negroes would love their masters better than their attorneys; and now that extra labour is to be obtained from them by their own consent, if they find their master abandon them to the care of others, they will withhold their labour, and in a few years they will abandon him. I know that you have friends who are deeply interested in this question: so have I connexions, whose interests are not matters of indifference to me. My views may not be theirs: my experience may be contrary to their impressions; and to oppose prevailing prejudices in this colony, has hitherto been to be considered hostile to the interests of the proprietors: it is to me, however, of more importance to state what I believe to be the truth, that is advantageous to be made known, than to court any favour I |