along the summit, played hotly with grape; and their troopers, galloping over the glacis of Almeida, poured down the road, sabring every thing in their way. Ney, desirous that Montbrun should follow this movement with the whole of the French cavalry, and so cut off the troops from the bridge, sent five officers in succession to urge him on; and so mixed were friends and enemies at this moment, that only a few guns of the fortress durst open, and no courage could have availed against such overwhelming numbers. But Montbrun enjoyed an independent command; and, as the attack was made without Massena's knowledge, he would not stir. Then the British regiments, with singular intelligence and discipline, extricated themselves from their perilous situation; for, falling back slowly, and yet stopping and fighting wherever an opportunity offered, they made their way through a rugged country, entangled with vineyards, in despite of their enemies, who were so fierce and eager that even the horsemen rode in amongst the enclosures, striking the soldiers as they mounted the walls or scrambled over the rocks. As the retreating troops approached the river, they came upon a more open space; but the left wing being harder pressed, and having the shortest distance, arrived while the bridge was still crowded, and some of the right wing distant. Major M'Leod, of the 43rd, seeing this, rallied four companies on a hill just in front of the passage, and was immediately joined by a party of the 95th; and at the same time two other companies were posted, by brigade Major Rowan, on another hill flanking the road; these posts were thus maintained until the enemy, gathering in great numbers, made a second burst, when the companies fell back. At this moment the right wing of the 52nd was seen marching towards the bridge, which was still crowded with the passing troops. M'Leod, a very young man, but with a natural genius for war, immediately turned his horse round, called to the troops to follow, and, taking off his cap, rode with a shout towards the enemy. The suddenness of the thing, and the distinguished action of the man, produced the effect he desired; a mob of soldiers rushed after him, cheering and charging as if a whole army had been at their backs; and the enemy's skirmishers, astonished at this unexpected movement, stopped short; before they could recover from their surprise the 52nd crossed the river, and M'Leod, follow 187 ings, both feeling and thinking, in that particular structure of body and residentiary eleSUCH was the fish creation-a race of bement to which they were assigned. Like the vegetable tribes, they have been made to be useful to man, both in contributing to his sustenance and in supplying him with many important conveniences. But, independently of the human race, they have been created to be happy beings in themselves. From their vast numbers and varieties, and the comparatively small knowledge which man has of them, and the few out of their numerous species which have been converted to his use, we may assume that they were made principally on their own account, and for the display to us knowledge of his omnipotence, and give us tions, and imagination. of our Creator's mind, power, thoughts, invenThey enlarge our tiality. ocular sensations of its multifarious poten to themselves than any other classes of animal life. For, excepting the few species of birds Fish seem to be more exclusively confined and amphibious quadrupeds which seek them as food, no animal but man knows or notices them. They live in an element which is mortal to all but themselves; and no other creature, nor even man, can molest them, but as they choose to float near the surface of their waves, or to be tempted by the baited hook that descends deeper. But they are equally unfitted and unable to have any concernment with other beings. They die in no long time if removed from their habitual fluid; and thus they are entirely beings of the world of waters, and have no functions or faculties for any other region or mode of existence. In general, they are made to be helpless to all assailants.. Animals have teeth and claws, or horns, and other weapons for fight or escape, but few fish have such endangering instruments. They are an instance that an innumerable class of aniinoffensive and unresisting helplessness. They mated beings may exist in great comfort and activity, whose prevailing character is that of are subjected to death, and several of their species receive the termination of their being, at times, by serving as the food to others; but most of those whose life is not thus intercepted As the regiments passed the bridge, they planted themselves in loose order on the side of the mountain. The artillery drew up on the summit; and the cavalry were disposed in parties on the road to the right, because two miles higher up the stream there were fords, and, beyond them, the bridge of Castello Bom; and it was to be apprehended that, while the 6th corps was in front, the reserves and a division of the 8th corps, then on the Agueda, might pass at those places, and get between the division and the Celerico; the river, was, however, rising fast from the rains, and it was impossible to retreat farther. The French skirmishers, swarming on the right bank, opened a biting fire, which was returned as bitterly. The artillery on both sides played across the ravine: the sounds were repeated by numberless echoes; and the smoke, rising slowly, resolved itself into an immense arch, spanning the whole chasm, and sparkling with the whirling fuzes of the flying shells. The enemy gathered fast and thickly; his columns were discovered forming behind the T. P. But they are principally interesting to the contemplative student for the curious modification which they exhibit of the principles of life and of mind. They show the phenomena of these as they occur in the finny forms, functions, and element. We see, in them, fish mind and fish feelings, and find similarities between these and the faculties of the higher orders of animals, and of ourselves, which deserve all the attention they may excite, and enlarge our conception of the nature of the intellectual qualities. They contribute to prove, that life and mind do not arise from form, nor depend upon it; for they exhibit these as equally existing in every configuration, and in despite of diversity. No changes of mind are, therefore, independent of all matefigure prevent or suppress them; nor does the matter of the bodily substance united with them either cause or destroy them. Life and added to it and co-existing within it.-Sharon rial structure, and are some great principles Turner's Sacred History of the World. THE TOURIST. MONDAY, JANUARY 28, 1833. PROPRIETARY RIGHTS EXAMINED. As the advocates of Negro slavery in England lay much stress upon the proprietary rights of the West Indian body, dignifying them with the title of vested interests, it may assist the readers of The Tourist, in forming a correct judgment on this subject, if they have brought before them a true account of the origin of these vested interests, as given by the naval historian LEDIARD, in his history, published in two volumes, folio, in 1735. The first English slave-factor appears to have been Captain, afterwards Sir John, Hawkins; the accounts of whose three first enterprises in this way are as follows: Second Voyage.In the year 1564, Mr. | John Hawkins, having met with so good success in his first undertaking, resolved upon a second voyage, for the coast of Guinea, and from thence, with negroes, to the West Indies. For this voyage he had two ships and two barks: the JESUS, of Lubeck, of seven hundred tons; the Solomon, of one hundred and forty tons; the Tiger, of fifty; and the Swallow, of thirty tons. With these he departed, on the 18th of October, from Plymouth. The same day, they met, about ten leagues out at sea, the Minion, one of the queen's ships, commauded by Captain David Carlot, and the John Baptist, of London, who were likewise bound for Guinea; but the Minion, leaving the John Baptist in the company of Mr. Hawkins, went in search of the Merlin, of London, who had been separated from them. The 21st, they had a violent storm that continued for three and twenty hours, during which they This John Hawkins was the son of Mr. lost the company of the John Baptist and the William Hawkins of Plymouth, who was in Swallow, and the other three ships received great esteem with King Henry VIII., as a prin- considerable damage. The 23rd, they met cipal sea-commander, and of whose Voyages I with the Swallow again, ten leagues to the have already given an account in that king's northward of Cape Finisterre. The wind conreign. He had made several voyages to the tinuing contrary, on the 25th they put into Canary Islands, where he got all the intelli- Ferrol, in Galicia, where they stayed five days. gence he was able to procure of the state of The 26th, the Minion joined them there, havthe West Indies, of which he had before re-ing had the unhappiness to see the Merlin ceived some knowledge from the instructions given him by his father. Among other things, he was assured that negroes were a very good commodity in Hispaniola, and that they were easily to be had in great numbers on the coast of Guinea. Having opened his mind to his friends, he soon found adventurers for this undertaking, among whom were Sir Lionel Ducket, Sir Thomas Lodge, Mr. Gunson, his father-in-law, Sir William Winter, Mr. Bromfield, and others. Three ships were provided for this enterprise: the Solomon, of one hundred and twenty tons, commanded by Mr. Hawkins himself, as general; the Swallow, of one hundred tons, Thomas Hampton, captain; and the Jonas, a bark of forty tons. In this small fleet Mr. Hawkins took only a hundred men. First Voyage. He departed from the coast of England in the month of October, 1562, and sailed first to Teneriffe, where he took in several refreshments. From there he went to Sierra Leone, by the natives called Tegarin, on the coast of Guinea, where he made some stay, and during that time got into his possession, partly by the sword, and partly by other means, upwards of three hundred negroes, beside several commodities which that country affords. With this booty he set sail for Port Isabella, in the island of Hispaniola, in the West Indies; where he found a good vent for his English commodities and some of his negroes; but was obliged to be on his guard against the treachery of the Spaniards. From Port Isabella he went to Puerto de Plata, where he likewise trafficked, but still in danger. Thence he sailed to Monte Christi, another port on the north side of Hispaniola, where he was allowed to traffic peaceably, and sold the rest of his negroes. He made so good a return that he not only loaded his three ships with hides, ginger, sugar, and a good quantity of pearls, but he freighted two hulks with hides and other commodities, which he sent to Spain. Having thus finished his commerce, he went out by the islands of the Caycos without entering farther into the Bay; and so, returning with good success and great advantage to himself and his co-partners, arrived in England, September, 1563. blow up, and her hulk sunk, all that were in her being drowned, excepting a very few whom they took up miserably burnt. The 30th they all set sail together; the 4th of November they had a sight of the island of Maderia; and the 6th, of Teneriffe. There they stayed till the 20th; and, then departing, arrived on the 25th at Cape Blanc, on the coast of Africa. Here they took in several refreshments, particularly fish; and, departing the 26th, came the 29th to Cape Verd, in the latitude of fourteen degrees and a half. Here they proposed to have taken some negroes by force, but the Minion's crew betrayed their design, and prevented them. They, therefore, departed on the 7th of December, and came the next day to the island of Alcatrarga. Here the two ships rode at anchor, while the two barks went to the island of the Sapies, called La Formio, where they landed with eighty men in armour, thinking to take some negroes, but they were too nimble for them. The 14th, they came to the Island of Sambula, where they staid several days, and took every day some of the inhabitants, burning and ravaging their towns. The 21st, having their negroes on board, and being furnished with what provisions they wanted, in great plenty, they set sail and arrived the next day at the River of Callowsa, at the mouth of which the two ships came to anchor, while the two barks, with the John's pinnace, and the Solomon's boat, went up the river, and returned with two caravets loaded with negroes. The 27th, the Portuguese having informed them of a town of negroes, called Bymbo, where they said they would find a great quantity of gold if they would hazard the attack, Hawkins resolved to try his fortune: but by the carelessness and avarice of the men, who separated, every man his own way, in search of booty, they only brought off ten negroes, with the loss of seven of their best men (among whom was Mr. Field, the captain of the Solomon) and twenty-seven men wounded. The 28th they returned to their ships, where, in the mean time, four men had been killed, and one wounded, by sharks; and on the 30th they departed for Taggarrin. The first of January, 1565, the barks and boats went into a river called Casserroes, and, having dispatched their business on the 6th, returned to their ships, which were at anchor at Taggarrin. They continued on the coast till the 29th, and then, having completed their number of negroes, set sail for the West Indies. Being becalmed at sea, for eighteen days, they did not arrive at the Island of Dominico till the 9th of March, when they were reduced to the very brink of despair for want of water; and then, with great danger of being cut off by the cannibals, only got some rain-water, which drained from the hills and lay in puddles in the dales. They departed the 10th, the 15th had a sight of the Testigoes, and the 16th arrived at the Island of Margarita, where they were kindly entertained by the Alcalde, who furnished them with bullocks and sheep. But the governor not only refused them the liberty of trafficking there, and denied them a pilot whom they had actually hired, but sent a Caravela to inform the governor of St. Domingo of their arrival, who thereupon sent a command to the Spaniards, all along the coast, to have no dealings with the English. Hawkins, finding there would be no traffic for him here, departed on the 20th, and came on the 22nd to a place on the continent, called Santa Fe, where they found excellent watering, and some other refreshments. From hence they departed on the 28th, and the next day passed between the continent and the Island of Tortugas. They kept along the coast till on, the 3rd of April, they came to a town called Burboroata. Here Hawkins was obliged to ride at anchor and solicit fourteen days for liberty of traffic; and when he at last obtained this freedom, it was clogged with an article of such extravagant duty to the king of Spain as would more than have eat up the profit; finding, therefore, that nothing was to be done by fair means, on the 16th, he landed a hundred men well armed, and marched directly up to the town. By this means he brought the Spaniards to reason, who afterwards suffered him to traffic peaceably, and upon paying a moderate duty. Third Voyage.-The year 1567, Captain John Hawkins (or as Camden calls him Mr. John Hawkins, afterwards Sir John Hawkins, a merchant) of whose two first voyages I have already given an account, undertook a third voyage to Guinea and the West Indies. Be He went himself as captain-general, in the ship Jesus, of Lubeck, one of the Queen's ships, of seven hundred tons, which had been his admiral-ship in the foregoing voyage. sides this he had five other ships under his command; the Minion, Captain John Hampton, the William and John, Captain Thomas Bolton, the Judith, Captain Francis Drake, together with the Angel, and the Swallow. He set sail the 2nd of October, from Plymouth, and had tolerable weather for five days; but, being then forty leagues north of Cape Finis terre, they had so violent a storm, for four days, that the ships were separated, all their boats lost, and the Jesus almost disabled for the voyage. But, the storm ceasing on the 11th, they pursued their course. On the coast of Guinea they took in, after great difficulties and the loss of many of their men, about 500 negro slaves, and sailed with them to the islands of the Spanish West Indies, departing from Guinea the 3rd of February, 1568, to sell them to the Spaniards, as he had a right to do, by virtue of a treaty, yet subsisting, between Charles V. and Henry VIII. Such was the commencement of the slavetrade, which continued, with no material change in its characteristic features, for more than two centuries; till its abolition by act of parliament. Its details will remain a blot upon The 7th and 20th of March, they had sight | the pages of European history till the end of morbid diffidence which possessed him, of the Island of Dominica, in 14 degrees. time: but, so long as it continued, ships and for any public employment, that he deFrom thence they coasted from place to men proceeded from the ports of Great Britain, clined accepting the appointment; and place, as to Margarita, Carthagena, Capo de to the peaceful shores of Africa, where, under la Vela, and others; where, with some diffi- the notion of a traffic or trade, they burned the from the excitement of mind it had occaculty, they carried on a tolerable good trade. habitations, desolated the country, and stole sioned he soon after relapsed into the At Rio de la Hacha all commerce with the inhabitants, to transport them against most unhappy state of mental aberration. them was prohibited, till landing two hundred their will to a foreign shore, there to compel Shortly after his recovery he retired, at men they took the town by storm, with the loss them, by means the most cruel and revolt- the wish of his brother, into a state of of two men only, after which they were allowing, to submit to an unremunerated toil. From complete retirement at Huntingdon, and ed to carry on a private trade by night.-Le- such transactions as these do the West Indian here contracted an intimacy with the diard's Naval History, vol. 1. body derive the proprietary rights and vested interests, of which they talk so loudly, and family of a Mr. Unwin, resident there, on which they rest claims so formidable in a which proved one of the chief solaces of pecuniary point of view, and urge them so per- his after life. After the death of Mr. tinaciously. Unwin, he removed with his widow and daughter to Olney, in 1767, and employed himself chiefly in reading, and visiting and relieving the poor. His life was but little marked with important events until 1773, when, in the language of one of his biographers, "he sunk into such severe paroxysms of religious despondency that he required an attendant of the most gentle, vigilant, and inflexible spirit. Such an attendant he found in that faithful guardian (Mrs. Unwin), whom he professed to love as a mother, and who watched over him during this long fit of depressive malady, extended through several years, with that perfect mixture of tenderness and fortitude which constitutes the inestimable influence of maternal protection." His recovery was slow; and his state of mind, meanwhile, was such as necessarily precluded him from any vigorous or continued study. He continued, however, to amuse himself with reading such new books as his friends procured for him, with writing short pieces of poetry, tending some birds and hares which he had tamed, and drawing landscapesan art which he began to practise late in life, but in which he nevertheless acquired considerable excellence. His state of mind, at this time, may be best learned from a passage in one of his letters. "So long," says he, "as I am pleased with my employment, I am capable of unwearied application, because my feelings are all of the intense kind. I never received a little pleasure from any thing in my life: if I am delighted it is in the extreme. The unhappy consequence of this temperament is, that my attachment to any occupation seldom outlives the novelty of it." COWPER'S RESIDENCE AT WESTON, BUCKS. "His virtues formed the magic of his song."-CowrER'S EPITAPH. THERE is an unfailing and melancholy interest attaching to every thing which concerns this extraordinary man. The genuineness of his character, the benevolence of his heart, and the severe mental sufferings which imbittered his life,-all lay powerful claims to our sympathy and regard. He was, indeed, a martyr to sensibility. All the resources of his genius appear, by a strange fatality, to have been directed against his happiness. Of him it may truly be said, as it was of one of his most illustrious contemporaries, that "his imagination was but too prolific-a world of itself; in which he dwelt amidst chimerical alarms, and started like Prospero at the spectres of his own creation." The very narrow limits which we can allot to this article, will allow of our giving but a brief and naked detail of the main circumstances of his history. John Cowper, the father of the poet, was Rector of Berkhamstead, in Hertfordshire, where the latter was born, Nov. 26, 1731. From his infancy he appears to have been of the most delicate constitution, both of mind and body. In 1737 he was sent to a school at Market-Street, in Hertfordshire, under the care of Dr. Pitman, but was removed from it on ac count of ill health. At fourteen he was At length he was persuaded, by the kind entreaties of his friend and companion, Mrs. Unwin, to prepare a volume of poems for the press; and, accordingly, in his fiftieth year, he presented his first work to the public, comprising the "TableTalk," "Hope," the " Progress of Error," &c.; and from that time continued to compose, chiefly at the suggestion of Lady Austen, a woman of great taste and talent with whom he had the happiness to become intimately acquainted. To her suggestions we owe "the Task," which was published in 1784, "John Gilpin," and other minor poems. In 1785 he pub 190 lished his "Tirocinium," and his translation of Homer in 1790. From this time the pensive tone of his feelings appears gradually to have deepened; and the loss of Mrs. Unwin, by death, in 1795, seems to have subdued for ever all the energies of his mind. After some further attempts to improve his Translation of Homer, and the composition of some minor poems, he sunk, in the year 1800, under a malady originating rather in his morbid habits of mind than in physical decay. Of his published works it is hardly necessary to speak either in the way of criticism or of eulogium. Their merits are of a high and rare order; and perhaps none in our literature have gained a more general or a more favourable reception among all classes of readers. Perhaps their unexceptionable moral tendency is at once their most obvious and their highest distinction. Cowper is one of the few imaginative writers who might at the close of life take a scrutinizing review of their entire works, and not find a line which, in that hour of calm and enlightened judgment, they could wish erased. If, however, there is one class of his writings to which entire justice has not been done, we should say it is his correspondence. We think his letters distinguished by every species of excellence of which that order of composition is susceptible; and we cannot better describe or eulogize them than by adopting the words of one whose discernment and taste are equally demonstrated by his criticisms and his compositions: "I have always considered the letters of Mr. Cowper as the finest specimen of the epistolary style in our language. To an air of inimitable ease and carelessness they unite a high degree of correctness, such as could result only from the clearest intellect combined with the most finished taste." It would be difficult to speak in too high terms of his moral and religious character. It was eminently distinguished by purity and devotion, while his singular gentleness and suavity of disposition, if it was inconsistent with the manliness and majesty which is frequently associated with such distinguished talents, yet had the effect of irresistibly attracting to him the warmest and best affections of all. After saying thus much of Cowper, it may seem almost superfluous to add that he was the indignant and unsparing enemy of colonial slavery. Perhaps there was no subject which elicited from him such powerful expressions of horror and disgust as the system referred to a fact to which his works every where offer abundant testimony. IN MEMORY OF WILLIAM COWPER, ESQ., BORN IN HERTFORDSHIRE, 1731; Ye who with warmth the public triumph feel BEETHOVEN. BEETHOVEN is the most celebrated of the please him. He looked hard at the stranger, and spat on the floor, as if he had seen a toad; then glanced at the newspaper, then again at the intruder, and spat again, his hair bristling gradually into more shaggy ferocity, till he closed the alternation of spitting and staring by fairly exclaiming, "What a scoundrelly Even pliz!" and rushing out of the room. among his oldest friends he must be humoured like a wayward child. He has always a small paper book with him, and what conversation takes place is carried on in writing. In this, too, although it is not lined, he instantly jots down any musical idea which strikes him. These notes would be utterly unintelligible, even to another musician, for they have thus no comparative value; he alone has in his own mind the thread by which he brings out of this labyrinth of dots and circles the richest and most astounding harmonies. The moment he is seated at the piano, he is evidently unHis remains were buried in St. Ed-conscious that there is any thing in existence mund's Chapel, in the church of East Dereham, Norfolk, and a monument was erected over his grave, on which was inscribed the following epitaph, from the pen of his friend, Mr. Hayley : but himself and his instrument; and, consi- almost imperceptible motion of his fingers, the man's soul passed over his countenance. RESPIRATION OF THE SPIDER. A HOUSE spider was placed by a gentleman on a small platform, in the middle of a glass full of water, the platform being about half an inch above the surface. It presently made its escape, as might have been anticipated, by suffering a thread to be wafted to the edge of the glass. The person who witnessed this, suspecting it might have been assisted by the water, being so nearly on the same level, poured some of the water away, and placed the spider as before. It descended by the stick that supported the platform, till it reached the water, but, finding no way to escape, it returned to the platform, and, for some time, employed itself in preparing a web, with which it loosely enveloped the abdomon by means of the hinder legs. It now descended, without hesitation, to the bottom of the water, when the whole of the abdomen was covered with a web, containing a bubble of air, probably intended for respiration, as it evidently included the spiracles. The spider, enveloped in this little diving-bell, endeavoured on every side to make its escape, but in vain, on account of the slipperiness of the glass; and, after remaining at the bottom for about thirteen minutes, it returned, apparently much exhausted, as it coiled itself close under the little platform, and remained afterwards without motion. WAGES OR THE WHIP. "Under the most mitigated system, slavery is still labour obtained by force; and if by force, I know not how you can stop short of that degree of force which is necessary to extract involuntary exertion. A motive there must be; and, ransack your invention as you will, it comes at last to this Inducement or Compulsion: Wages or the Whip."-Mr. Buxton's Speech in the House of Commons, May 24, 1832. THE time is well nigh arrived when the question must be promptly disposed of, whether the cultivators of the soil now in bondage in the colonies are to continue their labour from that universal stimulus, the desire of reward, or from that unnatural stimulus by which their labour has been so long unrighteously exacted, the lash. The present tract is undertaken in no acrimonious spirit towards those who are so unfortunate as to remain still unconvinced that the higher motive of reward will yield as profitable a result as the debasing corporeal chastisement now exercised throughout the colonies. It may in some measure influence even the prejudiced colonist to place before his view, in contra-position, such proofs as the history of negro labour affords of the different results from the two systems. In doing so, one or two instances will serve as well as more. shall, therefore, give but two-one of foreign slaves, the other of British slaves. I In Cuba, 150 Spanish black slaves produce no more than 180 tons of sugar, or 403,200 pounds weight.* Steele. Mr. S. says "As a beginning of By what one dare hardly to speak my general plan, I had, towards the of as an accident, the Plantation end of the year 1783, taken the whips Journal of the manager of the estate and all power of arbitrary punish- of Piercefield fell into the hands of ments, from all the overseers and their the most eminent of the negro's white servants, which occasioned my friends. I proceed to give extracts chief overseer to resign, and I soon therefrom, and their dissonance with dismissed all his deputies, who could the course of proceeding in the Barnot bear the loss of their whips. badoes estate, on the other side, will "I resolved to make a further ex- prepare my readers for a material difperiment, in order to try whether I ference of result. could not obtain the labour of my May 29. Dick Orton complained negroes by voluntary means instead that Mary Daniel had stolen two large of the old method, by violence; when, bunches of Bananas out of the Banana for a small pecuniary reward over and Walk. At two o'clock the gang was above their usual allowances, the called over, and she was severely pupoorest, feeblest, and, by character, nished. the most indolent negroes in the whole gang, cheerfully performed the holing of my land for canes (generally said to be the most laborious work) for less than a fourth part of the stated price paid to the undertakers for holing. I repeated the like experiment the following year with equal success; and, on the 18th of November, 1789, I gave all my slaves tenements of land, and pecuniary wages by the hour, the day, or the week, for their labour and services." "Priscilla was also punished for quitting the watch, &c." June 7.-"Priscilla came in and received thirty-nine. She brought Betsy, who was also punished. Punished also-Domingo, Lena, Betsy Peters, Joe and Mary Daniel, for missing grass last night. Santy brought home at noon by Scipio and Adams. Gave him, at two o'clock, thirty-nine, SEVERELY, AND THEN PICKLED HIM. "In four years and three months, and Priscilla got thirty-nine each. under this change of management, Domingo and Lena got twelve each -went to the sick-house UNDER PREthere were forty-four births, and only of three in the number of the gang." LICKS. forty-one deaths, giving an increase TENCE OF BEING STIFF WITH THE Thus, by humane treatment, and la- Santy. I got some peppers out of It was no pretence with bour stimulated by reward, the gang the garden, and STEEPED THEN IN of 288 became 291, showing an in- HOT WATER, AND BATHED PRISCILLA Icrease of three; and the planter's own benefit is thus stated by himself:"The annual nett clearance of the estate (which had previously been times more than it had been for ten heavily encumbered) was above three years before." AND DOMINGO. July 14.-" Santy brought home at four o'clock. Gave him thirtynine severely. put round Santy's neck, and gave him thirty-nine for his last trip." July 31. Had an iron collar The flogging and pickling is thus carried on throughout the year. Thus, in the course of seven years, from 1812 to 1819, by cruel treatment and coerced labour, the gang of 140 declined to 86, showing a decrease of 54. This decrease of the material, by which the estate can be successfully worked, will show that a process far other than a clearance of the estate was rapidly going forward.t It will perhaps be said that I have drawn from a source which should be considered as an exception to the general kindness of treatment on a West India estate; but why should I think so? It has occurred that the Piercefield manager's own account has been accidentally revealed: where the whole cannot be seen, we must judge by the part that can be seen. Could access be had to similar documents from other estates, I doubt not that the same course of flogging and pickling would be shown up. The extravagance to which the apologists of slavery resort in extenuation of the cruelties laid to their charge was exhibited by the city pro-slavery champion recently at an antislavery lecture, held at Brunswick Chapel, Mile End. avert the indignation raised by a recital of the Moss's cruelty in rubbing Cayenne pepper into the eyes of their victim, Mr. was hardy enough to express his entire belief that the girl rubbed the pepper into her own eyes.* L To there no others on record, would fully satisfy me that the whip I have another proof in favour of the negro, which, were is a wanton and needless exercise of cruelty in order to stimulate him to labour. In a conversation which I held, a few months ago, with a West India planter of twenty-seven years' standing, he related the following anecdote :-A cotton-field was in course of picking, when the evening of Saturday drew nigh, and the overseer made an exclamation to this effect: "Before Monday comes round, half the cotton remaining unpicked will be lost." On this, one of the gang advanced, saying, "Massa, suppose you pay-a-we, we pick him to-morrow, massa;" to which all cheerfully consented. Here the negroes were willing, after the full week's labour, to surrender their day of rest, so far as it was a day of rest, and the benefit to arise from their market concerns, to attain an immediate and tangible benefit by their extra labour. With such evidence as this in proof of their willingness to labour freely for an adequate remuneration, is not the outcry against emancipation mere drivelling? See Dr. Dickson's Mitigation of Slavery. N. P. + See Appendix to Mr. Stephen's Delineation of Slavery, 2nd volume. So preposterous a supposition as this squares with nothing but what is said to have been the decision of a Dutch jury in a matter of some INTRICACY for want of satisfactory evidence. In a squabble between two men, one sustained the loss of his nose, said by him to have been bitten off by his anta gonist. The party so charged declared his innocence, and asserted that the sufferer was himself the perpetrator. On these conflicting assertions the jury consulted long, and the case turning wholly on general character, in which the party first charged had a preference, he was at length acquitted under the following verdict: That as nothing could, by man, be declared to be * See the Report of Mr. Ward, envoy to Mexico, made to the Right Hon. absolutely impossible, a man might bite his own nose off." The gentleman G. Canning, March 13th, 1826. June 8." This morning, Santa must unquestionably have formed one of this Dutch jury. |