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. WAGES. In Mexico, 150 Spanish free blacks, with occasional additions when the season is late, or the work has been retarded by accidental causes, produce 450 tons of sugar, or 1,008,000 pounds weight. THE WHIP. I In Cuba, 150 Spanish black slaves produce no more than 180 tons of sugar, or 403,200 pounds weight.* WAGES. THE WHIP. OF BEING STIFF WITH THE "In four years and three months, and Priscilla got thirty-nine each. under this change of management, Domingo and Lena got twelve each there were forty-four births, and only went to the sick-house UNDER PREforty-one deaths, giving an increase TENCE of three in the number of the gang. LICKS. It was no pretence with Thus, by humane treatment, and la- Santy. I got some peppers out of bour stimulated by reward, the gang the garden, and STEEPED THEM IN of 288 became 291, showing an in- HOT WATER, AND BATHED PRISCILLA benefit is thus stated by himself: "The annual nett clearance of the estate (which had previously been heavily encumbered) was above three times more than it had been for ten crease of three; and the planter's own years before." AND DOMINGO. July 14. Santy brought home at four o'clock. Gave him thirtynine severely. July 31. Had an iron collar put round Santy's neck, and gave him thirty-nine for his last trip." 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 Here we have palpable, commercial proof, in pounds avoir-not that the same course of flogging and pickling would be dupois, of the balance in favour of free labour over slave 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. L - was hardy enough to express his entire belief that the girl rubbed the pepper into her own eyes.‡ labour. In the next instance, I shall not be able to bring out the deficit against slave labour so arithmetically palpable-that is, not in pounds avoirdupois-as in the foregoing; but I shall place life against life, instead of sugar against sugar, and that in one of our own colonies. 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 negroes by voluntary means instead of the old method, by violence; when, for a small pecuniary reward over and above their usual allowances, the poorest, feeblest, and, by character, 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." May 29." Dick Orton complained that Mary Daniel had stolen two large June 7.-" Priscilla came in and AND THEN To I have another proof in favour of the negro, which, were there no others on record, would fully satisfy me that the whip 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 antagonist. The party so charged declared his innocence, and asserted that the sufferer was himself the perpetrator. On these conflicting assertions the jury June 8." This morning, Santa 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. must unquestionably have formed one of this Dutch jury. THE FLYING SQUIRREL. THIS curious animal is one of eleven species of the squirrel, or sciurus; so called from two Greek words, which signify "tail" and "shade," and which designate the use of its tail as a, kind of umbrella. It inhabits the birch-woods of Finland, Lapland, and other Arctic regions, and is also found in Asia, in the woods of the Uralian Chain, and in various parts of North America. It lives principally on the shoots and buds of the birch and pine, generally in solitude, except at one period of the year, and builds its nest of the softest mosses, in the hollows of trees, at a considerable height from the ground. It is principally distinguished from the better-known species of squirrel by a lateral membrane extending from the fore to the hind legs, and which so far serves the purpose of a wing or sail as to have conferred the name of the flying squirrel. It is, however, to be observed, that this term is improperly applied; for although APHORISMS. WE fall not from virtue, like Vulcan from heaven, in a day. Bad dispositions require some time to grow into bad habits; bad habits must undermine good, and often-repeated acts make us habitually evil; so that by gradual depravations, and while we are but staggeringly evil, we are not left without parentheses of consideration, thoughtful rebukes, and merciful interventions, to recal us to ourselves.-SIR THOMAS BROWN. An elevated genius employed in little things appears like the sun in his evening declination; he remits his splendour, but retains his magnitude, and pleases more though he dazzles less.-LONGI NUS. Swearing is properly a superfluity of naughtiness, and can only be considered as a sort of pepper-corn rent, in acknowledgment of the devil's right of superiority.-ROBERT HALL. Books are not absolutely dead things, but do contain a potency of life in them to be as active as that soul was whose progeny they are; nay, and extract on of that living intellect that bred they do preserve, as in a vial, the purest efficacy them.-MILTON. tion we raise against the living labours of public men-how we spill that seasoned life of man preserved and stored up in books-since we see a kind of homicide may be thus committed, sometimes a martyrdom, and, if it extend to the whole tion ends not in the slaying an elemental life, but impression, a kind of massacre, whereof the execustrikes at that ethereal and fifth essence, the breath of reason itself, and slays an immortality rather than a life.—Ib. We should be wary, therefore, what persecu RIVER OF VINEGAR. this apparatus assists them in leaping SEEDS OF THE LABURNUM. Ir is generally believed that the seeds of the laburnum (cytisus laburnum) are very poisonous, and, in consequence, children are frequently warned against eating them. Their poisonous quality is also mentioned in some botanical works; but, as no notice is taken of this opinion in Dr. Christison's Treatise on Poisons, or in Dr. Beck's Medical Jurisprudence, it may be of some importance to mention the following circumstance:-On Saturday last (September 15, 1832), I was called to see three children, of the ages two and a half, five, and about seven respectively, who, having been sent into the garden to amuse themselves, were induced to eat a small quantity of the seeds of the laburnum, which they mistook for mouse peas. Very shortly afterwards, all the children were taken very sick, and vomited repeatedly, the youngest and the oldest with less violence than the other. After vomiting, they were soon relieved, and in the evening had recovered their usual health and spirits. About thirteen years ago, I knew two young well by steeping the seeds of laburnum in more easily through them, in threading them J. D. "And yon shrine, where fame is BYRON. like a regular detail inconsistent with the space which we can allot to the subject. On the other hand, the building, in its present state, is so replete with objects of engrossing interest, and so richly furOUR notices of this edifice, whether nished with the most valuable contribuhistorical or descriptive, must of necessity tions of art, as equally to forbid us to be exceedingly limited and defective. Its enter on a general detail, and to force us history, on the one hand, extends over so to a very scanty selection. In making many centuries, and involves so many this we shall freely avail ourselves of interesting events, as to render any thing whatever sources of authentic informa tion are within our reach, to which we need not refer the notice of our readers. It has been said, that the building of the Abbey Church of St. Peter, Westminster, is "involved in mists too dense for the sun of antiquarian research to dissipate." It is perfectly true that its early history is sufficiently crowded with preposterous legends, fables, and dreams. But, in spite of all the trickery of its reverend possessors, its chronology has been pretty accurately determined. It was founded about the year 604, by Sebert, king of the East Saxons. If, however, we could rely on dreams, and particularly on those of monks, we might quote the authority of Wulsinus, that the Apostle St. Peter himself had a chapel or oratory on the site of the magnificent pile dedicated to him. The vision of Wulsinus was turned to some advantage by the succeeding monks, who added a new legend of St. Peter's crossing the water one stormy night to consecrate the church, and rewarding the fisherman who ferried him over Thorney (water which surrounded the church, the site of which was called Thorney Island), with a miraculous draught of salmon, assuring him and his fellow-watermen that they should never want fish, provided they would give one-tenth of what they caught to the newly-consecrated church. To those who consider the influence of the Catholic priesthood, it will not excite much surprise that the tale was believed, and that, for several centuries, the monks of Westminster fed on the offerings of the Thames fishermen. What was at first solicited as a benevolence, in the course of time was claimed as a right, so that, in the year 1231, the monks brought an action at law against the minister of Rotherithe, in which they compelled him to give up to them one-half of the tithe of all salmon caught in his parish. From the foundation of the Abbey to the time of Edward the Confessor its history is very obscure; but this pious prince, in consequence of an injunction from Leo IX., who had absolved him from a rash vow, appropriated one-tenth of his property, in "gold, silver, cattle, and all other possessions," to the rebuilding of the Abbey. It was commenced in 1050, and finished fifteen years afterwards. This king endowed it very liberally, and enriched it with (what at that time was highly attractive) numerous relics, the authenticity of which, in those days, it was not the custom to dispute, though some of them are sufficiently startling. Among these relies, the monkish writers assure us, were part of the manger in which Christ was born, the frankincense offered to him by the Eastern Magi, a splinter of the table of our Lord, a erust of the bread that he blessed, and a slab of the wall of the prison in which he was confined. When the chapel had been completed, Henry III. resolved that the remains of the Confessor should be removed into the new shrine in the chapel; and, says Neale, in his excellent history of this Abbey, " in the sight of all the principal nobility and gentry of the land, who were assembled here, he and his brother Richard carried the chest containing St. Edward's remains, upon their shoulders, to the new shrine, wherein it was deposited with vast ceremony and exultation. The princes, Edward and Edmund, together with the Earl of Warren, the Lord Philip Basset, and others of the nobility, assisted to support the chest; and we are informed, by Matthew of Westminster, that, on seeing it exalted, the devils were instantly cast out of two possessed persons, who had come purposely (the one from Ireland, the other from Winchester), to receive benefit on the day of St. Edward's removal !" During the reign of Henry III. and Edward I., the eastern parts of the nave and the aisles were rebuilt, and finished in 1307. To Edward II., Edward III., and Richard II., we are indebted for the Great Cloisters, Abbot's House, and the principal monastic buildings. The western parts of the nave and aisles were rebuilt by successive monarchs, between the years 1340 and 1483. The west front and the great window were built by those rival princes, Richard III. and Henry VII.; and it was the latter monarch who commenced the magnificent chapel which bears his name, and which was finished by his son and successor. The first stone of this chapel was laid on the 24th of January, 1502-3, by the Abbot Islip; and although the king did not live to see the work finished, yet, after amply endowing the Abbey, he gave Islip £5000 towards completing it, only a few days before his decease. Although Henry VIII. finished the chapel, yet he did not spare the Abbey from the general dissolution of the monasteries, nor could an existence of upwards of nine centuries successfully plead in its behalf. From the time of Henry VIII. to the accession of the House of Brunswick, little appears to have been done to improve the Abbey; but, on the contrary, it suffered the profanation of the soldiery during the civil wars of Charles I., when Sir Robert Harlow, the bigot, who was employed to demolish the venerable Cross at Cheapside, broke into Henry the Seventh's Chapel, demolished the altar stone, and committed other outrages. During the reigns of George I. and George II. the great west window was From the time of the Confessor to the reign of Henry III., little appears to have Been done to the Abbey; but, in the year 1220, the latter monarch laid the first stone of a new chapel, in honour of the Virgin Mary, on the site now occu-rebuilt, and the western towers compied by Henry the Seventh's chapel; but pleted; but it is to their immediate suclittle was done to the building until the cessors that Westminster Abbey is most year 1245, when it was more actively pro- indebted, in the restoration of the exte-. secuted, and that with a prodigality of rior of Henry the Seventh's Chapel to its expense which at the period was unparal-original beauty, after it had become so leled. much dilapidated. This work was commenced in 1809, under the direction of Mr. James Wyatt, and has been completed at an expense of about £42,000. The external appearance of the Abbey is not strictly uniform, but the appearance of the west front is extremely magnificent. The gate is wrought with much delicacy, and the light and elegant screen corresponds with the large window it supports. The chapel of Henry VII. is a magnificent specimen of ecclesiastical architecture, which, from the beauty of the design, and the rich and elaborate manner in which it is executed, proves that it must have been the work of no ordinary artists and artificers. The chapel is nearly square; the east end forming five sides of an octagon. When viewed exteriorly, it presents a light and airy structure; and the interior is of singular beauty and symmetry, though much disfigured by the stalls and flags of the Knights of the Bath, who are installed here. Edward the Confessor's Chapel, situated at the east end of the choir, contains several royal tombs, as well as the celebrated coronation chair, in which is the still more celebrated stone, related by monkish tradition to have been Jacob's pillow. This stone is placed within the frame-work of the chair, and was brought from Scone, in Scotland, in 1267, by Edward I. It is a remarkable instance of the force of superstition, that this stone has been the subject of an express article in a treaty of peace, as well as of a conference, between Edward III. and David II., king of Scotland. By the treaty, it was agreed to give the stone up to Scotland, and in the conference it was resolved that the king, after being crowned in England, should repair to Scotland, and be crowned king at Scone; but neither of these resolutions were carried into effect. A prophetic distich, said to have been cut on this stone, by King Kenneth, is no doubt the cause of the Scottish attachment to it; since, translated, it means, Where'er this stone is found, or Fate's decree is vain, The Scots the same shall hold, and there supremély reign." There are several other chapels in various parts of the building, all of which contain the tombs of some distinguished persons. The south transept, commonly known by the name of Poet's Corner, is perhaps the most attractive spot, in this respect, which the Abbey contains. It would be impossible to describe all the monuments here which deserve notice, and even to enumerate their names would be but to furnish a long and uninteresting catalogue. Many of the inscriptions they bear are distinguished by a degree of pathos, simplicity, and terseness, which constitutes the perfection of this species would be open to receive English and other foreigners of distinction. statues which ornament the peristyle, I placed Climbing, says he, one of those enormous myself above it, like Anchises of old, upon the shoulders of Encas. would hardly be too strong to do justice cended like the roaring of an ocean. Confusion could scarcely be greater in the plains of Shinar, when the descendants of Noah fled from the superstructure of their ignorance and folly. As far as the eye could reach, the tops of all the houses in Rome were laden with spectators. A single square, in the spacious area below, was preserved free from the multitude by the whole body of the pope's military, who had formed themselves into a quadrangle. Every other spot was occupied; and so closely were the people united, that their heads in motion resembled the waves of the sea. variety of colours blended together, and, glittering in the sun, produced an effect of equal novelty and splendour. It surpassed all I had ever seen or imagined; nor do I believe any country upon the globe ever produced its parallel. The of this amazing spectacle, a loud flourish of While I was occupied in the contemplation trumpets from two opposite sides of the area announced the approach of cavalry. First entered the nobles, in habits of green and gold, mounted upon sumptuous chargers, who came prancing into the centre of the military quadrangle. Other troops followed; and the whole corps, saluting the balcony over the grand portals of St. Peter's, from which his holiness was to appear, arranged themselves in order. Gives more than female beauty to a stone, And Chatham's eloquence to marble lips." There is, nevertheless, an irresistible Another very striking monument is that interest connected with this place. The to Fox, by Westmacott. He is repre- spectator cannot but feel that he is sented as dying in the arms of his coun- walking among the monuments, and His form and features are depicted treading on the dust, of the greatest try. with great fidelity, and the expression of of his countrymen and of his species. By suffering in his countenance can scarcely that curious anachronism peculiar to fail to awaken a painful sympathy in the public cemeteries, his imagination is at mind of the spectator. Near him is seen once brought into immediate contact with a negro, whose anxious and grateful exthose men whose names have illustrated pression is intended to commemorate the the pages of history at different and dispolitical achievement which of itself would tant periods, and a feeling is excited suffice to attach to him the lasting vene- nearly corresponding in character with ration of posterity: we mean the aboli- that eagerness for posthumous celebrity tion of the slave-trade. There is one which distinguished and actuated the more monument which deserves some- mighty dead" around him-a desire thing more than a mere casual mention; factitiously to extend the limits of his this is to the memory of Joseph Gas- existence by a temporary and imaginary coigne Nightingale, Esq., and the Lady intercourse with them. We cannot but Elizabeth his wife, daughter of Washing- admire that national taste and sentiment ton, Earl Ferriers. The design of this which has crowded this spot with so many masterpiece of art (the last ever executed affecting associations; for though we canby Ronbiliac) is singularly pathetic. It not more powerfully realize the equalconsists principally of three figures in sta-izing power of death than by visiting the tuary marble, representing Lady Night- spot where the ill-fated Queen of Scots ingale and her husband, and the personi-sleeps beside her vindictive and perse-brow; while enormous plumes were seen fication of death. The latter is represented as a complete skeleton, in shroud-like habiliments, raising his fatal dart to pierce the bosom of the lady, who appears sinking to the grave in the last stage of debility. Her husband is seen rushing forward, extending his right arm to ward off the attack of the monster, while with his left he clasps his dying wife to his breast, whose languid helplessness beautifully contrasts with the energetic and muscular attitude of her husband. The figure of death is distinguished by wonderful anatomical correctness, and is represented in an attitude of eagerness and resolution. "It is almost impossible," says a writer in describing this monument, "to speak of such a masterly work without a degree of admiration bordering upon enthusiasm; yet even the language of enthusiasm itself 66 cuting sister, where Pitt and Fox moulder THE CEREMONY OF THE PAPAL DR. CLARKE received a card of invitation, At this instant a bell tolled; and, throughout the whole of that vast multitude, such a silence prevailed as one would have thought it impossible to produce without a miracle. Every tongue was still, and every eye directed and venerable figure of the pope, standing erect toward the balcony. Suddenly the majestic upon a lofty and self-moving throne, appeared through clouds of incense burning around him. As he advanced, his form became more and more distinct. All behind was darkness and mystery. The most costly robes decorated his body; a gorgeous tiara glittered on his waving on all sides of the throne. As he approached the light, with elevated front and uplifted hands, he called aloud on the Almighty. Instantly the bare-headed multitude fell prostrate. Thousands, and tens of thousands, knelt before him. The military, with dier was seen with his face to the earth. A a crash, grounded their arms; and every solvoice, which penetrated the remotest corner of the area, then pronounced the benediction. Extending his arms, and waving them over the people, he implored a blessing upon all the nations of the earth. Immediately the cannons roared, trumpets screamed, music. played, all the bells in Rome sounded, the guns from St. Angelo poured forth their thunder; more distant artillery repeated the signal, and the intelligence became conveyed from fortress to fortress throughout the remotest provinces Clarke. of the empire. From Otter's Life of E. D.. |