tures listened to the advice thus administered. At first, a few only deserted from the plantations where they were settled. These, their employers immediately sought to reclaim by the gentle means of persuasion, but finding them obstinate, they were obliged to request the aid of the police department to compel them to implement their agreement, and continue in service for the period, and at the wages, agreed on. What, however, was the astonishment of the planters, when in answer to their application, they were informed by the chief commissary of police, that these Chinese and Indians, being free men, had a right to leave their service if they pleased, and that government could not interfere to enforce the performance of their stipulated service! The planters felt astonished and disappointed at the conduct of the local authorities in thus thwarting their honest endeavours to fulfil the wishes of the British nation, by trying to eradicate the system of slavery, by the introduction of free and voluntary labour in the Colony. But what was their indignation and disgust, when they found that their runaway workmen were receiving every possible protection, supplied daily with 14 lbs. of rice for each man, with plenty of wood to cook it, and in this manner befriended and encouraged by government, in the unlawful dereliction of their services and engagements. Intelligence of these circumstances soon spread through the island, and the disastrous effects were only such as might easily have been foreseen. All the plantations to which the news had reached, were speedily abandoned by their Indian cultivators, who resorted, in crowds, to the policeoffice in Port Louis, where they met with the most ample protection. The bounty of the government even went so far, as to grant them permission to build huts in the neighbourhood of the town, on a piece of ground belonging to the harbour-master, and immediately adjoining his villa. In an incredibly short time, between 500 and 600 of these idlers encamped on this spot, under the immediate auspices of the government, scorning any attempt on the part of their masters, to compel them to fulfil their agreement. But the unfortunate VOL. XXIX. NO. CLXXVI. planters were not the only persons doomed to suffer from the protection thus given to these Indian miscreants. Freed from control, and following no regular employment, they soon turned their thoughts to the commission of every sort of aggression; they began to prowl about the neighbourhood, seeking for plunder, robbing poultry yards, stealing sheep, calves, and pigs, and attacking black servants on the high-ways. In vain did those who suffered from such depredations, endeavour to represent the lawless violence of these savages. No complaint was listened to by the local authorities. After this state of things had continued for some time, a government notice appeared in the official Gazette, calling on the respective planters to shew cause why all Indian labourers should not be sent back to their native country, and the rations given them by the police paid for at the expense of the planters. Some of the planters, rather more bold than the rest, ventured humbly to represent, in written memorials to the governor, the intolerable hardship of being saddled with the expense of maintaining them, and of transporting them back to their own country, after the dreadful loss they had sustained by the advance of wages and the expense of bringing them to the island. To this temperate and legitimate address no reply was given, and, immediately after, a peremptory order was issued to the chief commissioner of police to have all the Indians embarked forthwith. The order was, of course, instantaneously obeyed. Three vessels were got ready for the purpose; and the tumultuous host of these lawless vagrants, who seemed to glory in the impunity with which they had been able to perpetrate so much mischief, embarked with banners flying, and such shouts of malicious triumph, as at first spread consternation through the whole town. Thus terminated the attempt to establish free labour in the Mauritius; but its results, at the date of the last accounts, had not terminated. The government advocate had received instructions to institute legal proceedings against nineteen of the principal planters, in order to draw from them payment of the expenses incurred in the maintenance and passage of these Indians! On the subject of this prosecution will depend the adoption of similar measures against the rest of the planters who have had the misfortune to be concerned in this abortive scheme of introducing free agricultural labour into the Mauritius. What the result will be it is not difficult to anticipate. The ill-fated colonial planter is a being whom every colonial authority may trample in the dust at pleasure, certain that the harsher he treats them, the more he will be praised in the mother country, and the higher he will be rewarded by the directors who direct the heads of the Colonial Office. But enquiry must come; and when it does come, the results cannot be pleasant to those more immediately interested. The colonial government of the Mauritius would not have ventured to have acted in the manner that has been described, unless they had had higher authority, and unless they had been certain that they would, against the planters in the Mauritius, have the support of Aldermanbury Street, which, on any day it chooses, can make Downing Street tremble.* Is there, my Lord Duke, an honest and right-thinking Briton, who can contemplate the proceedings I have noticed without a feeling of alarm and indignation? Is there an independent mind in the British empire who can look at them, and yet not blush for his country? Before I conclude, permit me for a moment to advert to that den of pestilence and vice, Sierra Leone. Official shame and concealment can no longer deny the complete failure of this senseless experiment. During the last session of Parliament, two important reports have been published regarding this place by order of the House of Commons. The first, paper No. 57, was made up of papers selected to defend it; the last, paper No. 661, containing the evidence of naval officers and others employed on the coast, shewing the horrid nature of the place, the total want of improvement of the population collected in it, and the vast superiority of Fernando Po, in salubrity, fertility, and eligibility, over it. In the first report, DR BARRY describes the climate as terrific. Owing to the great heat during the rains, and owing to "the sand and porous red sandstone which forms the stratum on which the town is erected, we are," says he, "for more than six months in the year, LIVING IN AN OCEAN OF VAPOUR!" So thick is this steam vapour, as Commodore BULLEN in his evidence informs us, that when ashore at the governor's house, but which he was as seldom as possible, he has seen his excellency get on his horse, at his own door, in the morning, and shortly afterwards I have merely seen PARTS OF HIS BODY-I have not seen his horse at all!!" No European constitution, * Mauritius is one of those colonies which is arbitrarily governed by the regula tions and laws of those who govern the official heads in Downing Street. How it improves under these, the following list of sentences, passed upon slaves in the criminal court of the colony, particularly since the application of the orders in council of 1824, will shew: 66 nor any constitution, can stand this steam-bath. Colonel NICHOLS gives us a dreadful picture of the pestilence of the place. In his passage out to Fernando Po he was a few days at Sierra Leone. The ship's crew caught the fever. "In their way down," says he, a seaman, a marine, and a midshipman, died. They had a most extraordinary eruption upon them. I said, 'This is not a fever of the West Indies, but a malignant yellow fever; therefore do not dissect them.' The surgeons dissected them, and EVERY ONE of the surgeons were taken ill, and ALL OF THEM died but one; two of them died just as we had got to Fernando Po, and the third died afterwards." Regarding the character of the black population, and the improve ment of that population which we have collected in Sierra Leone, let the following short extracts, taken from the last-mentioned official report, testify and shew: GEORGE JACKSON, Esq. one of the Judges of the Mixed Commission Court, examined by the Committee, states:"Quest. Their joy at first landing probably is very great? Ans. One can hardly speak of any feeling they have; they are more like BRUTE BEASTS than any thing else, when they come ashore. Quest. You have made use of the expression that the slaves landed were more like brutes than human beings; does that refer to their habits of life, or their understanding? Ans. Those who come from the country north of Sierra Leone, I should not so describe; but those from the Bight of Benin and from the south, I should. Quest. They are lower in the class of intelligence, taking them together? Ans. Yes. Quest. Could you get any satisfactory information from them on the topics on which you examine them? Ans. With the greatest difficulty. Quest. Did that arise from want of power of expression, or want of capacity? Ans. BOTH THE ONE AND THE OTHER!!" Mr GEORGE CLARK, Second Clerk of the Ordnance Works, and who had been five years at Sierra Leone, questioned by the Committee, states:-"Ans. They are scarcely half clothed in the villages. Quest. What is your opinion as to the opportunities, on the part of liberated Africans, to pursue useful occupations? Ans. I do not think they are capable of it. Quest. From want of industry? Ans. FROM WANT OF CAPACITY. Quest. Is there any want of industry? Ans. No, I think not. Quest. Did you perceive any advance in intelligence in the liberated Africans who had been there any length of time? Ans. No, I DID NOT! Quest. Do you think there have been no improvements in their houses? Ans. No, not among the liberated Africans." COLONEL NICHOLS examined, states:"Quest. Are the Committee to understand that the blacks resident in Fernando Po generally abstain from liquor? Ans. The blacks we take in slave vessels do not like liquor, but those fellows in Sierra Leone are the biggest drunkards I ever met with in my life, and the biggest rascals too; they are also great thieves." A communication, dated Freetown, July, 1830, (see Morning Post, 11th October,) describes the character of the population thus: "You would be astonished to see the prevalence of vice in this wretched place. All the great landmarks of civilisation are noticed only with the view of drawing fresh supplies from the Northern Country. They are never dwelt on as being conducive to happiness, or practised in the search of it. Here the European and the African, with some few exceptions, know but the resemblance of virtue, and that only as the means of ENABLING THEM TO INDULGE IN VICE." But this is not all. The reports referred to, and the communication just alluded to, tell us decidedly, that "the slave trade is carried on to a considerable extent in this very colony!!" JUDGE JEFFcote, lately sent from this country, in an address to a jury, told them, however appalling the fact may be, and incredible as it must appear to many," still that in this Colony per"found who aid and abet the abominable traffic in slaves." "Vessels are purchased, after their mission Courts, to make a second and condemnation by the Mixed Coma third experiment in the slave trade, to be perhaps again captured by our cruizers, and again bought up by the skulking foreigners who prowl about this place as the one best calculated for their iniquitous purposes!!" At that sitting he sentenced to five years' imprisonment in the house of correction, THOMAS EDWARD COWAN, a missionary schoolmaster, for having stolen in order" to sell into slavery, a liberated African, and one of his sons are pupils, also a liberated African!! The Judge at the same time told his hearers, that during "the last ten years, upwards of 22,000 Africans" had been liberated and located in Sierra Leone, at an expense to the British Government, taking into account every thing, of "SEVEN MILLIONS STERLING!!" Commodore BULLEN, in his evidence, informs us that, in three years ending 1827, during which time he was on the African station, his squadron captured and sent to Sierra Leone 11,000 slaves! The expenses incurred by this country, on account of this place, are incredible. Government, in fact, cannot ascertain the amount, as in many instances no accounts were kept, and consequently no accounts can be produced. The following document, which I have obtained from a member of the FINANCE COMMITTEE, (for the use and information of the members of which only, the return was published,) gives us the best account that the government can furnish of the expenditure to the close of the year 1826. It is entitled, "From Revenue Book, No. 114, Finance Accounts, Slave Trade, Public Income and Expenditure, 1826." The audacious compiler of the Anti-Slavery Reporter had the impudence to pronounce this paper, referred to by SIR HENRY PARNELL, the Chairman of that Committee, in his publication about the finances of this country, as 66 A FORGERY!" It is futile for the Reporter to assert that the whole expenditure was not upon Sierra Leone. Every thing done on the coast of Africa, for the suppression of the Slave Trade, has been done to raise up and to make that place; and therefore, every expense incurred is justly and properly charged against it. Total Expense of Sierra Leone, &c. 2,238,351 179,813 162,367 2. Naval Expenditure for Vessels employed in the 1,630,282 81,628 102,883 Suppression of the Slave Trade 3. Payments on account of Captured Negroes at all other Stations except Sierra Leone 4. Bounty on Captured Negroes Slaves 7. Commission for enquiring into the State of certain Captured Negroes 8. Office of Registrar of Colonial Slaves 9. Indemnification to Captors of the Descubadore, for Damages awarded against them TOTAL, • All the officers examined by the Committee, condemn Sierra Leone as unfit for any useful purpose, and give the most unqualified and decided testimony in favour of the salubrity and fertility of Fernando Po, and of its superiority over Sierra Leone in every respect, for any purpose that this country can require in its future connexion with Africa. The delusive tales of free labour on the coast of Africa are also completely set at rest by the reports in question, but more particularly so from the following extract from a letter, dated 1st May, 1829, from Lieut.Colonel FINLAY to R. W. HAY, Esq.: "I beg leave to state to you, for the information of the Right Honourable the Secretary of State, that a great portion of the inhabitants of St Mary's, in the Gam bia, are composed of SLAVES belonging to the French of Goree and Senegal, who resort to the British settlement for employment; and although many of them have resided on the settlement for years, they are strongly attached to their owners, and regularly remit to them the produce of their labours, which draws a large sum of money out of the settlement annually." This, my Lord Duke, is a new and a remarkable fact, but what is more remarkable is, that while French slaves are permitted to labour in this manner in British settlements on the Coast of Africa, French slaves, who come from French colonies to any British colony in the West Indies, are confiscated and liberated. Whence comes this African partiality? The official report last alluded to confirms, in the fullest manner, the fact, that the slave trade is actually, at this moment, carrying on in Sierra Leone, almost openly, and with approbation. But this is not all. Is your Grace aware that MAJOR RICKETTS, lately governor of the place, has brought with him to the Colonial Office a petition, signed by almost all the Nova Scotians and Maroons in the place, PRAYING, in the most earnest manner, that they may be carried away from it, and sent to Jamaica, and placed upon any estate that Government may choose in that island!! What can the advocates of this wretched place say to these facts, or where is the minister or the legislator who will, after such disclosures, stand forward and defend this infamous den of deception, delusion, extravagance, waste, pestilence, and death, or the system for which it was established? He must be a bold man indeed who will do so. National insanity, my Lord Duke, was never before exhibited to the world in more striking and in more remarkable characters, than it has been in the conduct pursued by this country in whatever concerns our settlements on the coast of Africa, and whatever relates to our West India Colonies. In the former we have, after repeated violations of the law of nations, and in the face of all rational counsel and advice, spent only to no purpose, but absolutely, millions, many millions of money, not after a labour of forty years, left things where we found them, and have, at last, been compelled to acknowledge, not only that the Africans, whom we have, at such a vast expense, collected in Sierra Leone, have not improved in character, industry, and civilisation, but that they never can improve, (see MR MACORMICK's evidence, a friend to the place, in the official report already referred to,) unless we cease to bring any more of their brutal and barbarous countrymen amongst them! This is the result of forty years' labour, and the expenditure of upwards of ten millions of money! With regard to the latter, the West India CoTonies, we have, in order to benefit the former quarter, pursued and pursue a system, which paralyzes, crushes, and destroys that vast branch of British capital, trade, and industry, which had been planted in them, and not only so, but while thus forcing on the ruin of British subjects and British property in these possessions, we are driving British capital, withdrawn from them, into the cultivation of foreign countries, thereby giving employment to the population of those countries instead of our own, and also creating wealth, capital, and trade to those countries, at the expense of our own. My Lord Duke, the fact is notorious, that great London capitalists have lately been, and are at this moment, investing large sums of money, on the security of slave-cultivated sugar estates in Louisiana and in the Brazils. How humiliating must it be to British states, |