to obtain, from their own resources, a knowledge of letters, (ib. p. 325). And yet, by a regulation which the Society for propagating the Gospel sanctions, nearly 300 Creole slaves born in Barbadoes, therefore native born subjects of the king, nurtured in the very domicile of the Society itself, are doomed to exclusion from all instruction in reading, because they have passed the age of Ten. Can the Society possibly continue to uphold so indefensible a regulation? We are told (p. 8,) that "the desire of the slaves for instruction is manifest." Why is that desire thus repressed by those who ought, nay, who are bound to satisfy it?

We are further told that it is one of the rules of the Society, adopted, it should seem, for the first time in 1818, " that marriage be encouraged among the slaves;" (p. 6,) and yet it is stated, (p. 8,) that "there is but ONE instance of marriage among them legally performed." Here, however, what we most of all admire is the elaborate apology of the Chaplain of the Society for the absence of the marriage tie among its slaves, and the Society's most unaccountable adoption of that apology. The Chaplain, indeed, tells us that he ardently looks forward to the influence of religion in "putting an end to polygamy, and in promoting a desire and suitable reverence for this hallowed band." Yet he argues that their present connexions are not to be regarded in the light of promiscuous concubinage; instances of fidelity ("connubial fidelity" he calls it by a strange misnomer) being to be met with, though in other cases it is too frequently violated. Again, at p. 19, the Society edifies the public with reprinting its Chaplain's farther apology for the prevailing polygamy and concubinage. Though there is no marriage, he says, the husband considers those he lives with as his wives. "National habits," he adds, " are not changed in a day."-(The day to the Society has been a long one-upwards of 120 years.) But "when Christian instruction has had longer time" (how much longer?) "to operate," then we may look forward with hope to the slaves marrying, and polygamy vanishing. Can it be by a society comprehending all the Archbishops and Bishops of England that currency is given to such views as these? The defence seems quite as good in principle for concubinage in one part of the empire as in another, in England as in Barbadoes. Besides, the Chaplain mistakes the very nature of marriage. He forgets that it is a civil, as well as a religious institution, and that not only Christians, but heathens and infidels marry, and are bound by the laws affecting marriage. It is the law which prescribes what shall be its form, and its rights, and its obligations. But the Chaplain of the Society (and the Society seems to accredit his views by circulating them in this defence of its own conduct) seems to think, that the slaves should, at least, continue to live in concubinage and polygamy until his labours shall have made them Christians; making little or no account of the difference between an union sanctioned by law, and so legitimatizing its offspring, and such a casual union as no more binds the subjects of it to each other, than it binds the beasts of the stall. We are lost in amazement on reading such things. When the Maroons of Jamaica were removed to Sierra Leone in the year 1800, they had lived in polygamy and concubinage like the slaves of this Society. They were given to understand that such modes of life were unlawful, and could no longer be tolerated; and

and they at once agreed in future to abandon them. Now what has the Society done to put an end to this flagrant evil in its own family, among its own servants, persons actually born in its own house? Would the Governors of this Society, our Archbishops and Bishops, permit their male and female domestics to cohabit together without the sanction of marriage, merely because they had been previously uninstructed, in the hope that in time their Lordships' chaplains might succeed in convincing them of the impropriety of the practice? We suspect too that this state of illicit cohabitation is made no bar to the admission of persons to the sacrament of the Lord's supper, there being on the estate only one marriage of slaves, and the number of communicants, "slave and free," being seventeen (p. 19); a number of communicants it must be allowed sufficiently small, at the end of more than 120 years, even if all of them were slaves.

At p. 7 it is implied that the want of funds prevented any regular means of religious instruction being provided for their slaves until 1818. Yet the Society had always been in the receipt and expenditure of considerable funds, a part derived from the labours of these very slaves. What stronger claim could exist on those funds, whether derived from that source or from public or private contributions, than was preferred by the spiritual destitution of the slaves themselves?

The most important portion of the Society's statement consists of a letter from Mr. Clarke, the agricultural agent, dated in May last, and evidently intended as a reply to the inquiries addressed, a few months before, to the Society, by Mr. Riland. The most material part, however, of Mr. Clarke's information is wholly omitted; we mean his " list of the slaves, and the employment of each, with their respective ages and colours." (p. 26, &c.)

Mr. Clarke's account of the general treatment of the slaves, as well as that of Mr. Pinder, (p. 9,) does not differ materially, from that which West Indian planters are in the habit of giving as to the general style of their treatment. We believe it, however, to be much more correct than theirs usually is; and its greater correctness is proved by the comparative increase of the slaves on these estates. The descriptions which come to us, from Demerara and Jamaica, are quite as favourable to the humanity of the proprietors as those of Mr. Clarke and Mr. Pinder; but the results would indicate that there was much more of truth in the latter. Mr. Clarke has not enabled us to ascertain the rate of increase; but it appears, as far as we can form an opinion, to be about 14 per cent. per annum, while the amount of decrease, even on Lord Seaford's estates in Jamaica, is 1 per cent.; in Demerara, upwards of 2 per cent.; and in Trinidad nearly 3 per cent. But still the rate of increase which appears to take place among the Society's bondsmen, falls much below that both of the slaves in the Bahamas and the United States, and of the free population in Jamaica and the other colonies. And some of the causes of this inferiority, notwithstanding any comparative mildness of treatment, are perfectly apparent.-To say nothing of the licentious habits of polygamists and concubinists, for one third of the year, it is admitted, (p, 26,) that the labour of the slaves is protracted from five in the morning till eight or nine o'clock at night;—and we may assume that Mr. Clarke gives us the least unfa

vourable view of his own exactions. But what must the effect be of such continuity of labour in such a climate, exacted too, be it remembered, under the compulsion of the whip or of confinement in the stocks?-Again, no registry of punishments is kept on the estate, though these punishments are generally inflicted, not by order even of Mr. Clarke, but at the will of the resident manager, Mr. Hinkson. Now that these punishments have been few and light, we must take on the bare assertion of men habituated, through life, to the whip and the stocks, and from whom we might probably form a very different estimate on the subject, if we had the record book before us. But surely the want of such a record is quite inexcusable, after the distinct enunciation of the wishes of Government on that subject in 1823. Mr. Clarke and the Society could not be ignorant that such a record was required, or that importance was attached to it by the Government, and by all who know any thing of West Indian discipline. And yet, after a lapse of five years, even this simple measure of reform, this slight check on the despotic power of the manager, has not been adopted either by the Society or its agent. We cannot, therefore, admit, on such authority as is now before us, that on the Society's estates punishments have been either rare or light. Rare or light they may be, as compared with many other sugar plantations; but that they are rare or light as compared with what occurs in any English village of 400 inhabitants, or in any village of free labourers within the British dominions, we must have some better evidence than the loose assurances of men who have breathed from infancy the very atmosphere of slavery, and who have been familiarized to the very manipulation of all its loathsome and disgusting, and heart-hardening accompaniments.

But the whip in the field! The driver and manager, who it seemed had been ordered to lay it aside, represented to Mr. Clarke, (and Mr. Clarke, good easy man, admitted their plea,) that the want of it was attended with great inconvenience, and with loss of labour. The human cattle had begun to move slowly and sluggishly, on the whip being removed from sight and hearing, and it was therefore resumed to quicken their movements. The crimes which required it, and we are told they are "the common offences of the field," were "idleness, insolence, and insubordination."-For these CRIMES the men and women living on the Society's estates, and toiling for the Society's benefit from day to day, and all day long, without wages, were punishable, and were punished, in the year 1828, by the whip, or by confinement "for one, two, or more days or weeks, according to the nature of the offence ;" and all this at the sole pleasure of a Mr. Hinkson, who renders no account to the Society, because he keeps none, either of the lashes he inflicts, or of the hours and days of imprisonment he awards. And these punishments, be it remembered, are inflicted by his arbitrary mandate, not in general for any thing that we should call crime, or punish as such here, but for idleness, for loitering, for saucy language, and for what is called "neglect of business."

The system of coercion extends beyond the mere work of the field. It is employed to enforce attendance at church on Sunday, (p. 7, and 13.) Those who do not attend church on Sunday are condemned to labour (hard labour

And is this to continue? Is the Society to go on exacting their uncompensated toil from these poor creatures by means of stocks and stripes? Are they not entitled at least to wages, if not to liberty, at the hands of this Christian corporation? They are fed, we shall be told, and clothed, and lodged. So are the horses of every Governor of the Society; but like those horses they are driven to their labour. They can remit it in no case at their own choice, even for an hour, without the hazard of bodily suffering. The base passion of fear, therefore, is the only spring of action which is called into exercise.

The power of self-enfranchisement, however, is a boon which the Society seems never to have thought of extending to its slaves.-About six years ago three of them redeemed themselves by purchase, and a father is now about to be allowed to buy the freedom of two of his daughters;—and the price of the redemption of these five poor creatures, the long savings, doubtless, of many a painful fragment of time, rescued from the Society's constrained servitude is unscrupulously extorted from them, to swell the general funds of the corporation. We should like to know its amount. The remarks of Mr. Clarke, on this subject, (p. 28,) are in the true style of Creolian prejudice, but we need not enter upon them. As for the Society, it has evidently bestowed no serious consideration on the subject. It continues to grasp these human chattels, "the stock of the estate," as the Society scruples not to call them, (p. 17,) as firmly as any planter in Barbadoes; and even the Christian children, born from year to year under its roof, continue doomed, as far as any thing has yet been done by it, to bear, in perpetuity, the brutalizing yoke of slavery, for the sole purpose of replenishing the Society's coffers.

Our view of the effects of the abolition of Sunday markets in Barbadoes, boasted of so highly by the Society for the Conversion of Slaves, (See Reporter, No. 41, p. 321, &c.) is incidentally, but most fully confirmed in this statement. The Chaplain says, (p. 24,) that he is confident, "the Society will be gratified to learn that its slaves will feel no inconvenience from the abolition of the Sunday market, as it affects the sale of their provisions, &c. as Mr. Clarke has determined to allow all the labouring slaves on the plantation every alternate Saturday, as a day for going to market, which will be an increase of comfort to them, and render the abolition of the Sunday market a benefit even in a worldly point of view." To those then who are not thus favoured, it is not "a benefit," but "an inconvenience;" and in general they are not so favoured.*

being in this country our punishment for great crimes) on the following Saturday afternoon, while those who do attend are exempt from it. This, it must be admitted, is rather a compulsory kind of worship.-How very extraordinary it is that the agents of these estates should feel themselves at liberty thus to compel the slaves to attend divine worship, and yet should have been able to discover no means of enforcing the decency of connubial unions among them!

But, in truth, it is a farce to call the Barbadoes law an abolition of Sunday markets. These now exist, by law, from five to nine on Sunday morning. In the newspaper of that island, called the Barbadian, of the 16th December last, is the following editorial paragraph. "We look anxiously for the day when our market-house will be closed the whole of the Lord's day. When shall we get rid of the trafficking and slaughtering, the noise and uproar, the cursing and swearing, which, from the dawn of day till nine o'clock on Sundays, are so disgusting, and are too disgraceful to be much longer tolerated, we trust, in this Christian land."-Christian land indeed!

It further appears, that no means have been taken by the Society or its agents, to establish any thing like a Savings' Bank for the slaves, though that also was recommended by the Government. Mr. Clarke, indeed, discovers that such is the feeling of distrust entertained by the slaves, that though a single family has OFTEN been known to receive £20 or £30 for its crop, whatever money it may lay up is "carefully concealed from the knowledge of owners and overseers," (p. 28.) How then has Mr. Clarke acquired his knowledge of their large earnings? And what encouragement has he given to these poor thralls to place those earnings in safe deposit until they shall accumulate to the value of their redemption, which, in Barbadoes, on the average, does not now exceed £28 sterling? (see Reporter, No. 19, p. 282, &c.) So that, if the statement be true, that families are OFTEN receiving £20 or £30 for a crop, that is from £14 to £21 sterling, redemptions might be continually occurring.

But, before we close our remarks, we are anxious it should not be supposed that, in making them, we are actuated by any unfriendly feelings towards the venerable Society for propagating the Gospel. If our obligations to the great cause we have undertaken would have permitted us to be silent with respect to its proceedings, we should have felt ourselves relieved from a very painful responsibility. But it would have been actual treason to that cause to have passed so influential an example wholly overlooked. Indeed, having found it to be our duty fearlessly to arraign as criminal the principle and whole system of colonial bondage, as well as the conduct of many of those who administer it, it would have laid us justly open to the imputation of moral cowardice, and of the most reprehensible partiality, had we shrunk from a frank and full statement of our views, not only of this Society's proceedings, but of its present attempt to vindicate them. In proportion as its Directors stand high in public estimation and in public confidence, is it important that we should not allow them unwittingly to lend their sanction to principles and practices which we have uniformly denounced, and must continue to denounce, as opposed to the plainest maxims of humanity and justice, and as altogether incompatible with the spirit and the precepts of the Gospel. In the case of private individuals there is at least one palliative plea, however weak it may be in itself, which they may advance. Considerations of self-interest naturally make them averse to reforms, however salutary, which they may think threaten to affect their property. But in the case of the Society there is not even this excuse for maintaining, for a single day, any principle or any practice which Christianity, or even humanity reproves. We very willingly and gladly admit, that on the Society's estates the oppressions of the system are not so deathful as on most other sugar plantations; though, even here, the progress of population is much slower than among the free blacks and coloured classes in our islands, or among the slaves either in the Bahamas or in the United States. But if the positive physical oppressions, the over-working and the underfeeding, to which the Society's slaves, in common wtth all around them, were long subjected, have, (as we are happy to believe they have,) diminished in their intensity, so as to admit now of an increase, still we maintain that the Society's slaves continue to indicate the pressure of their bond