SOCIAL AND INDUSTRIAL CAPACITIES OP NEGROES. (1)

(_Edinburgh Review_, March, 1827.)

It {361}was not till a short time back that we entertained the

slightest intention of criticising the speculations of Major Moody. We

had supposed that they would of course pass in their infancy to that

Limbo which is ordained for Laureate Odes, old Court Kalendars, and

Sermons printed at the request of Congregations. That a Commissioner

should write a dull Report, and that the Government should give him a

place for it, are events by no means so rare as to call for notice. Of

late, however, we have with great surprise discovered, that the books of

the Major have been added to the political canon of Downing-Street,

and that it has become quite a fashion among statesmen who are still

in their novitiate, to talk about physical causes and the philosophy

of labour. As the doctrines which, from some inexplicable cause, have

acquired so much popularity, appear to us both false and pernicious,

we shall attempt, with as much brevity as possible, to expose their

absurdity.

There are stars, it is said, of which the light has not yet travelled

through the space that separates them from the eye of man; and it is

possible that the blaze of glory which dazzles all the young politicians

between Charing-Cross and Westminster Hall may not yet have reached our

more

(1) Art. VI. 1. _Papers relating to Captured Negroes. No. I.

Tortola_ Schedules. Ordered by the House of Commons to be

printed, 16th, March 1825.

2. _Further Papers relating to Captured Negroes. No. II.

Separate Report of John Dougan, Esq. No. III. Separate

Report of Major Thomas Moody._ Ordered by the House of

Commons to be printed, 10th Mardi 1825.

3. _Second Part of Major Moody’s Report_. Ordered by the

House of Commons to be printed, 24th February 1820.

remote {362}readers. In order, therefore, that our remarks on the Report

of Major Moody may he clearly understood, we shall give a short account

of the circumstances under which it appeared.

By the Act which abolished the trade in slaves, the King was empowered

to make regulations for the employment and support of Negroes, who,

under the provisions of that Act, or in the course of hostilities with

foreign States, might be rescued from their kidnappers. Some of these

liberated Africans were, in consequence, admitted into the army and the

navy. Others were bound apprentices in the colonies: and of these last

many were settled at Tortola.

In the year 1821, the House of Commons presented an address to the King,

requesting that commissioners might be sent to ascertain the condition

of these people, and to report it to the Government. Major Moody

was selected for this purpose by the Colonial Office. Mr. Dougan, a

gentleman to whose talents and integrity the Major bears the highest

testimony, was joined with him in the commission. But Mr. Dougan,

whatever his good qualities may have been, was under the influence of

some unhappy prejudices, from which his colleague appears to have been

wholly free, he had been led to adopt the extravagant notion that the

Africans were his fellow-creatures; and this delusion betrayed him into

errors which Major Moody, to his eternal honour, endeavours to palliate,

but which a less candid and amiable censor would have stigmatized with

the severest reprehension. Our readers will be shocked to hear that an

English gentleman actually desired a black apprentice, during a long

examination, to take a seat! and they will be touched by the delicacy

and generosity of the Major, who mentions this disgrace! Its occurrence

“only,” as he says, “to show the bias on the mind of his colleague when

one of the African race was concerned with a white person.” (1)

At length some female Africans in the service of a person named Maclean,

were brought before the Commissioners. By their statement, and by the

confession of the master himself, it appeared that they had been cruelly

treated. Maclean, too, it appeared, had no legal right to them: for they

had been originally apprenticed to another person, and the

(1) First Part of Major Moody’s Report, page 103.

indentures {363}had never been transferred. Mr. Dougan thought it

desirable to take advantage of this circumstance, and at once to place

them in a more comfortable situation; and he prevailed on his

colleague to concur with him in recommending the case to the particular

consideration of the collector. In the mean time, however, Maclean wrote

to the Commissioners, requesting them to revise their proceedings, and

most impudently telling them, at the same time, _that he had whipped the

apprentices with tamarind switches for daring to bear evidence against

him!_ Mr. Dougan seems to have imagined that such conduct was grossly

insulting to the Commissioners, and to the government which employed

them. He probably thought, too, that to re-examine persons who had been

flogged for what they had stated on a former examination, would be to

violate every principle of equity and reason. On this point, it appears

that Major Moody was of a different opinion; and conceived that truth

was likely enough to be obtained from a witness who had just learned

that if his evidence be disagreeable to the accused party, he will

undergo severe chastisement. A rupture took place. The apprentices, we

should perhaps say the slaves, remained with Maclean; and Mr. Dougan

returned to England.

But we really cannot continue to speak ironically on a subject so

serious. We do earnestly and gravely assure Major Moody, that we think

his conduct, on this occasion, most unjust and unreasonable. Lord

Bathurst seems to have entertained the same opinion: For in consequence

of orders sent out from England, the wretched women were taken from

Maclean and apprenticed to another master.

Mr. Dougan now returned to the West Indies; and the disputes between him

and his colleague recommenced. At length both were recalled. Mr. Dougan

drew up a report of the proceedings under the commission. The Major

refused to concur in it, and presented a separate statement in answer to

it. Mr. Dougan, while labouring under a fatal malady, prepared a reply.

This document has, since his death, been transmitted to the Colonial

Office, and will, of course, be published with all expedition.

Mr. Dougan thought it sufficient to perform the duty with which he was

charged. His report is therefore, what it professes to be, an account

of the condition of the liberated Africans. {364}But the genius of the

Major was not to be confined within limits so narrow. He had command,

without stint, of the public paper and the publie type. He conceived

that the opportunity was not to be lost--that now or never was the time

to be a philosopher like his neighbours, and to have a system of his

own, which might be called after his name. The history of the liberated

Africans forms, therefore, a mere episode in his plan. His report is, in

substance, a defence of West Indian slavery, on certain new principles,

which constitute what he is pleased to call the Philosophy of Labour.

His theory has met with a very flattering reception from those who

are favourably inclined to the Colonial system, because they dread

innovation, because they hate the saints, or because they have mortgages

on West Indian plantations. Unable themselves to defend their opinion,

but obstinately determined not to renounce it, they are pleased with a

writer who abounds in phrases which sound as if they meant something,

and which, in the chat of a drawing-room, or in the leading article of a

newspaper, supply the place of a reason very creditably.

We come to the consideration of the Report with no such bias upon our

minds, and we have, therefore, formed a very different estimate of it.

We think that it is, in matter and manner, the worst state-paper that we

ever saw. The style is the jargon of a tenth-rate novelist, engrafted

on that of a tenth-rate pamphleteer. It abounds with that vague diction

which the political writers of France have invented, and by which they

often contrive to keep up appearances in spite of the most abject mental

poverty. At certain distances, and in certain lights, this paltry

and pinchbeck logic serves its purpose respectably; and to this,

unquestionably, the Major owes the greater part of his reputation. The

highest compliment which we can, with any sincerity, pay to him, is to

say, that he has some faults in common with Montesquieu--a writer whom

he evidently regards with great admiration. He calls one of the silliest

remarks of the lively president profound--an epithet which would have

amazed us if we had not recollected that the terms in which we describe

magnitudes, whether material or intellectual, are only relative,--that

the Grildrig of Brobdignag may be the Quinbus Flestrin of Lilliput. The

theories of Montesquieu are gone where the {365}theories of the Major

will soon go. But though Montesquieu could not keep his doctrines alive,

he understood how to embalm them. Their mummies are beyond all price.

The mouldering remains are valued, for the sake of the intricate folds

in which they are swathed up, the sweet and pungent spices with which

they are seasoned, and the gilded hieroglyphics with which they are

emblazoned. The Major has no such skill. Abundance of italics, and

occasional flowers of speech from the Emmelines and Adelines of the

Minerva Press, are the only ornaments which set off his speculations. If

our object were to render him ridiculous, we could easily fill our

pages with solecisms, with affected phrases, with sentences of which

the obscurity would leave the most sagacious interpreter at a fault. But

this is not our intention. We shall direct our attacks against the great

principles of his theory. To find these out, indeed, is no easy task.

For the work has neither beginning nor end. The author, instead of

taking the trouble to state his propositions, and class his arguments

for himself, has left the whole of that task to his opponents, and

has made it as difficult as possible by the most elaborate artifice of

disorder. We shall do our best, however, to perform it faithfully,

and to separate the most important passages from much curious matter

concerning the feudal system--the chisel of Phidias--the marriage in

Cana of Galilee--the difference between Theory and Practice--the choice

of Hercules--the peace and happiness of rural life--the rape of the

Sabines--the Supreme Being--and Major Moody himself.

The first great principle, then, which the Major professes to have

discovered is this, that there exists between the White and Black races

an instinctive and unconquerable aversion, which must forever frustrate

all hopes of seeing them unite in one society on equal terms. We

shall consider in succession the facts from which he draws this bold

conclusion.

By the constitution of Hayti, it seems, no white man of any nation can

be a master or proprietor in that island. From this circumstance the

Major deduces the following inferences.

“_It seems as if each party, when in power, acts as if it was mutually

thought the two races could not exist together, in the same community,

with equal political powers, from the operation of some powerful causes,

{366}which do not appear to have been felt in England in former ages,

when lier inhabitants were composed of freemen and slaves, or when

national distinctions among people living in the same country formed a

political barrier between Britons and Romans, or Saxons and Normans.”_(1)

Moreover a young Haytian, named Moyse, about thirty years ago,

complained of the attention which Toussaint Louverture paid to the

interests of the Europeans, and declared that he should never like the

whites till they should restore to him the eye which he had lost in

battle, with them! This last important anecdote, the Major prints in

italics, as quite decisive. (2) The poor Haytian must have been best

acquainted with the origin of his own feelings; and, as he ascribed them

to a cause which might well account for them, it is difficult to divine

why any other should be assigned. The liberality of Toussaint, also, is

at least as strong an argument against the hypothesis of Major Moody, as

the animosity of Moyse can be in its favour.

From the law which declares white men incapable of becoming proprietors

in Hayti, nothing can be inferred. Such prohibitions are exceedingly

foolish; but they have existed, as every person knows who knows any

thing of history, in cases where no natural antipathy can be supposed to

have produced them. We need not refer to the measures which the Kings of

Spain adopted against their Moorish subjects--to that tyranny of nation

over nation which has, in every age, been the curse of Asia--or to the

jealous policy which excludes strangers, of all races, from the interior

of China and Japan. Our own country will furnish an example strictly in

point. By the common law of England, no alien whatever can hold

land, even as a tenant. The natives of Scotland remained under this

incapacity, till the two divisions of the island were united under James

the First: and even then, the national prejudice was strong against the

removal of the disability. The House of Commons was decidedly averse

to it. The Court, in consequence, had recourse to a measure grossly

unconstitutional. The Judges were persuaded to _declare_ that to be law

which the Parliament could not be persuaded to _make_ law; and even thus

it was found impossible to remove the restriction from Scotchmen born

before the Union of the Crowns.

(1) Major Moody’s Second Report, p. 29.

(2) Ibid. p. 45.

The {367}Major ought to be well acquainted with these proceedings. For

Lord Bacon, of whom he professes himself a disciple, appeared as counsel

for the post-nati. It is amusing to consider what the feelings of that

illustrious man would have been, if some half-taught smatterer of his

philosophy had risen to oppose him with such arguments as these. “The

English can never amalgamate with any foreign nation. The existence

and the popularity of such a law as this sufficiently prove that

some powerful cause operates upon our countrymen, which does not act

elsewhere. Our ancestors always felt that, although in other countries

foreigners may be permitted and even encouraged by the natives to settle

among them, no such mixture could take place here. I have been credibly

informed also, that a Scotchman whose eye was struck out in a fray

forty years back, swore that he never could bear the sight of a Southern

after.” With what a look would Sir Francis have risen to annihilate such

an argument! What mirth would have shone in his eyes! What unsavoury

similitudes would have risen to his lips! With what confusion would the

dabbler in experimental science have shrunk from a conflict with that

all-embracing and all-penetrating mind, which fancy had elevated but

not inebriated, which professional study had rendered subtle, but could

not render narrow. As the Major seems very willing to be an experimental

philosopher, if he knew how to set about it, we will give him one

general rule, of which he seems never to have heard. It is this. When

the phenomena can be explained by circumstances which, on grounds

distinct from those phenomena, we know to exist, we must not resort

to hypothetical solutions. We are not entitled to attribute the hatred

which the Haytian Blacks may have felt towards the Whites to any latent

physical cause, till we have shown that the ordinary principles of human

nature will not explain it. Is it not natural, then, that men should

hate those by whom they have been held in slavery, and to whom they have

subsequently been opposed in a war of peculiar ferocity? Is it not also

perfectly agreeable to that law of association, from which so large a

portion of our pains and pleasures is derived, that what we have long

regarded as a distinguishing badge of those whom we hate should itself

become hateful to us? If these questions be answered in the affirmative,

the aversion {368}which the Haytian Negroes are said to entertain

towards the Whites is at once explained.

The same remark applies to all that the Major has said respecting the

state of public feeling in North America. The facts of the case he has

stated quite correctly. It is true that, even in those States of the

Union which have abolished slavery, the free Blacks are still regarded

with disgust and contempt. The most benevolent inhabitants of New

England and New York, conceive that liberty itself will scarcely be a

blessing to the African, unless measures be taken for removing him to

some country where he may not be reminded of his inferiority by daily

insults and privations. Hence Major Moody thought himself, as he tells

us,--“_justified in the inference, that some powerful causes must be

in action, and that those of a physical nature had not been overcome by

mere legal exactments_.” (1)

It cannot be doubted that some powerful cause has been in action. But

that it is a physical cause, is not quite so clear. The old laws have no

doubt produced a state of public feeling, which their repeal cannot at

once correct. In all the States the Negro colour _has been_ the livery

of servitude. In some it still _is_ so. The connexion between the

different commonwealths of the confederation is so close, that the state

of feeling in one place must be influenced by the state of the laws

in another. This consideration is surely sufficient to explain all the

circumstances to which the Major refers. It is for him to show, that an

aversion for which _slavery_ alone will sufficiently account is really

the effect of _blackness_. He would, we believe, find it as easy to

prove that there is something _naturally_ and universally loathsome in

the cut and colour of a prison uniform.

That the complexion of the free African renders his condition more

unfortunate, we acknowledge. But why does it produce this effect? Not,

surely, because _it is_ the degrading circumstance, but because it

is clear, instantaneous, and irrefragable _evidence_ of the degrading

circumstance. It is the only brand which cannot be counterfeited, and

which cannot be effaced. It is borne by slaves and their descendants;

and it is borne by no others. Let the Major prove, that, in any society

where personal bondage has never existed, the

(1) Second Part of Major Moody’s Report, p. 27.

whites {369}and blacks have felt this mutual dislike. Till he can show

this, he does nothing.

But, it seems, an anonymous writer in South America, some years ago,

declared, that the blacks never could amalgamate with the whites. (1)

That a man who had passed his life among negro _slaves_ should transfer

to their colour the feelings of contempt with which he regarded their

condition, and the mean vices to which that condition necessarily gave

birth, was perfectly natural. That he should suppose a feeling, of which

he could not remember the origin, to be instinctive, was also natural.

The most profound thinkers have fallen into similar errors. But that

a man in England should believe all this, only because a man at Bogota

chose to write it, argues a strange degree of credulity. Such vague

authority is not sufficient to establish a fact. To quote it in support

of a general proposition, is an insult to common sense. The expressions

of this Columbian prove only, what the refusal of the Major to let a

negro sit in his presence proves as satisfactorily, that there are very

weak and very prejudiced people in the world.

Feelings exactly similar to those which are unhappily so common among

the whites of the United States, have often existed in cases where it is

impossible to attribute them to physical causes. From a time beyond the

researches of historians, an impassable gulf has separated the Brahmin

from the Paria. The Jews were long regarded by the Spaniards and

Portuguese with as much contempt and hatred as the white North American

feels for the man of colour. The cases, indeed, are strikingly similar.

The national features and rites of the Hebrews, like the black skin and

woolly hair of the Africans, visibly distinguished them from the rest of

the community. Every individual of the race bore about him the badges

of the synagogue. Baptism itself could not wash away the distinction.

Conversion might save him from the flames; but the stigma was

indelible--he bore it to the grave--he bequeathed it to his

children--his descendants, as long as their genealogy could be traced,

were objects of scorn to the poorest Castilian peasant, who gloried in

the name of an old Christian.

But we will not multiply examples in a case so plain. We hasten to

another argument, on which Major Moody

(1) Second Part of Major Moody’s Report, p. 23. 24

dwells {370}with peculiar complacency. At this, indeed, we do not much

wonder. It is entirely his own. He is the first writer who ever used

it, and we venture to prophesy that he will be the last. We speak of

his remarks on the influence of the sexual passion. We will give his own

words:--

“_In such committees as I have referred to, an observer will not fail to

discover the want of a certain class of sympathies, which are daily seen

in action when men of the same race live together, even in republics,

like the United States of America, although a portion of the community

consisted of men of different nations and habits, but yet resembling

each other in external form, colour, features, &c.

“I allude to the extraordinary rarity of virtuous unions having taken

place between the males and females of the pure Negroes and the pure

Whites in America. I certainly have heard of such unions as in certain

classes of society are seen in London; but in America, they were

considered rather as very extraordinary occurrences, particularly if the

male should be a pure negro, and the female a pure white. On the other

hand, when the female is an African, lust, aided by fear or avarice, has

often led to an illicit union between the sexes....

“In the New World of America, virtuous unions between the extreme

colours of black and white are always considered something in violation

of the ordinary sympathies which spring from a pure affection, and

therefore derogatory to the feelings of caste; for even the free

coloured females, I understand, would have a reluctance, if advanced in

civilization, to form a virtuous union with a pure negro....

“Some of the intelligent free negroes of the United States, with whom I

often conversed, for the express purpose of personal observation, felt

the ban under which they were put, by the influence of prejudice, as

they considered it, after the laws of the country had declared

them free, and equal to any other citizen of the State; and, in the

confidence inspired by my inquiries about their situation, I was often

asked if, in England, white women did not marry black men? And, with

apparent simplicity, it was inquired why the American white women were

so prejudiced against black men?...

“Those who merely refer the degraded state of the free Africans or

blacks to their having been formerly slaves, and leave out of their

consideration the consequences arising from physical differences in

form, colour, feature, and smell, influencing those general ideas of

beauty, creating that passion of love that most commonly leads to a

virtuous union of the sexes of different nations, must be considered

as having taken a very narrow view of the question, from the prevalent

custom of merely referring to moral causes alone, and omitting all

references to those of a physical nature, though still more powerful in

their effect._” (1)

This extraordinary argument is concluded by a touching representation of

the refinement which modesty gives to pleasure, and of the happiness

of being cherished and beloved, which, we hope, will edify the young

gentlemen of the

(1) Second Part of Major Moody’s Report, pages 19 and 20.

Colonial {371}Office, but which has, we think, little to do with the

question. This, therefore, we omit, as well as the pious appeal to the

God of Truth, which follows it.

Is it possible that the Major does not perceive how directly all his

statement leads towards a conclusion, diametrically opposite to that at

which, by some inconceivable process, he has managed to arrive? We will

give him an answer. But we really hope that he is the only one of our

readers who will need it.

The passion of the sexes is a natural appetite. Marriage is a civil and

religious institution. Where, therefore, between two classes of people,

the passion exists, but marriage is not practised, it is evident that

nature impels them to unite, and that acquired feelings only keep them

asunder.

Now, Major Moody just reverses this mode of reasoning. Because the

Whites form with the Blacks those illicit unions, to which the motive is

physical, but do not form those legitimate unions to which the motive

is moral, he actually infers that the cause which separates the races

is not moral, but physical! In the same manner, we presume, he would

maintain, that a man who dines heartily without saying grace, is

deficient, not in devotion, but in appetite.

The story which he tells respecting the free blacks, with whom he

conversed in the United States, is alone sufficient to show the

absurdity of his hypothesis. From his own account, it is plain that

these blacks had no antipathy to white women. The repugnance was all on

one side. And on which side? On that of the privileged class, of those

whose superiority was till lately recognised by law, and is still

established by custom. Is this a phenomenon so extraordinary that we

must have recourse to a new instinct to account for it? Or may it not

be explained into the same causes which in England prevent a lady from

marrying a tinker, though the tinker would gladly marry the lady?

In the last century, the dissipated nobles of France lavished their

wealth with the wildest profusion on actresses and opera girls. The

favour of a distinguished heroine of this class, was thought to be

cheaply purchased at the price of jewels, gilded coaches, palaces

blazing with mirrors, or even of some drops of aristocratic blood. Yet

the poorest gentleman in the kingdom would not have married Clairon.

This, Major Moody would say, proves that men who wear swords, feather,

{372}and red-heeled shoes, entertain a natural aversion to women who

recite verses out of Andromaque and Tartuffe. _We_ think that we could

hit on a different explanation.

It happed, indeed, rather unluckily, that, of the phenomena which the

Major recounts, there is none which cannot be satisfactorily explained

into moral cause, and none which can possibly be explained into

physical causes. White women, says he, much more rarely form licentious

connections with black men, than white men with black women. And this is

a proof that the aversion of the two races is natural. Why, if it were

natural, does it not influence both sexes alike? The principles to

which these facts must be referred, are principles which we see in daily

operation among ourselves. Men of the highest rank in our country, are

frequently engaged in low amours. The wife or daughter of an English

gentleman very seldom forgets herself so far. But who ever thought of

attributing this to physical causes?

The Major, however, is resolved not to leave himself unrefuted in

any point. “Even the free coloured females,” says he, “would have a

reluctance, if advanced in civilization, to form a virtuous union with

a pure negro.” He cannot pretend to believe that any physical cause

operates here: and, indeed, distinctly attributes the reluctance of the

coloured female to her advancement in civilization. That is to say,

he distinctly acknowledges that certain acquired habits, and certain

advantages of rank and education, are alone sufficient to produce those

effects which, according to his own theory laid down in the same page,

can only result from natural organization.

The Major tells us, the colour, the features, and the other

peculiarities of the black race, excite the disgust of Europeans. Here

his testimony is at variance with that of almost all the writers on

the subject with whom we are acquainted. Travellers and historians

innumerable, have asserted, that white men in the torrid zone,

generally prefer black females to those of their own country, Raynal,

if we remember rightly, gives a very rational explanation of the

circumstance. It is needless, however, to attack the Major with

authorities from other writers. He may easily be refuted out of his own

mouth. How can the physical peculiarities of {373}the African race be

more offensive in the wife than in the concubine? It is quite needless

to inquire into the origin of the different opinions which people, in

different situations, form on the subject of beauty. It is quite enough

for us at present to discover, that if a man does not think a woman too

ugly to make her his mistress, it cannot surely be on account of her

ugliness that he does not make her his wife.

In England white women not unfrequently marry black men. We have

ourselves known several such instances. Yet if the external appearance

of the negro were such as naturally to inspire aversion, that feeling

would be more strongly excited in a country of which the inhabitants are

not familiarized by use to the revolting spectacle. This consideration

alone would satisfy us that the real cause of the horror with which the

Whites in some other countries shrink from the thought of marriage with

an African is to be found, not in physical, but in political and moral

circumstances. We entertain little doubt, that when the laws which

create a distinction between the races shall be completely abolished, a

very few generations will mitigate the prejudices which those laws have

created, and which they still maintain. At that time, the black girl,

who, as a slave, would have attracted a white lover, will, when her

father has given her a good education, and can leave her a hundred

thousand dollars, find no difficulty in procuring a white husband.

We have perhaps dwelt too long on the feeble and inconsistent arguments

which the Major has urged in support of his hypothesis. But we were

desirous, before we entered on that part of his work which relates to

questions of more difficulty, to furnish our readers with a specimen of

his logical powers. They will perhaps be inclined to suspect, that a man

who reasons thus on one subject, is not very likely to reason justly on

any.

We now come to the second great principle which Major Moody conceives

himself to have established. It may be stated thus. The inhabitants

of countries lying within the torrid zone ean be induced to engage in

steady agricultural labour only by necessity. The barrenness of the

soil, or the density of the population, may create that necessity. In

Hindostan, for example, the peasant must work or starve. But where a few

inhabitants are thinly scattered over the {374}country, they will

be able to procure a subsistence with very little exertion. With a

subsistence they will be content. The heat renders agricultural

labour so painful that those who are their own masters will prefer the

enjoyment of repose to any of the comforts which they might be able to

procure by regular industry. For this evil the only remedy is coercion,

or, in other words, slavery. Such are the elements of the new philosophy

of labour.

It may be doubted whether these doctrines, if admitted, would amount to

a vindication of slavery. It does not appear to us quite certain that

we are justified in compelling our fellow-creatures to engage in

a particular employment, merely because that employment gives them

exquisite pain. If a large portion of the human race be really placed in

regions where rest and shade are the most delightful luxuries which they

can enjoy, a benevolent man may perhaps be of opinion that they ought to

be suffered to doze in their huts, except when necessity may drive

them to employ an occasional hour in angling, gathering berries, or

scattering a little rice in the marshes. We are entitled to demand that

this point shall be saved to us; but we do not foresee that we shall

need it. We assert, and will prove, that Major Moody has not established

his theory; that he has not even raised a presumption in its favour; and

that the facts on which he relies are either such as have no relation to

the question, or such as occur daily in every climate of the globe.

We will begin with the case with which Major Moody would have done

well both to begin and end--the case of the liberated Africans who were

placed in Tortola. We must premise, that no experiment was ever made

under circumstances less favourable. The Negroes, when received from

the holds of the slave ships, were in a state of extreme weakness and

disease. Of six hundred and seventeen Blacks who were taken from the

Venus and the Manuella, two hundred and twenty-two died before they

could be settled as apprentices. (1) The constitutions of many who

survived were completely broken. By the masters to whom they were

apprenticed, they were frequently treated with inhumanity. The laws and

institutions of Tortola, framed for

(1) Mr. Dougan’s Report, p. 7.

a {375}society made up of masters and slaves, were, as the Major himself

states, by no means fitted for the regulation of such a class of persons

as the apprenticed Africans. The poorer freemen of every colour felt an

enmity towards people who were about to intrude themselves into those

trades of which they possessed a monopoly. The planters were not

inclined to look with favour on the first fruits of the abolition.

Apprentices are, in every part of the world, noted for idleness. The

degree of that idleness is in general proportioned to the length of

the term for which they are bound to an unrequited service. The man who

expects soon to be his own master, may exert himself to acquire skill

in the business by which he is to subsist. He, on the other hand, who

expects to waste half of his life in labour without remuneration, will

generally do as little as he possibly can. The liberated Africans were

most injudiciously apprenticed for fourteen years, and some even for a

longer time. They had neither the motive of the freeman, nor that of the

slave. They could not legally demand wages. They could not legally be

subjected to the driver. Under these disadvantages was the trial made.

And what was the result?

Major Moody examined into the conduct of sixty-one apprenticed negroes

who had been rescued from the Manuella. The masters and mistresses were

carefully interrogated. It appears from the schedules signed by the

Major himself, that good characters were given to forty. Nine only

appeared to be idle and disorderly. With respect to twelve, no decisive

information was obtained. A similar inquiry took place respecting

fifty-five apprentices who had formed a part of the cargo of the Venus.

Good accounts were received of forty. Only six were described as idle

and disorderly.

Among sixty-five negroes who had been taken from the Candelario, there

was not a single instance of grossly bad conduct. Fifty-seven received

fair characters for honesty and industry.

Lastly, of one hundred and ten negroes who had been on board of the

Atrevido, only four are characterized as decidedly worthless. Nine may

be considered as doubtful. A favourable report is given of the remaining

ninety-seven.

These facts, as we have said, we find in the papers signed by the Major

himself. He has not, it is true, thought it necessary {376}to give us

the result of his inquiries in the Report so compendiously as we now

exhibit it. He dwells at great length on particular cases which prove

nothing. He fills page after page with the nonsense of planters who had

no apprentices, who evidently knew nothing about the apprentices,

and who, in general terms, proving nothing but their own

malevolence, characterized the whole race as idle, disorderly,

quarrelsome, drunken, greedy. But, from the beginning to the end of the

Report, he has not been able to spare three lines for the simple fact,

that four fifths of these vilified people receive excellent characters

from their actual employers, from those who must have been best

acquainted with their disposition, and who would have lost most by their

idleness. Whoever wishes to know how Daniel Quabott broke his wife’s

nose--how Penelope glum whipped a slave who had the yaws, how the Major,

seventeen years ago, went without his supper in Guiana--how the arts and

sciences proceeded northward from Carthage till they were stopped by the

frozen zone, may find in the Report all this interesting information,

and much more of the same kind. But those who wish to know that which

Major Moody was commissioned to ascertain, and which it was his peculiar

duty to state, must turn over three hundred folio pages of schedules.

The Report does not, as far as we have been able to discover, give the

most distant hint of the discoveries which they will make there.

We have no idea of charging the Major with intentional unfairness. But

his prejudices really seem to have blinded him as to the effect of the

evidence which he had himself collected. He hints that his colleague had

privately prepared the apprentices for the examination. Of the justice

of this charge we shall be better able to judge when the answer of Mr.

Dougan shall make its appearance. But be it well founded or not, it

cannot affect _our_ argument. The Major does not pretend to insinuate,

that any arts were practised with _the masters_, and it is on the

testimony of the masters alone that we are willing to rest our case.

Indeed, the evidence which was collected by the Major in the absence of

his colleague, and which we must therefore suppose to be perfectly pure,

tends to the same effect, and would alone be sufficient to show, that

the apprentices have, as a body, conducted themselves in a manner which,

under any circumstances, would have been most satisfactory.

It {377}is perfectly true, that a knot of slave-owners, forming the

legislature of Tortola, petitioned the Government to remove these

apprentices from the island. From internal evidence, from the peculiar

cant in which the petition abounds, and from the sprinkling of bad

grammar which adorns it, we are half inclined to suspect that it is

the Major’s own handywork. At all events, it is curious to see how

he reasons on it. It is curious to see how the Major reasons on this

fact:--

“_Doubtless, the legislature of Tortola may be mistaken in their

opinions; but the mere fact of their agreeing to sign such a petition,

shows they really did think, that the labour of the African apprentices,

when free, would not be useful to them or the colonists generally.

“And this fact alone, my Lord, is calculated to excite important

reflections, as to the character of the free Africans, for industry in

West Indian agriculture.

“Is it probable, that mere prejudice against the colour of a man’s skin

could ever induce anybody of people, like the Tortola petitioners, to

make a request so apparently absurd, as that of removing from their

colony a numerous body of Africans, consisting of able bodied men and

women, If they were as willing as they were capable of working, and

increasing the value of the land now given to pasturage, for want of

cultivators to be employed therein._” (1)

We earnestly request our readers to observe the consistency of Major

Moody. When his object is to prove, that whites and blacks cannot

amalgamate on equal terms, in one political society, he exaggerates

every circumstance which tends to keep them asunder. The physical

differences between the races, he tells us, practically defeat

benevolent laws. No Act of Parliament, no order in Council, can surmount

the difficulty. (2) Where these differences exist, the principles of

republican equality are forgotten by the strongest republican. Marriage

becomes an unnatural prostitution. The Haytian refuses to admit the

white to possess property within the sphere of negro domination. The

most humane and enlightened citizen of the United States, can discover

no means of benefiting the free African, but by sending him to a

distance from men of European blood. “I should ill-perform my duty,”

says the Major, “if I suppressed all mention of a physical cause like

this, which in practice is found to have an effect so powerful, however

the philanthropist

(1) First Part of Major Moody’s Report, p. 125.

(2) Second Part of Major Moody’s Report, p. 20 and 21

{378}or the philosopher may regret it, and however it may be beyond

their power to remove it by legislative means.” (1) But, when it is

desirable to prove the idleness of the free African, this omnipotent

physical cause, this instinct against which the best and wisest men

struggle in vain, which counteracts the attraction of sex, and defies

the authority of law, sinks into a “mere prejudice against the colour

of a man’s skin,” an idle fancy, which never could induce any body of

people to remove able bodied men and women from their country, if those

men and women were willing to work. Are all the free negroes of North

America infirm, or are they all unwilling to work? They live in a

temperate climate, and to them the Major’s theory does not apply. Yet

the whites are subscribing to transport them to another country. Why

should we suppose the planters of Tortola to be superior to feelings

which some of the most respectable men in the world are disposed to

gratify, by sending thousands of people, at a great expense, from a

country greatly understocked with hands?

It is true that the apprenticed Africans were not employed in the

cultivation of the soil. The cause is evident. They could not legally be

so employed. The Older in Council under the authority of which they

were put out to service, provided that no woman should be employed

in tillage. The blank form of indenture sent out by the government

contained a similar restriction with regard to the males.

We are, however, inclined to believe with the Major, that these people,

if they had been left to take their own course, would not have employed

themselves in agriculture. Those who have become masters of their time,

rarely do so employ themselves. We will go further. We allow that very

few of the free blacks in our West Indian Islands, will undergo the

drudgery of cultivating the ground. Major Moody seems to think that,

when this is grunted, all his principles follow of course. But we can by

no means agree with him. In order to prove that the natives of tropical

countries entertain a peculiar aversion to agricultural labour, it is by

no means sufficient to show that certain freemen, living in the torrid

zone, do not choose to engage in agricultural labour. It is, we humbly

conceive, necessary also to show, that the wages of agricultural labour

are, at the place and time in

(1) Second Part of Major Moody’s Report, p. 21.

question, {379}at least as high as those which can be obtained by

industry of another description. It by no means follows, that a man

feels an insurmountable dislike to the business of setting canes,

because he will not set eanes for sixpence a day, when he can earn

a shilling by making baskets. We might as well say, that the English

people dislike agricultural labour, because Major Moody prefers making

systems to making ditches.

Obvious as these considerations are, it is perfectly clear that Major

Moody has overlooked them. From the Appendix to his own Report it

appears, that in every West Indian island the wages of the artisan are

much greater than those of the cultivator. In Tortola, for example, a

carpenter earns three shillings sterling a day, a cartwright or a cooper

four shillings and sixpence, a sawyer six shillings; an ablebodied field

negro, under the most advantageous circumstances, nine pounds a year,

about seven pence a day, allowing for holidays. And because a free

African prefers six shillings to seven pence, we are told that he has

a natural and invincible aversion to agriculture!--because he prefers

wealth to poverty, we are to conclude that he prefers repose to

wealth. Such is the mode of reasoning which the Major designates as the

philosophy of labour.

But, says the Major, all employments, excepting those of the cultivator

and the domestic servant, are only occasional. There is little demand

for the labour of the carpenter, the cooper, and the sawyer. Let us

suppose the demand to be so incredibly small, that the carpenter can

obtain work only one day in six, the cooper one day in nine, and the

sawyer one day in twelve; still the amount of their earnings will be

greater than if they broke clods almost daily through the whole year.

Of two employments which yield equal wages, the inhabitants of all

countries, both within and without the tropics, will choose that whieh

requires the least labour Major Moody seems throughout his Report

to imagine, that people in the temperate zone work for the sake of

working; that they consider labour, not as an evil to be endured for the

sake of a good produced by it, but as a blessing, from which the wages

are a sort of drawback; that they would rather work three days for a

shilling, than one day for half a crown. The case, he may be assured,

is by no means such as he supposes. If he will make proper inquiries he

will {380}learn, that, even where the thermometer stands at the lowest,

no man will choose a laborious employment, when he can obtain equal

remuneration with less trouble in another line. But it, is unnecessary

to resort to this argument; for it is perfectly clear, on Major Moody’s

own showing, that the demand for mechanical industry, though occasional

and small, is still sufficient to render the business of an artisan much

more lucrative than that of a field labourer.

“I have shown,” says he, “that the sugar-planter himself, obtaining 287

days labour on the very cheapest terms, could not have afforded to give

more than about 9l. per annum for labourers, and therefore, that he

never could hope to induce any liberated African to work steadily for

such wages, when the liberated African could obtain from 15l. to 21l.

per annum by the irregular labour of occasionally cutting firewood,

grass, or catching fish, &c....

“This is the most favourable view of the case; for the fact is, the

sugar-planter, on the very best soils in Tortola, could only a fiord

to give 91. per annum; but in soils of average fertility, he could only

afford 6l. 15s. per annum to the labourer, even if the planter gave up

all profits on his stock, consisting of lands, buildings, and machinery.

If the liberated Negro would not labour steadily for 9l. per annum, it

is clear he would be less likely to work for 6l. 15s. per annum; but

if he did not work for less than that sum, the planter in Tortola could

obtain no profit on stock, and consequently could have no motive for

employing any person to work for such wages. The white race, being

unable to work, must in this, as in all similar cases, perish, or

abandon their country and property to the blacks, who can work, but

who, as I have shown, are not likely to make use of more voluntary

steady exertion than will afford the means of subsistence in the

lowlands of the torrid zone, where the pleasure of repose forms so great

an ingredient in the happiness of mankind, whether whites, blacks, or

Indians.”

We really stand aghast at the extravagance of a writer who supposes that

the principle which leads a man to prefer light labour and twenty-one

pounds, to hard labour and six pounds fifteen shillings, is a principle

of which the operation is confined to the torrid zone! But the matter

may be put on a very short issue. Let Major Moody find any tropical

country in which the inhabitants prefer mechanical trades to field

labour when higher advantages are offered to the field labourer than to

the mechanic. He will then have done what he has not done hitherto. He

will have adduced one fact bearing on the question.

If the circumstances which we have been considering prove any thing,

they appear to prove the inexpediency of the {381}coercive system. The

effect of that system in the West Indies has been to produce a glut

of agricultural labour, and a scarcity of mechanical dexterity. The

discipline of a plantation may stimulate a sluggish body; but it has no

tendency to stimulate a sluggish mind. It calls forth a certain quantity

of muscular exertion; but it does not encourage that ingenuity which is

necessary to the artisan. This is the only explanation which at present

occurs to us of the enormous price which skilled labour fetches in a

country in which the cultivator can barely obtain a subsistence. We

offer it, however, with diffidence, as the result of a very hasty

consideration of the subject. But it is with no feeling of diffidence

that we pronounce the whole argument of the Major absurd. That he has

convinced himself we do not doubt. Indeed he has given the best proof

of sincerity: For he has acted up to his theory; and left us, we must

confess, in some doubt whether to admire him more as an active or as a

speculative politician.

Many of the African apprentices emigrated from Tortola to the Danish

island of St. Thomas, some with the consent of their masters, and others

without it. Why they did so, is evident from the account which the Major

himself gives. The wages were higher in St. Thomas than in Tortola. But

such theorists as the Major are subject to illusions as strange as

those which haunted Don Quixote. To the visionary Knight every inn was

a castle, every ass a charger, and every basin a helmet. To the Major

every fact, though explicable on ten thousand obvious suppositions, is

a confirmation of his darling hypothesis. He gives the following account

of his opinions and of his consequent measures.

“The occupations followed by the apprentices in the Danish island of St.

Thomas, on these occasions were generally the irregular and occasional

industry of porters, servants on hoard vessels, &e., in which they often

got comparatively high wages, which enabled them to work for money

at one time in order to live, without working for a longer or shorter

period; such a mode of existence being more agreeable to them than

steady and regular industry affording employment during the whole year.

“From this irregular application to certain kinds of labour and dislike

to that of agriculture, it was my wish to turn the attention of the

African apprentices, and therefore I was anxious to prevent their

running away to the Danish island of St. Thomas, or being sent there.

His Excellency Governor Van Seholton afforded me every facility in

removing them; but they soon returned again. It will also be seen that

in St. Thomas they were liable to be taken up and sold as slaves, it was

actually the case with one apprentice. It is not undeserving of remark,

that not one of the apprentices who thus withdrew themselves from

Tortola, ever {382}hired themselves to agricultural labor for any fixed

period.”

“The occasional high wages in irregular kinds of industry, however

uncertain, appear to have pleased them better than the permanent

rewards procured by an employment less exposed to uncertainty, but which

required a steady exertion.”

What the permanent rewards of agricultural labour were in Tortola, we

have seen. The planter would have found it ruinous on most estates to

give more than six pounds fifteen shillings a year, or about fourpence

a day. Unless, therefore, they were much higher in St. Thomas, it is

surely not extraordinary that they did not induce these apprentices

to quit the employments to which, not by their own choice, but by

the orders of the Government, they had been trained, for a pursuit

uncongenial to all their habits. How often is it that an Englishman,

who has served his apprenticeship to an artisan, hires himself to

agricultural labour when he can find work in his own line?

But we will pass by the absurdity of condemning people for preferring

high wages with little labour, to low wages with severe labour. We

have other objections to make. The Major has told us that the African

apprentices could not legally be employed in agriculture on the island

of Tortola. If so, we wish to know how their dislike of agricultural

labour could be their motive for quitting Tortola, or how, by bringing

them back to Tortola, he could improve their habits in that respect? To

bring a man by main force from a residence which he likes, and to place

him in the hands of an employer acknowledged to be cruel, for fear that

he may possibly be made a slave, seems to us also a somewhat curious

proceeding, and deserves notice, as being the only indication of zeal

for liberty which the Major appears to have betrayed during the whole

course of his mission.

The Major might perhaps be justified in exerting himself to recover

those apprentices who had emigrated without the consent of their

masters. But with regard to the rest, his conduct {383}appears to have

been equally absurd and mischievous. He repeatedly tells us that Tortola

is a poor island. It appears from the schedules, that he was in the

habit of asking the masters and mistresses, whether their apprentices,

after the term of service should have expired, would be able to support

themselves. In the ease of some most respectable and industrious

workmen, the answer was, that they possessed all the qualifications

which would enable them to earn a livelihood; but that Tortola was too

poor to afford them an adequate field: And this was evidently the cause

which induced so many to transport themselves to St. Thomas. Of all the

innumerable instances in which public, functionaries have exposed their

ignorance by officiously meddling with matters of which individuals

ought to be left to judge for themselves, we remember none more

conspicuous than that which Major Moody has thus recorded against

himself.

But it seems the industry of these emigrants, and indeed of the free

Blacks generally, is not regular or steady. These are words of which

Major Moody is particularly fond, and which he generally honours with

Italics. We have, throughout this article, taken the facts as he states

them, and contented ourselves with exposing the absurdity of his

inferences. We shall do so now. We will grant that the free blacks do

not work so steadily as the slaves, or as the labourers in many other

countries. But how does Major Moody connect this unsteadiness with the

climate? To us it appears to be the universal effect of an advance

in wages, an effeet not confined to tropical countries, but daily and

hourly witnessed in England by every man who attends to the habits

of the lower orders. Let us suppose, that an English manufacturer can

provide himself with those indulgences which use has rendered necessary

to his comfort for ten shillings a week, and that he ean earn ten

shillings a week by working steadily twelve hours a day. In that case,

he will probably work twelve hours a day. But let us suppose that the

wages of his labour rise to thirty shillings. Will he still continue

to work twelve hours a day, for the purpose of trebling his present

enjoyments, or of laying up a hoard against bad times? Notoriously

not. He will perhaps work four days in the week, and thus earn twenty

shillings, a sum larger than that whieh he formerly obtained, but less

than that which he might obtain if he chose to labour as he formerly

laboured.

When {384}the wages of the workman rise, he Everywhere takes out, if

we may so express ourselves, some portion of the rise in the form of

repose. This is the real explanation of that unsteadiness on which Major

Moody dwells so much--an unsteadiness which cannot surprise any person

who has ever talked with an English manufacturer, or ever heard the name

of Saint Monday. It appears by his own report, that a negro slave works

from Monday morning to Saturday night on the sugar grounds of Tortola,

and receives what is equivalent to something less than half-a-crown in

return, then he ceases to be a slave, and becomes his own master; and

then he finds that by cutting firewood, an employment which requires

no great skill, he can earn eight shillings and fourpence a week. By

working every other day he can procure better food and better clothes

than ever he had before. In no country from the Pole to the Equator,

would a labourer under such circumstances work steadily. The Major

considers it as a strange phenomenon, peculiar to the torrid zone, that

these people lay up little against seasons of sickness and distress--as

if this were not almost universally the case among the far more

intelligent population of England--as if we did not regularly see our

artisans thronging to the alehouse when wages are high, and to the

pawnbroker’s shop when they are low--as if we were not annually raising

millions, in order to save the working classes from the misery which

otherwise would be the consequence of their own improvidence.

We are not the advocates of idleness and imprudence. The question before

us is, not whether it be desirable that men all over the world should

labour more steadily than they now do; but whether the laws which

regulate labour within the tropics differ from those which are in

operation elsewhere. This is a question which never can be settled,

merely by comparing the quantity of work done in different places. By

pursuing such a course, we should establish a separate law of labour for

every country, and for every trade in every country. The free African

does not work so steadily as the Englishman. But the wild Indian, by

the Major’s own account, works still less steadily than the African.

The Chinese labourer, on the other hand, works more steadily than the

Englishman. In this island, the industry of the porter or the waterman,

is less steady than the industry {385}of the ploughman. But the great

general principle is the same in all. All will work extremely hard

rather than miss the comforts to which they have been habituated; and

all, when they find it possible to obtain their accustomed comforts

with less than their accustomed labour, will not work so hard as

they formerly worked, merely to increase them. The real point to be

ascertained, therefore, is, whether the free African is content to miss

his usual enjoyments, not whether he works steadily or not; for the

Chinese peasant would work as irregularly as the Englishman, and the

Englishman as irregularly as the negro, if this could be done without

any diminution of comforts. Now, it does not appear from any passage in

the whole Report, that the free blacks are retrograding in their

mode of living. It appears on the contrary, that their work, however

irregular, does in fact enable them to live more comfortably than they

ever did as slaves. The unsteadiness, therefore, of which they are

accused, if it be an argument for coercing them, is equally an argument

for coercing the spinners of Manchester and the grinders of Sheffield.

The next ease which we shall notice is, that of the native Indians

within the tropics. That these savages have a great aversion to

steady labour, and that they have made scarcely any advances toward

civilization we readily admit. Major Moody speaks on this subject with

authority; for it seems that, when he visited one of their tribes, they

forgot to boil the pot for him, and put him off with a speech, which

he has reported at length, instead of a meal. He, as usual, attributes

their habits to the heat of the climate. But let us consider that the

Indians of North America, with much greater advantages, live in the same

manner. A most enlightened and prosperous community has arisen in their

vicinity. Many benevolent men have attempted to correct their roving

propensities, and to inspire them with a taste for those comforts which

industry alone can procure. They still obstinately adhere to their old

mode of life. The independence, the strong excitement, the occasional

periods of intense exertion, the long intervals of repose, have

become delightful and almost necessary to them. It is well known

that Europeans, who have lived among them for any length of time, are

strangely fascinated by the pleasures of that state {386}of society, and

even by its sufferings and hazards. Among ourselves, the Gypsey race,

one of the most beautiful and intelligent on the face of the earth, has

lived for centuries in a similar manner. Those singular outcasts have

been surrounded on every side by the great works of human labour. The

advantages of industry were forced upon their notice. The roads on

which they travelled, the hedges under which they rested, the hen-roosts

which furnished their repast, the silver which crossed their palms--all

must have constantly reminded them of the conveniences and luxuries

which are to be obtained by steady exertion. They were persecuted under

a thousand pretexts, whipped for vagrants, imprisoned for poachers,

ducked for witches. The severest laws were enacted against them. To

consort with them was long a capital offence. Yet a remnant of the

race still preserves its peculiar language and manners--still prefers

a tattered tent and a chance-meal of carrion to a warm house and a

comfortable dinner. If the habits of the Indians of Guiana prove that

slavery is necessary within the tropics, the habits of the Mohawks and

Gypsies will equally prove, that it is necessary in the temperate zone.

The heat cannot be the cause of that which is found alike in the coldest

and in the hottest countries.

Major Moody gives a long account of the Maroon settlements near Surinam.

These settlements were first formed by slaves, who fled from the

plantations on the coast, about the year 1667. The society was,

during the following century, augmented from time to time by fresh

reinforcements of fugitive negroes. This supply, however, has now been

for many years stopped. It is perfectly true, that these people were

long contented with a bare subsistence, and that little of steady

agricultural industry has ever existed amongst them. The Major again

recurs to physical causes, and the heat of the sun. A better explanation

may be given in one word, insecurity. During about one hundred years,

the Maroons were absolutely run down like mad dogs. It appears from the

work of Captain Stedman, to which the Major himself alludes, that those

who fell into the hands of the whites were hung up by hooks thrust into

their ribs, torn to pieces on the rack, or roasted on slow fires. They

attempted to avoid the danger, by frequently changing, and carefully

concealing their residence. The accidental crowing of a cock, {387}had

brought destruction on a whole tribe. That a people thus situated should

labour to acquire property which they could not enjoy--that they

should engage in employments which would necessarily attach them to a

particular spot, was not to be expected. Their habits necessarily became

irregular and ferocious. They plundered the colony--they plundered each

other--they lived by hunting and fishing. The only productions of the

earth which they cultivated, were such as could be speedily reared, and

easily concealed. But during the last fifty years, these tribes have

enjoyed a greater degree of security; and from the statement of Major

Moody, who has himself visited that country, and who, though a wretched

logician, is an unexceptionable witness, it appears, that they are

rapidly advancing in civilization; that they have acquired a sense of

new wants, and a relish for new pleasures; that agriculture has taken

a more regular form; and that the vices and miseries of savage life are

disappearing together.

“The young men among the Maroons acknowledged, that the conduct of the

chiefs had become much better, in respect of not interfering with the

wives of others, and that everybody now could have his own wife.”.......

“I observed, that they had adopted the system of sometimes domesticating

wild animals, and rearing those already domesticated for food; that

instead of always boucaning their meats, like the Indians, they now

often used salt when they could get it; and, finally, that instead of

depending on the forests for fruits, or cultivating roots which were

soon reaped, and conld easily be concealed, they had generally adopted

the banana and plantain as a food, which requires about twelve months to

produce its fruits, and the tree obtains a considerable height.”....

“I also found, that a certain degree of occasional industry had taken

place among the Maroons. Some of these young men had devoted a few days

in the year to cutting down trees which nature had planted. From such

occasional labour they were enabled to procure finery for a favourite

female, a better, gun, or a new axe.”

Surely this statement is most encouraging. No sooner was security given

to these Maroons, than improvement commenced. A single generation has

sufficed to change these hunters into cultivators of the earth, to teach

them the use of domestic animals, to awaken among them a taste for the

luxuries and distinctions of polished societies. That their labour is

still only occasional, we grant. But this, we cannot too often

repeat, is not the question. If occasional labour {388}will supply the

inhabitant of the temperate zone with comforts greater than those to

which he is accustomed, he will labour only occasionally. These negroes

are not only willing to work rather than forego their usual comforts,

but are also willing to make some addition to their labour, for the sake

of some addition to their comforts. Nothing more can be said for the

labourers of any country. The principle which has made England and

Holland what they are, is evidently at work in the thickets of Surinam.

That the habits of the fugitives were altogether idle and irregular

till within the last fifty years, is nothing to the purpose. How much

of regular industry was formerly to be found among the outlawed

moss-troopers of our Border, or in the proscribed elan of the

Macgregors? Down to a very late period, a large part of the Scotch

people were as averse to steady industry as any tribe of Maroons. In

the year 1698, Fletcher of Saltonn called the attention of the Scottish

Parliament to this horrible evil. “This country,” says he, “has always

swarmed with such numbers of idle vagabonds as no laws could ever

restrain. There are at this day in Scotland two hundred thousand people

begging from door to door, living without any regard or subjection to

the laws of the land, or to even those of God and nature. No magistrate

could ever discover or be informed which way one in a hundred of

these wretches died, or that ever they were baptised.” He advises

the Government to set them to work; but he strongly represents

the difficulty of such an undertaking. That sort of people is so

desperately wicked, such enemies of all work and labour, and, which is

yet more amazing, so proud in esteeming their own condition above that

which they will be sure to call slavery, that, unless prevented by the

utmost industry and diligence, upon the first publication of any orders

for putting in execution such a design, they will rather die with hunger

in caves and dens, and murder their young children. Fletcher was a

brave, honest, and sensible man. He had fought and suffered for liberty.

Yet the circumstances of his country shook his faith in the true

principles of government. He looked with dismay on the mountains

occupied by lawless chiefs and their gangs, and the lowlands cursed

by the depredations of some plunderers and the protection of others.

Everywhere he saw swarms of robbers and beggars. He contrasted this

desolate prospect {389}with the spectacle which Holland presented, the

miracles which human industry had there achieved, a country rescued from

the ocean, vast and splendid cities, ports crowded with ships, meadows

cultivated to the highest point, canals along which hundreds of boats

were constantly passing, mercantile houses of which the daily payments

exceeded the whole rental of the Highlands, an immense population whose

habits were sober and laborious, and who acquired their comforts, not

by injuring, but by benefiting their neighbours. He did not sufficiently

consider that this state of things sprung from the wisdom and vigour of

a government, which insured to every man the fruits of his exertions,

and protected equally the pleasures of every class, from the pipe of

the mechanic to the picture-gallery and the tulip-garden of the

Burgomaster;--that in Scotland, on the contrary, the police was feeble,

and the gentry rich in men and destitute of money; that robbery was in

consequence common; that people will not build barns to be burned,

or rear cattle to be lifted; that insecurity produced idleness, and

idleness crimes, that these crimes again augmented the insecurity from

which they had sprung. He overlooked these circumstances, and attributed

the evil to the want of coercion. He censured the wreak humanity of

those fathers of the church who had represented slavery as inconsistent

with Christianity. He cited those texts with which the controversies

of our own times have rendered us so familiar. Finally, he proposed to

convert the lower classes into domestic bondsmen. His arguments were

at least as plausible as those of Major Moody. But how signally has

the event refuted them! Slavery was not established in Scotland. On the

contrary, the changes which have taken place there have been favourable

to personal liberty. The power of the chiefs has been destroyed.

Security has been given to the capitalist and to the labourer. Could

Fletcher now revisit Scotland, he would find a country which might well

bear a comparison with his favourite Holland.

The History of the Maroons of Surinam appears to us strictly analogous

to that of the Scottish peasantry. In both cases insecurity produced

idleness. In both security produces industry. The African community

indeed, in the middle of the last century was far more barbarous than

any part of the Scotch nation has ever been since the dawn of authentic

{390}history. Not one of the fugitives had ever been taught to read and

write. The traces of civilization which they brought from the colony

were very slight, and were soon effaced by the habits of a lawless and

perilous life. Of late, however, their progress has been rapid. Judging

of the future by the past, we entertain a strong hope that they will

soon form a flourishing and respectable society. At all events, we

are sure that their condition affords no ground for believing that the

labourer, within the tropics, acts on principles different from those

which regulate his conduct elsewhere.

We now come to the case of Hayti, a ease on which Major Moody and his

disciples place the strongest reliance. The report tells us, that

Toussaint, Christophe and Boyer, have all found it necessary to

compel the free negroes of that island to employ themselves in

agriculture--that exportation has diminished--that the quantity of

coffee now produced is much smaller than that which was grown under the

French government--that the cultivation of sugar is abandoned--that the

Haytians have not only ceased to export that article, but have begun

to import it--that the men indulge themselves in repose, and force the

women to work for them; and, finally, that this dislike of labour can

be explained only by the heat of the climate, and can be subdued only by

coercion.

Now we have to say, in the first place, that the proofs which the Major

brings refute each other. If, as he states, the Haytians are coerced,

and have been coerced during the last thirty years, their idleness maybe

an excellent argument against slavery, but can be no argument against

liberty. If it be said that the coercion employed in Hayti is not

sufficiently severe, we answer thus:--We never denied, that of two kinds

of coercion, the more severe is likely to be the more efficient. Men can

be induced to work only by two motives, hope and fear; the former is the

motive of the free labourer, the latter of the slave. We hold that,

in the long run, hope will answer best. But we are perfectly ready to

admit, that a strong fear will stimulate industry more powerfully than

a weak fear. The case of Hayti, therefore, can at most only prove that

severe slavery answers its purpose better than lenient slavery. It can

prove nothing for slavery against freedom. But the Major is not entitled

to use two contradictory {391}arguments. One or the other he must

abandon. It’ he chooses to reason on the decrees of Toussaint and

Christophe, he has no right to talk of the decrease of production. If,

on the other hand, he insists on the idleness of the Haytians, he must

admit their liberty. If they are not free, their idleness can be no

argument against freedom.

But we will do more than expose the inconsistency of the Major. We will

take both suppositions successively, and show that neither of them can

affect the present question.

First, then, let it be supposed that a coercive system is established

in Hayti. Major Moody seems to think that this fact, if admitted, is

sufficient to decide the controversy.

“The annexed regulations,” says he, “of Toussaint, Desformomi, and

Christophe, as well as those of President Boyer, intended for people

in circumstances similar to those of the liberated Africans, appear to

prove practically that some such measures are necessary as those which

I have submitted as the result of my own personal observation and

experience, in the control of human labour in different climes, and

under various circumstances.”

We must altogether dissent from this doctrine. It does not appear to us

quite self-evident, that every law which every government may choose

to make is necessarily a wise law. We have sometimes been inclined

to suspect that, even in this enlightened country, legislators have

interfered in matters which should have been left to take their own

course. An English Parliament formerly thought fit to limit the wages

of labour. This proceeding does not perfectly satisfy us, that wages

had previously been higher than they should have been. Elizabeth,

unquestionably the greatest sovereign that ever governed England, passed

those laws for the support of the poor, which, though in seeming and

intention most humane, have produced more evil than all the cruelties

of Nero and Maximin. We have just seen that, at the close of the

seventeenth century, a most respectable and enlightened Scotch

gentleman thought slavery the only cure for the maladies of his country.

Christophe was not destitute of talent:-. Toussaint was a man of great

genius and unblemished integrity, a brave soldier, and in many respects

a wise statesman. But both these men had been slaves. Both were ignorant

of history and political economy. That idleness {392}and disorders

should follow a general civil war, was perfectly natural. That rulers,

accustomed to a system of compulsory labour, should think such a system

the only cure for those evils, is equally natural. But what inference

can be drawn from such circumstances?

The negligence with which Major Moody has arranged his Appendix, is most

extraordinary. He has, with strange inconsistency, given us no copy

of the decree of Toussaint in the original, and no translation of the

decree of Christophe. The decree of Boyer, the most important of the

three, he has not thought fit to publish at all; though he repeatedly

mentions it in terms which seem to imply that he has seen it. Our

readers are probably aware, that the decree of Toussaint, or rather the

Major’s translation of it, was retouched by some of the statesmen of

Jamaica, docked of the first and last paragraphs, which would at once

have betrayed its date, and sent over by the Assembly to England, as a

new law of President Boyer. This forgery, the silliest and most impudent

that has been attempted within our remembrance, was at once exposed. The

real decree, if there be such a decree, is not yet before the public.

The decree of Toussaint was issued in a time of such extreme confusion,

that even if we were to admit its expediency, which we are very far from

doing, we should not be bound to draw any general conclusion from it.

All the reasonings which Major Moody founds on the decree of Christophe,

maybe refuted by this simple answer--that decree lays at least as many

restraints on the capitalist as on the labourer. It directs him to

provide machinery and mills. It limits the amount of his live-stock. It

prescribes the circumstances under which he may form new plantations of

coffee. It enjoins the manner in which he is to press his canes and

to clean his cotton. The Major reasons: Christophe compelled the

field-negroes to work. Hence it follows, that men who live in hot

climates will not cultivate the soil steadily without compulsion. We

may surely say, with equal justice, Christophe prescribed the manner in

which the proprietor was to employ his capital, it is, therefore, to

be inferred, that a capitalist in a hot climate cannot judge of his own

interests, and that the government ought to take the management of his

concerns out of his hands. If the Major will not adopt this conclusion,

he must abandon {393}his own. All our readers will admit, that a Prince

who could lay the capitalists under such restrictions as those which we

have mentioned, must have been ignorant of political science, and prone

to interfere in cases where legislative interference is foolish

and pernicious. What conclusion, then, can be justly drawn from the

restraints imposed by such a ruler on the freedom of the peasant?

We have thus disposed of the first hypothesis, namely, that the

Haytians are coerced. We will proceed to the second. Let it be supposed,

that the Haytians are not coerced. In that case we say, that if they do

not export as much as formerly, it will not necessarily follow that they

do not work as much as formerly; and that, if they do not work as much

as formerly, it still will not follow that their idleness proceeds from

physical causes, or forms any exception to the general principles which

regulate labour.

The first great cause which depresses the industry of the Haytians, is

the necessity of keeping up large and costly establishments. All who,

since the expulsion of the French, have governed that country, have

wisely and honourably sacrificed every other consideration to the

preservation of independence. Large armies have been kept up. A

considerable part of the population has consequently been supported

in an unproductive employment; and a heavy burden has been laid on the

industry of the rest. Major Moody quotes the following passage from the

narrative of a most respectable and benevolent American, Mr. Dewey:--

“Throughout the island the women perform the principal part of the

labour in the field and in the house.... I was often moved with

pity for their lot, though I rejoiced that the burden was now voluntary,

and admired the spirit of women who could so readily perform the work of

the men, that the men may be employed in the defence and preservation of

their liberties.”

The Major pounces on the fact stated by Mr. Dewey; but, with the amiable

condescension of a superior nature, gently corrects his inferences.

“That Mr. Dewey, and pious persons like him, do state the facts which

he observed correctly, I am quite convinced: but when he, and those who

reason in his manner, assign causes as solely producing the effect, it

is then that error glides into their statements.”

We are not so completely convinced as the Major seems to {394}be, that

all pious persons state correctly such facts as Mr. Dewey has observed:

but we are sure, that Mr. Dewey must be the most ungrateful of men,

if he is not grateful for such compliments. Indeed, the style which

the Major always adopts towards philanthropists reminds us of Dogberry

patting Verges on the back:--“A good old man. Sir! he will be talking.

Well said, i’faith, neighbour. An two men ride of a horse, one must ride

behind. An honest soul, i’faith, as ever broke bread. But God is to be

worshipped. All men are not alike.” But we must go on with the argument

of our philosophical commissioner.

“Any person who has travelled among people in a backward state of

knowledge and social civilization, people who never experienced what

slavery was, must have observed, as I have done, that the burden

of agricultural labour is generally imposed on the females, by the

arbitrary power exercised over them by the males....”

“Whilst an examination into the actual population of Hayti, and the real

number of the males actually withdrawn from agricultural pursuits for

those of military service, at the time Mr. Dewey made his observations,

would show, that, though the cause assigned by him might have some

effect, that, in point of fact, a more powerful influence would probably

be found in the action of causes springing from a different source than

that assigned by him as the true cause; and whilst these other powerful

causes are left in action, little practical good is effected by the

removal of a minor influence.” (1)

We have not time to notice the innumerable beauties of this headless and

endless sentence, in which a double allowance of thats compensates for

the absence of a nominative case and a verb:--those who study the works

of the Major must take such grammar as they can get, and be thankful.

But, does be advance any reason, or the shadow of tiny reason,

for dissenting from the opinion formed by a man whose honesty he

acknowledges, on a point on which it is scarcely possible to be

mistaken? No man of common sense can live three days in a country

without finding out, whether it is by idleness, or by military duties,

that the males are prevented from working. But Major Moody reasons

thus--Savages, from their propensity to indolence, make their women work

for them. The Haytians make their women work for them; therefore the

Haytians are indolent savages;--an exquisite specimen of syllogistic

reasoning! Horses are quadrupeds: but a pig is a quadruped; therefore a

pig is a horse. The

(1) Ibid. p. 39.

dullest {395}of the gravediggers in Hamlet would have been ashamed of

such an argal.

The Major surely does not mean to deny, that, in civilized and

industrious nations, circumstances similar to those which exist in

Hayti, have compelled the women to engage in agricultural labour.

History abounds with such instances. When, fourteen years ago, the

Prussians rose against the French, almost the whole harvest of Silesia

and Upper Saxony was gathered in by females. The conscriptions of

Buonaparte frequently produced the same effect. The Major says, indeed,

or rather we, endowing his purposes with Syntax, say for him, that

if the numbers of the Haytian people and of the Haytian army were

ascertained, the causes assigned by Mr. Dewey would be found to have

produced only part of the effect. But what evidence does he offer? Where

are his facts, and his reasonings on these facts? Does he know what the

population of Hayti may be? Does he know how large its army may be? If

he knows, why does he not tell us? If he does not know, how can he tell

what might be the result of an examination into those particulars? It

is something too much that a writer, who, when he tries to demonstrate,

never demonstrates any thing but his own ignorance of the art of

reasoning, should expect to be implicitly believed, when he merely

dogmatizes.

We grant, that the Haytians do not rear any great quantity of sugar.

But can this circumstance be explained only by supposing that they

are averse to the labour necessary for that purpose? When capital is

withdrawn from a particular trade, a political economist is commonly

inclined to suspect that the profits are smaller than those which may be

obtained in other lines of business. Now, it is a notorious fact, that

the profits which the cultivation of sugar yields are, in all our West

Indian islands, extremely low; that the business is carried on only

because a large quantity of capital has already been fixed in forms

useless for every other purpose; and that, if this fixed capital were to

be suddenly destroyed, no fresh investment would take place. A man

who has purchased a costly apparatus for the purpose of carrying on a

particular manufacture, will not necessarily change his business because

he finds that his gains are smaller than those which he might obtain

elsewhere, he will generally prefer a small profit to a dead loss, and

rather take two per cent upon {396}his first investment than let that

investment perish altogether, suffer his machinery to be idle, and turn

the remains of his fortune to a pursuit in which he might make five per

cent. This, we believe, is the only cause which keeps up the cultivation

of sugar in Jamaica and Antigua.

In Hayti this cause has ceased to operate. Most of the fixed capital

necessary for the sugar-trade was destroyed by the war which followed

the liberation of the negroes. The machinery which remained was employed

as formerly. But it was not replaced as it fell to decay. This at once

explains the gradual decrease of production. A similar decrease, from

similar causes, is taking place in our oldest colonies. But let us

even suppose that the cultivation of sugar was likely, under ordinary

circumstances, to flourish in Hayti, it still remains to be considered

what security capital invested in that business would have enjoyed.

A short time back it seemed by no means improbable that France would

assert her rights to the sovereignty of the island by arms. In the

year 1814, the strongest apprehensions were entertained. A murderous and

devastating war, a war in which quarter would neither have been given

or taken, was to be expected. The plan of defence which the rulers of

Hayti contemplated was suited to so terrible a crisis. It was intended

to turn the coast into a desert, to set fire to the buildings, to

fall back on the interior fastnesses of the country, and by constant

skirmishes, by hunger, and by the effects of a climate so fatal to

Europeans, to wear out the invading army. This design was avowed by the

Government in publications which have found their way to England. It

was justified by circumstances, and it could scarcely have failed

of success. But it is evident that the remotest prospect of such an

emergency would alone have deterred any capitalist from sinking

his property in the extensive and valuable machinery necessary to a

sugar-planter.

It is true that there is a diminution in the quantity of coffee exported

from Hayti. But the cause of the diminution is obvious. The taxes on

that article are exorbitantly high. The territorial impost raised on the

plantation, and the customs which must be paid previous to exportation,

make up a duty of sixty per cent, on the prime cost. If the Haytians

are to be free, they must have an army. If they are to have an army,

they must raise money; and this may possibly {397}be the best way

of raising it. But it is evidently impossible that a commodity thus

burdened can maintain a competition with the produce of countries where

no taxes exist.

We therefore think it by no means improbable that the Haytians may have

abandoned the cultivation of sugar and coffee, not from idleness, but

from prudence; that they may have been as industriously employed

as their enslaved ancestors, though in a different manner. All the

testimony which we have ever been able to procure tends to prove that

they are at least industrious enough to live comfortably, and multiply

rapidly under the weight of a very heavy taxation.

We have shown that the decrease in the exports of Hayti does not

necessarily prove a decrease in the industry of the people. But we also

maintain, that, even if we were to admit that the Haytians work less

steadily than formerly, Major Moody has no right to attribute that

circumstance to the influence of climate. His error in this and in many

other parts of his work proceeds from an utter ignorance of the habits

of labourers in the temperate zone. What those habits are, we have

already stated. If an English labourer, who has hitherto been unable

to obtain the enjoyments to which he is accustomed without working three

hundred days a year, should find himself able to obtain those enjoyments

by working a hundred days a year, he will not continue to work three

hundred days a year. He will make some addition to his pleasures, but he

will abate largely of his exertions. He will probably work only on

the alternate days. The ease of the Haytian is the same. As a slave he

worked twelve months in the year, and received perhaps as much as he

would have been able to raise in one month, if he had worked on his own

account. He was liberated--he found that, by working for two months,

he could procure luxuries of which he had never dreamed. If he worked

unsteadily, he did only what an Englishman, in the same circumstances,

would have done. In order to prove that labour in Hayti follows a

law different from that which is in operation among ourselves, it is

necessary to prove, not merely that the Haytian works unsteadily, but

that he will forego comforts to which he is accustomed, rather than work

steadily.

This Major Moody has not even asserted of the Haytians, or {398}of any

other class of tropical labourers. He has, therefore, altogether failed

to show, that the natives of the torrid zone cannot be safely left to

the influence of those principles which have most effectually promoted

civilization in Europe. If the law of labour be everywhere the same,

and he has said nothing which induces us to doubt that it is so, that

unsteadiness of which he speaks will, at least in its extreme degree,

last only for a time, which, compared with the life of a nation, is but

as a day in the life of man. The luxuries of one generation will become

the necessaries of the next. As new desires are awakened, greater

exertions will be necessary. This cause, cooperating with that increase

of population of which the Major himself admits the effect, will,

in less than a century, make the Hayti an labourer what the English

labourer now is.

The last case which we shall consider is, that of the free negroes who

emigrated from North America to Hayti. They were in number about six

thousand. President Boyer undertook to defray the whole expense of their

passage, and to support them for four months after their arrival--a

clear proof that the people of Hayti are industrious enough to place at

the disposal of the Government funds more than sufficient to defray

its ordinary charges. We give the sixth and seventh articles of Boyer’s

instruction to the agent employed by him on this occasion, as Major

Moody states them. It is on these that his whole argument turns.

“Article VI.--To regulate better the interests of the emigrants, it

will be proper to let them know in detail, what the government of the

republic is disposed to do, to assure their future well-being and

that of their children, on the sole condition of their being good and

industrious citizens. You are authorized, in concert with the agents

of the different societies, and before civil authority, to make

arrangements with heads of families, or other emigrants who can unite

twelve people able to work, and also to stipulate that the government

will give them a portion of land sufficient to employ twelve persons,

and on which may be raised coffee, cotton, maize, peas and other

vegetables and provisions; and after they have well improved the said

quantity of land which will not be less than thirty-six acres in extent,

government will give a perpetual title to the said land to these twelve

people, their heirs, and assigns.

“Article VII.--Those of the emigrants who prefer applying themselves

individually to the culture of the earth, either by renting lands

already improved, which they will till, or by working in the field to

share the produce with the proprietor, must also engage themselves by

a legal act that, on arriving in Hayti, they will make the above

mentioned {399}arrangements; and this they must do before judges of the

peace; so that, on their arrival here, they will be obliged to apply

themselves to agriculture, and not be liable to become vagrants.” (1)