MONTHLY REVIEW OF LITERATURE AND ART. 603 



inhumanly severe. She was a woman somewhat plump in her person, and the 

 whip being wielded with great vigour, every stroke cut deep into the flesh. 

 She writhed and twisted her body violently under the infliction moaning 

 loudly, but uttering no exclamation in words, except * * * * appear- 

 ing to suffer, from matronly modesty, even more acutely on account of 

 her indecent exposure than the cruel laceration of her body. But the over- 

 seer only noticed her appeal by a brutal reply (too gross to be repeated), and 

 the flogging continued. Disgusted as I was, I witnessed the whole to a 

 close. T numbered the lashes, stroke by stroke, and counted fifty, thus 

 exceeding by eleven the number allowed by the Colonial law to be inflicted at 

 the arbitrary will of the master or manager. This was the only occasion on 

 which I saw the legal number of thirty-nine lashes exceeded, but I never 

 knew the overseer or head book-keeper give less than thirty-nine. This poor 

 victim was shockingly lacerated. When permitted to rise, she again 

 shrieked violently. The overseer swore roughly, and threatened, if she was 

 not quiet, to put her down again. He then ordered her to be taken to the 

 hot-house or hospital, and put in the stocks. She was to be confined in the stocks 

 for several nights, while she worked in the yard during the day at light work. 

 She was too severely mangled to be able to go to the field for some days/' 



The author inquired of Mr. Burrows, the head book-keeper, if he could 

 point out a working negro, among the 277 on the estate, male or female, who 

 had not been flogged with the cart- whip. After a little reflection he replied 

 in the negative. 



With a gentleman named Drake, superintendent of a workhouse gang of 

 convict slaves, he had the honour of dining at the overseer's house. " After 

 dinner," says Mr. W., " while he and I were standing at the door, he pro- 

 ceeded to abuse the friends of negro emancipation in England in very violent 

 terms, and added, ' that if ever I uttered a word unfriendly to them (the slave 

 holders), he would have great pleasure in cutting my head off.' Then, ex- 

 tending his arm, and pointing to his miserable gang, who were at work, full 

 in view, at no great distance, he uttered a tremendous oath, and said ' Oh 1 

 if I had but Buxton and Lushington chained by the necks in yonder gang, I 

 would cure them that would I, by G ! We would be all right/ he added, 

 ' if these devils would but let us alone/ " 



The open and avowed licentiousness of the plantation whites disgusted 

 him almost as much as the cruelty of the system. At New Ground the 

 overseer, book-keepers, and head carpenter, all lived in the habitual practice 

 of gross and unblushing profligacy. One of the book-keepers voluntarily 

 told him that he had twelve ' negro wives' within six months. He saw 

 another of the whites on this estate give his 'housekeeper* (conciibine), a 

 cruel beating with a supplejack while she was in a state of pregnancy, and 

 for a very trifling fault. For refusing to degrade himself by complying with 

 " the custom of the country," as it was lightly termed, in this point, he was 

 looked upon, as he soon perceived, with mingled contempt and suspicion by 

 the plantation whites generally ; and no sooner was the fact of his having 

 occasionally officiated as a Wesleyan local preacher in England discovered, 

 than a deputation, consisting of a Mr. Dicken and a Mr. Brown, from the 

 Colonial Church Union of St. Ann's, waited upon him, with the gratifying 

 information that they had a barrel of tar ready to tar and feather him, " as 

 he well desrved, and that they would do so, by G d." 



Shortly after the author having been seen conversing with Mr. Watkis, 

 a Wesleyan orders arrived from the attorney of the estate to enforce his im- 

 mediate departure. He accordingly sailed from Jamaica on the 8th of December 

 fully convinced, from what he had seen during a residence of seven weeks on 

 a sugar plantation, that the case of the colonial slave is even worse, infinitely 

 worse, than that of the factory child. 



To this temperate and well-timed pamphlet, from which, on account of its 





