1830] Voice of the Country Abolition of Slavery. 85 



ners, are not more remarkable than his judgment and his piety. The attorney 

 and manager are both of established character, the buildings, and especially the 

 hospital, in good order, and the negroe huts comfortable." 



If, therefore, these estates are " still a reproach to the Church 

 of England" we would ask what proprietor of property in the West 

 Indies can escape censure ? and, if the labourers upon them " differ 

 little" from the surrounding population whether there is any just 

 ground of complaint especially in regard to religious instruction? 

 In short, it must appear evident that the Reverend Daniel Wilson has 

 either been grossly deceived, or, if the anti-slavery report be correct, 

 has disgraced his holy calling by publicly uttering a base and scandalous 

 libel! 



To return to the anti- slavery meeting the arts usually resorted to on 

 these occasions for attracting public attention were not lost sight of. 

 Negroes, whose personal appearance gave no very favourable idea of 

 their progress in civilization, were posted at the door, or carried placards 

 in front of Freemason's Hall, with an inscription round their hats, 

 " Am not I a Man and your Brother ?" These fellows had been hired 

 for the occasion one of them is said to have declared that he and his 

 brethren in attendance knew nothing of the objects of the meeting that 

 he was a Roman Catholic, originally from Guadaloupe, " that he wor- 

 shipped St. Joseph and the Virgin Mary, but knew nothing of our 

 Saviour ! Such," says a respectable contemporary, ' f was the confession 

 of this poor black man, hired by the Anti-Slavery Society to parade 

 before the door of a meeting-house, wherein Mr. Wilberforce and his 

 colleagues were complaining that their missionaries have not full scope 

 for instructing the slaves in the West Indies \" 



Notwithstanding that constables were in attendance, many persons 

 had their pockets picked; and altogether, on a calm review of the 

 whole affair, it is quite clear that the day for this kind of humbug has 

 gone by, and that the friends of Mr. Wilberforce acted very injudiciously 

 in again exhibiting the old gentleman to the gaze of a mob, and the scru- 

 tiny of the public. We do not hesitate to tell them that however loudly 

 they may halloo in his ear that he is the benefactor of the human race, 

 the friend of the negro, and the regenerator of Africa they cannot stifle 

 the still small voice which whispers to him that his philanthropy has been 

 of a holy-day and pharasaiacal cast ; that, owing greatly to his indiscreet 

 zeal, the slave trade is carried on by foreigners with much greater cruelty 

 now than when it was a regulated trade, under humane provisions the 

 necessity for concealment having brought hundreds of thousands of poor 

 creatures to a cruel end ; that his friends, particularly at Sierra Leone, 

 have disgraced the cause of humanity by their selfishness ; that seven 

 millions of public money has been uselessly wasted, our own colonies 

 injured, and the number of slaves in foreign colonies immensely in- 

 creased ; and, finally, that all the future exertions of his party, even if 

 they were to succeed in throwing the British West Indies into confusion, 

 could only end in ruin and massacre similar to that which has come 

 upon St. Domingo, and the sugar districts of Mexico ; together with a 

 similar obliteration of all the benefits which our West India labourers 

 have derived, and are daily deriving from the present system of religious 

 education, and gradual amelioration, 



