CHAP, in.] WEST INDIES. 187 



mine. The most probable opinion is this. In the 

 year 1663, the assembly of Barbadoes were prevailed 

 on, by very unjustifiable means, as will hereafter be 

 shewn, to grant an internal revenue to the crown, of 

 four and a half per cent, on the gross exported pro- 

 duce of that island for ever. It is not unlikely that 

 the steady refusal of the Jamaica planters to bur- 

 then themselves and their posterity with a similar im- 

 position, exciting the resentment of the king, first 

 suggested the idea of depriving them of those consti- 

 tutional franchises which alone could give security 

 and value to their possessions. Happily for the pre- 

 sent inhabitants, neither secret intrigue nor undis- 

 guised violence were successful. Their gallant an- 

 cestors transmitted to their posterity their estates un- 

 incumbered with such a tax, and their political rights 

 unimpaired by the system of government attempted 

 to be forced on them. " The assembly (says Mr. 

 Long) rejected the new constitution with indigna- 

 tion. No threats could frighten, no bribes could cor- 

 rupt, nor arts nor arguments persuade them to con- 

 sent to laws that would enslave their posterity." 

 Let me add, as a tribute of just acknowledgment 

 to the noble efforts of this gentleman's great an- 

 cestor, Col. Long, that it was to him, Jamaica 

 WES principally indebted for its deliverance. As 

 chief judge of the island, and member of the coun- 

 cil, he exerted, on this important occasion, the pow- 

 ers with which he was invested, with such abili- 

 ty and fortitude, in defence of the people, as to baffle, 

 and finally overpower every effort to enslave them. 

 The governor, after dismissing him from the posts 



