498 Our Colonies. [ May, 
as, if they had their option (as their ancestors had) they would doubt- 
less, in most cases, have preferred. If they have stood these hazards— 
if they have encountered these difficulties, and have to stand and encoun- 
ter them still—we may not be able to secure them against the conse- 
quences of such a state of things, but at least we have no right to aggra- 
vate the hazard or the difficulties which we cannot relieve.” 
Although Jamaica was not expressly named, it was well known that 
she was aimed at in these resolutions. The legislative assembly of that 
colony, however, so far from receiving captiously, or reluctantly, the 
measures which were then proposed, set about giving the fullest effect to 
them—having always regard to that which they did know, and which the 
English government did not know—the local interests and peculiarities 
of their island. While there had been a great deal of prating here about 
the amelioration of the slaves, the legislature of Jamaica had been ear- 
nestly, and actively, and successfully employed in effecting it; acting ~ 
upon the principle which was known here, and laid down by some per- 
sons, (who only knew it, however, because the colonists of Jamaica had 
told them so) that it was necessary to prepare the slave, by enlightening 
his mind with the diffusion of knowledge, and purifying his heart with 
the principles of religion, before the gift of freedom could be any thing 
but a curse to him.* In 1816, the laws relating to slaves were consoli- 
dated, and the new act received the royal assent. The progress of im- 
provement was rapidly continued, and so many other provisions, extend- 
ing the privileges and comforts of the slaves, were subsequently passed, 
that, in 1826, it was thought advisable to frame a general act which 
should combine the whole code of laws relating to the slave population of 
the island. At this time, a despatch from Lord Bathurst, then Secretary — 
of State for the colonies, containing certain recommendations in pursu- — 
ance of the resolutions respecting the slaves, had been received in 
Jamaica. The assembly, who thought that their knowledge was at least 
equal to that of the persons by whom these recommendations had been 
suggested, felt reasonably dissatisfied that measures had been dictated 
to them, without any previous investigation, at which they had been 
heard, either for the preservation of their interests, or for the vindication 
of their character. They contented themselves, however, with 
expressing this just and natural feeling, and set about carrying such of 
the recommendations of this government into effect as they thought 
practicable and judicious. A concise statement in their own words of the 
objects of the new law which they framed, will prove their earnestness 
to assist the work of improvement, and the injustice and falsehood of 
the imputations which have been made against them. Having stated 
that they had provided for the protection of the persons of females, in 
conformity with the spirit of the English laws, they proceeded thus: 
«Sentence of death, by judicial authority, cannot be enforced withou' 
the sanction of the Governor. Manumissions have been encouraged and 
* «Tn dealing with the negro, Sir, we must remember that we are dealing with a being 
possessing the form and strength of a man ; but the intellect only of a child. To tum 
him loose in the manhood of his physical strength, in the maturity of his physical passions, 
but in the infancy of his uninstructed reason, would be to raise up a creature, resembling 
the splendid fiction of a recent romance, the hero of which constructs a human form with — 
all the corporeal capabilities of a man, and- with the thews and sinews of a giant; but 
being unable to impart to the work of his hands a perception of right and wrong, he finds, — 
too late, that he has only created a more than mortal power of doing mischief, and himself — 
recoils from the monster which he has made.”—Mr. Canning’s Speech in the House of — 
Commons, March, 1824. 
