1829-3 Condition of the West-Indian Slave Population. 277 



the colony." A more perfect and unqualified recognition of the prin- 

 ciple of the resolutions of the House of Commons cannot be conceived. 

 An examination of the substance of the act will shew how far the legis- 

 lature of Jamaica have evinced a dispositon to carry into effect the 

 specific recommendations of Lord Bathurst : a disposition not generated 

 by any notion that those recommendations possessed even the shadow of 

 authority, but a gratuitous and spontaneous inclination on the part of the 

 colonists to fulfil the promise which had been made in their names, and 

 to go as far as prudence would permit them in the very path pointed 

 out by the government of this country. 



In considering what has been done by the legislature of Jamaica, the 

 fact must never be lost sight of, that regulations which are not only wise 

 and humane, but which would be absolutely just in this country, are, in 

 many respects, wholly inapplicable to the state of negro slaves — that 

 they must be prepared gradually for the improvement they are to un- 

 dergo, and that the first steps towards such improvement must be the 

 releasing them from the ignorance, and from the practices of that de- 

 grading superstition which is a characteristic of the nations of Africa ; in 

 short, that before they can be made free, they must be made Christians. 

 With a view to this important point, and in compliance with the first of 

 the requisitions, the proposed act directs the owners of slaves to endea- 

 vovir, as much as in them lies, to instruct their slaves in the principles of 

 the Christian religion, whereby to facilitate their conversion ; and re- 

 quires them to do their utmost endeavours to fit their slaves for baptism, 

 and to cause them to be baptized, which ceremony clergymen are 

 directed to perform without any fee. 



The spirit of the second regulation is carried into effect by the colonial 

 legislature by an enactment, the preamble to which recites, that " it is 

 exjoedient to render the Sabbath as much as possible a day of rest and 

 for religious worship ;" and which then provides, that no levy shall be 

 made on slaves under any description of process, on Saturday or Sunday 

 — that the slaves shall be allowed one day in every fortnight to cultivate 

 their own provision grounds, exclusive of Sundays, except during the 

 time of crop ; and that the number of days so allowed to the slaves, for 

 the cultivation of their own gi'ounds, shall be at least tAventy-six in the year, 

 exclusive of holidays at Christmas and other accustomed festivals ; that no 

 person shall hire the slaves of otl^.ers to work for them on the Sundays 

 or holidays ; that, during the crop, not only shall the slaves be exempted 

 from labour on Sundays, but that no mills shall be put about or worked 

 between the liours of seven o'clock on Saturday night and five o'clock on 

 Monday morning ; and, for the purpose of preventing that violation of 

 the Sabbath, which the Sunday markets had been found to give rise to, 

 no white person, or persons of free condition, shall expose on a Sunday, 

 after the hour of eleven o'clock in the forenoon, any goods or provisions 

 for sale in any market, or in any shop or other place. When it is re- 

 membered, that the distances at v;hich some of the negroes reside from 

 the markets of their several parishes or districts renders it necessary 

 that tliey should have time enougli allowed to reach them ; that under 

 the old law, the markets might be kept open till nine o'clock at night ; 

 and tliat the act from which we quote was only proposed to remain in 

 operation for three years (after wliich the result of this experiment would 

 form the basis for future regulations), it will not be denied that every 

 disposition has been shewn by the colonists to comply with the resolu- 



