86-4 
and not immediately pressed, the 
juice begins to férment, and is fit 
only to be converted by distillation 
intorum. At these seasons, there- 
fore, and particularly in the latter, 
. every hand that can work, however 
feebly, is of importance to the 
planter ; and the urgent demand for 
labour sometimes makes him wholly 
insensible to acts of inhumanity, 
which, perhaps, at other times, might 
appear to him in their true light, and 
as odious and atrocious in the ex- 
treme. This is not the case in the 
Brazils. The season of planting, 
on account of the longer continu- 
‘ance of rain, is at least two months 
Jonger here than in the West Indies ; 
and the gradual ripening of the 
plants protracted in the same pro- 
portion. Itis not therefore found 
to be necessary here, as is the case 
in our colonies, to drive the slaves 
to work with the crack or the lash 
of the whip, or to regulate the 
stroke of the bill or the hoe by the 
measure of a forced song, 
If it should unfortunately happen 
that our colonies in the West Indies 
may ultimately be involved in the 
fate of St. Domingo, a considerable 
mass of property will no doubt be 
lost to this country; but, at the 
same time, it cannot well be denied 
that this loss would be productive 
of a most important saving to the 
state, by the number of British sub- 
jects whe, in their removal to a 
better climate, would escape a pre- 
mature death. The most valuable 
productions of the West India 
islands were originally transplanted 
from the Kast, where the labour of 
slaves is not required, nor, any ex- 
traordinary waste of Europeans oc- 
casioned. ‘T'o this source we may 
again recur, and India and China 
may eventually prove the great 
ANNUAL REGISTER, 1806. 
sheet anchors of our commercial) 
prosperity. 
The ruin of the West Indias 
islands, it is to be feared, would 
equally affect the franquillity of 
those colonies on the continent of 
South America, in the possession of 
the English and the Dutch, which 
would tend in a very material degree 
to enhance the valué of the posses-~ 
sions of Spain and Portugal on the 
same continent. But the restrictions, — 
the exactions, and the monopolies, - 
under which the settlements of these 
two powers are oppressed, and the 
total want of energy in the inhabit- 
ants, which necessarily results from 
such asystem, areso many invincible 
barriers against any improvement 
which favourable circumstancesmight 
otherwise suggest. Few countries af-~ 
ford so great a number or So great a 
variety of valuable productions as 
the Brazils. Beside the articles de- 
scribed in eight ancient paintings, 
which are noticed inaformer chapter 
of the original work,thecountry pro- 
duces an inexhaustible supply of the 
finest timber, suitable for all the 
purposes of civil and naval architec- 
ture; but the cutting and disposing 
of it is a monopoly of the crown. 
The first object of every man who 
obtains a grant of woodland, is to 
destroy the best trees as fast as he 
can: because he is not only forbid- 
den to send them to market, but 
may have the additional mortifica- 
tion of being obliged to entertain 
the king’s surveyor, whenever he 
thinks fit to pay him a visit, with a 
numerous retinue, for the purpose 
of felling the timber, which he, as 
owner of the estate, has not the 
power to prevent. Yet, notwith- 
standing this discouraging monopoly, 
together with the difficulty of trans- 
post, on account of the badness of 
the 
} 
