INTEODUCTION. 9 



the most suitable juncture, to the production of the contemplated 

 results. 



I only contend that, as certain effects flow from certain 

 causes, so certain results ought naturally to have succeeded the 

 abolition of slavery; and that these results had necessarily a 

 great influence on the conditions under which the social economy 

 of the West Indies was constituted. In my opinion, measures 

 might have been adopted to counteract some of those results, and 

 to render the Act of Emancipation a boon to the slave-holder as 

 well as to the slave himself. 



It was eight years only after the abolition of slavery that the 

 Equalisation Act of 1846 was passed; so that only eight years 

 had been allowed, both to the planters and the emancipated class, 

 for recovering from the shock of a great social revolution, and 

 for settling down from the violent oscillation which had been 

 imparted to the entire social body in the colonies. These eight 

 years, besides, had been a period of unceasing contention and of 

 growing bewilderment. 



The planter had to be taught by experience, and by experience 

 only, a totally new system of property management ; the emanci- 

 pated had to be taught that freedom imposed on them new duties 

 and new obligations ; that it behove them to become industrious, 

 to obey the laws and submit to prescriptions of which, as slaves, 

 they had no idea. And whatever may have been said to the 

 contrary, both planters and emancipated did prove themselves 

 equal to all reasonable expectations. For who, with the slightest 

 knowledge of human nature, could possibly have expected that 

 the one party would never commit disorders in practice, nor the 

 other be guilty of errors in judgment. 



During the time of slavery, free labour, when procurable, was 

 paid at a very high rate ; immediately after emancipation, the 

 labouring population considered themselves as entitled to, and 

 actually received, the same high wages ; and through fear that 

 the labourers would altogether retire from the cane field, the 

 planter readily paid the amount demanded, in order to keep his 

 property under cultivation, till better days should come. The 

 scarcity of labour in the colonies, and the high price of sugar in 

 the home market, seemed to concur in justifying both the 

 unreasonable demands of the labourers and the imprudent offers 

 of the planters. Things were carried a stage further: the 

 planter, instead of showing himself provident and calculating, 

 began to create a competition in the labour market, by offering 

 enhanced wages to the labourer. Led on by reckless impro- 

 vidence, and deceived by fallacious appearances, he at once sought 

 to extend his cultures at a moment when the labour market was 

 under a severe strain, and offered the most exorbitant wages for 



