354 JAMAICA. 



Africans. Whatever great pcrfonages this country might anciently 

 have produced, and concerning whom we have no information, they 

 are now every where degenerated into a brutifii, ignorant, idle, crafty, 

 treacherous, bloody, thievifh, miftruftful, and liiperftitious people, 

 even in thofe ftates where we might expefl to find them more 

 polifhed, humane, docile, and incluftrious. It is doubtful, whether 

 we ought to afcribe any fuperior qualities to the more ancient Afri- 

 cans ; for we find them reprefented by the Greek and Roman authors 

 under the moft odious and defpicable charader ; as proud, lazy, de- 

 ceitful, thievifii, addifted to sll kinds of luft, and ready to promote 

 them in others, inceftuous, flivage, cruel, and vindictive, devourers 

 of human fieOi, and quafTers of human blood, inconftant, bafe, and 

 cowardly, devoted to all ibrts of fuperftition ; and, in fhort, to every 

 vice that came in their w^ay, or within their reach. 



For the honour of human nature it were to be wiHicd, that thefe 

 defcriptions could with juftice be accufed of exaggeration ; but, in re- 

 fpeft to the modern Africans, we find the charge corroborated, and 

 fupported by a confiftent teftimony of fo many men of different na- 

 tions, who have vifitcd the coall, that it is difficult to believe they have 

 all bsen guilty of mifreprefcnting thefe people ; more efpecially, as 

 they tally exadly with the charader of the Africans that are brought 

 into our plantations. This brutality fomewhat diminiflies, when 

 they are imported young, after they become habituated to cloathing 

 and a regular difcipline of life ; but many are never reclaimed, and 

 continue favages, in every {tn(e of the word, to their latcfl period. 

 We find them marked with the fame bcftial manners, Itupidity, and 

 vices, which debafe their brethren on the continent, vv'ho feem to be 

 diftinguifhed from' the reft of mankind, not in perfon only, but in 

 poffelling, in abftrad, every fpccies of inherent turpitude that is to be 

 found difptrfed at large among the reft of the human creation, wn'ii 

 fcarce a fingle virtue to -extenuate tiiis fliade of charafter, differing in 

 this particular from all other men ; for, in other countries, the moft 

 abandoned villain we ever heard of has rarely, if ever, been known 

 importioned with fome one good quality at leaft, in his compofition. 

 It is allonifhing, that, although they have been acquainted with Eu- 

 ropeans, .and their manufadures, for fo many hundred years, they 

 have,, in all this feries of time, manifelled.fo little tafte for arts, or a 



genius 



