IMPROVEMENT OF EMANCIPATED SLAVES. 399 



that the whole of the emancipated class would then purchase lands 

 and retire altogether from cane cultivation. But measures of a 

 precautionary nature might be devised to neutralise such a result; 

 and the inconveniences arising from the adoption of such a plan 

 would be more than compensated by its concurrent advantages. 

 Squatting would, most certainly, be at an end ; and emigrants 

 would arrive in sufficient numbers to make it hardly profitable for 

 the great mass of our labouring population to become proprietors. 

 "Moreover, to endeavour to reduce the negro to a state of almost 

 forcible labour, would be to arouse his naturally suspicious mind, 

 and render him unmanageable and difficult to govern ; whereas, 

 by giving scope to what industrial notions he may possess, and en- 

 couraging them, so that they may become habits, not only in 

 himself, but in his children, his energies would be more rapidly 

 developed, his general tone would be improved, and a thriving 

 and, I believe, a numerous population would be more readily 

 produced." (Lord Harris to Earl Grey.) 



To the present day, nothing has been done to encourage the 

 industry of the emancipated class, or of emigrants generally. 

 After importing the latter, we have, faithful to the compact, re-ex- 

 ported them at the expiration of their five years of residence in the 

 colony, with whatever amount of specie they may have amassed. 

 We have yet had no signs that the energies of the labouring 

 population " have been developed ;" that their " general tone has 

 been improved." None of the improvements contemplated under 

 the provisions of the Territorial Ordinance, have been effected; but, 

 on the contrary, the largest proportion of the ward rates have been 

 directed to purposes quite foreign to the measure, as originally 

 passed. 



" To force all the men of the lower classes, not otherwise em- 

 ployed, to become agricultural labourers is, I conceive, hardly 

 desirable, and not very possible. 



" It requires no very great experience amongst the lower 

 orders of society, to discover that many will become useful mem- 

 bers of society, if allowed to cultivate their own lands, who, if 

 forced to labour for wages, only turn to the idle and dissolute life 

 of smugglers or poachers in England, and that of squatters in 

 Trinidad." (Lord Harris to Earl Grey.) 



The soundness of these remarks once admitted, it only remains 

 to decide according to what plan, and on what terms, the public 



