148 A. D. 1788. 



breakflifl: on the field and dinner at their own houfes. In crop time, 

 which lafts about five months, they alfo work half the night, being 

 divided into two fpells, or watches, who relieve each other at noon and 

 midnight, as the operation of boiling the iugar is never interrupted 

 throughout the week. 



The Negroes are tried for capital, or heinous, crimes by two juftices 

 of the peace afTilled by three freeholders *. And they are punifhed by 

 whipping for fmaller crimes, negled of their work, &c, of which the 

 overfeer or manager, to whom the proprietor commits the charge of 

 the plantation, is judge ; and not only he, but alfo the inexperienced 

 young men who are retained, under the mifapplied name of book-keepers, 

 as his afliftants, and even the black drivers f . When the overfeer hap- 

 pens to be a man of humanity (and on this occafion it was aflTerted that 

 overfcers were now much more humane and enlightened than they 

 ufed to be formerly :|:) the punifhments are perhaps not more frequent 

 or fevere than may be neceffary to compell flaves to perform work, in 

 the fuccefs of which they have no intereft. Negroes, who are bred to 

 trades, efpecially if they are good workmen, meet with better encourage- 

 ment : and houfe Haves, particularly the handfome wenches, are fre- 

 quently fpoiled by exceffive indulgence. The health of plantation flaves 

 is taken care of by a furgeon, who is retained by the year at a fixed 

 rate per head, with additional payment for extraordinary cafes, as inno- 

 culation, &c : and a houfe or hofpital, called the hot-houfe, is allotted 

 for the reception of the fick Negroes upon every plantation. 



The advocates for the flave trade infifted, that it was impoflible to 

 keep up the flock of Negroes without continual importation from Africa. 

 It is, indeed, very evident, that, as long as the importation is continued, 

 and two thirds of the flaves imported are men, the fucceeding genera- 

 tion, in the mod favourable circumftances, cannot be more numerous 

 than if there had been only half as many men ; or, in other words, at 

 leafl: half the men may be faid, with refpe£t to population, to die with- 

 out leaving any poflierity. If that inequality cannot be redified by an 

 extra importation of women (and the flave-merchants fay, they are not 

 to be had §) a floppage of importation would of itfelf corred the evil in 



* So it is in Jamaica : but the law, or cuftom, in general men of much better abilities than for- 



varies in the different iflands. In Antigua three merly. Mr. Beckford fays nearly the fame in his 



juftices, and fix freeholders or houfeholders, are re- Defcr'tpttve account of 'Jamaica, V. \, p. 354. And 



quired to conftitute a court for the trial of Negroes, the fame obfervation was made by the committee 



In Grenada and S'. Chriftophers t»no juftices are of the aftemhly of Jamaica In the year 1792. \_Ed- 



fufficient. wards' j H'ift. of the Wejl-Ind'ies, V. \\, p. 502.3 



f Thefe are a kind of of&cers, generally well \ If there is a fcarcity of women in the ilave- 



experienced in the duty of the plantation, whom markets on the weft coaft of Africa, it appears to 



the overfeer appoints to fee that the other flaves be quite the reverfe on the caft fide of it. When 



do not negleft their work. Mr. Ledyard was at Cairo in Egypt in the year 



\ Mr. Long alfo obferves \_H\Jlory (f "Jamaica, 1788, he faw 200 Negro flaves brought from Dar- 



V, a, p. 43 j] that the overfeers arc now (1774) foor, a country in the heart of Africa (now better 



known 



