A. D. 1788. 167 



the Englifh captains and furgeons into their emplo}'ment, that they 

 might engage in the flave trade, in which for many years they have not 

 had a fingle velTel. Meflieurs Baker and Dawfon, however, proceeded 

 as if the contract had been completed, trufting to the honour of the 

 court of Spain for fulfiUing the terms of it. 



About this time many of the Spaniards appear to have been very 

 eager to get into the flave trade. In march 1788 fome planters and' 

 merchants from the Havanna and Hifpaniola vifited Manchefter and 

 Liverpool in order to fee the goods prepared for the African trade and 

 learn their prices, and to pick up what knowlege they could by infpcd- 

 ing the flave fliips, and inquiring into the method of conducing the 

 trade : and they alfo wiflied to engage fome commanders, furgeons, Sec. 

 experienced in the trade, to enter into their fervice, and fail from Cadiz. 

 Even the Spanifli government propofed to go into the trade, and fit out 

 fliips on their king's account. But, whether this plan of a royal flave. 

 trade was carried into execution or not, I_have not learned. 



The Philippine company of Spain obtained a privilege to fupply 

 South America with flaves. They employed an agent in England, who, 

 it was faid, engaged fix fliips of about 300 tuns at London, Briftol, and 

 Liverpool, to carry flaves from the coafl: of Africa to Buenos Ayres, and 

 to return to England with hides and horns. Their outward cargoes, 

 which were laid in at the ports whence they failed, were immediately^ 

 paid for by the agent, the intention of the company being, that the 

 money arifing from the fales of the flaves fhould be ready at Buenos 

 Ayres for their Eafl:-India fliips to take it onboard there on their out- 

 ward pafliige by their new route round the Cape of Good hope. Thefe 

 vefl'els failed under Britifli colours *. 



* 



The committee at the conclufion of tlieir Re- fugar, and the fpirit made from the flcimmings and 



port inferted faeh accounts as they could obtain of melaffes, are produced of quahties fupetior to thofe 



the trade in the interior parts of Africa, which is of the Weft-Indies, and at far inferior prices, the 



now better known from the communications of the former being fold by the planters of Java at about 



affociation for promoting the difcovery of that 18/" fterling per pecul (133-!- lb.) and the later 



country, and other publications of late travelers in about id a gallon. \_Report, part iii, Pjceti 4 I, 



it. 4 K.] The fuperiority of the Oriental manufac- 



Before I take leave of the Report on the flave ture of fugar by free men over that of the Weft 



trade, which has furniihed fo much valuable in- by flaves is fo little known in Europe, that it has 



formation, I ought to give a brief flcetch of the confidently been aftcrtcd to be impoflible, though 



method of conduSing a fugar plantalion In the Eafl- defcribed, not only by Mr. Botham, but alfo by 



Indies, communicated to the committee by Mr. Mr. Fitzmaurice in a printed Letter to the directors 



Bothai^n, who was two years in the Biitilh and of the Eajl- India company, and Mr. Le Poivrc in 



French \Veft-Indies, and afterwards condufted Obfervatiora fur les arts en Afie, iijc. Mr. Botham's 



fugar-works at Bencoolen in Sumatra. The opera- method is nearly tranfcribcd in IVadflrom's Effay 



tions of ploughing, (not digging with hoes) plant- on colom%alwn, p. 259 Sir George Staunton {xn 



ing, weeding, moulding, cuttuig, boiling, claying, \\\^ Emhajfy to China, V. m, p. 2^z,fecond edition^ 



and packing for the market, are all performed by defcribes the praftice of jobbers in China with 



people hired for the occafion at an agreed rate for traveling fugar-works grinding and boiling the 



the quantity ; fo that the owner very nearly knows, canes of many fmall plantations ; which, however, 



what his fugar will colt him. By this diftribution can only be effecltd in a country everywhere in- 



of labour, and the ufe of the plough in preparing terfedted by canals, upon whicii the moveable - 



the ground, and alfo in weeding and moulding, fugar-works are cafily tranfported. See alfo th.- 



