The "Good Old Times" in Guiana. 129 



hast but courage to set about giving the world a tinished picture of it, 

 neither materials to work on, nor colours to paint it in its true shades will 

 be wanting in thee." 



This quaint style enables us to have full sympathy with the writer, 

 and every true naturalist feels himself in harmony with his genial mind. 

 We can be sure that as a planter in charge of slaves he never could have 

 been anything but the kind Massa so often pictured by visitors to the 

 colony. This idea is justified by his own words : — 



" Slavery can never be defended ; he whose heart is not of iron can 

 never wish to be able to defend it ; while he heaves a sigh for the poor 

 negro in captivity, he wishes from his soul that the traffic had been stifled 

 in its birth ; . . . now . . . the situation of the plantation slaves is 

 depicted as truly deplorable and their condition wretched. It is not so. 

 A Briton's heart, proverbially kind and generous, is not changed by 

 climate, or its streams of compassion dried up by the scorching heat of a 

 Demerara sun ; he cheers his negroes in labour, comforts them in sick- 

 ness, is kind to them in old age, and never forgets that they are his 

 fellow-creatures.'' 



Although I have given due prominence to Ralegh and Waterton, it is 

 not to be supposed that they are the only writers on Guiana, there were 

 Dutch and French authors of some note, but 1 can only find space to 

 touch on the principal English books. Dr. Bancroft lived in Demerara 

 about 1760 and wrote an "Essay on the Natural History of Guiana 

 which is useful but almost entirely descriptive. His account of the 

 Indians is interesting but I can only quote a paragraph : — 



" The simplicity of the lives of these people, the paucity of their 

 wants, and the ease with which they are supplied, in a country so happily 

 situated, and so liberally endowed with the necessaries of life, leaves the 

 greater part of their time unoccupied with the cares of procuring suste- 

 nance, in which they have ample leisure to pursue the various modes of 

 amusement and pleasure, which are most agi eeable to their simple rustic 

 inclinations : A part of these idle hours they pass in bathing and swim- 

 ming in the rivers, which they do in companies, without distinc- 

 tion of sex several times a day : and they are so constant and expert at 

 swimming, that they almost deserve to be classed with amphibious animals; 

 this they find not only an agreeable but salubrious exercise, as it tends to 

 repress excessive perspiration and preserve health. At other times they 

 visit each other, and are mutually entertained, not only with the simple 

 occurrences of their lives, but with a variety of fables, which are merry, 

 significant and replete with such simple morality, as their confined observa- 

 tions and uncultivated minds have suggested. On these occasions they 

 often abandon themselves to puerile mirth, dancing, or immoderate 

 laughter ; but harmony and good humour ever prevail, until they are in- 

 toxicated by drink." 



Dr. Pinckard's Notes on the West Indies is of much interest to the 

 historian and readable as well. He came with the fleet that took over the 



