Letters of Aristodemus and Sincerus. 237 



promising, will not give good crops after five or six 

 years. With all the losses on the upper lands, however, 

 the colonies did not go back, but, on the contrary, they 

 improved, even in spite of the fact that money could 

 not be had at any price on account of the severe losses. 

 Slaves are sold much higher here than in Berbice, Suri- 

 nam, or St. Eustaiius, while our produce fetches a very 

 low price. The nation should open up the slave trade 

 direcl with Africa and establish trading stations on the 

 coast in the same manner that the English are doing; in 

 this way we should not only get cheap slaver, hut also 

 find a market for our plantation rum. Neither justice 

 or equity are known in these colonies, there are no legal 

 gentlemen, but plenty of law, planters' law, Roman law 

 and Dutch law, administered by people, some of whom 

 are unable to read the language, and those who can do 

 so still utterly incompetent to understand the laws. 



According to a letter from an attorney to his principal, 

 the administration of justice was wretched, few of the 

 colonists were fit to sit on the bench ; most of them 

 Germans, English, and French, knowing nothing of the 

 Dutch law. The colonies required hrst-class men, not 

 only as lawyers, but also as merchants and navigators. 



A similar letter gives a very clear statement of affairs 

 as follows : — 



" If no new settlers, no buyers, no slaves, and no pro- 

 per servants are introduced ; if no proper regulations 

 are made, and if we get only the same old government 

 and servants of the same kind as are usually sent out 

 here, then I would advise you to end the matter and 

 abandon the place. To the West India Company the 

 colony has always been a source o( trouble and loss ; it 



