42 , TIMEHRI. 
The Rum manufaéturer has this high ground of moral 
superiority over the British distiller, that whereas the 
latter abstracts from the necessaries of life and perverts 
grain from a wholesome article of food to deleterious 
luxury, the former only manufaétures what would other- 
wise be an useless refuse, and is obliged to distil, 
otherwise the sugar duty would not leave him one far- 
thing to feed either himself or his negroes. The British 
Distillery trade is optional, and it abstraéts from the 
article of food, perverting what was intended for bread 
alone, to a more obje€tionable purpose. But the West 
Indian planter only distils what would otherwise run to 
waste, and the produce of which puts bread in the mouth 
—being a work of sheer necessity, and forced upon him 
by the exactions of the revenue. The British distiller 
takes from a necessary to fabricate a superfluous article, 
and the farmer would rather grow barley for him than 
wheat for others, so that the poor man’s loaf pays a 
tax to the British distiller, and the Government authorizes 
the taxation when the same superfluity can be afforded by 
the West India planter, without objection as to the effeét or 
means,—sugar is a useful and necessary article of con- 
sumption, and every puncheon ofrum, mustbe concomitant 
with the produétion of at least * hhds. sugar ; there is 
something here to counterbalance the moral tendency of 
the fa&t. But with the British distiller there is absolutely no 
palliative to the destruétive charge of turning breadintogin. 
At this rate it would not be worth the while to distil 
rum at all, if the sweets could otherwise be disposed of, 
only that on an involved estate the petty sum thus 
realized is the only disposable revenue of the Planter, 
* Left open in MS, 
