224 



humboldt's cuba. 



and free population of blacks and mulattoes, amount- 

 ing to 326,000 ; being an excess of 97,000 over the 

 number imported. 1 When it is remembered that the 

 whites have contributed to the existence of 70,000 

 mulattoes, 2 leaving aside the natural increase that 

 has resulted from so many thousand negroes pro- 

 gressively imported, one exclaims, "What other 

 nation, or human society, can give so favorable an 



1 My calculation closes with 1825, and the number of negroes 

 imported since the conquest amounts to 413,500. The calculation 

 sent to the Cortes closes with 1810, and gives 229,000. (Documen- 

 ts, p. 119.) Difference, 184,500 ; but, according to the returns of 

 the Havana custom-house alone, the number of African negroes 

 brought to that port from 1811 to 1820, has been 109,000, and to 

 this we must add, 1st, according to the principles admitted by the 

 consulado, one-fourth or 27,000, for the licit importations at other 

 ports of the island ; and, 2d, the amount of illicit traffic, from 1811 

 to 1825.— H. 



2 The work undertaken by the consulado, in 1811, relative to the 

 probable distribution of 326,000 blacks, free aDd slave, contains 

 some very interesting matter, which great local knowledge alone 

 could have supplied to that body. A. Cities. Western part. — In 

 Havana, 27,000 free colored, and 28,000 slaves ; seven towns, with 

 Ayuntamiento, 18,000 ; from which we have, in the jurisdiction of 

 Havana, 36,000 free colored, and 37,000 slaves. Eastern part, 

 86,000 free colored, and 32,000 slaves. Total, in the cities, 72,000 

 free colored, and 69,000 slaves, or 141,000. B. Country. — Jurisdic- 

 tion of Havana, 6,000 free colored, and 110,000 slaves. Eastern 

 part, 36,000 free colored, and 33,000 slaves. Total, in the country, 

 185,000. — Documentor sobre los negros, p. 121. — H. 



