228 



humboldt's cub a. 



heard discussed with the greatest coolness, the 

 question whether it was better for the proprietor not 

 to overwork his slaves, and consequently have to 

 replace them with less frequency, or whether he 

 should get all he could out of them in a few years, 

 and thus have to purchase newly imported Africans 

 more frequently. But these are the reasonings of 

 avarice when one man holds another in servitude. 



It w^ould be unjust to deny that the mortality of 

 the blacks has diminished greatly in Cuba, within 

 the last fifteen years. Many proprietors have 

 studied how they might best improve the rules of 

 their plantations. The mean mortality of the newly 

 imported negroes is still from ten to twelve per 

 cent., 1 and from observations made on several well 

 conducted sugar plantations, it may fall to even six 

 or eight per cent. This loss among the newly 

 imported negroes varies much according to the time 

 of their arrival ; th^ most favorable season for them 

 is from October until January, those being the most 

 healthy months, and most abundant in provisions on 



J We are assured that in Martinique, where there are 78,000 

 slaves, the mean mortality is 6,000, while the births are barely 1,290, 

 yearly. Before the cessation of the slave-trade, Jamaica lost 

 annually, 7,000, or 2£ per cent. ; since that time, the diminution of 

 the population is scarcely perceptible.— Review of the Registry Laws 

 by the Com. of the Afric. Inst. 1820, p. 43.— H. 



