3^5 NARRATIVE OF AN 



CHAP, for above an hour after, until one of them expired under 



yryy 



t - the cruel lafh, which put an end to the inhuman ca- 

 taftrophe. A law-fuit was inftantly commenced againft 

 Ebber for aflaffination. He was convicted, but condemn- 

 ed to no other punifhment than to pay the afore-mentioned 

 hundred guineas, which price of blood is always divided 

 between the fifcal and the proprietor of the deceafed 

 flave ; it being a rule in Surinam, that by paying a fine 

 of five hundred florins, not quite fifty pounds per head, 

 any proprietor is at liberty to kill as many of his own 

 negroes as he pleafes ; but if he kills thofe of his neigh- 

 bour, he is alfo to pay him for the lofs of his Have, the 

 crime being firft fubftantiated, which is very difficult in 

 this country, where no flave's evidence can be admitted. 

 Such is the iegiflature of Dutch Guiana, in regard to 

 negroes. The above-mentioned Ebber was peculiarly 

 tyrannical ; he tormented a boy of about fourteen called 

 Cadetty, for the fpace of a whole year, by flogging him 

 every day for one month; tying him down flat on his 

 back, with his feet in the flocks, for another ; putting an 

 iron triangle * or pot-hook round his neck for a third, 

 which prevented him from running away among the 

 woods, or even from fleeping, except in an upright or 

 fitting pofture ; chaining him to the landing-place, night 

 and day, to a dog's kennel, with orders to bark at every 

 boat or canoe that paflfed for a fourth month ; and fo 



* Thefe triangles have three long barbed fpikes, like fmall grapplings, projedling 

 jBrom an iron collar. 



on, 



