EXPEDITION TO SURINAM. 361 



Now would this inconfiderate colony but give up their chap, 

 habits of pride and luxury, nay, in a moderate degree, J^^' 

 20,000 negroes at leaft might be added to thofe now la- 

 bouring in the fields, which (providing the whole were 

 treated with lefs feverity) muft at the fame time keep 

 the above fuperfiuous number of idlers employed ; and 

 by affifting the others in their neceffary occupations, 

 could not but tend greatly to prevent that fhocking mor- 

 tality, to which they are at prefent expofed by unbound- 

 ed ill-ufage and barbarity. 



But every reform muft begin at that which is the fource 

 of manners as well as of jujlice\ and thofe therefore who 

 are entrufted with the executive government Ihould have 

 no temptation to overlook the breaches of a law^ while 

 it ought to be a facred and invariable rule never to allow 

 either the governor or the magiftrates of fuch a colony 

 to be the proprietors of more Haves than merely a limited 

 number, to attend on their perfons, according to their 

 ranks : lince more than once, even to my obfervation, it 

 has occurred that thofe who made, and thofe who were 

 appointed to enforce the laws, have been the firft that 

 broke tbem, for the paltry benefit of caufing their ne- 

 groes to work on a Sunday, or to follow the bent of their 

 unbounded paflions ; from which fhameful example from 

 the magiftrate, the contagion muft neceffarily fpread 

 among the individuals. 



Let the governor and principal magijlrates^ there- 

 fore, be fent out from Europe; let them be gentle-* 

 men of fortune and education; and, above allj men 

 Vol, IL / 3 A of 



