SS6 STATISTICAL ACCOUNT OF THE 



Considerable praise is due to the negroes for their orderly 

 and good conduct throughout the scarsity, or rather famine ; 

 the change of diet did not agree with them, though medical 

 assistance, port wine, sago, &c. were administered with in- 

 creased attention. The number of deaths was never equalled 

 in the same space of time. On many estates, the negroes only 

 worked half days, and were allowed the remainder of the 

 time to fish, and attend to their own concerns. 



A circumstance which redounds to the honor of the court of 

 justice at Demerary, I will relate. A Dutchman, well known 

 on the east sea coast of that colony for the vulgarity of his 

 person, coarseness of mind, and litigiousness of character, and 

 possessing two clear unincumbered plantations, worked by 

 three or four hundred negroes, was the only person during the 

 scarsity convicted of ill treating them. It appeared that his ne- 

 groes had been without provisions being served to them, a week 

 or ten days, without any other cause being assigned for it than 

 that flour was too dear. The poor fellows were continued at 

 their work as usual, without any other food than that which 

 they could pick up off their own grounds, or beg from their 

 neighbours. Such was their situation, that incapable of sub-: 

 sisting any longer, they came to a determination to send a de-- 

 putation to wait on the fiscal, at Stabroek, to lay before him a 

 state of the case, and request immediate assistance for their 

 fellow sufferers. The fiscal conferred with the governor, and 



