SETTLEMENTS ON THE DEMERARY, &C. 537 



an extraordinary court was called. The charges were made by 

 the negroes, and supported by witnesses brought for that pur- 

 pose; it was clearly proved that the proprietor might have 

 purchased provisions for his negroes, but would not. The 

 court declared him incapable, and an improper person to ma- 

 nage his own affairs; they therefore appointed curators, or trus- 

 tees, to superintend the estates, and bound him under a severe 

 penalty and the displeasure of the court, to reside off the estate, 

 and not interfere with the direction of the plantations, negroes, 

 &c. the court making itself answerable for all the produce. A 

 similar charge was brought against a Dutchman of Essequebo; 

 suffice it to say, though he was a member of the honourable 

 court of justice of that colony, he was fined fifteen thousand 

 guilders. To prevent, if possible, ever such an occurrence 

 again, the court of police revised and corrected the laws re- 

 specting provisions, and made the penalties and fines so high, 

 as to insure their being attended to. Sworn surveyors were 

 sent round the colonies to measure all the plantain walks, and 

 those estates which had not an acre of full grown plantains for 

 every four negroes, had heavy penalties inflicted on them. 



This scarsity was by no means equally grievous in the shire 

 of Surinam, where longer experience of the casualities of this 

 climate had taught the planters better to proportion their gar- 

 den-grounds to their farms. Yet it was not relieved and sup- 

 plied by the spare produce of that district in the degree that 



