METHODS OE AMELIOKATION. 
273 
of afFection whicli for the most part characterize the African 
race, finds that after liis labour some care is taken of him 
amidst his indigent family, is in a position not to be compared 
'vith that of the insulated slave lost in the mass. This diver- 
tsity of condition escapes the notice of those who have not 
I'ad the spectacle of the West Indies before their eyes. 
Owing to the progressive amelioration of the state even of 
the captive caste in the island of Cuba, tlie luxury of tlie 
masters, and the possibility of gain by their work, have drawn 
more than eighty thousand slaves to the towns ; and the 
manumission of them, favoured by the wisdom of the laws, is 
become so active as to have produced, at the present period, 
more than 130,000 free men of colour. By considering the 
individual position of each class, by recompensing, by the 
decreasing scale of privations, intelligence, love of labour, 
and the domestic virtues, the colonial administration will 
find the best means of improving the condition of the blacks. 
Philanthropy does not consist in giving “ a little more salt- 
fish, and some fewer lashes the real amelioration of the 
captive caste ought to extend over the whole moral and phy- 
sical position of man. 
The impulse may be given by those European governments 
■«'hich have a right comprehension of human dignity, and 
■"■ho know that whatever is unjust bears with it a germ of 
destruction ; but this impulse, it is melancholy to add, will 
be powerless, if the union of the planters, if the colonial 
assemblies or legislatures, fail to adopt the same views, and 
to act by a well-concerted plan, having for its ultimate aim 
the cessation of slavery in the West Indies. Till then it 
will be in vain to register the strokes of the whip, to diminish 
the number that may be given at one time, to require the- 
presence of witnesses, and to appoint protectors of slaves; 
all these regulations, Rotated by the most benevolent inten- 
tions, are easily eluded : the isolated position of tiie plan- 
tations renders their execution impossible. They pre-suppose 
a system of domestic inquisition incompatible with what is 
Understood in the colonies by the phrase “ established 
rights.” The state of slavery cannot be altogether peaceably 
^meliorated, except by the simultaneous action of the free 
men (white men and coloured), residing in the West Indies ; 
ty colonial assemblies and legislatures ; by the influence ot 
VOL. III. T 
