238 TlMEHRI. 
myself with your Excellency's pardoning the freedom I 
take in writing. 
Gedney Clarke Junior to Count Bentinck. The Hague, July 16th, 1762. 
I have the honour to present your Excellency with a 
plan of our fertile, tho' neglected River Demerary.* Let 
me petition a place for it in your cabinet. If not worthy 
enough, at least vouchsafe to honour it with your patron- 
age and protection. Then shall its inhabitants, distant 
as they are, extol your bounty, and be for ever reminded 
of their duty. 
Enclosure. — Memorandum concerning Rio Demerary. 
About the year 1752 tbe first Settlements were begun 
in Demerary. The inhabitants as was natural, expected 
proper encouragement from their mother Country and 
were even promised it. Instead of which they have not 
to this day received the least supply of negroes or any- 
thing else towards the advancement of their Estates, so 
that they have been obliged all along with great risk, to 
purchase these necessaries at Saint Eustatius, the English 
Islands, or wherever they could get them and at any 
price. Without negroes it is impossible for them to 
cultivate their lands, so that without a steady supply of 
that article in particular, Demerary, fertile as it is, must 
dwindle and come to nothing. There should also be a 
Bank of Credit formed to give a lifting hand to the 
inhabitants and enable them to purchase slaves when 
they arrive. 
* This was doubtless the " Caerte van de Rivier Demerary" dated 
1759, and signed Laurens Lodewyk van Bercheyck, a copy of which 
is in the R. A. & C. Society's Reading Room. Berchyck was Com- 
mandeur of Demerara, 1761-4. 
