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HISTORY OF THE [book iv. 
negroes on a plantation must be reduced to a deplo¬ 
rable state of wretchedness, if, at any time, they 
suffer their aged companions to want the common 
necessaries of life, or even many of its comforts, as 
far as they can procure them. They seem to me to 
be actuated on these occasions by a kind of involun¬ 
tary impulse, operating as a primitive law of nature, 
which scorns to wait the cold dictates of reason: 
among them, it is the exercise of a common duty, 
which courts no observation, and looks for no ap¬ 
plause.* 
Among other propensities and qualities of the 
negroes must not be omitted their loquaciousness. 
They are as fond cf exhibiting set speeches, as ora¬ 
tors by profession; but it requires a considerable 
share of patience to hear them throughout; for 
they commonly make a long preface before they 
come to the point: beginning with a tedious enu¬ 
meration of their past services and hardships. I hey 
dwell with peculiar energy (if the facts admits it) 
on the number of children they have presented to 
* The greatest affront (says Mr. Long) that can be offered to a ne¬ 
gro, is to curse his father and mother, or any of his progenitors. It 
may not be improper in this place to add, that many of the negroes 
attain to great longevity.—-In February 1792, a black woman of the 
name of Flora Gale, died at the very extraordinary age of lao, at Sa- 
vanna-la-Mar in Jamaica. She remembered perfectly well the great 
earthquake in 1692, which proved so fatal to Port Royal. She left 
a numerous progeny of children, grand and great-grand children, and 
it is remarkable, that she always refused to be baptized, assigning for 
reason her desire to have a grand negro dance at her funeral, accord¬ 
ing to the custom of Africa : a ceremony never allowed in Jamaica at 
the burial of such as have been christened. 
