The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1852-06-15 00:00:00

THE WEST INDIA QUESTION.

THE obstinate and impracticable nobleman who
lately presided over the Colonial-office being now
happily removed, there is, at the least, some hope
that, bye and bye, the attention of the Government,
and of the British people, may be drawn seriously
to the disastrous state of things existing in our
West Indian colonies, with a view to provide a re-
medy. On Thursday night petitions were presented
by Lord BROUGHAM, the Bishop of OXFORD, and
the Earl of HARROWBY, disclosing a picture of
ruin and progressive decay in those colonies never
before witnessed in any portion of her MAJESTY'S
dominions. It is not the property of the planters
alone which is being rapidly destroyed ; but the
very civilization of that race, for whose sake, as we
fondly thought, this country was willing to make
so large a sacrifice of money, and upon whose con-
dition the sympathies of the humane were so freely
lavished. From the prayer of these petitioners, and
from the statements of parties well informed, in-
cluding those of some of the gentlemen present at
a meeting of the West India Association, held in
this town on Friday last, we learn that many of the
negro population in Jamaica, refusing to work,
" had retired far from the seats of civilization in the
island, and had formed native villages, where they
were fast relapsing into African barbarism, and
substituting the worship of Obeah for that of the
Creator." It is a significant fact, in proof of this
phase of the case, that Lord DERBY has just had
presented to him a memorial from Jamaica, corro-
borative of the statements and prayer of the
petition from that island, which, he informed
the House on Thursday night, was signed
by the bishop, two archdeacons, and sixty-nine
clergymen of the Established Church ; and
by eighty-three ministers of all denominations,
including Wesleyans, Baptists, Independents, and
Roman Catholics. All these parties point—as the
main source of their sufferings—to the reduction of
the sugar duties in 1846.
Earl GREY, of course, denied stoutly that either
the act of 1846, or the further one of 184 S, had at
all contributed to produce the existing state of dis-
tress, and especially that the introduction of foreign
slave-grown sugar had diminished the efficiency of
the measures adopted by the squadron in repressing
the slave trade. He remarked that

6' There was this striking fart in the papers nn their
lordship's table that, taking the five years before the ad-
mission of foreign sugar into the markets of this country,
and taking tie five years since, there was a marked dimi-
nution in the amount of the slave trade ; and there was
still this more remarkable fact, that at this moment the
planters of Cuba wert so satisfied by what they saw goino
on, that free labourTcas cheaper than slave labour, that
they were taking measures to introduce no fewer than
80,000 industrious Chinese free labourers.—(Hear.)"

We wish to direct the particular attention of the
British public, and especially to those who have
heretofore taken an interest in the question of
slavery and the slave trade, to that portion of his
lordship's speech which we have printed in Italics.
There is an error in the number 80,000. The ac-
tual number is 8,000 of Chinese coolies, for whose
conveyance to Havana a contract is at present in
tours of execution by Messrs. SYME, MUIR, and
Co., of Amoy. The terms of the contract, we are
credibly informed, include an engagement for eight
years. But where, let us ask, is the guarantee for
the fulfilment of that contract on the part of the
Cuban planter ? Who is to assure us that the ser-
vitude is not to be virtually slavery in all its rigour
—or who can tell us how many of these poor beings
will, at the end of these eight years, be alive to tell
the tale of their sufferings, or whether a single man
of them will be permitted to return to the land of
his birth ? " Free labour," his lordship says, "is
cheaper than slave labour." Yes,—if such poor
unfortunates as these Chinese coolies can be called
free labourers,' when once they come under the ope-
ration of Spanish laws.
We shall not dwell further upon his lordship's
contradiction of facts so obvious as that our co-
lonies are declining, and that the result of the
measure of 1846 has been to stimulate the traffic
In, and the working of slaves. The former assump-
tion was sufficiently disposed of by the Earl of
HARROWBY on Thursday night, and the latter by
Lord BROUGHAM and the Bishop of OXFORD•
We 'prefer, at present, directing the attention of
Lord DERBY'S Government to the very different
position in_which the British planter is placed in
the endeavour to procure a supply of free labour,
compared with that of the foreign planter. We
bind the former down by the most sev:ra restric-
tions, both with respect to his control over the free
labourer, and the length of the contract he may
make with him. So far as regards the smaller of
the West India Islands, the planter, after payment
of all expenses of importation, is rarely able to re-
tain him for above thirteen or fourteen months.
From this circumstance mainly, the efforts made
during the past few years to increase the working
popttlation of our West India colonies have been
productive only of loss and disappointment. A
British company, however, under the guarantee of
British honour and humanity, is permitted to en-
gage, as free labourers, 8000 Coolies at Amoy, for a
fixed term of eight years, but in reality for pre-
cisely so long or short a period as they may
be enabled to exist in a state of virtual slavery,
under the intolerable yoke of Spanish tyranny.
Surely there is something here which calls for
notice on the part of our Government. Let the
impression once get abroad amongst the Chinese
people that British merchants are permitted to en-
gage in such an abominable traffic, and we may
shortly find closed against us one of the most
valuable sources of that abundant supply of free
labour, which, under a wise colonial Government,
we have a right to expect.

THE LITERARY AND PHILOSOPHCAL SOCIETY of this
town have issued a list to their own members and others
preparatory to the preparation of a Fauna for the district
near the Mersey and De
Dee. Mr. Byerley of Upton, will
superintend the publication of it, and it will be uniform in
size with Dr. Dickinson's Flora of the town and neigh-
bourhood.

BANKRUPTCY COURT, YESTERDAY.—D. H. Thorns
came before Mr. Commissioner Perry for his certificate
He was opposed by Mr. Bingham, solicitor, of Manches
ter ; and supported by Mr. Evans, solicitor, of t"-'—
The zround of o •

gance as to famill,

expenditure, but overruled
certificate of the second cla