The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1836-10-28 00:00:00

THE LIVERPOOL STANDARD. f

COLONIAL INTELLIGENCE

Private letters have been received from the Cape of Good
Hope, which contain some interesting details on the subject of
the compensation for slaves, and of the extraordinary difficul-
ties thrown in the way of those who have claims to prefer, which
are so serious in their operation that in many instances they
may cause delay of adjustment of this species of property for
18 months or two years, and in others they reuilar it scarcely
worth the while of those who live at any distance, or who may
not have any great amount of such properly, to make any claim
at all. The claims, it is represented, are issued so slowly,
and the forms are so complex, that they are productive of as
much annoyance as injury, and these government arrange-
ments are, naturally enough, producing great dissatisfaction, as
well as threatening to work considerable injustice. If a farmer
resident 600 miles ((rum the Cape, and 100 miles from a special
magistrate or notary, has a claim of £3O or Elo, he has to go to
the Cape. lie may next have to wait a month to get his cer-
tificate and power, and to employ an agent to sell or recover his
claim. If he engage an agent in town, he must pay commis-
sion and postage, and travel 200 miles to sign before a magis-
trates or notary ; and after all, on sending to the Cape, there
may be some trilling mistake in the documents which will render
all useless. Other blank forms are then applied for; but the
commissioners have none to give, stating that they had only
800 blanks in the first instance, and that the home commis-
sioners have promised to send more ;- but though several vessels
have since arrived, there has been no further supply of blank
forms. Thus, to secure anything like safety, the farmers have
to travel from 400 to 1,000 miles, and wait a month in Cape
town to have the document executed; and then, when the small
pittance is awarded, they will have to take a similar journey to
receive it! Surely such difficulties and annoyances might have
been averted, or, when known, remedied, and ignorance of them
it is apprehended cannot be pleaded.
In a private letter from Antigua' of the sth ult., some very
indignant remarks appear nu the subjectof the recruiting among
the negroes, which since the emancipation has been freely re-
sorted to for the supply of the regiments stationed in that island.
Some of the planters had been deprived by it of so large a por-
tion of their hands, as materially to impede the working of their
estates, and under the new system it was not amuse easily prac-
ticable to make up the deficiency. Before the emancipation the
negro, being the absolute property of the planter, could not be
detached, frown his service, •and they very strongly exclaim
against-the almost equal impolicy, or wrong, as they term it, of
thus seducing from them their voluntary labourers. A petition
against it had been prepared and submitted to the Legislature.
Antigua, it should be borne in mind, is one of the islands, in
which emancipation took place immediately on the passing of
the act. The planters determined, after mature deliberation,
to forego the intermediate step of the apprentice system. All
over the West India islands, and indeed in all our colonies
where the cultivation of sugar exists on an extended scale, it
has become a most important point how to supply the deficiency
of negro labour, which has been heretofore considered as alone
effectual for the p'lrpose, and preparations are making in many
of them to draw upon Europe for that purpose. Hence there
may easily ensue, it' the labourers of this country are not put
upon their guard, a traffic in the labour of %bite men scarcely
less reprehensible than that negro slavery to which a stop has
recently been put. As a specimen of the species of temptation
held out to them, we may quote a letter from Jamaica which
says—
" You are aware of the resolution of the hon. house of assem-
bly to allow £l2 currency for the importation of every adult
person, and £8 for those under 12 years of age ; and I am also
authorise-1 by the commissioners of this town to pay any reason-
able expenses incurred in England or Scotland for transporting
such emigrants to their place of embarkation. Country people
will be preferred, but there is no exception to tradesmen of any
description. Each family will have a neat and comfortable
cottage, 22 feet long by 18 feet wide, partitioned into three
rooms, with liberty to add to it any other buildings. A garden
round the house of, say, half an acre, and any quantity of land
to cultivate at a very low rent, which may be paid in services of
any kind. Abundant provisions will be ready for the emigrants
by the month of November, which will be delivered to them
without limit at the lowest market price, to be repaid as the
rent, in service or labour. Any respectable family wfshing for
a cow may be accommodated on credit, to be paid for in the
same way. Pigs and poultry may be had on similar terms.
The settlement is on the Rio Grande, in a beautiful and most
healthy district, where a white man can work all day long in a
cloudy day, and seven or eight hours (if required) even in the
sun. Those who have any means of their own will of course be
independent, after paying any expenses incurred by the com-
missioners on their account, and will meet with every encou-
ragement to exert themselves for the exclusive benefit of them-
selves and their families. Those on whose account money will
have been advanced will be expected to repay at least a portion
of it in services previous to being allowed to quit the township.
Work will be provided for everybody desirous of it, and at li-
beral wages, and all persons will be allowed a choice of work
suitable to their habits and experience as far as such accommo-
dation is possible."
This is merely a preparation, however, for a very important
question, which must soon come broadly before the public and
attract the attention of parliament, whose most efficient protec-
tion will be required to prevent its degenerating into a must
mischievous abuse.