New-York daily tribune. [volume] (New-York [N.Y.]) 1842-1866, 1855-02-13

lsft speedily to terminate. or miscrs5ly to pro-
tract, wretched existence a. they might. They
were subjected to much tho Same legal dissbili-
ties and indienides a. are the colored people Of
our Sou .aern States-not being allowed to testify
sgsinst white man, to vote or 70 hold any Of
fee; asd the Legislature Of Jamaica had also
provided-a thing not yet found necessary 10 any
of our Southt m States-that no test.men.ary de
vife from white person TO q negro or mulssto
should be valid if it exceeded the amount Of
s. GOO. The females had. a. their only resource,
the concubiDage above described-a degraded po-
sition In which, however. they often fulflei, with
the utmost scrupulousnem and selfdevotion, all
the duties, without enjoying one Of the rights, Of
q wife: and which, as it secured to them aud their
colored relations, 4 white Oh smpion and prctec-
tor was regarded as the greatest piece Of good
fortune, and the most respectable position to
which they could possibly attain.
Such was the prosperity over the decay Of
which so many regrets are uttered-the enjoy
ments if they are to be called such, secured BY it
to the limited white population aud to them oaly,
being Of the grossest character. From living
constantly among negroes, mostly imported from
Africa, over whom they exercised despotc au
thority, the white immigrants, the greater part
of them not over refined to begin with, degener-
sted into gross barbarisus. Their only relaxa-
tons were drunken frolics-nsked negro girls
being employed to wait at table While it was an
ordinary piece of Jamaica hospitality to furnish,
rot only bed (, the guest but person to share IT,
Such were the pleasures of the whites of Amaca;
their businefs consisted in watching and driving
up the negroes, and 10 gradually accumulating
the means to fit for moment as nominal pro-
pretor of plantation, which proprietorshsp in
nineteen cases out of twenty, speedily trans
fered these hard earned gsins into the Golfers Of
some London sugsr-house.
Nor was even this wretched system sustained,
except BY strict monopoly of the British sugar
market, secured to the British West India plant
era monopoly which, in the latter quarter Of
the last century, was so severely felt by the Brit
ish consumers, considering the prices at which
they might have purchased the rival sugars Of
French st. Domingo, as to raise great clanor
in England against the whole system of West
India cultivation as ruinOus aud losing con :em,
accompanied by q scheme for drawing the supply
of sugar from the East Ihdies-a scheme which
only received its quietus when the revolt Of the
slaves In French St. Domingo bad freed the Brit
ish colonies from that ihvidious contrast. On
the other hand, the Legislature Of Jamaica CON-
planned with no less emphasis of the wretched
condition to which the Island was reduced
They stated in formal report, that, in conse
quence of the interruption Of their usual sup
plies resulting from the quarrel between Great
Britain and her northern continental colonies,
NOW the United States, fifteen thousand ne
groes had persisted between the end Of 1850
and the beginning of l7o7, "of famine, or OF dis
leases contracted by scanty and unwho!esome
"diet" Another report, dated Nov. 22, 1872,
represents that, ia the course of twenty years
preceding, III estates were sold for the payment
of debts; IS were throrn sp-so long ago had
that abandonment of estates commenced, OF which
we nov. a-days hear so much, as though IL were
new thing growing out Of emancipstion-snd
90 we're then in the hands Of creditors; while,
during the same period, 60,02l executions,
amounting to above f22 500 600 sterling, had
been lodged in the Provost Msrshals office
Such was the prosperity of Jamaica in 1892;
and accounts still more lamentable are given in
another Report of Nov 90, 1904, and in Reports of
the British House Of Commons, ofJuly24, 1907, Of
April 10, lsOs-Repor No. 279, 1912, and No. 33l,
1882; from all which appears that Jamaica ruins
an ancient and chronic complaint-as painful no
doubt, but apparently not much more dangerous
than the gout--which, the patient has survived
it for seventy years more, 10 notlikey, perhaps,
to retult in immediate dissolution; especially as
the inhabitants Of the Island, in spite of this pro-
trscted and reiterated ruin Of the sugar planters,
are vastly better of in every respecs-socially,
politically, Intellectually religiousy, physically
and m6fslly-thsn at any former period.