The weekly Anglo-African. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1859-1861, 1860-05-12
From the Atlantic Monthly, for May
THE MAR0ONS OF SURINAM.
IConcluded.l
BY 7. W. HIGGIEsoN.

lConciuded.]
Of course, they repaid these atrocities in
kind If they had not, it would have de-
monstrated the absurd paradox, that slav-
cry educate higher virtues than freedom.
1t bewilders all the relations of human re-
sponsibility, if we expect the Instruction
airy slave to commit no outrage; if slavery
have not depraved him, it has done him
little harm. If be the normal tendency
of bondage to produce saints like Uncle
Tom, let us all offer ourselves at auction
Immediately. 1t is Classy and bred who
are the normal protest of human nature
against systems which degrade it. Ac-
cordingly, these poor, ignorant Maroons,
who had seen their brothers and sisters
logged, burned, mutilated, hanged on iron
hooks, broken on the wheel, and had been
all the while solemnly assured that this
was paternal government, could only repay
the paternaliSm in the same fashion, when
they had the power. Stedman saw a ne
gro chained to red-hot distilIery-furnace;
he saw disobedient slaves, in repeated in
stances, punished by the amputation of
leg, and sent to boat-service for the rest of
their lives; and of course the rebels Dor
rowed these suggestions. They could
bear to watch their captives expire under
the lash, for they had previously watched
their parents. If governed rangers receiv-
ed twenty-five forms for every rebel right
handed which they brought in, of course
they risked their own right-hands in the
pursuit. The difference was, that the one
brutality was that of a mighty state, and
the other was only the retaliation of the
victims. And after all, Stedman never
ventures to assert that the imitation equall-
ed the original, or that the Maroons had
inflicted SO much as they had suffered
The leaders of the rebels, especially,
were men who had each his own story of
wrongs to tell. Baron, the most formula
BILE, had been the slave of Swedish gen.
tleman, who had taught him to read and
write, taken him to Europe, promised to
manumit him on his return, and then, break
ing his word, sold him to Jew. Baron
refused to work for his new master, was
publicly logged under the gallows, fed
to the woods next day, and became the
terror of the colony. Joli Coeur, his first
captain, was avenging the cruel wrongs of
his mother Bonny, another leader, was
born in the woods, his mother having taken
refuge there just previously, to escape
| from his father, who was also his master.
Colo, another, had defended his master
against the insurgents until he was obliged
by i'll usage to take refuge among them;
and he still bore upon his wrist, when
Stedman saw him, a silver band, with the
inscription-"True to the Europeans"
In dealing with wrongs like these, Mr..
Carlyle would have found the despised ne
groes quite as ready as himself to take the
total-abstinence pledge against rose-water.
In his first two months campaign, Sted-
man never saw the trace of Maroon: in
the second, he once came upon their trail !;
in the third, one captive was brought in,
two surrendered themselves voluntarily,
and large party was found to have cross
ed river within mile of the camp, fer
rying themselves on palm-trunks, according
to their fashion. Deep swamps and scorch-
ing sands-toiling through briers all day,
and sleeping at night in hammocks sus-
pended over stagnant water, with weapons
supported on sticks crossed beneath-all
this was endured for two years and half,
before Stedman personally came in sight
of the enemy.
On August Goth, l775, the troops found
themselves at last in the midst of the rebel
settlements. These villages and forts bore
a variety of expressive names, such as
Slide me, o thou surrounding verdure,
III shall be taken" 1.-THE woods lament for
me" Disturb me, if you dare, "Take a
teasing, if you like it," "Come, try me, il
you be men," "God knows me and none
else" II shall moulder before / shall be
taken" Some were old plantation-grounds
with few huts, and were easily laid
waste, but all were protected more or less