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Show 278 LIBERTY AND SLAVERY. about a third of that of 1780. But such violent regulations could not continue to be enforced amid the succeeding agitations, and under a republica" regime. Almost all traces of laborious culture were soon oblitcmted; large tracts, which had been one entire sugar garden, presented now only a few scattered plantatious."* Thus the lands were divided out among the officers of the army, while the privates were compelled to cultivate the soil under their former military commanders, clothed with more than "a little brief authority." No better could have been expected except by fools or fanatics. Tho blacks might preach equality, it is true, but yet, like tho more enlightened ruffians of Paris, they would of course take good care not to practise what they had preached. lienee, by all the horrors of their bloody revolution, they only effected a change of masters. 'rhe white man had disappeared, and the black man, one of their own race and color, had assumed his place and his authority. And of all masters, it is well known, the naturally servile arc tho most erne!. "Tho earth," says Solo- * Eneycloprodia of Gco., vol. iii. pp. 302, 303. ARGUMENT FROM TilE PUDLIO GOOD. 270 1non, "cannot bear a servant when he reignoth. "* "Tho sensual Md the dnrk rebel in vain: Slaves by their own compulsion, in mad game 'l'hcy burst their ma.na.clcs, to wear tho name Of }'recdom, graven on o. heavier chain. 11 COLERIDOE. Thns "the world of good" they sought was found, most literally, in "the word;" for the word, the name of freedom, was all they had achieved-at least of good. Poverty, want, disease, and crime, were the substantial fruits of their boasted freedom. In 1789, the sugar exported was 672,000,000 pounds; in 1806, it was 47,516,531 pounds; in 1825, it was 2020 pounds; in 1832, it was 0 pounds. If history had not spoken, we might have safely inferred, from this astounding decline of industry, that the momls of the people had suffered a fearful deterioration. But we are not loft to inference. We are informed, by the best authorities, t that their "morals arc exceeuingly bad;" and that under the reign of * Prov, n:r.. 22. t Encyc. of Oco., vol. '.ii. p. 303. Mn.ckcnzie's St. Domingo, TOl. ii. pp. 260, 321. |