a sheep---several dishes of beef, or mutton--a turkey--a large ham-guinea fowls--and a pigeon pie; with various kinds of puddings; a profusion of vegetables; and multitudes of sweets. I was lately one of a small party, where precisely this dinner was served, and where the half of a sheep, kicking its legs almost in the face of the master of the house, adorned the bottom of the table---forming the most unseemly dish I ever beheld.

The too prevalent English custom of sending away the ladies, or, according to the politer term, of the ladies retiring after dinner, for the gentlemen to enjoy their bottle, prevails also at Barbadoes; and, we have thought, even to a greater extreme than in England. They leave us very soon after dinner, and often we see no more of them during the evening. Frequently they do not even join us before dinner; but we find them all assembled, at the head of the table, when we enter the dining room; and even there we have little of their company, for the party is often so badly arranged, that we have scarcely more of the society of the ladies, and the people of the island, than if we had remained on board ship. Instead of the different persons being intermixed, it is common to see the ladies grouped together in a crowd at the upper end of the table--the officers and strangers, just arrived from Europe, placed at one side, and the gentlemen of the island, who are mutual and familiar acquaintances, at the other side-implying that it is considered a rule of politeness to place each person nearest to those with whom he is best acquainted.

'The attendants at the dinner table are very numerous. In addition to those of the family, almost every gentleman has his own slave; and, thus, it often happens that the room is quite crowded with sable domestics, whose surfaces emit an odour not less savoury than the richest dishes of the board. How long it may be before our olfactories become reconciled to this high-seasoning of a West India feast I cannot conjecture; but, at present, we find it extremely offensive. Poor Master is particularly annoyed by it, and always takes care to obtain a seat as much to windward as possible. Cleghorn and myself suffer no less from a most filthy custom of the negroes VOL. I. 30

--of taking a plate from the side-board, before it is wanted, and standing with it under the arm, ready to give it at the moment a change is required. On account of this dirty habit, we are obliged to attend with eagle watchfulness to avoid receiving as a clean one, a plate which a slave has been holding for some time closely pressed to, certainly, not the sweetest part of his naked skin.

In point of clothing the people of Barbadoes deviate less from the habits of England than the difference of climate would seem to warrant. Their dress resembles that worn in our more northern latitude, being for the most part a cloth coat, with white cotton waistcoat, and nankeen pantaloons. In some instances people of very active employment, or those who are much exposed in the fields, have the whole suit made of nankeen. Their night clothing seems more appropriate to the greater heat of climate than the apparel of the day. It is common to sleep on a hard mattress in a long cotton shirt, without any other covering, except in the coolest season, when they make the slight addition of a simple cotton sheet.

One of the most prominent characteristics of the island is the tedious langour in which the people of Barbadoes pronounce their words. Nothing perhaps is more annoying to strangers. To convey to you, by the pen, any idea of their manner of speaking is utterly impossible:--to be comprehended, it must be heard. The languid syllables are drawled out as if it were a great fatigue to utter them; and the tortured ear of an European grows irritable and impatient in waiting for the end of a word, or sentence. "How you do to da-ay," spoken by a Barbadian creole, consumes nearly as much time as might suffice for all the compliments of the morning! nor is this wearisome pronunciation confined to the people of colour only. It occurs likewise among the whites, particularly those who have not visited Europe, or resided for some time away from the island. In the same lengthened accent do the lower orders of Barbadians, in unrestrained impetuous rage, pour forth vollies of uncommonly dreadful oaths, which, in their horrible combinations and epithets, form imprecations so strongly impious, as to entitle them to the merit of peculiarity.

In manner also and in movement, as well as in speech, a degree of indolence and inaction prevails, beyond what might be expected, merely from heat of climate, and which has in it a something extremely annoying to Europeans,

Very much to the discredit of Barbadoes numbers of old, diseased, decrepit negroes, at once objects of compassion and of horror, are seen lying at the corners, or begging about the streets. This, like the toleration of the swarms of mendicants in England, is an evil, and a nuisance, for which there is no excuse. If these poor unfortunate negroes are free, they should be relieved by a general tax upon the island: if slaves, the law should compel every master to provide for his own.

The first specimen we saw of West India negroes--the first example of slaves was singularly calculated to impress us with sentiments of compassion and disgust. It occurred at the very moment too when the impression would be most powerful, and consequently ever remain indelible. Immediately on our coming to anchor in Carlisle bay, a woman appeared alongside the ship in a small boat with some bad fruit, tobacco, salt fish, and other articles of traffic. She was rowed by two negroes, who we learned were her slaves. Two such objects of human form and human misery had never before met our eyes! They were feeble, miserable, and dejected-half-starved, and halfnaked; and, in figure, too accurately resembling hungry and distempered grey-hounds! They crouched upon their heels and haunches in the boat-the naked bones almost pierced their filthy and eruptive skins---their wasted frames trembled with debility--and while their hollow eyes and famished countenances rendered them ghastly images of horror, their whole appearance shocked humanity, and appalled the sight !--------Are these, we exclaimed, what are called slaves? Is this the state to which human beings are reduced in bondage?---Afflicting and cruel indeed! Well may slavery be deemed a curse! Can it be possible that these spectres once were men! Are such the objects we are to sec--are these the wretched and deplorable, beings who are to appear every day, and every hour before our eyes! Forbid it humanity: forbid it heaven !----Such was the catastrophe of the moment, and I feel a sincere

gratification in being able to inform you, that the melancholy subjects of this first impression were not correct specimens of the general mass of slaves.

'But it is easy to distinguish the slaves of the opulent and respectable inhabitants from those of the poor and needy people of the town. The latter, being in poverty themselves, can only give to their negroes a scanty allowance of food, while their indigence induces them to exact an over-proportion of labour. Hence the slaves of this class of people appear too often with sharp bones and hungry flavid countenances, having eruptions about the body, and their skins of an unhealthy obfuscate hue. Their general appearance is indeed dirty and unwholesome, and strikingly marks their dejected state. Want and wretchedness are deeply stamped in every line of their persons ---and they may not unaptly be said to resemble the worn-out horse, or the starved and jaded ass, too often seen trembling under a heavy burden---or reeling in an old tattered cart upon the roads of England.

arm.

It is not the practice to load the slaves with superfluity of clothing.---A shirt, and a pair of breeches, or only the latter for the men; and a single petticoat for the women, constitute the whole apparel.----Bedding and bed-clothes find no place in their list of necessaries: they usually sleep on a hard plank, in the clothing of the day. Repose is both ensured and sweetened to them by labour---and the head needs no pillow but the Some who, by means of industry and economy, are more advanced in their little comforts, procure a kind of matting, a paillasse of plaintain leaves, or some other species of bedding, to defend them from the rough plank; but this is an indulgence self-attained, not a necessary provided by the master. The architecture of their little huts is as rude as it is simple. A roof of plantain leaves, with a few rough boards, nailed to the coarse pillars which support it, forms the whole building. The leeward-side is commonly left in part open, and the roof projects for some distance over the door-way, forming a defence against both the sun and the rain.

"Notwithstanding the great heat experienced by Europeans, the negroes feel the evenings chilly, and we frequently see

'them crowding round the bit of fire which they make for cooking their supper. This is commonly in the open air near to the door of the hut; but they sometimes place it upon the middle of the dirty floor withinside the building--where they seem to have great enjoyment in squatting round it, amidst the thick cloud of smoke, to whiff additional fumes from the short pipe or segar, and to join in loud and merry song.

The food of the negroes is issued to them weekly, under the inspection of the manager. It is very simple and but little varied; breakfast, dinner, and supper being similar to each other, and for the most part the same throughout the year. It consists mostly of Guinea corn, with a small bit of salt meat --or salt fish. Formerly a bunch of plantains was given to each slave as the weekly allowance; but the plantain walks being mostly worn out, this is become an expensive provision. Rice, maize, yams, eddoes, and sweet potatoes, form an occasional change, but the Guinea corn is commonly issued as the weekly supply; and in order to have some variety of food, they barter this in exchange for other provisions, or sell it for money, and with that buy salt meat or vegetables. We occasionally see them offering the Guinea corn for sale; and on being asked why they sell it, they thus express themselves---"Me no like for have him Guinea corn always! Massa gib me Guinea corn too much-Guinea corn to day--Guinea corn to-morrow-Guinea corn eb'ry day--Me no like him Guinea corn-him Guinea corn no good for gnhyaam."

The weekly supply being issued to them on the Sunday, it becomes their own care how to husband it so as to have a sufficiency of food until the following Sabbath. Those who are industrious have little additions of their own, either from vegetables grown on the spot of ground allotted to them, or purchased with the money obtained for the pig, the goat, or other stock raised about their huts in the negro yard.

The common round of labour of the slaves is from sun-rise to sun-set, having intervals of rest allowed them, at the times of breakfast and dinner.

The negroes are generally sad thieves; they appear to know no sense of honesty. Ignorant of all moral principle,