1830.

IN ITS MILDEST FORM.

253

then, in the four Crown Colonies that slavery existed in its mildest form; and yet, upon the oath of the planters themselves, there were registered in these four colonies, in the two years 1828-9, 68,921 punishments, of which 25,094 were registered as inflicted females.* upon

*

Now, as the law allowed twenty-five stripes to one punishment, which limit was frequently passed†, we cannot (taking it at twenty stripes to a punishment) estimate the total amount of stripes inflicted during 1828-9 in those four colonies at less than one million three hundred and fifty thousand.

* See Protector's Reports. Parliamentary Papers.
† Ibid.

OF MINISTRY.

CHAPTER XVII.

SLAVERY.

1831.

RELIGIOUS MEDITATIONS. THE DUKE'S DECLARATION. —CHANGE THE WHIG GOVERNMENT DOES NOT TAKE UP THE SUBJECT OF SLAVERY. ·QUAKERS' PETITION. — DECREASE OF THE SLAVE POPULATION. -DEBATE. THE GOVERNMENT STILL TRIES TO LEAD THE COLONISTS TO ADOPT MITIGATING PARLIAMENT DISSOLVED.

MEASURES.

LETTER FROM

BELLPARTY AT THE

FIELD. LETTER TO A SON AT COLLEGE.
BREWERY. ANECDOTES. -REFLECTIONS ON SHOOTING.-DEATH
OF MR. NORTH. CORRESPONDENCE.

THE day before the commencement of the session of 1831, Mr. Buxton thus implores help and guidance from on high:

-

"January 30. 1831.

"Give me, O Lord, thy help, thy present, and evident, and all-sufficient help in pleading the cause of the slave. Let the light of thy countenance shine upon me. Give me wisdom to select the proper course, and courage to pursue it, and ability to perform my part; and turn the hearts of the powerful, so that they may be prone to feel for, and prompt to help those, whose bodies and whose souls are in slavery. If ye ask any thing in my name,' said our Saviour, 'I will do it.' In His prevailing name, and for His merits, do this, O Lord God! * * * But whatever may be thy will in my secular concerns, give me patience, faith, thankfulness, confidence; a sense of thy Divine Majesty, of the benignity of Christ, a love for thy scriptures, a love of prayer, and a heart firmly fixed on immortality. May I remember that, ere the year closes, I may be snatched away and hurried before thy judgment-seat! Be with me, then,

1831.

APATHY OF THE GOVERNMENT.

255

in health and in sickness, in life and in death, in events prosperous and adverse, in my intercourse with my family, in my public duties, in my study. Be Thou my strong habitation to which I may continually resort. Be with me and mine every day and every hour during this year."

The recent political changes augured well for the cause of Emancipation. The Duke of Wellington's celebrated declaration against Reform had broken up his ministry. That of Earl Grey had succeeded, in which the post of Lord Chancellor was filled by Lord Brougham.

Yet Dr. Lushington writes,

"For the sake of all the great interests of humanity, I trust that you may now resume your public duties. I am of opinion that this is a fearful crisis for many of the great objects you have at heart. Without great exertion both slavery and Capital Punishment will be almost unaltered. I have but little confidence in the merely voluntary good-will of the new government, and feel strongly the necessity that they should be taught that the voice of the people will not admit of dilatory or half measures.”

With the Reform question on their hands, there seemed but little chance that the Whig Government, however friendly to emancipation, would undertake its accomplishment. But Mr. Buxton would leave no chance untried. On the 25th of March, in stating his intention to move a resolution for the complete abolition of slavery, he declared that he would "most readily leave the matter in the hands of Government, if Government would take it up; "but to this offer no reply was made.

It is to this subject that the following letter alludes, addressed to a member of the Administration :

"April 6. 1831.

"I feel bound to tell you that upon the most attentive consideration I shall feel compelled to withhold my concurrence from any resolutions which do not declare the extinction of slavery' to be their object. I am aware that I do not go farther in detestation of slavery than his Majesty's Government; but perhaps a long and laborious investigation may have led me to entertain a deeper sense of the practical evils of the system. In my mind, these amount to nothing short of a crime; and, if it be a crime, the way to deal with it, is, not to strip it of some of its worst features, but to abandon it altogether.

"I confess I distrust all ameliorations of slavery. If the Government resolve to undertake them, theirs will be the responsibility; and if they succeed, theirs exclusively the merit.

"I believe their intentions to be perfectly honest, and that they will act resolutely in carrying those intentions into execution. For these and for other reasons, it gives me the greatest pain to be unable to yield my opinions to theirs. I am sure if I act thus, it is not from obstinacy, or from unwillingness to meet their wishes; but it is from fidelity to the cause itself, and to the friends of the cause, to whom I am pledged to bring forward a motion, not for the mitigation, but for the extinction, of slavery."

A few days later, in presenting, among 500 petitions against slavery, one subscribed by the Society of Friends, he said:

"I have great pleasure in presenting this petition from that body; as they were the very first persons in the country, who promulgated the doctrine that the buying, selling, or holding of slaves was contrary to the Christian religion. Forty years ago they presented the first petition

1831.

DECREASE OF POPULATION.

257

for the abolition of the Slave Trade, and eight years ago they presented the first petition for the abolition of slavery."

It was a part of Mr. Buxton's policy to avail himself as little as possible of the evidence furnished by men favourable to emancipation; he always strove to draw his statements from the speeches and writings of his opponents, or immediately from official reports. In this branch of his labours (and it was no small one) he derived much assistance from the great knowledge and practised sagacity of Mr. Macaulay, and also from the secretary of the Anti-slavery Society, Mr. Thomas Pringle, whose poetical writings are well known. Mr. Pringle's originality, conjoined with other qualities, as useful if less brilliant; his admirable English style; his diligence, tact, and temper, rendered good service to the cause. Being ready to catch a hint from any quarter, they frequently tracked documents of great value into the Colonial Office, and then by reiterated motions Mr. Buxton usually succeeded in bringing them to light.

In this way vast funds of information had been collected; and between the sessions of 1830-31, Mr. Buxton ransacked all his stores for evidence relative to the decrease of the slave population. Having completed his calculations, he laid them before the House on the 15th of April.

In the commencement of his speech, he assured the

George Fox (the founder of Quakerism), when in Barbadoes, urged the overseers" to deal mildly and gently with the Negroes, and not to use cruelty towards them, as the manner of some has been and is."(See "A popular Life of George Fox." C. Gilpin, 1847.)