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should fall into his hands should be treated in a similar manner, and that not even the governor should escape, if the chances of war should favour him with so gratifying a prize.

From the strange association of ideas which the mind is obliged to form in contemplating the extraordinary characters of these adventurers, we feel much difficulty, as intimated before, in developing the causes which could give their actions birth. The general hatred which the cruelties of the Spaniards had excited in Europe, seems to have raised up some of these formidable enemies to revenge the cause of the injured Indians. It was their sufferings that determined Montbar, a gentleman of Languedoc, to engage in the Buccaniering expeditions. He felt himself urged by a powerful impulse to revenge the blood which in imagination he saw recking from the wounds of what he termed murdered innocence. Agitated with these sensations, and impelled to vengeance, he joined himself to the Buccaniers, of whom he had heard some indistinct accounts, and performed prodigies of valour. In his first expedition, he boarded a Spanish ship with almost more than human fury; and having mowed down with his own sabre all who attempted to oppose him, till he had completely cleared the decks, he gave up all the booty to his seamen; and felt for himself the highest gratification, in contemplating the mangled bodies of the dead, and the agonies of the dying.

There is no doubt but many others were impelled by the same motives which actuated Montbar; and it must be confessed, that the instances of revenge which were taken on the Spaniards by these licensed and unlicensed robbers, may be considered as temporal retaliations, by the permission of Providence, for the inhumanities which had been practised by those destroyers of mankind. Thus the calamities which they inflicted upon the Indians, were requited by the Buccaniers; so that "with what measure they meted, it was measured to them again ;" and all the miseries of the Spaniards on this occasion may be considered as nothing more than the price of blood.

The strange adventurers who were collected from every nation, actuated by one common principle, and directing their views to one common object, differing only in subordinate particulars, seem to have been over-ruled by a power superior to their own. The military glory which they acquired was, without doubt, transcendently brilliant; but their adventurous spirits were incapable of a transfer. The age in which they lived and acted saw their exploits; but with their persons their influence vanished away. Their appearance was as astonishing to Europe as their power was invincible: they were the terror of the age in which they lived, and they still continue to be the

admiration of mankind. They form of themselves an important epoch in history; without competitors, and without examples, in the whole empire of enterprise and war; distinguished at once from the rest of mankind, by their mode of warfare, their intrepidity, their promptitude of action, their unparalleled success, and unexampled dissipation. It is difficult to class them with any other denomination either of warriors or robbers: they stand alone; and are best expressed by their own appellation, that of Buccaniers.

CHAP. VII.

HISTORY OF JAMAICA.

Internal government of the island-constitution and laws-supreme courts and administration of justice—calamities to which the island has been exposed-earthquake of 1692-description of that calamity-part of the island ravaged by the French in 1694-desolation occasioned by that incursion the island visited by a succession of hurricanes-symptoms of a hurricane-description of that which happened in 1712-history of the Maroons-origin of that people and their successive depredations-treaty with lord Trelawney-instances of treachery-occasion and particulars of the late war-their final overthrow, and exile from the island to Nova Scotia in 1796-reflections.

THE influx of inhabitants whom the convulsions of England had both allured and driven into this island, tended considerably to increase its population. The planters who had been introduced from Barbadoes, together with those labourers whom both Scotland and Ireland had yielded, had imported habits of industry, and the surface of the island began to wear a more cheerful aspect. The wise regulations which had been introduced into the system of government had just begun their operations, and the inhabitants felt their salutary effects.

The wealth which had been acquired by those Buccaniers who belonged to the English nation, was imported into this island by a train of circumstances which stood connected with the adventurers, and was circulated through the island by those secret avenues which link agriculture to commerce, and commerce to war. The wealth which had found an asylum in Jamaica soon made itself known at home, and drew to this distant market the merchandise and manufacturers of the parent state. Thus that branch of the riches which Spain had gained by barbarous inhumanity, and lost by the ferocious impudence of the Buccaniers, found its way into our own country, without impoverishing the island in which it was first deposited.

Jamaica in the mean while, profiting by the different branches of commerce which occasionally touched her shores, acquired strength by imperceptible degrees. The transacting of business brought with it a facility of action, which coincided with industry, and was not easily repressed. The claims of one common

concern tended to soften the asperity of contending parties, and to melt down their jarring interests. It served to unite in one family compact those who had alternately reproached each other with offences, which were generally exaggerated, but were not altogether unfounded in fact. Such was the state of Jamaica in the early years of the Restoration.

But prosperity is too frequently the first victim of oppression. The enlightened policy which dictated the measures that Charles II. seemed determined to pursue on his accession to the throne, soon became tainted with the prevailing prodigality of the times, and finally forsook his councils. His efforts to enslave his subjects were immediately felt at home, and soon reached to the extremities of the empire. The example of Barbadoes afforded a precedent for his conduct towards Jamaica; and the earl of Carlisle, at once armed with authority and instructions, was deemed a proper instrument to execute his despotic designs. Carlisle reached the island in 1678, and began his career with an attempt to rob the inhabitants of those constitutional rights, which their ancestors had imported from England, and which had been established by the proclamation of lord Windsor. By this proclamation it was declared, "That all the children of our natural-born subjects of England, to be born in Jamaica, shall from their respective births be reputed to be, and shall be, free denizens of England, and shall have the same privileges to all intents and purposes as our free-born subjects of England." In direct violation of these pointed and expressive guarantees, an impost of 4 per cent. on all exported produce of the island. was demanded, to be settled as a perpetual revenue on the crown. The colonists, alarmed at such arbitrary measures, resisted the innovations which were urged upon them, and boldly refused to accept of an oppressive code of laws which Carlisle endeavoured to compel them to adopt without alteration or amendment. In opposing these unconstitutional designs, many among the planters distinguished themselves; but no one rendered himself more conspicuous than Colonel Long, who was at that time a member of the council and chief judge of the island. Carlisle felt the influence of his resistance; and to rid himself for ever of a man who became obnoxious to him in proportion as he was actuated by patriotic virtue, caused him to be arrested and sent a state-prisoner to England. But this act of injustice and violence produced an effect exactly the reverse of what was intended. Colonel Long on his arrival was cited before the king and privy council, to answer for the acts of contumely with which he stood charged. The event proved that he was not to be intimidated. The eloquence which he displayed to support the justice of that cause which he had

espoused, overpowered the subtlety and chicanery of his oppo nents, and finally broke those snares which were laid to entangle the liberties of his country, and to rob him of his life. The council, unable to resist the force of his arguments, reluctantly gave way. The attempt was relinquished. The colonial assembly had their suspended rights restored. Carlisle was recalled. Sir Thomas Lynch, who from 1670 to 1674 had acted as lieutenant-governor, succeeded him in office, and the island reposed in peace.

But though the project was thus apparently relinquished, it was deemed too important to be wholly abandoned. The principle, though partially smothered, was renewed under almost every form it could assume, whenever any favourable crisis flattered it with a prospect of success. The claims of the crown, and the resistance of the colonists, perpetuated a disagreeable contest between them, to which the occasion that we have recited had given birth. From the period we have mentioned to the reign of George II. a revival of the attempt to encroach kept alive resistance, and the effects of this misunderstanding were felt in the legislative department of the island. The laws which had been enacted in the colony, and transmitted to the mother country to obtain the sanction of the sovereign, were either neglected or forgotten; so that, though they afforded a ground for action, their want of permanency placed the colonists in a state of indecision, and forbade them to act with vigour under the guarantee of institutions which were neither ratified nor repealed. At length, in the year 1728, both the crown and the colonists receded from that tenacity which they had exhibited in preceding years, and met together on terms of mutual accommodation. By this compromise it was agreed, that the island at large should pay to the crown the annual fixed revenue of £8000, without having any regard to the quantity of produce either raised or exported. But even this sum was only admitted under certain stipulations. First, they demanded, "That the quit-rents of the whole island, which at that time were estimated at nearly £1500 per annum, should be considered as part of the above sum." Secondly, "That the code of laws which they had framed and sent to England from time to time, some of which had been lying for more than half a century in the state we have described, should immediately receive the royal assent." And finally, "That all such laws and statutes of England as had been at any time esteemed, introduced, used, accepted, or received as laws in the island, should be and continue laws of Jamaica for ever."

The long interregnum which elapsed between the attempt to

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