I have already spoken of the immorality practised in the West Indies. It is a topic most harrowing to the feelings, and one that a sensitive mind cannot descant upon. What was the origin of that awful state of society? _Slavery!_ Illicit love was not only countenanced, but actually encouraged upon estates between the white masters and their black slaves, in order that the gang of slaves might be enlarged by such unholy means! In these brighter days of freedom there is, at least, not this inducement to licentiousness in its most hideous form, and consequently, that degraded state of morals which marked the annals of former years, has, in great measure, disappeared. Again, slavery occasioned the _planter_ immense trouble and perplexities in managing his slaves; it engendered continual heart-burnings and jealousies; it soured his temper, rendered him callous, deadened those feelings of humanity which the Spirit of Love has implanted in our breasts, and, however kind and benevolent he might be in his domestic circle, a few months spent in managing slaves, and he forgot to exercise his self-control, and gave way to bursts of passions which, in his calmer moments, he perhaps bitterly repented of. Nor was this all: slavery engendered suspicion. There was not a single slave-holder or slave-manager who, one time or the other, was not made the prey to apprehensions, and had his brain filled with thoughts of rebellions and insurrections. Emancipation has entirely banished this hydra-like train of evils, and paved the way for more enlightened and happier times. It has also put an end, in great measure, to pretended illness among the negroes. During slavery, this was a practice universal. No sooner did Monday morning arrive than the manager’s door was thronged with self-elected invalids, and more diseases were then complained of than even Dr. Buchan would have us believe “flesh and blood are heir to.” Some made their appearance with their heads tied up in a bundle of banana-leaves—a negro prognosticator of a severe head-ache; others were suffering from pains in the knees and ankles, and consequently, such parts of their frame were duly enveloped in sundry particles of old cloth or dried snake-skins; while some, again, with woe-begone countenances, expressed “dat dey felt bad all ober dem.” In vain the poor manager protested their pulse was good, the tongues in a healthy state—the negroes only groaned the more, gave a longer detail of their aches and pains, or else, in a very doleful voice, exclaimed—“Massa no b’leive he, (pointing to their tongues and wrists,) he no worth b’leiving, for he no ’peak true!” and so the end of the confab was, that the slaves in question were put upon the sick-list.