This passage attracted much attention in the colonies. The Court of Policy in Demerara, in stating, at a subsequent period, that it could not enact compulsory manumission, since “It had not the right to invade the property of its fellow-colonists, by admitting that they can in any manner be deprived of it contrary to the laws by which it is secured to them,” remarked—“This principle is laid down in Earl Bathurst’s letter of the 9th July, 1823, wherein _the consent of the master_ is distinctly coupled with the application to be made by or on the behalf of a slave for freedom.” This reply of the court of policy of Demerara is copied into a pamphlet, entitled, “The West India Question practically considered,” with which performance the Colonial Department may possibly be acquainted. It has the important words, “consent of the master,” printed as above in italics, as if to remind the government more forcibly of its own previous statement. After this exposition, may we not venture to ask, who most deserves the reprobation of disinterested members of the legislature? The ministerial advocate, who asserts that compulsory manumission was avowed from the outset, or the West Indian who can produce Lord Bathurst’s own words to prove the contrary? It must have been between July, 1823, and March, 1824, that the innovation was devised. But even at the latter period its bearings were not developed. Few members of the House of Commons can have forgotten Mr. Canning’s luminous oration on this occasion, when he described the evil consequences of precipitation, and the difficulties which opposed themselves to the termination of a state like that of slavery. It is not a little singular, that the same passage which the apologist of the Colonial office quotes from this speech as proving that emancipation was then contemplated, may, with far more effect, be turned against him. Adverting to the other measures of amelioration, Mr. Canning, on the 16th March, 1824, observed: “By this process, and by these degrees, may the slave be gradually fitted for the last grand consummation of benefit, the power of acquiring his freedom.” The term here used, FITTED FOR, is in strict consonance with the word PREPARE, employed by Mr. Canning in the outset; and though he now, for the first time, notices Compulsory Manumission, he passes it over in a very cursory manner, either as if anxious to avoid discussion, or desirous of concealing its importance. An ordinary observer, on reading the more recent despatches sent out to the colonies, in which the views of government were stated, would imagine that, in place of the guarded expressions originally used, terms impelling to quicker and more extensive proceedings had since been substituted.