Geffrard, like many other coloured men, was much distressed by the crispness of his hair and his dark colour, and having a half-brother very fair, he persisted in assuring us that he had been born nearly white, with straight hair, but that having unfortunately bathed in the streams of Sal Tron during many months, the water, being deeply impregnated with iron, had curled his hair and darkened his skin. In any other man I should have suspected a jest. One of the things which contributed to the unpopularity of the Emperor Soulouque was the waste of the public finances and the extravagance of his court. General Geffrard, who lived in penury before becoming President, promised to reform this; but instead of doing so, he gradually raised his own allowance to £10,000 a year; he also had the sole control of £4000 a year for secret service, and another £4000 a year for the encouragement of the arts and sciences. The grateful country had also presented him with two large estates, the expenses of which were largely borne by the State, whilst the profits were Geffrard’s. As nearly every one of his countrymen would have acted in the same manner if he had had the opportunity, Geffrard’s conduct excited envy rather than blame. Even in the smallest details of the household there was a mean spirit; the expenses of the meat of the family were put down to the _tirailleurs_, whilst some exquisite champagne purchased of a colleague was charged to the hospital. Geffrard was certainly one of the most distinguished of his race, yet he sullied his good name by all these petty meannesses. I once asked a Haytian friend why she and others were always running down Geffrard and his family. She answered, “Because when I knew them intimately, they were as poor as myself, but now Madame Geffrard insults me by calling on me in a carriage. What right has she to a carriage more than I?” Geffrard was personally brave, which quality is not too common among his countrymen, who are rather wanting in martial qualities. He had no idea of true liberty, nor of freedom of discussion. A son of a black Minister wrote a pamphlet in favour of strict protection for the manufactures of Hayti, in order to encourage native industry. A young mulatto replied, demolishing with ease the absurd idea that manufactures could be readily established in a tropical country, which could only be made to prosper by encouraging agriculture. The father was offended by this liberty, and, to soothe his wounded feelings, Geffrard had the young mulatto arrested, put as a common soldier into a regiment, and set to work to carry on his head barrels of powder to a village five miles in the mountains. The argument was unanswerable, and it is no wonder that the pamphleteer became a protectionist, though I believe that subsequently, when he was made a senator, he was inclined to return to his primitive views.