The Royalist party, headed by the Governor, found their influence gradually declining, and, to strengthen their hands against both the Colonial Assembly with its traitorous projects and the violence of the lower part of the white population, are accused of having first thought of enlisting the blacks to further their schemes and to strengthen their party. It is said that they proposed to Toussaint, a slave on the Breda estates, to raise the negroes in revolt in the name of the King. This account I believe to be a pure invention of the coloured historians, and the conduct of the blacks clearly proved that they were not moved by French officers. Whoever was the instigator, it is certain that the negroes in the northern province rose in insurrection, put to death every white that fell into their hands, began to burn the factories, and then rushed _en masse_ to pillage the town of Cap Haïtien. Here, however, their numbers availed them little against the arms and discipline of the French troops, and they were driven back with great slaughter, and many then retired to the mountains. It would naturally be suspected that the coloured people were the instigators of this movement, were it not certain that they were as much opposed to the freedom of the blacks as the most impassioned white planter. The insurgent slaves called themselves “Les Gens du Roi,” declaring that he was their friend, and was persecuted for their sake; they hoisted the white flag, and placed an ignorant negro, Jean François, at their head. The second in command was a Papaloi or priest of the Vaudoux, named Biassou. He encouraged his followers to carry on the rites of their African religion, and when under its wildest influence, he dashed his bands to the attack of their civilised enemies, to meet their death in Hayti, but to rise again free in their beloved Africa. The ferocity of the negro nature had now full swing, and the whites who fell into their hands felt its effects. Prisoners were placed between planks and sawn in two, or were skinned alive and slowly roasted, the girls violated and then murdered. Unhappily some of these blacks had seen their companions thus tortured, though probably in very exceptional cases. Descriptions of these horrors fill pages in every Haytian history, but it is needless to dwell on them. On either side there was but little mercy. The Governor at length collected 3000 white troops, who, after various skirmishes, dispersed these bands with much slaughter; but as this success was not followed up, Jean François and Biassou soon rallied their followers.