The truth is, however, that, owing to the crowded population of Barbadoes, the planters have had everything in their own hands, much more than in other islands. In Trinidad or British Guiana the negroes were not obliged by competition to submit to the obnoxious tenure; and they soon found, where land was so cheap, that a path to independence lay open before them in working their own little properties. The planters became more stubborn and more rigid, and the result was in many cases the absolute abandonment of large estates for want of labor. The industry of the Barbadoes population is shown in the fact, that, out of the 106,000 acres of the island, 100,000 are under cultivation,[A] while the average price of land rises to the unprecedented height of five hundred dollars an acre. [Footnote A: Schomburg.] Notwithstanding the high price of land and the low rate of wages, the freed slaves have increased the number of small proprietors with less than five acres from 1100 to 3537[B] during the last fifteen years,--an increase which alone testifies to the remarkable thrift of the emancipated negro in Barbadoes. [Footnote B: Governor Hincks.] Mr. Sewell has talked with all classes and conditions, and "none are more ready to admit than the planters that the free laborer is a better, more cheerful, and industrious workman than was ever the slave." "The colored mechanics and artisans of Barbadoes," says the same author, "are equal in general intelligence to the artisans and mechanics of any part of the world equally remote from the great centres of civilization. The peasantry will soon equal them, when education is more generally diffused." The surest evidences, however, on this question are those of figures. Land has doubled in value on the island since emancipation.[C] Of the increased value of estates, we quote, as an example, the case mentioned in a published letter of Governor Hincks, January, 1858:--