[13] This representation, it may be presumed, is fairly applicable to all the West Indian Legislatures: indeed it would be unjust to them to suppose, that they were less politic and provident than the Legislature of Dominica. The charge involved in it, however, is certainly far from being light or trivial, especially as it is made by one who is a thorough master of the subject on which he writes, “having passed many years in the West Indies, and having been resident in most of the Colonies.” P. 34. The charge amounts to this: that the individuals composing the legislatures of the Islands, and who we may suppose to be the most honourable part of the community, have entered into a combination to deceive the British Parliament and the British public; that they have prostituted the solemn legislative functions with which they were invested, to the promotion of this dishonourable purpose; and that, with the pretended view of promoting the protection, security, and comfort of the Negroes, they have framed a set of laws, the real object of which is not to benefit the Negroes, but to prevent the mother-country from interfering to mitigate the cruel oppression under which they groan. The reader must form his own judgment of persons capable of such conduct. [14] If the reader will have the goodness to refer back to p. 19, he will see with what parade this very clause is introduced into the Act. It was framed expressly “_to secure, as far as possible, the good treatment of the Slaves_;” and yet it appears from the first to have been regarded in the island as an absolute nullity. “IT HAS BEEN WHOLLY NEGLECTED.” Not one certificate has been filed in consequence of it, nor has one penalty been enforced for the neglect. How different this from the fate of the eighth clause, denouncing the punishment of death on Negro Slaves guilty of certain crimes! _This clause_, we are told, _has not been allowed to_ SLEEP! Here we have a lively picture of the nature of West Indian legislation. When laws are directed _against_ the Negro Slave, they operate with certainty and permanent effect. When enacted in his favour, they prove dormant from the moment of their birth. [15] The act requires owners, &c. to _exhort_ their Slaves to marry. Mr. AUDAIN says, that their owners do NOT _exhort_ them to it. [16] The Slaves, it is affirmed, will confound abolition with emancipation. But what proof is there of this? Have they done so in Virginia? The Slave trade has been abolished in that state for near thirty years. Has any such misconception, as is now anticipated, taken place among the Virginian Slaves? Certainly not. Experience therefore is against the reasoning of the West Indian body. [17] Suppose a plantation under the management of such a man as Crone, the proprietor being in England; what a sum of misery might be crowded into a short space of time!