might be cultivated advantageously." But the free negro will not work. With a hook and line he can in half an hour provide sustenance for himself and family for the day, and with this he is content. No stimulus will arouse him. He will undertake no employment but at an exorbitant rate of wages, and even then he is careless about finishing what he commences.

Considerable quantities of land are covered with pine of a superior quality. Where these abound the soil is sandy and not so productive; it would, however, be well adapted to the cultivation of the coffee plant.

The neighbouring woods are rich in objects of natural history, and it is much to be regretted that a field which promises so much should so long have remained untrodden.

Belize, like many other settlements similarly situated, abounds with insects, which by their number and venomous properties, become a complete pest. Swarms, or rather myriads of ants, darken every household utensil, and leave no corner of any dwelling free from their intrusions hundreds of cockroaches (the Blatta Americana) appear in the evening, in almost every apartment; the very chambers of the houses are not free from the unwelcome visits of lizards, centipedes, and scorpions, to say nothing of the mosquito, or of that most fruitful of all the insect tribe, the

nigus. This last diminutive little worm exercises its malignant powers chiefly upon the black population, who are always without shoes or stockings; it enters the foot between the cutis and the cuticle, where it breeds with the greatest rapidity. The only remedy is to pick them out with a needle, and pour oil into the wound.

The climate is, on the whole, more favourable than that of the West India islands. The average heat is from 82° to 85° Fahrenheit, in the shade.

Europeans chiefly suffer from remitting and intermittent fevers, caused probably by the numerous swamps which surround the settlement. The ravages of small pox are not great, as vaccination is now universally practised. In the year 1826, great numbers of children were carried off by the measles, but this disease has not since that time made its appearance. Hooping cough prevails much among the younger part of the community, and dysentery and rheumatism are not unfrequent among the full grown negroes; yet, on the whole, they may be esteemed healthy, and sometimes attain to a great age. The strong sea breeze, which blows freely nine months in the year, contributes mainly to the health of the inhabitants.

Still the heat is by far too great to make any part of this province desirable as a place for emigration; and had the memorable cacique of Poyais, M'Gregor, had any intention of colonizing,

which there is little reason to believe,) it is very problematical how far he could have succeeded. The miserable condition of the unhappy wretches who were deluded by his golden promises, is but too well known, and it is but justice to say, that they received, in the hour of their distress, every kindness from the settlers in Belize.* *

* The Poyais territory, where this adventurer talked of establishing his deluded followers, is not literally in the province of Honduras, but consists of unappropriated territory on the banks of the Rio Tinto, or Black River, which discharges itself into the Atlantic, near Cape Camaron. Since the failure of this expedition, it has been included in the tract of country claimed by the Columbians.

CHAPTER III.

Black Population,—Character,—Amusements, —Morals,—State of Religion,—Inhabitants of the Mosquito Shore,—Coronation of their King, Customs, &c.

That slavery must necessarily have a lowering and degrading influence on the character of the slave is self-evident: but it is requisite to live among such, in order to know and feel the extent of the degradation. The moral effects of this evil, not the growth of a day or a year, but of ages, are so deep, as at first sight, almost to seem indelible. In proportion as the avarice of man has tightened the chain around his victim, has its degrading and depressing influence infused itself into his principles and habits, withered all his energies, and impeded the growth of every thing noble and elevated in his character.

If any thing could lessen our sympathy in the unhappy fate of the negro, it would be to view his debasing character, apart from the causes which have induced it. Indolent and unprincipled, he will never work, excepting when under the eye of a

superior. Fawning in the extreme, when in dream of punishment, he is tyrannical and overbearing if clothed for a moment in temporary power. His only wisdom is a species of low cunning. His only virtues belong to the brute creation,—an instinctive love of his offspring, and a species of attachment to the tyrant who rules him.

Nor is the freed African one degree raised in the scale of being. Under fewer restraints, his vices display themselves more disgustingly. Insolent and proud, indolent and a liar, he imitates only the sins of his superiors, and to the catalogue of his former crimes adds drunkenness and theft.

Such is the poor child of Africa, after centuries of subjection to the enlightened sons of Europe. The thought of what he might have been, had the same efforts been used to improve, which have been exercised to degrade, makes one shudder at the awful responsibility of those who have made him what he is.

The favourite amusement of the negroes here, as in other parts of the West Indies, is dancing. It surprises an European to observe the regularity with which these nightly entertainments are conducted; the graceful step of the dancers to the sound of the gumby, the expensive refreshments provided, and the air of display that pervades the whole performance. The same passion manifests itself at their funerals, which are conducted in as