not in the least like the effeminate and luxurious Creoles who
figure in the English imagination, broke a four-post bedstead down
among them with hideous roar and ruin; and had to be picked up and
called to order by their elders. Next, the wind, which ranged
freely through the open roof, blew my bedclothes off. Then the dogs
exploded outside, probably at some henroost-robbing opossum, and had
a chevy through the cocos till they tree'd their game, and bayed it
to their hearts' content. Then something else exploded--and I do
not deny it set me more aghast than I had been for many a day--
exploded, I say, under the window, with a shriek of Hut-hut-tut-tut,
hut-tut, such as I hope never to hear again. After which, dead
silence; save of the surf to the east and the toads to the west. I
fell asleep, wondering what animal could own so detestable a voice;
and in half an hour was awoke again by another explosion; after
which, happily, the thing, I suppose, went its wicked way, for I
heard it no more.

I found out the next morning that the obnoxious bird was not an owl,
but a large goat-sucker, a Nycteribius, I believe, who goes by the
name of jumby-bird among the English Negroes: and no wonder; for
most ghostly and horrible is his cry. But worse: he has but one
eye, and a glance from that glaring eye, as from the basilisk of
old, is certain death: and worse still, he can turn off its light
as a policeman does his lantern, and become instantly invisible:
opinions which, if verified by experiment, are not always found to
be in accordance with facts. But that is no reason why they should
not be believed.

In St. Vincent, for instance, the Negroes one evening rushed
shrieking out of a boiling-house, 'Oh! Massa Robert, we all killed.
Dar one great jumby-bird come in a hole a-top a roof. Oh! Massa
Robert, you no go in; you killed, we killed,' etc. etc. Massa
Robert went in, and could see no bird. 'Ah, Massa Robert, him darky
him eye, but him see you all da same. You killed, we killed,' etc.
Da capo.

Massa Robert was not killed: but lives still, to the great benefit
of his fellow-creatures, Negroes especially. Nevertheless, the
Negroes held to their opinion. He might, could, would, or should
have been killed; and was not that clear proof that they were right?

After this, who can deny that the Negro is a man and a brother,
possessing the same reasoning faculties, and exercis