n a condition to protect themselves
by equal laws, and thus to restrain the tyranny of the whites. The Abbe
Gregoire pleaded for them in the National Assembly; and on the 10th of
March was passed the celebrated decree which gave the mulattoes the
privileges of French citizens, even to the enjoyment of the suffrage,
and to the possession of seats in the parochial and colonial assemblies.
To Europeans there appears nothing extraordinary in the admission to
these civil functions of freeborn persons, many of whom were wealthy,
and many educated; but to the whites of Saint Domingo the decree was
only less tremendous than the rush of the hurricane.

It arrived at Cap Francais on the 30th of June, and the tidings
presently spread. At first, no one believed them but the mulattoes.
When it was no longer possible to doubt--when the words of Robespierre
passed from mouth to mouth, till even the nuns told them to one another
in the convent garden--"Perish the colonies, rather than sacrifice one
iota of our principles!" the whites trampled the national cockade under
their feet in the streets, countermanded their orders for the fete of
the 14th of July (as they now declined taking the civic oath), and
proposed to one another to offer their colony and their allegiance to
England.

They found means, however, to gratify their love of power, and their
class-hatred, by means short of treason. They tried disobedience first,
as the milder method. The governor of the colony, Blanchelande,
promised that when the decree should reach him officially, he would
neglect it, and all applications from any quarter to have it enforced.
This set all straight. Blanchelande was pronounced a sensible and
patriotic man. The gentlemen shook hands warmly with him at every turn;
the ladies made deep and significant curtseys wherever they met him; the
boys taught their little negroes to huzza at the name of Blanchelande;
and the little girls called him a dear creature. In order to lose no
time in showing that they meant to make laws for their own colony out of
their own heads, and no others, the white gentry hastened on the
election of deputies for a new General Colonial Assembly. The deputies
were elected, and met, to the number of a hundred and seventy-six, at
Leogane, in the southern region of the island, so early as the 9th of
August. After exchanging greetings and vows of fidelity to their
class-interests, under the name of patriotism, they adjou