erial
prosperity and comfort of living.

The truth is (he wrote) that our labourers are for the most part in
the position of persons who live habitually within their incomes. They
are generally sober and frugal, and accustomed to a low standard of
living. Their gardens supply them in great measure with the
necessaries of life. The chief part, therefore, of what they receive
in money, whether as wages or as the price of the surplus produce of
their provision grounds, they can lay aside for occasional calls, and,
when they set their minds on an acquisition or an indulgence, they do
not stickle at the cost. I am told that, in the shops at Kingston,
expensive articles of dress are not unusually purchased by members of
the families of black labourers. Whether the ladies are good judges of
the merits of silks and cambrics I do not pretend to decide; but they
pay ready money, and it is not for the sellers to cavil at their
discrimination. The purchase of land, as you well know, is going on
rapidly throughout the island; and the money thus invested must have
been chiefly, though not entirely, accumulated by the labouring
classes since slavery was abolished. A proprietor told me the other
day that he had, within twelve months, sold ten acres of land in small
lots, for the sum of 900_l_. The land sold at so high a price is
situated near a town, and the purchasers pay him an annual rent of
50_s_. per acre, for provision grounds on the more distant parts
of the estate. Again, in most districts, the labourers are possessed
of horses, for which they often pay handsomely. A farm servant not
unfrequently gives from 12_l_. to 20_l_. for an animal which
he intends to employ, not for purposes of profit, but in riding to
church, or on occasions of festivity.

Whence then are these funds derived? That the peasantry are generally
frugal and sober I have already observed. But they are assuredly not
called to tax their physical powers unduly, in order to achieve the
independence I have described. Although the estate I lately visited is
well managed, and the best understanding subsists between employer and
labourers, the latter seldom made their appearance in the field until
some time after I had sallied forth for my morning walk. They work on
the estate only nine days in the fortnight, devoting the alternate