of sugar, and forty-two to other productions of less
importance. There were exactly the same number at St. Thomas, and
they had the same destination, but were much more considerable.
Of three hundred and forty-five plantations, which were seen at
Santa Cruz, one hundred and fifty were covered with sugarcanes.
In the two former islands, the plantations acquire what degree of
extent it is in the power of the planter to give them, but in the
last, every habitation is limited to three thousand Danish feet
in length, and two thousand in breadth.

St. John is inhabited by one hundred and ten white men, and by
two thousand three hundred and twenty-four slaves: St. Thomas, by
three hundred and thirty-six white men, and by four thousand two
hundred and ninety-six slaves: Santa Cruz, by two thousand one
hundred and thirty-six white men, and by twenty-two thousand two
hundred and forty-four slaves. There are no freed men at St.
John's, and only fifty-two at St. Thomas, and one hundred and
fifty-five at Santa Cruz; and yet the formalities required for
granting liberty are nothing more than a simple enrolment in a
court of justice. If so great a facility hath not multiplied
these acts of benevolence, it is because they have been forbidden
to those who had contracted debts. It hath been apprehended, that
the debtors might be tempted to be generous at the expence of
their creditors.

This law appears to me a very prudent one; with some mitigation
it might be of service, even in our countries. I should very much
approve, that all citizens invested with honourable functions,
either at court, in the army, in the church, or in the
magistracy, should be suspended whenever they should be legally
sued by a creditor, and that they should be unremittingly
deprived of their rank whenever they should be declared insolvent
by the tribunals. It appears to me that money would then be lent
with more confidence, and borrowed with greater circumspection.
Another advantage which would accrue from such a regulation,
would be, that the subaltern orders of men, who imitate the
customs and the prejudices of the higher class of citizens, would
soon be apprehensive of incurring the same disgrace; and that
fidelity in engagements would become one of the characteristic of
the