Footnote A: We learn from the Jamaica papers, since our return to this
country, that Mr. Hill has been elected a member of the Assembly.]

Having said thus much respecting the political advancement of the
colored people, it is proper to remark, that they have by no means
evinced a determination to claim more than their share of office and
influence. On the contrary, they stop very far short of what they are
entitled to. Having an extent of suffrage but little less than the
whites, they might fill one third of the seats in the Assembly, whereas
they now return but four members out of forty-five. The same may be said
of other offices, particularly those in the city of Kingston, and the
larger towns, where they are equal to, or more numerous, than the
whites. It is a fact, that a portion of the colored people continue at
this time to return white members to the Assembly, and to vote for white
aldermen and other city officers. The influential men among them, have
always urged them to take up white men, unless they could find
_competent_ men of their own color. As they remarked to us, if they were
obliged to send an _ass_ to the Assembly, it was far better for _them_
to send a _white_ ass than a _black_ one.

In company with a friend, we visited the principal streets and places of
business in Kingston, for the purpose of seeing for ourselves the
general employments of the people of color; and those who engage in the
lowest offices, such as porters, watermen, draymen, and servants of all
grades, from him who flaunts in livery, to him who polishes shoes, are
of course from this class. So with the fruiterers, fishmongers, and the
almost innumerable tribe of petty hucksters which swarm throughout the
city, and is collected in a dense mass in its suburbs. The market, which
is the largest and best in the West Indies, is almost entirely supplied
and attended by colored persons, mostly females. The great body of
artisans is composed mostly of colored persons.

There are two large furniture and cabinet manufactories in Kingston, one
owned by two colored men, and the other by a white man. The operatives,
of which one contains eighty, and the other nearly as many, are all
black and colored. A large number of them are what the British law terms
_apprentices_, and are still bound in unremunerated servitude, though
some of them for thrice seven years have been adepts in their trades,
and not a few are earning their masters twenty or thir