result of it was _highly satisfactory to himself_.
In the year 1788, when only the first and second part of it had been
reduced to practice, he spoke of it thus:--"A plantation," says he, "of
between seven and eight hundred acres has been governed by fixed laws
and a Negro-court _for about five years with great success_. In this
plantation no overseer or white servant is allowed to lift his hand
against a Negro, nor can he arbitrarily order a punishment. Fixed laws
and a court or jury of their peers _keep all in order_ without the ill
effect of sudden and intemperate passions." And in the year 1790, about
a year after the last part of his plan had been put to trial, he says in
a letter to Dr. Dickson, "My copyholders have succeeded beyond my
expectation." This was his last letter to that gentleman, for he died in
the beginning of the next year. Mr. Steele went over to Barbadoes, as I
have said before, in the year 1780, and he was then in the eightieth
year of his age. He began his humane and glorious work in 1783, and he
finished it in 1789. It took him, therefore, six years to bring his
Negroes to the state of vassalage described, or to that state from
whence he was sure that they might be transferred without danger in no
distant time, to the rank of freemen, if it should be thought desirable.
He lived one year afterwards to witness the success of his labours. He
had accomplished, therefore, all he wished, and he died in the year
1791, in the ninety-first year of his age.

It may be proper now, and indeed useful to the cause which I advocate,
to stop for a moment, just to observe the similarity of sentiment of two
great men, quite unknown to each other; one of whom (Mr. Steele) was
concerned in preparing Negro-slaves for freedom, and the other
(Toussaint) in devising the best mode of managing them after they had
been suddenly made free.

It appears, first, that they were both agreed in this point, viz. that
the _first step_ to be taken in either case, was _the total abolition of
arbitrary punishment_.

It appears, secondly, that they were nevertheless both agreed again as
to the necessity of punishing delinquents, but that they adopted
different ways of bringing them to justice. Toussaint referred them to
_magistrates_, but Mr. Steele _to a Negro-court_. I should prefer the
latter expedient; first, because a Negro-court may be always at hand,
whereas magistrates may live at a distance from the plantations, and not