his Excellency now circumstantially represents what have been the
most common causes of complaint among the apprentices, and why the
island is subject to the reproach that the negroes, in some
respects, are now in a worse condition than they were in slavery."
]

We heard frequent complaints in Jamaica respecting the falling off of
the crops since abolition. In order that the reader may know the extent
of the failure in the aggregate island crops, we have inserted in the
appendix a table showing the "exports for fifty-three years, ending 31st
December, 1836, condensed from the journals of the House."

By the disaffected planters, the diminished crops were hailed as "an
evident token of perdition." They had foretold that abolition would be
the ruin of cultivation, they had maintained that sugar, coffee, rum,
&c., could not be produced extensively without the _whip of slavery_,
and now they exultingly point to the short crops and say, "See the
results of abolition!" We say exultingly, for a portion of the planters
do really seem to rejoice in any indication of ruin. Having staked their
reputation as prophets against their credit as colonists and their
interests as men, they seem happy in the establishment of the former,
even though it be by the sacrifice of the latter. Said an intelligent
gentleman in St. Thomas in the East, "The planters have _set their
hearts upon_ ruin, and they will be sorely disappointed if it should
not come."

Hearing so much said concerning the diminution of the crops, we spared
no pains to ascertain the _true causes_. We satisfied ourselves that the
causes were mainly two.

First. The prevailing impression that the negroes would not _work well_
after the abolition of slavery, led many planters to throw a part of
their land out of cultivation, in 1834. This is a fact which was
published by Lord Sligo, in an official account which he gave shortly
before leaving Jamaica, of the working of the apprenticeship. The
overseer of Belvidere estate declared that he knew of many cases in
which part of the land usually planted in canes was thrown up, owing to
the general expectation that _much less work_ would be done after
abolition. He also mentioned one attorney _who ordered all the estates
under his charge to be thrown out of cultivation_ in 1834, so confident
was he that the negroes would not work. The name of this attorney was
White. Mr. Gordon, of Williamsfield, stated, that the qu