hy middle class is rapidly forming.... If
the real object of emancipation was to place the freedman in such a
position that he might work out his own advancement in the social
scale, and prove his capacity for the full and rational enjoyment
of personal independence, secured by constitutional liberty,
Jamaica will afford more instances, even in proportion to its large
population, of such gratifying results, than any land in which
African slavery once existed.

'Jamaica, at this moment, presents, I believe, at once the
strongest proof of the complete success of the great measure of
emancipation, as relates to the capacity of the emancipated race
for freedom, and the most unfortunate instance of a descent in the
scale of agricultural and commercial importance as a colonial
community.'

Governor Darling's words suggest the exact reason why Jamaica may be
looked upon either as the most fortunate or the most unfortunate of the
emancipated colonies. All depends upon the point of view. If the largest
amount of individual well-being and the most favorable conditions of
gaining independence and self-respect constitute a community fortunate,
then Jamaica stands at the head of her island sisters. If immense
wealth, centred in a few, constitutes a community fortunate, then
Barbados is at the head. In Barbados the wealth of the planters is
greater, in Jamaica the condition of the laborers is better. The late
Mr. Sewell remarked to the writer that the common people in Jamaica had
a more manly and self-respecting look than in any of the smaller islands
which he had visited. It is much to be lamented that the divorce between
the proprietary and the laboring interest was so complete in this
island, and the consequent industrial anarchy so great. But even this
was better than the depressed condition in which the peasantry of the
smaller islands are kept by the hold that the planters have upon them.
Manhood is a better crop than either sugar or coffee, and in the long
run brings all other things with it. The article in the March number of
the _Atlantic Monthly_ for 1862, shows, in brief compass, what
inestimable benefits have followed in the smaller islands from
conferring the boon of personal freedom, even with so stringent a social
dependence remaining. In Jamaica, freedom has been more complete, and
the recoil of the social elements from each other more violent. The
dis