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59.09% slaves west negroes negro men indies islands poor man state act work pay treatment common pence gentlemen day half human manner life oppressed cruelty instances owner india instance white owners climate order violent witness usage estates distress island barbadoes lives creatures mentioned king jamaica redress oppression surprising despair threatened
13.64% master boat money slave run times indies pounds hundred suffer west servant sugar paid boys navigation shipboard purchase doran year earned trifling lady teach buy places character escape robert guineas portsmouth case town understood looked stores sailor discharged baptized charles saved amiable forty brother pretty favour seized knowledge business
27.28% other topics

The small account in which the life of a negro is held in the West Indies is so universally known, that it might seem impertinent to quote the following extract, if some people had not been hardy enough of late to assert that negroes are on the same footing in that respect as Europeans. By the 329th Act, page 125, of the Assembly of Barbadoes, it is enacted 'That if any negro, or other slave, under punishment by his master, or his order, for running away, or any other crime or misdemeanor towards his said master, unfortunately shall suffer in life or member, no person whatsoever shall be liable to a fine; but if any man shall out of wantonness, or only of bloody-mindedness, or cruel intention, wilfully kill a negro, or other slave, of his own, he shall pay into the public treasury fifteen pounds sterling.' And it is the same in most, if not all, of the West India islands. Is not this one of the many acts of the islands which call loudly for redress? And do not the assembly which enacted it deserve the appellation of savages and brutes rather than of Christians and men? It is an act at once unmerciful, unjust, and unwise; which for cruelty would disgrace an assembly of those who are called barbarians; and for its injustice and insanity would shock the morality and common sense of a Samaide or a Hottentot.