Page:The History of Slavery and the Slave Trade.djvu/159

 others, Sunday only; and on others, Sunday only in part, for some people, says the Dean of Middleham, required grass for the cattle on Sundays to be gathered twice in the day; and Lieutenant Davison says he has known them forced to work on Sundays for their masters. It appears again, that in crop, on no estates, have they more than Sunday for the cultivation of their lands. The Dean of Middleham has known them continue boiling the sugar till late on Saturday night, and in one instance remembers it to have been protracted till sun-rise on Sunday morning: and the care afterwards of setting up the sugar-jars must have required several hours.

The point which may lie considered next, is that of the slaves' food. This appears by the evidence to be subject to no rule. On some estates they are allowed land, which they cultivate for themselves at the times mentioned above, but they have no provisions allowed them, except perhaps a small present of salt fish or beef, or salt pork, at Christmas. On others they are allowed provisions, but no land: on others again, they are allowed land and provisions jointly. Without enumerating the different rations mentioned to be allowed them by the different witnesses, it may be sufficient to take the highest. The best allowance is evidently at Barbadoes, and the following is the account of it. The slaves in general, says General Tottenham, appeared to be ill-fed; each slave had a pint of grain for twenty-four hours, and sometimes half a rotten herring, when to be had. When the herrings were unfit for the whites, they were bought up by the planters for the slaves. Mr. Davis says that on those estates in Barbadoes, where he has seen the slaves' allowance dealt out, a grown negro had nine pints of corn, and about one pound of salt fish a week, but the grain of the West Indies is much lighter than wheat. He is of opinion that in general they were too sparingly fed. The Dean of Middleham also mentions nine pints per week as the quantity given, but that he has known masters abridge it in the time of crop. This is the greatest allowance mentioned throughout the whole of the evidence, and this is one of the cases in which the slaves had provisions but no land. Where, on the other hand, they have land and no provisions, all the witnesses agree that it is quite ample for their support, but that they have not sufficient time to cultivate it. Their lands, too, are often at the distance of three miles from their houses, and Mr. Giles thinks the slaves were often so fatigued by the labor of the week, as scarcely to be capable of working on them on Sunday for their own use. It is also mentioned as a great hardship, that often when they had cleared these lands, their master has taken them away for canes, giving them new wood-land in their stead, to be cleared afresh. This circumstance, together with the removal of their houses, many of them have so taken to heart as to have died.

Whether or not their food maybe considered as sufficient in general for their support, may be better seen from the following than the preceding account. Mr. Cook says that they have not sufficient food. He has known them to eat the putrid carcasses of animals, and is convinced they did it through want. Mr. J. Terry has known them, on estates where they have been worse fed than on others, eat the putrid carcasses of animals also. Dead mules,