Page:The Homes of the New World- Vol. III.djvu/258

Rh who then selects one of three persons nominated by the slave and his master, and he decides the question.

According to the Spanish laws of freedom a mother has a right to purchase the freedom of the child before its birth for fifteen dollars, and afterwards for double that sum. This law, however, it is said, is not acted upon, excepting with the consent of kind-hearted masters.

The Spanish law of freedom allows the slave many opportunities of earning money, so that the moment of freedom can always shine like a star of Bethlehem upon his desert path. This, however, has reference more particularly to slaves in the cities. On the plantations and within the walls of the bohea, it is not an easy thing to hear of the star of freedom, still less to attain to it. Yet that happens sometimes even there.

These laws of emancipation have caused the negro population of Cuba to amount to nearly five hundred thousand souls; about one half of the whole population of the island, and near one-third free negroes. And the free negro of Cuba is the happiest of all created beings. He is protected by the laws of the country from that violence, and those hostile attacks which continually threaten him in his own country from hostile tribes. He can for a small impost become the possessor of a couple of acres of land, on which he builds his hut of palm bark and palm leaves. Around this he plants the trees and edible roots of his native land, and the golden maize. The earth produces at small expense of labour all that he requires. He needs not to labour, and he can enjoy much, and rest the while. The sun gives him fire, and frees him from the necessity of clothing, for the greater part of his body. The cocoa-palm gives him milk; the plantain-tree bread; the king-palm feeds his swine and his poultry; the field gives him sugar-cane, and the wild trees of the forest drop for him their manifold fruits. The African drum with its cheerful life, the African dances and songs are free to