I had
no claim to be admitted. I felt that I should be an intruder, and had I
been allowed would have taken myself elsewhere, but Sir Charles's
peremptory generosity admitted of no refusal. As a subject I was bound
to submit to the Queen's representative. I cannot say I was sorry to be
compelled. In Government House I should see and hear what I could
neither have seen nor heard elsewhere. I should meet people who could
tell me what I most wanted to know. I had understood already that owing
to the sugar depression the state of the island was critical. Officials
were alarmed. Bankers were alarmed. No one could see beyond the next
year what was likely to happen. Sir Charles himself would have most to
say. He was evidently anxious. Perhaps if he had a fault, he was over
anxious; but with the possibility of social confusion before him, with
nearly 200,000 peasant subjects, who in a few months might be out of
work and so out of food, with the inflammable negro nature, and a
suspicious and easily excited public opinion at home, the position of a
Governor of Barbadoes is not an enviable one. The Government at home, no
doubt with the best intentions, has aggravated any peril which there may
be by enlarging the suffrage. The experience of Governor Eyre in Jamaica
has taught the danger of being too active, but to be too inactive may be
dangerous also. If there is a stir again in any part of these islands,
and violence and massacre come of it, as it came in St. Domingo, the
responsibility is with the governor, and the account will be strictly
exacted of him.

I must describe more particularly the reasons which there are for
uneasiness. On the day on which I landed I saw an article in a
Bridgetown paper in which my coming there was spoken of as perhaps the
last straw which would break the overburdened back. I know not why I
should be thought likely to add anything to the load of Barbadian
afflictions. I should be a worse friend to the colonies than I have
tried to be if I was one of those who would quench the smoking flax of
loyalty in any West Indian heart. But loyalty, I very well know, is
sorely tried just now. The position is painfully simple. The great
prosperity of the island ended with emancipation. Barbadoes suffered
less than Jamaica or the Antilles because the population was large and
the land limited, and the blacks were obliged to work to keep
themselves alive. The abolition of the sugar duties was the next blow.
The pr