e also civil
magistrates, concur in these two statements; that the amount of crime is
actually less than it was during slavery; and that it _appears_ to _be
greater_ because of the publicity which is necessarily given by legal
processes to offences which were formerly punished and forgotten on the
spot where they occurred.

Some of the prominent points established by the foregoing evidence are,

1st. That most of the crimes committed are petty misdemeanors such as
turning out to work late in the morning, cutting canes to eat, &c. _High
penal offences_ are exceedingly rare.

2d. That where offences of a serious nature do occur, or any open
insubordination takes place, they are founded in ignorance or
misapprehension of the law, and are seldom repeated a second time, if
the law be properly explained and fully understood.

3d. That the above statements apply to no particular part of the island,
where the negroes are peculiarly favored with intelligence and religion,
but are made with reference to tire island generally. Now it happens
that in one quarter of the island the negro population are remarkably
ignorant and degraded. We were credibly informed by various
missionaries, who had labored in Antigua and in a number of the other
English islands, that they had not found in any colony so much
debasement among the people, as prevailed in the part of Antigua just
alluded to. Yet they testified that the negroes in that quarter were as
peaceable, orderly, and obedient to law, as in any other part of the
colony. We make this statement here particularly for the purpose of
remarking that in the testimony of the planters, and in the police
reports; there is not a single allusion to this portion of the island as
forming an exception to the prevailing state of order and subordination.

After the foregoing facts and evidences, we ask, what becomes of the
dogma, that slaves cannot be immediately placed under the government of
_equitable laws_ with safety to themselves and the community?

Twelfth proposition.--The emancipated negroes have shown _no disposition
to roam from place to place._ A tendency to rove about, is thought by
many to be a characteristic of the negro; he is not allowed even an
ordinary share of local attachment, but must leave the chain and staple
of slavery to hold him amidst the graves of his fathers and the society
of his children. The experiment in Antigua shows that such sentiments
are groundless prejudices