FREE BOOKS

Author's List




PREV.   NEXT  
|<   136   137   138   139   140   141   142   143   144   145   146   147   148   149   150   151   152   153   154   155   156   157   158   159   160  
161   162   163   164   165   166   167   168   169   170   171   172   173   174   175   176   177   178   179   180   181   182   183   184   185   >>   >|  
, burned houses and destroyed plantations, far below. The only man who could cope with their peculiar tactics was Major James, the superintendent just removed by government,--and his services were not employed, as he was not trusted. On one occasion, however, he led a volunteer party farther into the mountains than any of the assailants had yet penetrated, guided by tracks known to himself only, and by the smell of the smoke of Maroon fires. After a very exhausting march, including a climb of a hundred and fifty feet up the face of a precipice, he brought them just within the entrance of Guthrie's Defile. "So far," said he, pointing to the entrance, "you may pursue, but no farther; no force can enter here; no white man except myself, or some soldier of the Maroon establishment, has ever gone beyond this. With the greatest difficulty I have penetrated four miles farther, and not ten Maroons have gone so far as that. There are two other ways of getting into the defile, practicable for the Maroons, but not for any one of you. In neither of them can I ascend or descend with my arms, which must be handed to me, step by step, as practised by the Maroons themselves. One of the ways lies to the eastward, and the other to the westward; and they will take care to have both guarded, if they suspect that I am with you; which, from the route you have come to-day, they will. They now see you, and if you advance fifty paces more, they will convince you of it." At this moment a Maroon horn sounded the notes indicating his name, and, as he made no answer, a voice was heard, inquiring if he were among them. "If he is," said the voice, "let him go back, we do not wish to hurt him; but as for the rest of you, come on and try battle, if you choose." But the gentlemen did not choose. In September the House of Assembly met. Things were looking worse and worse. For five months a handful of negroes and mulattoes had defied the whole force of the island; and they were defending their liberty by precisely the same tactics through which their ancestors had won it. Half a million pounds sterling had been spent within this time, besides the enormous loss incurred by the withdrawal of so many able-bodied men from their regular employments. "Cultivation was suspended," says an eye-witness; "the courts of law had long been shut up; and the island at large seemed more like a garrison under the power of law-martial, than a country of agriculture and comm
PREV.   NEXT  
|<   136   137   138   139   140   141   142   143   144   145   146   147   148   149   150   151   152   153   154   155   156   157   158   159   160  
161   162   163   164   165   166   167   168   169   170   171   172   173   174   175   176   177   178   179   180   181   182   183   184   185   >>   >|  



Top keywords:

farther

 

Maroon

 

Maroons

 

island

 

choose

 

entrance

 

penetrated

 

tactics

 

battle

 
convince

martial

 
country
 
agriculture
 

advance

 
moment
 

answer

 

garrison

 

courts

 
inquiring
 

sounded


indicating

 

gentlemen

 

precisely

 
liberty
 
bodied
 

defending

 

ancestors

 

enormous

 

incurred

 

withdrawal


million

 
pounds
 

sterling

 

defied

 

mulattoes

 

Assembly

 

Things

 

September

 
regular
 

handful


negroes
 
employments
 

Cultivation

 

months

 

suspended

 

witness

 

ascend

 
assailants
 

guided

 
tracks