58]

The more insistent demands which Governor Modyford made in 1670 for
freedom of trade to Africa show that the company's failure to send
Negroes to Jamaica after 1667 was beginning to be resented. Although
there had been a constant demand for Negroes in Jamaica there was up
to 1670 less need for slaves there than in Barbadoes. At least the
demands made by the planters of Jamaica were not so frequent and so
insistent as they were in Barbadoes. To a certain extent the planters
of Jamaica may have been deterred from representing the lack of labor
supply while Governor Modyford was one of the company's factors.
Modyford had been very much interested in the company's trade,
especially with the Spanish colonies. As soon as it became clear,
however, that the losses incurred in the Anglo-Dutch war, would make
it impossible for the company to continue the slave trade to the West
Indies, Modyford undoubtedly voiced a genuine demand on the part of
the planters for more slaves. By the year 1670 the island was better
developed than it had been ten years before and the need for slaves
was beginning to be acute.[59]

About the first of March, 1662, two Spaniards made their appearance at
Barbadoes to make overtures for a supply of slaves, which they
intended to transport to Peru. If they received encouragement, the
Spaniards asserted that they would come every fortnight with large
supplies of bullion to pay for the slaves which they exported. Sir
Thomas Modyford, the company's factor and the speaker of the Barbadoes
assembly, was enthusiastic about this proposition and pointed out that
the trade with the Spanish colonies would increase the king's revenue
and at the same time would deprive the Dutch of a lucrative trade.[60]
Since they were well treated on their first visit to Barbadoes the
Spaniards returned in April, 1662, at which time they bought four
hundred Negroes for which they paid from 125 to 140 pieces of
eight.[61] When the Spaniards came to export their Negroes, however,
they found that Governor Willoughby had levied a duty of eleven pieces
of eight on each Negro. The assembly under Modyford's leadership at
once declared the imposition of such a tax illegal. This resolution
was carried to the council where, against the opposition of the
governor, it was also passed. Governor Willoughby, nevertheless, had
the temerity to collect the tax on some of the Negroes then in port,
and a little later when one of the ships of the