Where The Twain Meet

n about Jamaica. Wearisome sometimes naturally, because for one

hank him for his book. It is a very strange thing how personality creeps out in writing. No one surely ever talked less of himself than Hans Sloane, but we somehow get a picture of a kindly, interesting man, patient and tactful, whom it must have been a privilege to know, and he manages to give

o their Masters, not only in feeding their own Families, but in affording them many Swine to sell for the Market. It was not a small Diversion to me, to see the Swine in the Woods, on the first sound of the Shell, which is like that of a Trumpet, to lift up their Heads from the ground where they were feeding and prick up their Ears to hearken for the second which so soon as

e very good and well tasted, Hens, Ducks, Muscovy Ducks and some very few Geese.... These Poultry are all fed

of Montego Bay, there is a swamp which at present breeds nothing but large and fierce mosquitoes, but where hogs might live to their advantage and the swamp's, and in these days of cold storage and world shortage I wonder why that swamp is not turned to good account. As for fowls and turkeys and ducks, they grow fat and heavy, they lay wonderfully

me this industry has rather

oes and are look'd after very carefully by the Planters. The Oxen who have been drawing in their Mills and are well

n for this unwilling hospitality that these gentlemen brought much of their plunder to Port Royal, for Jamaica, in those first years, even before Sir Hans Sloane wandered about it, made money out of the corsairs. They were a difficult problem. Other days, other mann

rbour save in the middle of the day, and none can go out save in the early morning or at night. He kept a record of the weather all the time he was in the island, and that record for 1687-88 might have done almost word for word for 1919-20, so little does the climate vary. His memorandum for the 25th October 1688 might have stood for the 25th October 1920, when I read it, "Fair weather with a small sea breeze." And when the sea breeze has failed he has a note which I feelingly record is perfectly true, "Extream h

tibly we throw off the old and take up the new. He dilates on the immorality of the people. Not that he worried about their souls as did later writers; he take

as everywhere else, who have been of bad Lives, whereby their minds are disturbed, and their Diseases, if not rendered Mortal, yet much worse to cure than those who have sedate Minds, and Clear Consciences. On the same account it is that those who have not their Wills, Minds, and Affairs settled, in Distempers are much worse to be cur'

r prescribes the mo

lief, by degrees recovered the sight of one Eye and then of the other, so that she could at last read Bibles of the smallest print, and was entirely cured." I am glad of that, for she had been bled by cupping, by scarification

nctilious then than now. He mentions "Loveney, a negro woman of Colonel Ballard's," "one Barret," "a lusty woman," "one Cornwall's daughter," "a Gentleman aged about 40 years," "a young Gentlewoman aged about twelve years." And he is extremely frank as to their ailments an

gainst next morning to be a guide on foot for about an hundred miles through the Woods to a place of the island to seize Pirates who, as the Duke of Albemarle was informed, had there unladed great quantities of Silver to Careen their Ship." Now Emanuel had evidently heard all about the pirates, and did not desire a closer acquaintance, and I have the sincerest sympathy with Emanuel. "About twelve a'Clock in the night he pretended himself to be extraordinary sick, he lay straight along, would not speak, and dissem

Ema

at when the flame came to burn them they might be awaked. I sent two several People in all haste to get ready these things, in the meantime leaving him, that he might have time to consider and recover out of this fit of Dissumlation, which in a quarter of an hour he did, so that he came to speak. I question'd him about his pain, he told me it was very great in his Back. I told him in short that he was a d

nish remains found warrant us in thinking them. He found a fort, a monastery, sugar works, and Captain Hemmings told him he often found pavements 3 feet deep under big canes. There were the ruins of several buildings not yet finished, and tradition said that the Europeans had been cut off by the Indians. The town had been overgrown for a long time, and he says most of the timber felled off this place, within the walls of

t up, tells a story of terror of the old days. But the English soldiery, contemptuous of all things Spanish, swept everything

uthlessly in the mills. Man has ever been cruel to the luckless beasts that fell into his hands. And Sloane remarks how smooth were the skins of these horses in comparison with the rough coated little horses introduced by the conquerors from New England. There were cattle too and the settlers as well as the buccaneers hunted these, killing them apparently rather wantonly, but probably there was not much else for the soldiers to feed on. "This way of taking the wild black Cattle," says Sloane, "cutting their tendons or Lancing is what is

at blackguards were these old colonists) "or such as were slaves to the Spaniards and taken from them by the English.... They are of an olive colour, have long black lank hair, and are very good Hunters, Fishers, or Fowlers, but are naught at working in the Fields or Slavish

sually for rebellion by burning them, by nailing them down to the ground with crooked Sticks on every Limb and then applying the Fire by degrees from the Feet and Hands, burning them gradually

r Ankles, or Pottocks about their necks, which are Iron Rings

ill Houses. Beating with Manati Straps is thought too cruel, and therefore prohibited by the Customs of the Country. The Cicatrices are visible on their skins for ever after, and a

, who are a very perverse Generation of People" (I remember that Miriam, my first waiting-maid, who wore her wool standing out in a series of little tails like a surprised night-mare, always considered the table laid when she had put on the carving knife, even

g what on earth the othe

e one it is true, but still in some

in Plantations. They are sold to very good profit; but if they have many Cicatrices or Scars on them, the marks of their severe

t be worth, perhaps saved many a poor slave from th

casion, "a ship come from the Guineas loaded with blacks to

heir look and by the country from which they come. The Blacks from the East Indies" (what a cruel long way to come in a slave ship) "are fed on Flesh and Fish at home, and therefore are not coveted, because troublesome to nourish, and those from Angola run away from their

themselves in fair water every day as "often as convenientl

under the water." Back he came with the good news, and Sir William Phipps joined him with another ship, and they set to work in businesslike fashion to possess themselves of that silver. The ship was a Spanish galleon, lost about the year 1659, bound to Spain, and it was near thirty years later that these Merchant Venturers turned it to good account. Their two ships were laden with trade goods in case they failed to find the ship, but having found it they set to work to clear away the coral and lapis astroites which had grown over it, "and they took up silver as the Weather and their Divers held out, some days more and some days less. The small Ship went near, the great one rode afar off." And they actually took out in bullion ￡22, 196, "30, 326 of which were Sows," says Sloane, "and

wrecks, and though Sloane says much money was made on that first wreck,

to have been a shining example of how not to live in the tropics, Hans Sloane, in the train of the Duchess, left Jamaica on the 16th March 1689, and did not arrive off the Lizard till the 29th May. How far off Jamaica was in those days we may judge when we are told that t

but find it. There was something wrong with his knee and he was afraid he was going to be a cripple for life, for no doctor could find out what was wrong. He used to struggle from his bed on to a board and his servants carried him that way to a sofa, where he spent his daylight hours. S

with a kindly face, his brown hair drawn back and tied behind with a ribbon, and his brown coat, knee-breeches, stockings and shoes those of other days. He said nothing, but, smiling quietly, came towards the bed and laying his hand on the injured leg began slowly stroking it up and down. It was infinitely soothing, and presently to

ld have done, whether the Duke of Albemarle's physician had visited him, he says, "Only fancy, I'm

ieve it was presented to people for amusement. If they had nothing else to read, it almost excuses the ignorance and easy-going ways of the planters and their families. Not that these regarded themselves as ignorant by any means. Uncultured as they were, they held themselves far above any o

get out of them was, 'Yes, ma'am,' 'No, ma'am,' with now and then a simper or a giggle. At last I set them to work

advantage if she could have met them on equal terms. But she never did. She seems to have been a cheery soul, but I am afraid she was convinced she was made of very supe

English, with an indolent drawling out of their words that is very tiresome, if not disgusting. I stood next to a lady one night, next to a wind

hough they had less learning than any cook-maid nowadays, less than the little black boys and girls trotting along the steep and

ck. He has, besides, an extraordinary propensity to dip his fingers into every dish. Yesterday he absolutely helped himself to some fricassee with his dirty finger and thumb." And again, "We drove to Lord Balcarres' Penn. Never was such a scene of dirt and discomfort. Lord B

emier colonies only thirty-five years before Queen Victoria came to th

the men of her day, which makes her most amusing reading, while it certa

here is without one) is a tall black woman, well made, with a flat nose, thick lips and a skin of ebony, highly polished and shining. She showed me her three yellow children, and

iggered, and talked in hushed voices into each other's ears, while the little girls looked innocent and had to pretend they did

sing a Mr Shirley, "a profligate ch

four wives, no more poor negro.' The overseers, too, are in general needy adventurers, without either principle, religion

anea. "She was a sickly, delicate child, with straight light hair and very black eyes. Mr T. appeared very anxious for me to dismiss her,

black, brown, and yellow ladies of the house, and fairly revelled in gossip,

the more so because she is unconscious of doing anything beyond telling the tale of her life and sufferings in a far land with what