PLANTERS AND SLAVES.
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to bear upon the negro; when the negro peasant will work regularly like the white peasant, then he ought to be as free. How are we to originate this moral stimulus ? By various means. I. By education ;—that is to say, by teaching every child to read; by providing Bibles and Prayer-books at moderate prices; by building or enlarging churches, or increasing the times of service, so that every one may be able to worship in the great congregation once at least on the Sunday. I I . By amending the details of existing slavery; that is to say, by thoroughly expurgating the colonial codes, by enacting express laws of protection for the slaves, by reforming the judicatures, by admitting the competency of slave evidence; by abolishing Sunday markets at all events; by introducing taskwork; by declaring women free from corporal punishment. I I I . By allowing freedom to be purchased at the market price. To the evidence of slaves and the purchase of freedom there is great opposition. My excellent friend, Mr. Coulthurst, who once entertained an opinion in favor of the first, was so shocked at the mass of perjury which it seemed to occasion, that he now more than doubts the propriety of its admission. The answer is twofold; first, that the evil will decrease every day in proportion to the advance