A
H
I
S
SHORT
T OF
FRENCH
O
R
Y
T H E
Colony in ST.
C H A P .
DOMINGO, & C
I.
Political State of S T . D O M I N G O previous to the Year 1789.
T
H E i n h a b i t a n t e of t h e F r e n c h part of St. Domingo, C H A P 1 as of all the Weft Indian Iflands, were compofed of three great clafles: ift, pure whites. 2d, people of colour, and blacks of free condition. 3d, negroes in a ftate of Inhabitants. flavery. T h e reader is apprifed that the clafs which, by a ftrange abufe of language, is called people of colour, originates from an intermixture of the whites and the blacks. The genuine offspring of a pure white with a negro is called a mulatto; but there are various cafts, produced by fubfequent connections, fome of which draw near to the whites, until all vifible diftinction between them is loft; whilft others fall retrograde to the blacks. All thefe were known in St. Domingo by the term fang-melĂŠes, or gens de couleur, (in comB
mon mon