Kirkland—­that forty freemen would accomplish as much as eighty slaves.  Mr. Gordon hires his people on Saturdays, and he expressed his astonishment at the increased vigor with which they worked when they were to receive wages.  He pointedly condemned the driving system which was resorted to by many of the planters.  They foolishly endeavored to keep up the coercion of slavery, and they had the special magistrates incessantly flogging the apprentices.  The planters also not unfrequently take away the provision grounds from their apprentices, and in every way oppress and harass them.

In the course of the conversation Mr. G. accidentally struck upon a fresh vein of facts, respecting the SLAVERY OF BOOK-KEEPERS,[A] under the old system.  The book-keepers, said Mr. G., were the complete slaves of the overseers, who acted like despots on the estates.  They were mostly young men from England, and not unfrequently had considerable refinement; but ignorant of the treatment which book-keepers had to submit to, and allured by the prospect of becoming wealthy by plantership, they came to Jamaica and entered as candidates.  They soon discovered the cruel bondage in which they were involved.  The overseers domineered over them, and stormed at them as violently as though they were the most abject slaves.  They were allowed no privileges such as their former habits impelled them to seek.  If they played a flute in the hearing of the overseer, they were commanded to be silent instantly.  If they dared to put a gold ring on their finger, even that trifling pretension to gentility was detected and disallowed by the jealous overseer. (These things were specified by Mr. G. himself.) They were seldom permitted to associate with the overseers as equals.  The only thing which reconciled the book-keepers to this abject state, was the reflection that they might one day possibly become overseers themselves, and then they could exercise the same authority over others.  In addition to this degradation, the book-keepers suffered great hardships.  Every morning (during slavery) they were obliged to be in the field before day; they had to be there as soon as the slaves, in order to call the roll, and mark absentees, if any.  Often Mr. G. and the other gentleman had gone to the field, when it was so dark that they could not see to call the roll, and the negroes have all lain down on their hoes, and slept till the light broke.  Sometimes there would be a thick dew on the ground, and the air was so cold and damp, that they would be completely chilled.  When they were shivering on the ground, the negroes would often lend them their blankets, saying, “Poor busha pickaninny sent out here from England to die.”  Mr. Gordon said that his constitution had been permanently injured by such exposure.  Many young men, he said, had doubtless been killed by it.  During crop time, the book-keepers had to be up every night till twelve o’clock, and every other night all night, superintending