Book 2, Part 8, Chapters 37-45 Summary

In Book 2, Part 8, Chapter 37, after Kemp's suicide, Erasmus goes into the sugar trade and marries a woman for her family's wealth and power. Kemp is meeting with Sir William Templeton, His Majesty's Principal Secretary to the West India Office, to attempt to stop the legislation being passed by the Kingston local assembly in which the land of absentee landlords would be confiscated and given to the locals. Erasmus threatens Sir William and leaves; he thinks back to his father and all he has achieved since his father's death. He arrives home and speaks to his wife briefly about her father's decision to purchase slaves so that the government will reimburse him when the slave trade is abolished; Erasmus does not believe the trade will be abolished any time soon and asks his wife to inform her father...