But the most dangerous class
of all is the mulatto; he is everywhere, like wealth, _irritamenta
malorum_. The 'bar sinister,' and the fancy that he is despised, fill him
with ineffable gall and bitterness. Inferior in physique to his black, and
in _morale_ to his white, parent, he seeks strength by making the families
of his progenitors fall out. Had the Southern States of America deported
all the products of 'miscegenation,' instead of keeping them in servitude,
the 'patriarchal institution' might have lasted to this day instead of
being prematurely abolished.
My first visit to Sa Leone showed me the root of all her evils. There is
hardly a peasant in the peninsula. Had the 'colony-born' or older
families, the 'King-yard men,' or recaptives, and the creoles, or children
of liberated Africans, been apprenticed and compelled to labour, the
colony would have become a flourishing item of the empire. Now it is the
mere ruin of an emporium; and the people, born and bred to do nothing,
cannot prevail upon themselves to work. But the 'improved African' has an
extra contempt for agriculture, and he is good only at destruction. Rice
and cereals, indigo and cotton, coffee and arrowroot, tallow-nuts and
shea-butter, squills and jalap, oil-palms and cocoas, ginger, cayenne, and
ground-nuts are to be grown.
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