But out-of-doors the feeling rather was that the insurrection had been
caused, not by the unreasoning though natural impatience for freedom
entertained by the negro--whom Canning had truly described as
"possessing the form and strength of a man, but the intellect of a
child"--but by the slackness and supineness of the local Legislature,
too much under the influence of the timid clamors of the planters to
listen to the voice of justice and humanity, which demanded to the full
as emphatically, if somewhat less vociferously, the immediate
deliverance of the slave. The object, however, thus desired was not so
free from difficulty as it seemed to those zealous but irresponsible
advocates of universal freedom; for, in the first place the slaves were
not the only persons to be considered; the planters also had an
undoubted right to have their interests protected, since, however
illegitimate property in human beings might be, it was certain that its
existence in that portion of the King's dominions had been recognized by
Parliament and courts of justice for many generations, and that suddenly
to withdraw a sanction and abrogate a custom thus established, and, as
it might fairly be believed, almost legalized by time, would be not only
ruinous to the planters, who would have no other means of cultivating
their lands, but, as being ruinous to them, would also manifestly be
most unjust.
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