effects produced by apprenticeship, and the fitness of the negroes for
liberty, that the attention of the community was soon awakened to the
subject, even more strenuously than it ever before had been; and the
walls of Parliament were soon made once more to ring with the sufferings
of the slave, only emancipated in name, and the injustice of withholding
from him any longer the freedom which was his indefeasible right, as
soon as he was shown capable of enjoying it beneficially for himself and
safely for the rest of the community.

In these transactions, both in Jamaica, where he is one of the largest
planters, and in Parliament, where he is one of the most respected
members, the Marquess of Sligo bore an eminent and an honourable part.
His praise has been justly sounded by all who have supported the cause
of negro freedom, and his conduct was by all admitted to be as much
marked by the disinterested virtue of a good citizen and amiable man, as
it was by the sagacity and ability of an enlightened statesman. Both as
governor of Jamaica, as the owner of slaves whom he voluntarily
liberated, and as a peer of Parliament, his patriotism, his humanity,
and his talents, shone conspicuously through this severe and glorious
struggle. While such was the conduct of those eminent philanthropists,
some difference of opinion prevailed among the other and older leaders
of the cause, chiefly grounded upon doubts whether the arrangement made
by Parliament in 1833, might not be regarded as a compact with the
planters which it would be unjust to violate by terminating their right
to the labour of the apprentices at a period earlier than the one fixed
in the Emancipation Act. A little consideration of the question at issue
soon dispelled those doubts, and removed every obstacle to united
exertion, by restoring entire unanimity of opinion. The slaves, it was
triumphantly affirmed, were no party to the compact. But moreover, the
whole arrangement of the apprenticeship was intended as a benefit to