compel those to labour who are more than sixty or less than seventeen years of age, nor employ females in work which is unsuitable to the sex; he must allow them reasonable innocent diversions; he must not turn old slaves or children adrift to starve; in the higher class of crimes he must leave the punishment to the law, and in the lower class he must not punish any slave with more than twenty five lashes, and those must begiven only by himself or his steward, and in such a manner as not to cause any contusion or efflusion of blood. Obedience to these injunctions is secured by fines and punishments of various kinds: the judge may even deprive of all his slaves an inhuman master. In addition to this, the negroes have the right to redeem themselves at an equitable price; freedom is given to every female with whom her master has cohabited; and if the father have, by any act, acknowledged the illegitimate offspring, they may, in failure. of lawful children, inherit his property, and they may succeed without any such act, to the property of their mother. III. (Free Mulatto, Address to Earl Bathurst, p. 8.) In the mean time died Don Martin de Salavaria, a man of ability, temperate in his measures, affable in his disposition. To his ready co-operation is to be attributed the rapid increase of the colony; he laid the foundation stone, but did not live to witness the completion of the superstructure. IV. La pièce suivante est une nouvelle preuve que Don Antonio Barreto était gouverneur de l'île en 1784 : Don Antonio Barreto, Capitan de Ynfanteria de las tropas fixas de Guaiana, Gobernador, Commandante General y Subdelegado de Real Hacienda por la Ysla de la Trinidad de Barlovento. Por quanto me allo con la competente autoridad para conceder á los naturales de los Dominios de S. M. Cathólica y á los Extrangeros cathólicos que se trasportasen en la Ysla con el fin de establecerse en ella las tierras realengas que solicitan para cultivar y poner en valor, y haviendoseme presentado el nuevo colon Juan Bla Sala solicitando con pedimento judicial la concesion en forma de las tierras realengas que con siencia y permiso anterior del Govierno esta cultivando en el districto del Corosal despues de haver hecho su juramento de fidelidad y vasallage al Rey nuestro señor. Por tanto atendiendo á su instancia y haviendose mandado que se procediera por uno de los Agrimensores jurados del Govierno á la mensura de dichas tierras con arreglo al Capitulo quinto del Reglamento acordado y á lo demas decretado, ha resultado por el plano y la certificacion, etc., etc. Dado en Puerto de España de Trinidad de Barlovento á los diez y seis de Febrero de mil setecientos ochenta y quatro años, firmado de mi mano, sellado y refrendado por el infraescrito secretario de Govierno. Antonio BARRETO, Por Mdo del S. Govor y Subdo de R. Hazienda: Seco de Govno. NOTES DU CHAPITRE X. I. (Thompson's Alcedo's Dictionary, art. Trinidad.) In the reign of Charles III great pains were taken for increasing the cultivation, population and commerce of this island; and there were planted in it coffee, cotton, and many other productions; at the same time a regiment of infantry was established for its defence in the capital, which is S. Joseph de Oruña.... It had been the intention of the Spanish government to have constituted Chaguarama Harbour and the peninsula of Point Gourde their naval and military stations for the Windward Islands. Its importance was not noticed until the peace of Paris, when every measure was adopted for its rapid settlement. Encouragement was held out to all nations to colonize it (so unusual to the Spanish policy); lands were liberally granted; utensils for agriculture provided; and Negroes were imported at great expense by the king of Spain, and afterwards sold to the new Settlers at a very long credit, and comparatively at a small price. Induced by this, numbers of debtors and unfortunate people flocked thither from all the other colonies of the Antilles. The convulsions of France helped to increase the population; both royalists and regicides successively emigrating there with the property each had been enabled to save. The island assumed the most rapid and flourishing appearance, and had the happiness, during that period, to have for its governor Don Chacon, a man of the most unbounded liberality, and who, if he had a bias, it was in favour of the British. II. (Parliamentary papers, Report on titles to lands, p. 27.) Notwithstanding the threatening Proclamation of Governor Chacon, Basanta, after an absence from the Island of some months, found on his return all the old inhabitants still in possession of their lands; » and, he a ds, « they were never deprived of them. » So that Governor Chacon's Proclamation appears in truth to have been intended, to borrow an expression of Lord Bacon, « more in terror than in rigor. » The committee of landholders contended that it was seulement un décret mis en tête du Libro Becerro, and applying only to the old inhabitants before the Cedula (which seem inconsistent statements), and assert that «< it was never acted upon. >> It does seem, however, to have been occasionally and partially applied; but it was at the best only a municipal regulation. III. (Parliamentary papers, App. to Report on titles to lands, p. 165.) ARTICLES which for the present specify the employ of the Commissaries, and point out the limits of their Duties. 1st The Island will remain divided in three divisions, each of which in the charge of one commissary: the first to consist of the quarters of las Cuebas, Salivet, Guanapo, Tacarigua, Zimmaronera, Ventilla, Santana, Mucurapo, Tragarete, Maraval, Diego Martin and Carenero; the second, of the quarters of Naparima, Galeota, Cocal and Otuare; the third, of Guapo, los Gallos and Guayaguayare. 24 The principal charge of the Commissaries is that of obtaining with the greatest exactitude a knowledge of the locality of their departments; to know the lands which have. been granted. To know the strength of each inhabitant, the cultivation which each carries on, to examine the rivers therein navigable, the roads which have already been opened, and those which ought to be made, to facilitate the transport of produce, with whatsoever can further conduce to the agriculture, commerce and population of their departments, its police and the happiness of its inhabitants, etc., etc. Given in Port of Spain, the 3d january 1787. Before me, Josef Maria Chacon. Luis Centeno, IV. (Bryan Edwards, History of the B. W. Indies, t. IV, p. 300 et seq.) Under the enlightened government of Don Joseph Chacon, the colony rapidly attained to a flourishing situation. Discordant in habits and opinions, as the colonists necessarily were, he kept them in a state of peace and order, by a due mixture of mildness and firmness. Between the years 1787 and |