During several years after the first arrival, the colony was occasionally in danger of famine, from obstacles to the receipt of supplies from home. After progress had been made in clearing the neighbouring district, and the cattle brought over had begun to multiply, this appre hension of course disappeared. At present, the price of corn seems nearly the same as in this country, and the price of butcher meat not much higher. The chief enhancement is experienced in whatever requires ma nual dexterity and the use of implements. Butter, from the scarcity of dairy accommodations, is twice, or rather thrice, its price in this country. Some progress, how ever, has been made in manufactures, particularly in the tanning of leather. Malt liquor being an article in gen eral demand, and difficult of importation, the colony con tains already four extensive breweries. The total popu lation now approaches 12,000, of whom about a third arc victualled and clothed at the public expence, while the others find means to earn their own support. The free settlers, who embarked for so unpromising a region, were not likely to belong to a meritorious class of society, and many of them have accordingly proved a burden on government. No branch of trade is carried ow with more activity than the sale of female dresses and ornaments. The avidity to purchase these, in this remote quarter, seems not inferior to the passion for dress in spheres of greater splendour ; and the shops are already fitted up with a degree of taste beyond our ordinary ideas of Bo tany Bay.
We shall conclude our remarks on this colony, by a notice of the principal things which remain to be done for its amelioration. The first of these, recommended as it is both by policy and humanity, is the determination of some specific limit to the state of durance in the eases of transportation for life. Whatever may have been the guilt of these persons, an ultimate prospect gf relief, at some time or other, should be allowed to visit their ima gination. Without such a prospect, they must continue unprofitable servants to the public,as they must be almost wholly hopeless in regard to their future fate. Another point of some consequence, is the introduction of bank rupt laws. There cannot be a more mistaken humanity, than to prevent the concerns of an embarrassed man from being brought to a decisive termination ; as it often hap pens, that he is induced to cling to a hopeless business, and to pass the best years of his life, without benefit either to himself or his creditors. A third improvement in this colony, would consist in the appointment of a civil governor, the questions of internal regulation be coming now too numerous for a military tribunal. A fourth object of attention, should be the nomination of a chief justice, who, whether he take law or equity as the rule of his decisions, should be a man of ascertained ability and experience. The colony supplies few per sons fitted to act as justices of the peace ; and not many, perhaps, qualified to discharge with impartiality the func tions of a juror. Hence the necessity of a judge going out from Britain, and of a form of procedure sufficiently simple and expeditious, to enable him to transact the judicial business of the settlement, as well as to save to the colonists a great part of the ordinary expellees of law.
Dutch Colonies.—The settlements of the Dutch in America have not been proportioned to the greatness of their maritime means. After conquering, in the seven teenth century, a great part of Brazil, they found it im practicable to retain it against the will of its Portuguese population. In the north, their colony of Nova Belgia was conquered by us in the reign of Charles II. and became an English province, under the name of Ncw York. The cause of so lukewarm a disposition towards America on the part of the Dutch, in this their era of power and vigour, is to be sought in their predilection for their possessions in the East. These possessions embraced the Cape, Java, the spice islands, part of Cey lon,. and several maritime stations on the continent of The commerce carried on between them and the mother country was very considerable, and passed, in the eyes of most men, for the pillar of the national wealth. In that age, the superiority, in productive power, of inland over foreign industry, was unknown. The no tion, that home traffic is an unprofitable transfer from hand to hand, and that national gains arc obtained only from abroad, was then still more general than at present.
From the imposing magnitude of the India ships, and the long catalogue of Dutch stations and provinces, it was natural to infer, that an extraordinary amount of profit must arist. (ruin such a source. The writers of :he last age went the length of pronouncing the Dutch possessions in the East much more valuable than the mother country : a notion a good deal similar to that of the French of the present day, who believe Bengal to be the main spring of British revenue. These considera tions, partly well partly ill founded, had the practical effect of inducing the Dutch to keep up with great care their eastern acquisitions, while, in the West, they aimed at nothing beyond the small islands of St Eustatia and Curacoa, along with continental tract in Guiana, which, in recent times, has owed much to British im provement, and has become familiar to us by the names of its subdivisions,--Surinam, Dcmarara, Essequibo, and Berbice.
As the Spaniards have been accounted the mildest of European taskmasters of negroes, the Dutch have been accused of falling into the opposite extreme. These contrasts, however, arc generally exaggerated, and, on analysing the matter, we should probably find that the character attributed to the Spaniard arose front his be ing too indolent to keep his people at work, while the Dutchman, accustomed to labour himself, made a point that his servants should follow his example. The Dutch West India company was incorporated in 1621, a bril liant mra in the long struggle of the Hollanders for na tional independence. Spanish America, as well as Bra sil, were open to the aggressive warfare of the Dutch, and their new company performed less the part of traders, than of directors of the naval exertions of their countrymen in the West. When political circumstances produced a cessation of the long contest with Spain, the unfitness of a great company for the management of con cerns, merely commercial, was felt, and, in 1674, the association was dissolved. A second company was form ed, but with no other monopoly than that of the African slave trade ; and in 1734 the latter likewise was laid open, on condition of the traders paying certain dues to the company. The Surinam company was a kind of emanation from the larger association ; the latter on ob taining, in 1682, certain privileges from the States Gen cral, for the supply and management of Surinam, admit ted two new parties to the contract, in consideration of their sharing the expellee of the charter. These parties were, the city of Amsterdam, and the opulent finnily of Sommelsdyk. The business of the association was managed at Amsterdam by representatives from each of the parties, but all the sigilauce and economy of Dutch directors were unable to form a counterpoise to the dis advantages inherent in mercantile coalitions. The stock of the company never rose to par, and fell eventually so low as thirty per cent. These examples of failure, on the part of the Dutch, are the more remarkable, because Holland was, of all countries, best fitted to supply the large advances required for newly settled countries. The interest of money in Holland, so far as 150 years ago, was very low, and did not, on undoubted security, exceed three per cent. while in England it was nearly double. The consequence has been, that while in this country no merchant has advanced capital to a colonist without obtaining a commission in addition to interest on his money, the Dutch capitalists have not hesitated to make loans on the security of \Vest India plantations, for mere interest, in the same way as in London a banker subscribes to a goverment loan on the security of stock. The extent to which this kind of business was carried, affords a striking proof of the ease with which unculti vated regions might be rendered productive, if the fruits of industry were not wasted in war expellees. Thirty years ago the capital due by the colony of Surinam to the mother country, amounted, says Al. Malouct, to eight millions sterling. This sum, large as it was, bears a small proportion to the mass of additional debt incur red by the planters since they came under our dominions. seventeen years ago. The high price of sugar in 1797 and 1799, induced our merchants to make very improvi dent advances for the purchase of negroes, as well as for other purposes ; and the subsequent fall of sugar pre vented that repayment, which, with the ordinary confi dence of \Vest Indians, was anticipated in the course of a few seasons.