lief for fome time was, that the revolt was by no means an extenfive, but a fudden and partial infurrection only. The largeft fugar plantation on the plain was that of Monf. Gallifet, fituated about eight miles from the town, the negroes belonging to which had always been treated with fuch kindaefs and liberality, and poffeffed fo many advantages, that it became a proverbial expreffion among the lower white people, in speaking of any man's good fortune, to fay, Il eft heureux comme un negre de Gallifet (he is as happy as one of Gallifet's negroes.) M. Odeluc, the attor ney, or agent, for this plantation, was a member of the general affem. bly, and being fully perfuaded that the negroes belonging to it would remain firm in their obedience, determined to repair thither, to encourage them in oppofing the infurgents; to which end, he defired the affiftance of a few foldiers from the townguard, which was granted him. He proceeded accordingly; but on approaching the estate, to his furprize and grief, he found all the negroes in arms on the fide of the rebels, and (horrid to tell!) their fandard was the body of a white infant, which they had recently impaled on a flake! M. Odeluc had advanced too far to retreat undiscovered, and both he, and a friend that accompanied him, with most of the foldiers, were killed without mercy. Two or three only of the patroles efcaped by flight, and conveyed the dreadful tidings to the inhabitants of the town. By this time, all, or moft of the white perfons that had been found on the feveral plantations, being maffacred, or forced to seek their fafety in flight, the ruffians exchanged the fword for the torch. The buildings and cane fields were every where fet on fire; and the conflagrations, which were vifible from the town, in a thoufand different quarters, furnished a profpect more shocking, and reflec tions more difmal, than fancy can paint, or the powers of man defcribe. Confternation and terror now took poffeffion of every mind; and the fcreams of the women and children, running from door to door, heightened the horrors of the scene. All the citizens took up arms, and the general affembly vefted the governor with the command of the national guards, requesting him to give fuch orders as the urgency of the cafe feemed to demand. One of the first measures was to fend the white women and children on board the fhips in the harbour; and very ferious apprehenfions being entertained concerning the domestic negroes within the town, a great proportion of the ableft men among them were like wife fent on fhip-board, and clofely guarded. There ftill remained in the city a confiderable body of free mulattoes, who had not taken, or affected not to take, any part in the difputes between their brethren of colour and the white inhabitants. Their situation was extremely critical; for the lower clafs of whites, confidering the mulattoes, as the immediate authors of the rebellion, marked them for destruction; and the whole number. of the town would undoubtedly have been murdered without fcruple, if the governor and the colonial affembly had not vigorously interposed, and taken them under their immediate protection. Grateful for this interpofition in their favour (perhaps not thinking their lives otherwife fecure) all the able men among them offered to march immediately againft the rebels, and to leave their wives and children as hoftages for their fidelity. Their offer was accepted, and they were inrolled in different companies of the militia. The affembly continued their deliberations throughout the night, amidst the glare of the furrounding conflagrations; and the inhabitants, being ftrengthened by a number of feamen from the fhips, and brought into fome degree of order and military subordination, were now defirous that a detachment should be fent to attack the strongest body of the revolters. Orders were given accordingly; and M. de Touzard, an officer who had diftinguished himfelf in the fervice of the North Americans, took the command of a party of militia and troops of the line. With thefe, he marched to the plantation of a M. Latouz, and attacked a body of about four thou. fand of the rebel negroes. Many were deftroyed, but to little purpofe; for Touzard, finding the number of revolters to increase in more than a centuple proportion to their loffes, was at length obliged to retreat; and it cannot be doubted that, if the rebels had forthwith proceeded to the town, defenceless as it then was towards the plain, they might have fired it without difficulty, and deftroyed all its inhabitants, or compelled them to fly to the shipping for refuge. dies of troops, with fuch artillery as could be fpared, were ftationed thereon. But thefe precautions not being thought fufficient, it was alfo determined to furround the whole of the town, except the fide next the sea, with a ftrong palifade and chevaux de frize; in the erecting and completing of which all the inhabitants laboured without diftinction or intermiffion. At the fame time, an embargo was laid on all the shipping in the harbour: a measure of indifpenfable neceffity, calculated as well to obtain the affiftance of the feamen, as to fecure a retreat for the inhabitants in the laft extremity. To fuch of the diftant parishes as were open to communication either by land or by fea, notice of the revolt had been tranfmitted within a few hours after advice of it was received at the Cape; and the white inhabitants of many of thofe parishes had therefore found time to establish camps, and form a chain of pofts; which, for a fhort time, feemed to prevent the rebellion spreading beyond the northern province. Two of thofe camps, however, one at Grande Riviere, the other at Dondon, were attacked by the negroes (who were here openly joined by the mulattoes) and forced with great flaughter. At Dondon, the whites maintained the conteft for feven hours; but were overpowered by the infinite difparity of numbers, and compelled to give way, with the lofs of upwards of one hundred of their body. The furvivors took refuge in the Spanish territory. Senfible of this, the governor, by the advice of the affembly, determined to act for fome time folely on the defenfive; and as it was every moment to be apprehended that the revolters would pour down upon the town, the fit measure reforted to was to fortify the roads and paffes leading into it. At the eastern extremity, the main road from the plain is interfected by a river, which luckily had no bridge over it, and was crof. fed in ferry-boats. For the defence of this paffage, a battery of cannon Thefe two diftricts, therefore, the was raised on boats lafhed together; whole of the rich and extenfive plain while two finall camps were formed of the Cape, together with the conat proper diftances on the banks. tiguous mountains, were now wholly The other principal entrance into the abandoned to the ravages of the enetown, and contiguous to it, towards my, and the cruelties which they exthe fouth, was through a mountain- ercifed, uncontrouled, on fuch of the ous diftrict, called le Haut du Cap. miferable whites as fell into their Poffeffion was immediately taken of hands, cannot be remembered withthefe heights, and confiderable bo-_out horror, nor reported in terms 3 F2 Atrong ftrong enough to convey a proper delity aud attachment in a negro, as idea of their atrocity. They feized Mr Blen, an officer of the police, and having nailed him alive to one of the gates of his plantation, chopped off his limbs, one by one, with an axe. A poor man, named Robert, a carpenter by trade, endeavouring to conceal himself from the notice of the rebels, was difcovered in his hiding place; and the favages declared, that he fhould die in the way of his occupa tion: accordingly they bound him between two boards, and deliberately fawed him asunder. M. Cardineau, a planter of Grande Riviere, had two natural fons by a black woman. He had manumitted them in their infancy, and bred them up with great tenderness. They joined in the revolt; and when their father endeavoured to divert them from their purpofe, by foothing language and pecuniary offers, they took his money, and then ftabbed him to the heart. All the whites, and even the muJatto children whofe fathers had not joined in the revolt, were murdered without exception, frequently before the eyes, or clinging to the bofoms of their mothers. Young women, of all ranks, were first violated by a whole troop of barbarians, and then generally put to death. Some of them were indeed referved for the farther gratification of the luft of the favages, and others had their eyes fcooped out with a knife In the parish of Limbe, at a place called the Great Ravine, a venerable planter, the father of two beautiful young ladies, was tied down by a favage ringleader of a band, who ravished the eldest daughter in his prefence, and delivered over the young. eft to one of his followers: their pal fion being fatisfied, they flaughtered both the father and the daughters. Amidst thefe fcenes of horror, an infance, however, occurs of fuch fi is equally unexpected and affecting. Monfieur and Madame Baillon, their daughter and fon-in-law, and two white fervants, refiding on a mountain plantation about thirty miles from Cape Francois, were apprized of the revolt by one of their own flaves, who was himself in the confpiracy, but promifed, if poffible, to fave the lives of his matter and his family. Having no immediate means of providing for their escape, he conducted them into an adjacent wood; after which, he went and joined the revolters: the following night, he found an opportunity of bringing them provifions from the rebel camp. The fecond night he returned again, with a further supply of provifions; but declared, that it would be out of his power to give them any further affiftance. After this, they faw nothing of the negro for three days; but at the end of that time he came again and directed the family how to make their way to a river which led to Port Margot, affuring them, they would find a canoe on a part of the river which he described. They fol lowed his directions, found the canoe, and got fafely into it, but were overfet by the rapidity of the current, and, after a narrow escape, thought it beft to return to their retreat in the mountains. The negro, anxious for their fafety, again found them out, and directed them to a broader part of the river, where he affured them he had provided a boat; but faid it was the laft effort he could make to fave them. They went accordingly, but not finding the boat, gave themfelves up for loft, when the faithful negro again appeared like their guardian angel. He brought with him pigeons, poultry, and bread; and conducted the family, by flow marches in the night, along the banks of the river, until they were within fight of the wharf at Port Margot; when, telling them they were entire ly ly out of danger, he took his leave for ever, and went to join the rebels. The family were in the woods nineteen nights. Let us now turn our attention back to the town of the Cape; where the inhabitants being at length placed, or supposed to be placed, in fome fort of fecurity, it was thought neceffary by the governor and affembly, that of fenfive operations against the rebels fhould be renewed, and a fmall army, under the command of M. Rouvray, marched to the eastern part of the plain, and encamped at a place called Roucrou. A very confiderable body of the rebel negroes took poffeffion, about the fame time, of the large buildings on the plantation of M. Gallifet, and mounted fome heavy pieces of artillery on the walls. They had procured the cannon at different fhipping places and harbours along the coast, where it had been placed in time of war by the government, and imprudently left unprotected; but it was a matter of great furprize by what means they obtained ammunition*. From this plantation, they fent out foraging parties, with which the whites had frequent fkirmishes. In these engagements, the negroes feldom flood their ground longer than to receive and ren a single volley, but they appeared again the next day; and though they were at length driven out of their entrenchment with infinite flaughter, yet their numhers feemed not to diminish :-as foon as one body was cut off, another appeared, and thus they fucceeded in the object of haraffing and deftroying the whites by perpetual fatigue, and reducing the country to a defert. To detail the various conflicts, fkirmishes, maffacres, and scenes of flaughter, which this exterminating war produced, were to offer a dif gufting and frightful picture ;-a combination of horror ;-wherein we fhould behold cruelties unexampled in the annals of mankind; human blood poured forth in torrents; the earth blackened with afhes, and the air tainted with peftilence. It was computed that, within two months after the revolt first began, upwards of two thousand white perfons, of all conditions and ages, had been maffacred;-that one hundred and eighty fugar plantations, and about nine hundred coffee, cotton, and indigo fettlements had been deftroyed (the buildings thereon being confumed by fire,) and one thousand two hundred chriftian families reduced from opulence to fuch a state of misery as to depend altogether for their clothing and fuftenance on public and private charity. Of the infurgents, it was reckoned that upwards of ten thoufand had perished by the fword or by famine; and fame hundreds by the hands of the executioner :-many of them, I grieve to fay, under the torture of the wheel;-a fyftem of revenge and retaliation, which no enormities of favage life could juftify or excufet: REMARKS * It was difcovered afterwards that great quantities of powder and ball were ftolen by the negroes in the town of Cape Francois, from the king's arfenal, and fecretly conveyed to the rebels. Moft of the fire-arms at firft in their poffeffion were fupposed to have been part of Oge's importation. But it grieves me to add, that the rebels were afterwards abundantly fupplied, by small veffels from North America ; the mafters of which felt no fcruple to receive, in payment, fugar and rum, from eftates of which the owners had been murdered by the men with whom they trafficked. Two of thefe unhappy men fuffered in this manner, under the window of the author's lodgings, and in his prefence, at Cape Francois, on Thursday the 28th of September, 1791. They were broken on two pieces of timber placed croffwife. One of them expired, on receiving the third stroke on his stomach, cach of his legs and arms having been firft broken in two places; the first three blows he bore without a groan. REMARKS ON THE ANTIQUITIES OF ROME AND ITS ENVIRONS. By Mr Lumifden. Of the Catacombs, or Subterraneous B Rome. UT here we are particularly to view the Catacombs, or fubter. raneous Rome, where we may wander under ground an incredible diftance, among the manfions of the dead. In traverfing these dark paffages, an affociation of ideas naturally throws a gloom on the mind of the curious inquirer. We find catacombs in many places round Rome, viz. at the churches of St Laurence, St Agnefe, &c. but thofe of St Sebaftian are commonly vifited by ftrangers. The entry to them is within the church. They are a kind of labyriaths, with many branches running off in different directions, and there are even stories above stories of them: fo that without torches, and a good guide, it is unsafe to examine; and it is dangerous to vifit them in the fummer feafon, as the cold in thefe grottos is fo much greater than that of the external air. Bofio, Arinhi, and others, have defcribed and published many monuments and infcriptions found in these catacombs. They generally pretend that they were made by the primitive Chriftians, to which they retired in time of perfecution, and where they performed the rites of their religion. To fup pofe that the perfecuted Chriftians could fecretly execute fuch immense works, in which they might conceal themselves, is abfurd. And would they not, in time of perfecution, readily fearch for them in these Catacombs, known to all the world? It is therefore, I think, more probable, that they were dug by the ancient Romans, and served for two purposes; First, the earth, pozzolana, and materials taken from them, ferved to carry on their vaft buildings, without deftroying the furface of the ground. And, fecondly, these paffages ferved for burying places to the ordinary people and flaves, who had not particular fepulchres; especially after the Campus Efquilinus was given to Mæ. cenas. It is true, as many of the bodies of Chriftians and martyrs had been likewife buried in these places, it induced Christians to erect altars there, and pay a great devotion to them. The bodies of the dead are depofited along the fides of the catacombs, in rows piled up, one above another, to a confiderable height; and they are shut up with bricks and flabs of ftone or marble. It is from hence that the monks, who have got poffeffion of them, have produced fo many holy bodies and relics. For wherever they find a crofs cut upon a ftone, and with the body a glafs vial a groan. The other had a harder fate. When the executioner, after breaking his legs and arms; lifted up the inftrument, to give the finishing ftroke on the breaft, and which (by putting the criminal out of his pain) is called le coup de grace, the mob, with the ferocioufnels of cannibals, called out Arretez!" (ftop) and compelled him to leave his work unfinished. In that condition, the miferable wretch, with his broken limbs doubled up, was put on a cart-wheel, which was placed horizontally, one end of the axle-tree being driven into the earth. He feemed perfectly fenfible, but uttered not a groan. At the end of forty minutes, fome English feamen, who were fpectators of the tragedy, ftrangled him in mercy. As to all the French fpectators (many of them perfons of fashion, who beheld the fcene from the windows of their upper apartments,) it grieves me to fay, that they looked on with the moft perfect compofure and fang froid. Some of the ladies, as I was told, even ridiculed, with a great deal of unfeemly mirth, the fympathy manifefted by the Englifh at the fufferings of the wretched criminals. |