MARCH 16.
It is to be wished, that the negroes would content themselves
with their occasional amusements of poisoning, stabbing, thieving,
&c., on a small scale ; but a
plan has just been discovered
in the adjoining parish of St. Elizabeth's, for giving, themselves a
grand fete by murdering all the whites in the island. The focus
of this meditated insurrection was on Martin's Penn, the property of Lord
Balcarras, where the
overseer is an old man of the
mildest character, and the negroes had always been treated with
peculiar indulgence. Above a thousand persons were engaged
in the plot, three hundred of whom had been regularly sworn to
assist in it with all the usual accompanying ceremonies of drinking human
blood, eating earth
from graves, &c. Luckily, the
plot was discovered time enough to prevent any mischief; and
yesterday the ringleaders were to be tried at Black River.
