It was not a question in Port of Spain, any more than it is in Martinique, of whether the Negroes should be able to read and write, but of whether they should exist on the earth at all for a few generations longer.

I say this openly and deliberately; and clergymen and police magistrates know but too well what I mean.

The priesthood were, and are, doing their best to save the Negro; and they naturally wished to do their work, on behalf of society and of the colony, in their own way; and to subordinate all teaching to that of religion, which includes, with them, morality and decency.

They therefore opposed the Government schools; because they tended, it was thought, to withdraw the Negro from his priest's influence.
I am not likely, I presume, to be suspected of any leaning toward Romanism.

But I think a Roman Catholic priest would have a right to a fair and respectful hearing, if he said:-- 'You have set these people free, without letting them go through that intermediate stage of feudalism, by which, and by which alone, the white races of Europe were educated into true freedom.