It was a necessary qualification of the former to possess no property; hence the most worthless vagabonds on the island were appointed.

The latter were worn out officers and dissipated rakes, whom the English government sent off here in order to get rid of them." As a specimen of the latter kind, this gentleman mentioned one (special Justice Light) who died lately from excessive dissipation.

He was constantly drunk, and the only way in which to get him to do any business was to take him on to an estate in the evening so that he might sleep off his intoxication, and then the business was brought before him early the next morning, before he had time to get to his cups.
It is well known that many of the special magistrates are totally unprincipled men, monsters of cruelty, lust, and despotism.

As a result of natural character in many cases, and of dependence upon planters in many more, the great mass of the special justices are a disgrace to their office, and to the government which commissioned them.

Out of sixty, the number of special justices in Jamaica, there are not more than fifteen, or twenty at farthest, who are not the merest tools of the attorneys and overseers.