18th_, 1836." ] The conversation on the subject of emancipation served to show that the prevailing sentiment was decidedly favorable to the free system.

Col.
Jarvis, who is the proprietor of three estates, said that he was in England at the time the bill for immediate emancipation passed the legislature.

Had he been in the island he should have opposed it; but _now_ he was glad it had prevailed.

The evil consequences which he apprehended had not been realized, and he was now confident that they never would be.
As to prejudice against the black and colored people, all thought it was rapidly decreasing--indeed, they could scarcely say there was now any such thing.

To be sure, there was an aversion among the higher classes of the whites, and especially among _females_, to associating in parties with colored people; but it was not on account of their _color_, but chiefly because of their _illegitimacy_.