Where the Twain Meet

by Mary Gaunt

From the mountain-side where we dwelt at the Hyde, we looked out over wooded hill and valley, coconut palms cut the sky-line, in the deeper hollows was the vivid green of sugar cane, and the bottoms between the hills were pasture land whereon were mules and horses and cattle, red and white. Always it was hill and dale, woodland and pasture, and flamboyant trees made splashes of gorgeous colour, there were plumps of dark green pimento trees like the myrtle groves wherein the gods of ancient Greece held high revel, there were orange trees and lemon trees with golden fruit and white blossoms that filled the air with fragrance; by moonlight it was fairyland and with the dawn all along the valleys and lowlands and in the clefts of the hills lay a fleecy, soft grey mist, the softest, tenderest mist that refreshed the land and added to its luxuriant fertility. And a little higher up, standing beneath a symmetrical broad leaf or a giant cotton tree, it was possible to see the blue Caribbean flecked with white waves or stilly reflecting the cloudless blue sky above. A lovely land the Maroons had for themselves for all time, and they loved it these long lithe warrior slaves with the quick wild and fiery eyes. But savages they were, and it was to keep some sort of check upon them that a white superintendent with helpers was set to live amongst them. Principally it seemed he was there to see that they did not maintain too friendly relations with the slaves from the plantations. He was bound to reside in the town, from which he could not be absent longer than a fortnight, and every three months he had to make a return on oath to the Governor of the number residing in his town, how many were able to bear arms, how many were fit for duty, the number of women and children, their increase and decrease.

So the white people kept in touch with their former enemies.

And the principal job of those enemies was to bring in runaways. They did that undoubtedly, and presently a law was passed allowing not only the usual reward, but a little extra if the slave was brought in alive.

They might have dances among themselves, and provided the dance was in the daytime with a small number of slaves. But the slaves were not to gather in Maroon Town and they were not to hold slaves of their own.

And lest they should be a danger to the country no party in pursuit of runaways was to consist of more than twelve men and was not to remain out more than twenty days, and before they went out they had to be provided with a written order from their superintendent. They were not to be employed by any white person without a written agreement and they were not to be whipped or otherwise ill-treated, and as they increased fast they had the right to relinquish their rights as Maroons and to live elsewhere in the island as free blacks.

Some of these laws had very little attention paid them. They kept slaves and bought them, they wandered about the island apparently wherever they chose, and many of them formed temporary connections with the women on the plantations. And so slack were they in their search for runaways that a large body of these emulated the Maroons themselves, and lived for over twenty years in the heart of the mountains between the eastern and the western Maroons.

The planters made no objections to their connections with their slaves, for the children of such connections belonged to them and were likely to have the strength and vigour of their fathers. But though the Maroons left these children in bondage as carelessly as did the whites in like case, still the connections thus formed must have broken away in a small measure the bitterness that was supposed to exist between the Maroon and the slave, and every child by his very vigour deepened the danger that for ever threatened the planters.

However, it was peace between the planters and the black freebooters, nominally at least for over fifty years. Doubtless there was much friction and discontent, but things always quieted down, till in 1795 the smouldering fire broke into flames again.

The causes of the second Maroon war as given by Dallas and others point to gross mismanagement on the part of someone, but we can hardly judge now of the provocation on either side.

Anyhow, there was trouble with the superintendent, a white man whom the Maroons liked and trusted, but who apparently was so slack he was away from his post for weeks at a time, and the Government suspended him and placed another man in his place. Then two Maroons, whom the Maroons openly said they counted of little worth, stole some hogs, and were apprehended and taken to Montego Bay and given thirty-nine lashes by—and there lay the sting for the unconquered Maroons—a common slave in the workhouse.