It is uttering no calumny against the people of Holland (I speak not of them as individuals, but as a nation), to say that they have ever been considered and proved the most cruel and severe task-masters: if we look, however, beyond the mere surface of things, we shall probably find that their conduct in this respect has arisen from qualities highly estimable and praiseworthy in themselves,—that, most persevering, industrious, and punctual in all his duties, his dealings, and private transactions in business, the Hollander has no sympathy with the idle, the indolent, or dissipated, portion of his fellow-creatures. The Dutchman's system is to compel obedience to his orders and regulations, more by the severity of his punishments, than by any marks of his kindness, or any promises of reward. He was taught in youth that the very utmost stretch of human exertion, to accomplish what he was ordered to perform, was a right or duty which he owed to his parents and superiors; and when he grew up, he felt that he had a claim to demand the same obedience from all his inferiors. Nature, therefore, had made him a very Jew in demanding the entire of his pound of flesh, and it is no difficult matter to account for the greater prevalence of Dutch feeling and Dutch practice amongst the British colonists in Guiana than in any other of our conquered possessions.