"From this specimen," moralizes our hero, "the reader will easily
perceive, that, if some of the inhabitants of Surinam show themselves
the disgrace of the creation by their cruelties and brutality, others,
by their social feelings, approve themselves an ornament to the human
species. With this instance of virtue and generosity I therefore
conclude this chapter."
But the troops soon had to undergo worse troubles than those of the
_commisariat_. The rainy season had just set in. "As for the negroes,"
said Mr. Klynhaus, the last planter with whom they parted, "you may
depend on never seeing a soul of them, unless they attack you off
guard; but the climate, the climate, will murder you all." Bringing
with them constitutions already impaired by the fevers and dissipation
of Paramaribo, the poor boys began to perish long before they began to
fight. Wading in water all day, hanging their hammocks over water at
night, it seemed a moist existence, even compared with the climate of
England and the soil of Holland. It was "Invent a shovel and be a
magistrate," even more than Andrew Marvell found it in the United
Provinces. In fact, Raynal evidently thinks that nothing but Dutch
experience in hydraulics could ever have cultivated Surinam.
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