CUT HIM WIFE 'MOAT OUT SIR,—When Jamaica is assuming her
independence as a nation and taking her place with other adult members of the Commonwealth it is disappointing to find you printing an article which suggests that she is still in a state of feudal backwardness.
Mr. Crawshaw (only a male observer, pre- sumably, would think that the white Sunday frocks are made of muslin) should buy a copy of Jamaica Talk by Professor Frederick Cassidy to supplement his efforts at understanding Jamaican conversation. He would then realise that 'Massa' and 'missy' may be appropriate in Uncle Tom's Deep South but that the equivalents in Jamaica are 'Baas' and 'missis.' `Chill'n' is good Negro spiritual but 'pickney" is universal Jamaican, The genuine Cockpit Country is only penetrated occasionally (and with great diffi- culty) by university scientific expeditions. There are no roads into it and the Maroons, like the rum shops, got no farther than the fringes, mainly at Accompong.
One or two misstatements of fact would not, how- ever, matter much, It is Mr. Crawshaw's tone which is objectionable. It implies that Jamaica is still, if it ever was, a quaint old colonial backwater where a few landowners enjoy gracious, if Victorian, living, where the natives live by superstition, promiscuity and drugs, and are inadequately controlled by police with all the virtues and weaknesses of fictional British constables as well as a few of their own. Such an article" will be in place in a few years' time when we shall all recognise it as a caricature as enter- taining as The Pirates of Penzance in respect to England.
24 Ravenhill Avenue, Bristol 3
B. L. MACLEAVY
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