The British Caribbean before emancipation has been described as "a barbarian community”. 1 Except perhaps for Barbados which had a relatively large and stable white population, the plantocracy in the various islands had made no serious attempt to establish permanent institutions of any kind in the West Indies and there was no systematic provision for education with four main social groups being identifiable - at the top, the whites made up of attorneys, planters, professionals, men of business who concentrated most of the political and all of the economic power in their own hands. 2 Immediately below this group and united to it by colour, were the white tradesmen, book-keepers and poor whites who farmed a few acres. Next came the growing body of free black and coloured people who were increasingly prosperous, and whose main objective was to become as close to the whites as possible in manners, dress, appearance and behaviour.3 At the bottom was the large mass of unpaid, unlettered slaves.