in a most deplorable condition. Of the negroes, thirty-nine had become perfectly blind-twelve had lost an eyeand fourteen were affected with blemishes more or less considerable. Of the crew, twelve lost their sight entirely, among whom was the surgeon-five became blind of one eye, one of them being the captain-and four were partially injured.

It is stated, among other things, that the captain caused several of the negroes who were prevented in the attempt to throw themselves overboard, to be shot and hung, in the hope that the example might deter the rest from a similar conduct. But even this severity proved unavailing; and it became necessary to confine the slaves entirely to the hold, during the remainder of the voyage. It is further stated, that upward of thirty of the slaves who became blind were thrown into the sea and drowned; on the principle, that, had they been landed at Gaudaloupe, no one would have bought them, and that the proprietors would consequently have incurred the expense of maintaining them without the chance of any return while, by throwing them overboard, not only was this certain loss avoided, but ground was also laid for a claim on the underwriters by whom the cargo had been insured; and who are said to have allowed the claim, and made good the value of the slaves thus destroyed.

At the statement of this case, and particularly of the fact last mentioned, by M. Constant, in the Chamber of Deputies, an expression of horror very naturally pervaded the Assembly.

The other case is as follows: The master of the La Jeune Estelle, on the vessel being boarded, on the 4th of March, 1820, by the boats of His Majesty's ship Tartar, commanded by Sir G. Collier, declared that he had been plundered of his slaves, and that none remained on board. His agitation

and alarm, however, excited suspicion; and led to an examination of the vessel's hold. During this examination, a sailor, who struck a cask which was tightly closed up, heard a faint voice issue from it, as of a creature expiring. The cask was immediately opened, when two girls, of about twelve or fourteen years of age, in the last stage of suffocation, were found to be enclosed in it; and, by this providential interposition, were probably rescued from a miserable death.

These girls, when brought on the deck of the Tartar, were recognised by a person on board, who had been taken prisoner in another slave ship, as having been the property of the captain of a schooner belonging to New-York. An investigation having taken place, it appeared that this American contrabandist had died at a place on the coast called Trade Town, leaving behind him fourteen slaves, of whom these two girls formed a part; and that, after his death, the master of the vessel had landed his crew, armed with swords and pistols, and carried these fourteen slaves on board the Jeune Estelle.

With respect to the other twelve, no distinct information could be obtained beyond the assertion of the master, that he had been plundered of them by a Spanish pirate; but it was recollected, with horror, by the officers of the Tartar, that when they first began the chase of La Jeune Estelle, they had seen several casks floating past them, in which they now suspected that these wretched beings might have been enclosed; having been thrown overboard by this man, to elude the detection of his piratical proceedings. It was now impossible, however, to ascertain the fact, as the chase had led them many leagues to leeward: and even after they had consumed the time, which would have been necessary, by beating to windward, to reach the place where the chase commenced, there were many chances against their again seeing the casks; and not the slightest probability, that any of the slaves enclosed in them,

Havannah, which represents the Slave Trade there as in a very flourishing state, and as chiefly carried on under the flag of France. The Directors have represented this circumstance to Lord Castlereagh; who agreed with them that such proceedings were in violation, not only of the engagements of France, but of the Treaty between Great Britain and Spain for the Abolition of the Slave Trade; and that Spain should be called on to fulfil her engagements, by effectually guarding against such an abuse.

By Portugal.

The period for the Abolition of the Slave Trade by Portugal remains still undetermined; although various discussions have taken place respecting it, between the British and Portuguese Governments.

A flagrant instance of the barbarities, which a familiarity with the Slave Trade has a tendency to produce, recently occurred in the case of a Portuguese Vessel called the Volcano do Sul. She was captured by his Majesty's ship Pheasant, with 260 Slaves on board: and, in the passage to Sierra Leone, her captain and crew rose on the British Officer and Sailors, murdered them all, and then carried the vessel into Bahia, where the Slaves were landed and sold.

The Directors trust that this atrocity will be strictly investigated, with a view to bring the perpetrators of it to justice.

Whether the recent changes in the Government of Portugal will afford any facilities in arranging this matter, it is impossible at present to say; but they have appeared to the Directors to afford

a favourable opportunity for distributing information in Portugal respecting

the real nature of the Slave Trade.

With this view, the Directors have pro

cured translations to be made into Portuguese of the Spanish Tract entitled, "Sketch of the Slave Trade, and Re

flections on that Traffic," written some years ago, at their request, by Mr. Blanco White; and also of an abridg

ment of Mr. Clarkson's History of the Abolition of the Slave Trade. The former work has already been found useful, in enlightening the public mind in Spain, and in promoting there the Cause of the Abolition. The translations of these works are now printed and ready for distribution.

Believing that the Public Mind in other foreign countries is even yet but ill-informed respecting the nature of the Slave Trade, the Directors have turned their attention to the best means of diffusing such information; with a view of exciting in those countries that moral abhorrence of this commerce to the prevalence of which in England must be attributed, not only our Acts for its Abolition, but the degree in which those Acts have proved effectual to their object for the Directors are well persuaded, that to the want of a similar feeling, which a full acquaintance with the innate criminality of this Trade could not fail to generate, much of the difficulty which has occurred to the British Government, in their representations on this subject to Foreign Pow ers, is to be ascribed.

REPORT OF A SPECIAL COMMITTEE.

It had been referred to a Special Committee, to form a Digest of the information relative to the Slave Trade, recently laid on the Table of the House of Commons; and to communicate such Digest, with their Observations thereon, to the Board. This communication was made to the Directors on the 8th of May; and has been printed, by their order, as a Supplement to the Annual Reoccupies 180 pages; and is fillport of the present year. It ed with details, the nature and bearing of which are clearly stated, by the Committee themselves, in the following summary of its contents:

The Committee feel that it will be impossible for any Member of the African Institution to peruse these documents without strong emotions. They exhibit, on the part of our Government, a perpetual and painful struggle against the apathy and negligence (to use the very mildest terms of which the case will admit) of those whom it has been urging, almost without intermission, but hitherto almost in vain, to perform their solemn contracts, to redeem their repeated pledges, and to act up to their public declarations.

If a close scrutiny might be.able to discover one or two instances, in which opportunities of beneficial interference may have been overlooked, even by our own Government, yet the comparison between its conduct in regard to the Slave Trade and that of the other Members of the Alliance, is too honourable to Great Britain, and too gratifying to the friends of Africa, to be passed without observation.

In other countries, the men in power, with few exceptions, appear to have contented themselves with bare professions, and to have made few or no spontaneous exertions in this cause. Even some of the best disposed among them have appeared rather resentful of complaint, as if it implied a charge of insincerity, than earnest by their conduct to obviate the possibility of such an imputation: nay, instances are not wanting, still judging from appearances, where they have sought rather to excuse criminals, than to discover, to punish, or even to restrain them. And when such are the dispositions manifested by persons in high station, it were folly to indulge any other expectation than that the subaltern agents both abroad and at home should be not only generally supine, but too frequently conniving and corrupt.

In the case of one Power, the Committee find the attempt revived to hide the enormities of its Slave Trade under the miserable pretence of concern for the souls of those, on whose bodily and mental feelings they scruple not to inflict the most grievous of all injuries.

In another, they discover an apparently fixed determination to cling to this flagitious Commerce at all hazards, unless it can wring, from the sympathies of this country toward Africa, a large redeeming price for the blood which it will otherwise deliberately shed, and for the agonies and tortures which it will otherwise deliberately inflict.

By a third, of whom better things might have been expected, the utmost pains have been taken to establish such a limitation of its own solemn engagements, as must fritter away or wholly destroy all the beneficial effects which they were designed to produce, so long as one state in Europe shall be found unprincipled enough to connive at crimes which it has professed to renounce and punish; or so long as Portugal, persisting in her determination to perpetuate a trade which she has declared to be a violation of the sacred principles of religion and humanity, shall be able to supply a human victim from her own possessions in Angola, or to glean man, woman, or child from the interior of Africa.

Of the conduct of a fourth power, the committee are unwilling to express themselves in terms that would appropriately convey their feelings. They will, therefore, abstain from the attempt; in the hope, that, in a country where public opinion is not without very considerable influence, and where information may be widely diffused, the bare statement of the facts of the case will produce their due effect, both on the government and the people.

They would only remark, that every one of these governments, whose subjects, it will be seen, carry on the Slave Trade, almost without disguise, and certainly with impunity, has joined in the unequivocal reprobation of the traffic, in language as strong as the most sincere detestation could suggest.

It seems important, also, to remark, that while Great Britain has been waging this unequal conflict with the avarice and profligacy of the traders of so many other states, which have certain

ly not shown any extraordinary ardour in repressing the crimes of their own subjects, it has derived but little aid from the reclamations and remonstrances of Austria, Russia, and Prussia: who stand equally pledged with Great Britain, to enforce and execute the solemn sentence pronounced on the Slave Trade, by the powers of Europe assembled in congress at Vienna; and to provide that it shall not be rendered abortive, by the arts or the influence of the miscreants who are engaged in carrying it on.

America alone has practically seconded our efforts with cordiality. But even this power-anxious as the committee believe her to be in her wishes to destroy this enormous evil, in which too many of her own subjects still participate-is restrained, by certain constitutional considerations, from that full cooperation which is necessary to its effectual repression. If, however, the report shall be confirmed-that she has, by a legislative enactment, stamped the Slave Trade with the brand of piracy; and subjected every citizen of the United States, as well as every foreigner sailing under the American flag, who shall be engaged in carrying it on, to capital punishment-she will have elevated her character to a height to which other nations may look with envy; and she will have set an example, which Great Britain, the committee cannot doubt, will be among the very first to imitate, and which must, sooner or later, become a part of the universal code of the civilized world.

Of the four powers referred to in this extract, the first is that of Spain-the second, Portugal -the third, the Netherlands and the fourth, France. The report that the United States had made the Slave Trade piracy, has been since confirmed.

Since the appearance of the Supplemental Report, resolutions and addresses to His Ma

jesty grounded on the documents contained therein, have been unanimously adopted by both Houses of Parliament-in the House of Lords, on the motion of the Marquis of Lansdowne; and in the House of Commons, on that of Mr. Wilberforce.

These resolutions and addresses are in full accordance with the sentiments of the special committee above stated, and enter at large and forcibly into the conduct of the Euro

pean powers. Of the late proceedings of the American States it is said

In witnessing the conduct of the Legislature of the United States on this occasion, we are led to reflect, with grateful exultation on our common origin, and on those common laws and institutions, whose liberal spirit has prompted our American brethren to be among the foremost in thus stampvery ing on a traffic in the persons of our fellow-creatures its just character and designation: and we cannot but express our earnest hopes, that not only we ourselves shall speedily follow so honourable an example, but that the day is not far distant, when, by the general concurrence of all civilized nations, this detestable traffic shall be pronounced to be piratical, to be an offence against all human kind, which all are entitled and bound by duty to suppress.

The conclusion of the resolutions of the House of Commons is worthy of the Representatives of a free and enlightened people :

While we thus entreat His Majesty, to concert with other powers the means of carrying into complete effect this great cause, we are not merely prompted by a sense of what is due to the general obligations of justice and humanity : we cannot but feel, that to Africa we owe a debt, which conscience and honour oblige us to repay; and, though