and inhaling the miasma. On one Sunday, the pedition had been so contemptuously disregarded, 23rd, says Dr. M'William, "the thermometer was proprietor of a small steamer which he embeing at 92° in the coolest part of the ship, ser-ployed in the African trade. He had generously vice was performed by Mr. Schön; but what with sent out directions to her commander, Mr. Bedeath, with those that had left us at the conflu- croft, to render the queen's steamers, in any way ence, and those lying sick around us, the congre- in his power, the assistance which he foresaw they gation seemed reduced to a mere skeleton of what would require; and that officer, hearing from the it had been." A chief came alongside in the af- crew of the Soudan that the Albert still remained ternoon with three slaves in his canoe. He turned in the river, proceeded at once in Mr. Jamieson's out to be the son of the potentate with whom the vessel, the Ethiope, in search of her. On the expedition had just concluded the anti-slavery trea- 13th the miserable survivors in the Albert espied ty at Iddah-a prince who, during Oldfield's visit with surprise and delight this little steamer comto his region, had, on the occasion of his broth- ing up the river to meet them. Capt. Becroft er's death, ensured to the defunct the sincere grief promptly sent his engineers on board and piloted of his family, by administering to his sixty widows them through the intricate shoals obstructing the a mortal dose, from the effects of which thirty-entrance to the Niger, with which he was well one died outright, and the twenty-nine who sur- acquainted. Had it not been for his seasonable vived were 66 grievously griped ;" and who had, aid, the few who now survive would have in all moreover, admitted having poisoned several of probability perished dismally, aground on those Laird's people. To this murderous savage Capt. burning and pestilential sand-banks. On the Trotter, surrounded by his dying comrades, in pur- 21st of October, after their arrival at Sierra suance of his instructions, gravely read, in what Leone, Mr. Willie died, and, finally, Dr. M'Willanguage we are left to guess, "the laws relating liam's health and spirits gave way, and he lay beto slave-dealing, and also his father's treaty abol-tween life and death for three weeks. During ishing slavery forever in his dominions!" that period Capt. Bird Allen, Lieut. Stenhouse, Mr. Woodhouse, assistant-surgeon, Mr. Wilmot, clerk, and many other brave proxies for the ardent philanthropists at home, paid the debt of nature. -The scenes on board the Soudan, since she had left the model farm with her dying freight, had been no less awful. When her gallant commander, Lieut. Fishbourne, brought her into Fernando Po, he was the only efficient man on board. The Wilberforce arrived there on the 1st of October in an equally distressed condition. As soon as the news of these horrors reached England, it was of course decided that both the diplomatic and agricultural branches of the scheme must be abandoned; but it then became necessary that one vessel should reäscend the river, and rescue the survivors, if any, of the band who had been so strangely left on the wreck of the metropolis. Eight volunteers, six of whom had already proved the dangers of that fatal scene, readily undertook the humane task; and the Wilberforce, under the command of Lieut. Webb, reëntered the Nun on the 2nd of July, reached the conflux of the Niger and the Tchadda on the 18th, and succeeded in bringing out the people and the Amelia schooner on the 27th. During the twenty-five days they were thus employed, seven of this small party, although by this time somewhat inured to the climate, were again stricken down by fever-two died. On the 3rd of October, being within two days' journey of Rabbah, Capt. Trotter himself was assailed by fever. At that time there remained on board capable of doing duty, Dr. M'William, Dr. Stanger, the geologist, Mr. Willie, mate, the sergeant, and one private of marines, one seaman, and a hospital-assistant. It was therefore decided that they should proceed no further. Dr. Stanger took charge of the engine, and Dr. M'William of the ship, for the mate was compelled to give in that very evening, and all the engineers were either dead or helpless. Two invalids, in despair, cast themselves overboard-one perished. On the 8th, Dr. M'William observes, "Had we run aground with a falling river at that period, the certain consequences, under all circumstances, were but too dreadful to contemplate. At this time the anxiety of Dr. Stanger and myself for the safety of the vessel, and our mental anguish at seeing nearly all our shipmates in a helpless condition, cannot be expressed.' On the 9th this death-ship reached the confluence of the rivers where the Buxtonian metropolis of African civilization had been founded, and the Amelia schooner moored. On boarding her, the schoolmaster and the gardener were found in fever in their berths; and on shore, in the Eglintoun tournament-tent, the superintendent lay in a dying state. These, and a few others, who were also sick, they took on board: "A great many of the colored people wished to Of the 145 Europeans who originally entered the return; but as they had previously volunteered to river-steady, sober men, carefully selected for the stop there, they were not allowed to leave." (Dun- duty, in the prime of life, mostly seasoned by prevican.) The farm was therefore left without su- ous tropical service, and provided with every comfort perintendent, farmer, schoolmaster, surgeon, or and palliative which medical art could suggest and gardener, in charge of a negro sailor. Mr. Duncan the most lavish expenditure provide all save one naïvely remarks, "I fear the result will not be suffered-forty lie buried on the banks of the very favorable." On the 10th the Albert resumed Niger. And thus ended Mr. Buxton's celebrated her race for life to the coast. Mr. Jamieson, attempt to discharge what he and Mr. Stephen at of Liverpool, whose remonstrances against the ex- that time were pleased to term "the national debu due by England to Africa,"- -a debt which the whig ministry are now so eager to repudiate. But, notwithstanding this melodious authority, every well-informed person is now agreed as to Having not the least desire to deal hardly by the actual condition some few years ago of the these no doubt well-meaning gentlemen, we shall laboring population in these colonies. We will here insert the apology which at a meeting at Ex-quote on that point a witness whose sagacity and eter Hall they themselves put forward in defence motives no one can question, and then advert to it of their conduct in this business :--no more. The late Lord Metcalfe wrote thus to Lord John Russell from Jamaica on the 1st of November, 1841 : "It is very unjust to press more heavily on the misfortunes of pure unmixed benevolence than on those of mere gain. The merchants of Liverpool were allowed, not only without blame, but with commendation for the hardihood of their enterprise, to send forty-eight white men up the Niger, for the development of the commercial resources of the country, and to bring back eight of those men. Not only was no cry raised against them, for staying at home while they exposed others to danger, but on the contrary the loudest expressions of public approbation were bestowed on them for their enterprise." merly slaves, but now perfectly free, and more inde"With respect to the laboring population, forpendent than the same class in other free countries, venture to say that in no country in the world can they be more abundantly provided with the necessaries and comforts of life, more at their ease, or more secure from oppression, than in Jamaica; and I may add, that ministers of the gospel for their religious instruction and schools for the education of their children are established in all parts of the island, with a tendency to constant increase." We are willing to give the friends of the African full credit for any good which they have really brought about, and we are moreover ready to admit that their motives have been generally pure-setting We are quite prepared to allow that their efforts aside, perhaps, a little vanity and want of charity. From long observation and humiliating experience, we have unwillingly been driven to the cynical conclusion that " pure, unmixed benevolence" is almost as dangerous an agent to tamper with as gun-cotton, unless it be freely diluted with the less transcendent qualities of practical knowledge and common sense. Macgregor Laird deservedly incurred the admiration of the public for himself head-somewhat accelerated the extinction of slavery in ing an expedition which might, in his opinion, have led to great results both in a philanthropic and a commercial point of view-his merits were none the less because his object was defeated by the climate, the nature of which had been, until his visit, reported to be far healthier than that of the coast. Mr. Buxton and his friends, however, had no great right to be surprised that the same meed of praise was withheld from them, when, in defiance of Laird's experience and repeated warnings, they persisted in despatching others to succumb under dangers which were then known to be insuperable, for purposes in the history of which the horrible scarcely predominates over the ludicrous.* the British dominions, and have since mainly tended But that slavery would have been abolished long to raise the negro to his present enviable position. ere this, throughout our colonies, without their further believe, that had they been less impatient interference, we are equally convinced; and we and impracticable, or had the government of that day been less susceptible to “ pressure from with out," a most wanton sacrifice of life and property advantageous results in favor of the negro and of might have been spared, and far more permanently our colonies might have been insured. their triumphs over justice and common sense, had But to proceed :-these gentlemen, elated with not the discernment to perceive that in every coun We now propose to accompany our readers on a short visit to the beautiful islands of the Carib-try the interests of the employer and the employed bean sea, which, we have no doubt, the lawgivers of the Strand contemplate with far more satisfaction than the pestilential scenes of their incapacity which we very willingly quit. One of their "Hymns for Public Worship" has this stan za: "Hasten to some distant isle In the bosom of the deep, * In order that our readers may be enabled to estimate the market value which pure unmixed benevolence bore at that time in England, as compared with the same article when adulterated with sense and reflection, unselfish courage, and effective humanity, we may as well here state, that for the respective parts which they played in this tragedy, Mr. Jamieson received no recompense whatever; Capt. Becroft, who saved the Albert at the risk of his life, was presented with 100l.; Mr. Buxton was made a baronet; and Mr. Stephen is now a privy councillor. The naval officers and men, of whose conduct it is impossible to speak too highly, were, we suppose, promoted to the death vacancies. +Heard sung in full chorus by a congregation of the Church of England, in Dublin, August, 1843-so says Mr. Thackeray.-Irish Tour, vol. ii., p. 149. for the good of the newly-emancipated negroes that must be coïdentical. They settled that it was a monopoly of labor should be secured to them, and tional immigrants, especially from Africa, as a therefore resisted all attempts at introducing addirevival of the slave-trade under another name. In short, they assumed it as their rule of action, that whatever was advantageous to the white land-owner must be prejudicial to their protégés. The planters, possessing a vast capital invested in the soil, in machinery, drainage, cultivation, and cattle, were thus compelled to submit to pay an extortionate rate of wages. They indulged the hope that, ere long, reason would resume her sway, and that they would be permitted to employ the 20,000,000. granted to them as compensation in procuring sufficient hands from abroad to cultivate their estates; for the difficulty of inducing the creole negroes to work, of course increased in proportion to the high wages paid to them. Their demands were based upon too just a principle to be directly refused ;— but for several years they were evaded, and when at last some slight concessions were made, they would have ultimately thriven upon the decay of were of a complicated and limited nature which the latter. The revolution of last year has, howrendered them valueless. Without entering more ever, involved all our free-labor sugar colories in fully into this branch of the subject, we shall con- one common ruin; and, it is needless to add, the ́tent ourselves with stating that, five years after chiefest brawlers in the present parliament for the evidence had been given before a committee of the cheap slave-grown sugars of Cuba and Brazil are house of commons, whereof Lord John Russell the very statesmen who fifteen years ago raised was a member, which must have satisfied the most themselves to power and popularity by their unconprejudiced that the laboring population of the West trollable hostility to the existence of slavery in the India colonies were generally in the state of social British dominions. and moral prosperity described by Sir C. Metcalfe, We ourselves are not astonished at this. The Sir H. M'Leod, and Governor Light-that the con-whigs have long been notorious for their propensity dition of the African at Sierra Leone was miserable to scud before the popular breeze, and it is quite and useless-that additional labor was urgently in character that the very minister who despatched required in the three great colonies of Guiana, the Soudan, Albert, and Wilberforce to found a Trinidad, and Jamaica-that the activity or languor of the slave-trade depended entirely on the high or low price of slave-sugar, and not at all on the presence of the combined squadron on the coast —and that the only efficient weapon by which that traffic could be successfully combatted was cheap freegrown produce-five years after all this, we say, we find, that during the last four months of 1847 upwards of 4000 slaves have been captured by our cruisers;—and that of these, in spite of the remarkable report of the committee of 1842 and the promises subsequently made by Lord John Russell to the West Indians in 1846, 2000 are known to have been, as heretofore, apprenticed to idleness, vice, and want in Sierra Leone, and but 300 have reached our West Indian colonies. Meantime the planters have been forced in despair to accept Coolie immigration, which from the physical debility and peculiar habits of that people, and from the expense of bringing them from such a distant point, has proved a total failure. city on the confluence of the Niger and the Tchadda, Every one interested in the welfare of the old sugar colonies foresaw that a time was not very remote when capital would cease to flow in that direction, if the course of policy we have here described was persisted in, and when the 20,000,000l. of compensation money would be absorbed in paying extravagant wages for unremunerative and dishonest The impediments which Buxtonism has during work. That time has come. The high price the last ten years thrown in the way of the West of sugar rather induced speculators to make large Indian planters have effectually prevented any investments in India and the Mauritius-the in- possible competition on their part with the foreign creased distance from Exeter Hall and the abundance slave colonies. The last few packets have conof labor in those countries more than counter-veyed instructions to the tropics which will have balancing the disadvantages of heavier freight and the effect of throwing thousands of laborers out of inferior soil; and there is little doubt that if all further supply of African immigrants had been steadfastly withheld from the West Indians, and if the free-traders had not interfered, the former work, and hundreds of estates out of cultivation. The various legislatures will no longer have the means to supply funds for religious and civil education, which they have hitherto done most * Mr. Macgregor Laird, in 1836, made the following condition of the free negro population must henceliberally, and therefore the physical and moral computation:-Population of Sierra Leone, 50,000; Trinidad, 54,000. Value of exportable produce grown in the forward inevitably retrograde. England has virModel Colony, 3,500l.; Trinidad, 560,000l. Imports to tually withdrawn her custom from her own colothe Model Colony, 100,000l.; Trinidad, 327,000l. A negro, therefore, at Sierra Leone, produced annually, 1s.nies; she is about to deal with their opponents, 6d., and consumed 21. worth of English goods; remove who indeed sell as yet equally good articles somehim to Trinidad, he would consume 71. 5s. 4d., and pro- what cheaper. But the workmen they employ are also Africans, and, moreover, slaves. Exeter Hall must surely inquire with some interest how those people fare. We will endeavor duce 121. 8s. 10d. + The wages paid by the Demerara Railway Company p to October last were seven dollars and a half per veek to laborers working nine hours per day, and at that price labor was scarce. to show them. We fortunately have at hand a notice it. These had been imported within the last witness whose testimony must be satisfactory to few months. The whole island is in favor of conall parties he is no rabid abolitionist like Turn- tinuing the trade, and, consequently no one interbull—he is no ruined planter like Jacob Omnium. doubloon for every negro landed in Cuba.” feres. It is usual to give the captain-general a We have selected for the scene of our inquiry a colony belonging to a nation celebrated for their We may therefore fairly assume that the various humanity to their slaves, and for our informant, an treaties which our most astute statesmen have from avowed admirer of the slave system and enemy of time to time concluded with the court of Spain are our country. This witness is an American phy-worth about as much as those entered into with sician, author of a well-written volume descriptive of Cuba. He tells the world : Although myself a native of a slave-holding state, my early education was received in a foreign land, where I imbibed prejudices against the institution of slavery that have only been removed by a long observance of the habits of the negro, for which the practice of my profession gave me ample means. Compared with the manufacturing and mining classes of England, they labor less, and, so far as physical enjoyment goes, are better off. I speak of those in Cuba; those in the United States are the happiest and best governed peasantry in the world."-Notes, p. 263. It will be at once conceded that this "physician" is no longer under the prejudices of the puling philanthropist; indeed, he admits in the same page his approval of "the lash, the stocks, and the chain for the inveterate runaway." the Attah of Iddah, the Almanez of Footah-Jallow, and the Sultan of Woolli, and no more; luckily they only cost money, not life. "When brought by the slaver, they are either landed on the coast near the plantation, for which the living cargoes are purchased in advance, or are sent overland to the Havana, where they are divided into their different tribes, the value of which differs according to their physical and mental capacities. Thus, the Lucomees are fine athletic men, and, when not worried by their overseers, excellent laborers, surpassing in intelligence all the other negroes. They are, however, bold and stubborn if injudiciously treated, and having been in their arrived at manhood when brought from the coast, country at the head of the warlike tribes, if already are most disposed to resist undue oppression from their masters. They are very prone to commit suicide, believing, with all Africans, that after death they shall be re-transported to their native country. It appears that he at first experienced some One of my friends, who had purchased eight newly interruption in his free progress from the lieuten- chastise slightly one of them. The punishment of arrived from the coast, found occasion soon after to ant-governor of Guines, a small town about forty the whip is applied to the delinquent lying on his miles from the Havana, with which it is connected face; and when he was ordered to place himself in by a railroad, in consequence of his being supposed that position the other seven lay down with him, to be a member of a nation whose name had hith- and insisted on being also punished. I continue erto been synonymous with hostility to slavery. the narrative in the words of my friend, although I As soon, however, as he had satisfactorily purged cannot give his graphic description of the scene that himself from the foul stigma of being an English-breakfast, and I had not long been seated to that ensued. The boy was punished,' he said, 'before man, and all doubts of his American citizenship meal when the contra-mayoral (a negro overseer) had been removed, he was "courteously treated," came to the door and advised me to go to the and during two winters wandered about the island, enjoying its beautiful climate-to which American invalids resort as ours do to Madeira-living chiefly among the coffee and sugar estates, and compiling the agreeable and instructive volume from which we purpose to enlighten our readers as to the past and present condition of the Cuban slaves. It seems that the surveillance of our cruisers only tends to enhance the prime cost of "bozal" negroes, as those freshly imported are called, and in no degree checks the supply when the price of produce is sufficiently high, as it has been and will continue to be since the last alteration in the sugar duties, to enable the planter to pay a remunerating price for the article. The "Physician," (p. 254,) with reference to this traffic, observes : negroes, for they were greatly excited, and were singing and dancing. I immediately seized my pistols, and, getting my horse, rode with him to the spot. The eight negroes, each one with a rope round his neck, on seeing us, scattered in different directions in search of trees on which to hang themselves. Assisted by the other slaves, we made all haste to secure them, but two succeeded in killing themselves; the rest, having been cut down before life was extinct, recovered. The captain of partido was summoned to hold his inquest over the dead bodies, which he examined minutely to see if the nately for me, there was not a single one, or I marks of the whip could be discovered, but, fortushould have had to pay a heavy bill. The rest refused to work; and I asked the captain, if I punished them, and they committed suicide, would I be chargeable? He answered that I certainly would be if he found the smallest sign of injury on the bodies. My neighbors then offered to take each one home, but they would not consent to be separated, and I was quite at a loss what to do, when I determined to run the risk of the law, and punished all the six. They went to work immediately; they are now in the gang, and are the best behaved of all my negroes.' "In 1841, 300 slaves were openly carried on the deck of a steamboat from Havana to Matanzas; their owner, an Italian, was my fellow-passenger, and I learned that he had made 800,000 dollars by the trade, and intended to continue it until he had accumulated a million. In the spring of 1843, 2000 were congregated in and near Havana for sale, or had been sold at its marts, and much anxThe cool, deliberate, unconscious brutality of iety was felt by the slavers lest the English should this story we have seldom seen equalled. All the officers of the government in Cuba are Spaniards | ple of a milder treatment of the negro by foreign from the old country and the anxiety of the captain of partido, or police magistrate, to ascertain whether the negroes had died from punishment, proceeded from a habit which they have of making every infringement of the laws an opportunity for exacting money from the Cuban proprietors, and from no desire of protecting the slaves. "The chief object in Cuba seems to be never to let them remain idle; and I have excited the astonishment of many a creole by stating the quantity of leisure our slaves enjoy after their daily tasks are over; they could not believe they would remain disciplined. Nor was their astonishment lessened, when I told them that in my native state, South Carolina, some planters paid missionaries to preach to their slaves, and even sometimes exhorted them themselves in the absence of clergymen! The laws in Cuba regulating slavery are, however, very liberal to the slave. Thus by them every owner is bound to instruct his slaves in the principles of the Catholic religion after the labor of the day has been finished, to the end that they may be baptized and partake of the sacrament. "" The Physician" remarks, however, that none of the said laws are ever observed, save those relating to baptism and burial. We will now accompany him to a cafetal, or coffee estate, and hear what he says of its propri etor: "He does not amass as large a fortune as the sugar-planter, but he witnesses no over-tasked labor of his slaves. Well fed, with sufficient time allowed them for rest, and the care of their own live stock of fowls and hogs, compared with the destitute of even our own northern states, they are happier, and many are enabled to save enough money to purchase their freedom, which is not unfrequently done."-p. 144. residents in Cuba, the annual loss by death was "During the winter, when the labor is very great, many of the slaves abscond, and lead a roving life in the woods. They are often very formidable to those who, with bloodhounds, make it a business to ferret them out of their retreats."-p. 262. The American doctor's account of these dogs will be read with much interest by zoologists, and ex-philanthropic members of the Society of Friends, who are reconciling themselves to slave-grown produce : "The celebrated bloodhound is a peculiar breed of dogs, somewhat of the build of the mastiff, with a longer nose and legs. He is naturally exceedingly fierce and dangerous, but owes all his habit of tracing the runaway slave to education. When nearly grown he is chained, and a negro is sent daily to worry him by whippings and other means, not enough, however, to frighten him, the dog being permitted occasionally to bite at the negro. After a long training, and when the dog has acquired a perfect hatred of his tormenter, the latter whips him severely, and then runs a considerable distance and climbs a tree. The dog is now let loose, and follows his track; nor will he leave the tree till the negro descends. I have cause to believe that much cruelty is practised on the human victim. One well taught, on smelling the clothes of the runaway slave, will trace him for miles through fields and forests, silently pursuing the chase until he sees it. The made a business by some persons, who thus gain training them, and pursuing absconded slaves, is their livelihood."-p. 312. The "Physician" then describes the hours of labor, merely from 14 to 15 hours per diem at very light work, and how the gang, of whom 80 were men and 40 women, were comfortably locked up together in their barracoon at night; he adds "No attention is paid to the matrimonial compact, some being polygamists, and others making mutual exchanges of their wives when tired of them"like English noblemen in French melodrames. The "Physician" is no friend to the English, Jacob Omnium's account of these proceedings proving clearly-in his own opinion at least-that rather shocked us at first; but after having made all their exertions and pretended sacrifices in the ourselves acquainted with the social state of Sierra cause of abolition have entirely proceeded from motives of self-interest. and Leone, we suppose we were over-squeamish, He also maintains that that it is all right. The male negroes are morewe have an eye to the occupation of Cuba; and over hired out during the sugar-crop to the Inge- as he is generous enough to concede to us the nios-whither we shall follow them, that the merit of being excellent "keepers"-citing Gibralsensitive British public may clearly understand on tar and Malta-he sensibly enough proposes that what terms they are (for a time) to enjoy cheap his own countrymen should thwart our designs by laying hold of it first. sugar : "A sugar plantation, during the manufacture of sugar, presents a picture not only of active industry but of unremitting labor. The oxen are reduced towards the end of the season to mere skeletons, many of them dying from over-labor. The negroes are allowed but five hours' sleep. In a brief appendix he adds, that since he first * Advertisements similar to the following appear daily in the Havana newspapers;-" Se vende una negra criolla, parida de 15 dias con su cria, o sin ella, con muy buena y abundante leche, propria para criandera por sus buenas circumstancias y por haber estado dedicada a manejar Before niños; muy ligera en el servicio a la mano--sana y sin the introduction of the steam-engine, and the exam- [tachas en $450.-Calle de Villegas, No. 202." |