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 A TRIBUTE 
 
 THE NEGRO 
 
 WILSON AKMISTEAI). 
 
 Truth, by its own sinews shall prevail; 
 And in the course of Heaven's evolving plan, 
 By truth made free the long scorned African 
 His Maker's image radiant in his face, — 
 Among earth's noblest sons shall find his place." 
 
,Q 
 
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 I 
 
 T1IBOTI m THE RI610 
 
 A VINDICATION 
 
 \[$ M0BAL ' INTELLECTUAL, AM) RELIGIOUS CAPABILITIES 
 
 ^\f (Kjre Cnhmrrit prtitm nf fthnlttnir; 
 
 WITH PARTICULAR REFERENCE TO THE AFRICAN RACE. 
 
 ILLUSTRATED BY 
 
 FACTS, ANECDOTES, ETC. 
 
 AND MANY 
 
 SUPERIOR PORTRAITS AND ENGRAVINGS. 
 
 BY WILSON AEMISTEAD. 3e26 
 
 WILLIAM IRWIN, 39, OLDHAM STREET. 
 
 LONDON: CHARLES GILPIN, BISHOPSGATE STREET, 
 
 AMERICAN AGENT: 
 
 WM. HARNED, ANTI-SLAVERY OFFICE, 01, JOHN STREET, NEW YORK ; 
 
 AND MAT BE HAD OF 
 
 H. LONGSTRETH AND G. W. TAYLOR, PHILADELPHIA. 
 
 1848. 
 
 
MANCHESTER : 
 
 PRINTED BY WILLIAM IRWIN, 
 
 39, OLDHAM STREET. 
 
LIBRARY UNIV. 0? 
 NORTIi CAROLINA 4 
 
 i 
 
 ' ' ' 
 
 ^CS^ 
 
 TO 
 
 JAMES W. C. PENNINGTON, FBEDEBICK DOUGLASS, 
 ALEXANDEE CEUMMELL, 
 
 AND 
 
 MANY OTHER NOBLE EXAMPLES OP ELEVATED HUMANITY 
 
 IN THE NEGRO; 
 
 WHOM FULLER BEAUTIFULLY DESIGNATES 
 
 "THE IMAQE OP GOD CUT IN EBONY:" 
 
 THIS VOLUME, 
 
 DEMONSTRATING, FROM FACTS AND TESTIMONIES, 
 
 THAT THE 
 
 WHITE AND DARK COLOURED RACES OP MAN 
 ARE ALIKE THE CHILDREN OP ONE HEAVENLY FATHER, 
 
 AND 
 
 IN ALL RESPECTS EQUALLY ENDOWED BY HIM ; 
 
 IS EESPECTFULLY INSCEIBED. 
 
 W 
 
 
Sin 
 
 PEEFACE. 
 
 In reviewing the history of mankind, we may observe, 
 that very soon after the creation of our first parents in 
 innocence and happiness, sin and misery entered into the 
 world. The evils of life commenced in the earliest ages, 
 and subsequent history and experience testify, that in all 
 their variety of form and character, they have continued to 
 exist in every successive generation to the present time. 
 
 To combat these evils, by endeavouring to effect their 
 removal or correction, is the most pleasing and useful oc- 
 cupation in which we can engage ourselves. Providence 
 has wisely instituted, in every age and in every country, a 
 counteracting energy to diminish the crimes and miseries 
 of mankind, which the influences of Christianity have in- 
 creased, by unfolding to it the widest possible domain. "At 
 her command, wherever she has been fully acknowledged, 
 many of the evils of life have already fled. The prisoner 
 of war is no longer led into the amphitheatre to become a 
 gladiator, and to imbrue his hands in the blood of his 
 fellow-captive, for the sport of a thoughtless multitude. 
 The stern priest, cruel through fanaticism and custom, no 
 longer leads his fellow-creature to the altar, to sacrifice him 
 to fictitious gods. The venerable martyr, courageous 
 through faith and the sanctity of his life, is no longer hur- 
 ried to the flames. The haggard witch, poring over her 
 incantations by moonlight, no longer scatters her super- 
 stitious poison amongst her miserable neighbours, nor 
 suffers for her crime." 
 
$nfan. 
 
 So long as any of the evils of life shall remain, accom- 
 panied, as they must invariably be, with misery and guilt, 
 the Christian will feel himself impelled by an impulse of 
 duty to oppose them ; and his energies will be roused into 
 active resistance, in proportion to the magnitude of the 
 evil to be overcome. 
 
 The most extensive and extraordinary system of crime 
 the world ever witnessed, which has now been in operation 
 for several centuries, and which continues to exist in 
 unabated activity, is Negro Slavery. This hateful sys- 
 tem, involving a most incalculable amount of evil, and 
 entailing a measure of misery on the one hand, and guilt 
 on the other, beyond the powers of language to describe, 
 entitles its victims to the strongest claims on our sympathy. 
 
 " If, among the various races of mankind," says the 
 pious Richard Watson, " one is to be found which has 
 been treated with greater harshness by the rest — one whose 
 history is drawn with a deeper pencilling of injury and 
 wretchedness — that race, wherever found, is entitled to 
 the largest share of compassion ; especially of those, who, 
 in a period of past darkness and crime, have had so great 
 a share in inflicting this injustice. This, then, is the 
 Negro race — the most unfortunate of the family of man. 
 From age to age the existence of injuries may be traced 
 upon the sunburnt continent ; and Africa is still the com- 
 mon plunder of every invader who has hardihood enough 
 to obdurate his heart against humanity, to drag his length- 
 ened lines of enchained captives through the deserts, or to 
 suffocate them in the holds of vessels destined to carry 
 them away into interminable captivity. Africa is annually 
 robbed" of Four Hundred Thousand "of her children. 
 Multiply this number by the ages through which this in- 
 jury has been protracted, and the amount appals and rends 
 
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 the heart. What an accumulation of misery and wrong ! 
 Which of the sands of her deserts has not been steeped 
 in tears, wrung out by the pang of separation from 
 kindred and country ? And in what part of the world have 
 not her children been wasted by labours, and degraded 
 by oppressions ? " 
 
 The hapless victims of this revolting system are men of 
 the same origin as ourselves — of similar form and delinea- 
 tion of feature, though with a darker skin — men endowed 
 with minds equal in dignity, equal in capacity, and equal 
 in duration of existence — men of the same social disposi- 
 tions and affections, and destined to occupy the same rank 
 in the great family of Man. 
 
 The supporters and advocates of Negro Slavery, however, 
 in order to justify their oppressive conduct, profess, either 
 in ignorance or affected philosophy, to doubt the African's 
 claim to humanity, alleging their incapacity, from inherent 
 defects in their mental constitution, to enjoy the blessings 
 of freedom, or to exercise those rights which are equally 
 bestowed by a beneficent Creator upon all his rational 
 creatures. 
 
 White men, civilized savages, armed with the power 
 which an improved society gives them, invade a distant 
 country, and destroy or make captive its inhabitants ; and 
 then, pointing to their colour, find their justification in 
 denying them to be men. A petty philosophy follows in 
 the train, and confirms the assumption by a specious theory 
 which would exclude the Negro from all title to humanity. 
 Thus would they strike millions out of the family of God, 
 the covenant of grace, and that brotherhood which the 
 Scriptures extend to the whole race of Adam. 
 
 The calumniators of the Negro race — those who have 
 robbed them of their lands, and still worse, of themselves — 
 
 ^ 
 
delight to descant upon the inferiority of their victims, 
 withholding the fact, that they have been for ages exposed 
 to influences calculated to develope neither the moral nor 
 the intellectual faculties, but to destroy them. It may, 
 perhaps, be fairly questioned, whether any other people 
 could have endured the privations or the sufferings to which 
 they have been subjected, without becoming still more de- 
 graded in the scale of humanity ; for nothing has been left 
 undone, to cripple their intellects, to darken their minds, 
 to debase their moral nature, and to obliterate all traces 
 of their relationship to mankind ; yet, how wonderfully 
 have they sustained the mighty load of oppression under 
 which they have been groaning for centuries ! 
 
 Prejudice and misinformation have, for a long series of 
 years, been fostered with unremitting assiduity by those 
 interested in upholding the Slave system — a party, whose 
 corrupt influence has enabled them to gain possession of 
 the public ear, and to abuse public credulity to an extent 
 not generally appreciated. In an age so distinguished for 
 benevolence, we can only thus account for the indifference 
 manifested towards this unfortunate race, and from the fact 
 that they are supposed to be in reality destined only for a 
 servile condition, entitled neither to liberty nor the legiti- 
 mate pursuit of happiness. 
 
 Has the Almighty, then, poured the tide of life through 
 the Negro's breast, animated it with a portion of his own 
 Spirit, and at the same time cursed him, that he is to be 
 struck off the list of rational beings, and placed on a level 
 with the brute ? Is his flesh marble, and are his sinews 
 iron, or his immortal spirit condemned, that he is doomed 
 to incessant toil, and to be subjected to a degradation, 
 bodily and mental, such as none other of the children of 
 Adam have ever endured ? Away for ever with an idea so 
 
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 absurd ! The subjection of a large portion of mankind to 
 the domination and arbitrary will of another, is as unnatural 
 as it is contrary to the principles of justice, and repugnant 
 to the precepts and to the spirit of Christianity ; and in 
 the advancing circumstances of the world, nothing can 
 be more certain, than that Slavery must terminate. It 
 is a blot which can never remain amidst the glories of 
 Messiah's reign. 
 
 My present purpose is not to enter into a recital of the 
 horrors of the Slave system in any of its revolting details. 
 The secrets of the dreadful traffic are veiled in those coffin- 
 like spaces in the interior of Slave ships, in which the 
 wretched victims are packed as logs of wood, their limbs 
 loaded with manacles and chains, to be succeeded by the 
 scourgings of the cruel driver ! But I will forbear ; the 
 mind shudders at the idea of a serious discussion of deeds 
 so hateful, which no prospect of private gain, no considera- 
 tion of public advantage, no plea of expediency, can ever 
 justify. 
 
 The purport of the present volume, in contradistinction 
 to the idea of the Negro being designed only for a servile 
 condition, is to demonstrate that the Sable inhabitants of 
 Africa are capable of occupying a position in society very 
 superior to that which has been generally assigned to them, 
 and which they now mostly occupy ; — that they are pos- 
 sessed of intelligent and reflecting minds, and however 
 barren these may have been rendered by hard usage, and 
 have become indeed as "fountains sealed," that they are 
 still neither unwatered by the rivers of intellect, nor the pure 
 and gentle streams of natural affection. By a relation of 
 facts, principally of a biographical nature, many of them 
 now published for the first time, I hope to counteract that 
 deeply-rooted prejudice, the growth of centuries, which 
 
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 attaches itself to this despised race — facts which render a 
 practical negative to the imputation of inevitable infe- 
 riority ; demonstrating, on the other hand, that, when 
 participating in equal advantages, they are not inferior 
 in natural capacity, or deficient of those intellectual and 
 amiable qualities which adorn and dignify human nature. 
 
 How far the attempt is successful must be left to the 
 reader's decision. Whether it result in convincing the 
 sceptical, or in confirming those already persuaded of the 
 truth of the position maintained, may it engender a more 
 lively feeling of brotherly sympathy towards this afflicted 
 people, by demonstrating them to be capable of every 
 generous and noble feeling, as well as of the higher attain- 
 ments of the human understanding. Once convinced of 
 this, we cannot contemplate with indifference their bodily 
 and mental sufferings, but rather desire that every barrier 
 may be removed which impedes their attaining to that 
 station in society which an all-wise and beneficent Creator 
 designed for them. 
 
 Should the facts recorded be deemed of too insulated a 
 nature to elucidate any general theory (most countries 
 having produced some individuals of unusual powers, 
 both of body and of mind), I may observe, that they are 
 only a fractional part of what might have been adduced. 
 I have still in reserve a mass of additional facts, teeming 
 with evidence the most unequivocal, that the Almighty 
 has not left the Negro destitute of those talents and capa- 
 bilities which he has bestowed upon all his intelligent 
 creatures, which, however modified by circumstances in 
 various cases, leave no section of the human family a right 
 to boast that it inherits, by birth, a superiority which might 
 not, in the course of events, be manifested and claimed 
 with equal justice by those whom they most despise. 
 
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 %tthtt< 
 
 I should be wanting in gratitude, were I to omit to 
 acknowledge the kindness of many friends who have aided 
 me during the progress of the work. Amongst these, I 
 may particularly mention Thomas Thompson, of Liver- 
 pool ; Thomas Scales,* and Thomas Harvey, of Leeds ; 
 Jacob Post, of London ; Edward Bickersteth,* Rector of 
 Watton ; Joseph Sturge, of Birmingham ; James Back- 
 house, of York ; Thomas Winterbottom, M.D., North 
 Shields ; Captain Wauchope, of the Royal Navy ; with 
 many others. To Robert Hurnard, of Colchester, I am 
 indebted for a Narrative and several M.S. letters of Solo- 
 mon Bayley, of which I regret being able to avail myself 
 only to a limited extent. Nor should I omit a tribute of 
 thanks to my friend Bernard Barton, for his appropriate 
 Introductory Poem, which adds to the interest of the 
 volume. 
 
 I may also acknowledge having frequently availed myself 
 of the researches of Dr. Lawrence, and the more recent 
 ones of Dr. J. C. Prichard, whose work on the History of 
 Man is the ablest extant in any language. 
 
 I have also derived much information from the work of 
 the Abbe Gregoire, entitled " De la Litterature des 
 
 * The reader will observe, throughout the present volume, except in the 
 first plate, engraved under other auspices, an omission of the title of 
 " Reverend," usually applied to Ministers of the Gospel. It is far from 
 my wish to appear uncourteous ; but whilst esteeming the virtuous and 
 the good of every class, I feel a decided objection to the use of this title, 
 on the ground of its being one assigued to the Almighty himself, whose 
 name is Holy and Reverend. (Psalm cxi. 9.) It is to be regretted that 
 Christian ministers, servants of Him who "made himself of no reputation," 
 should feel satisfied with this appellation being used, both in public and 
 private addresses, from their fellow-mortals. Neither the prophets of old, 
 nor the apostles, nor any of the immediate followers of Christ, however 
 eminent, required such an adulatory title, the tendency of which is, to 
 exalt the fallen creature rather than to honour the Divine Creator. 
 
$nfnn. 
 
 Negres, ou Recherches sur leur Facultes Intellectuelles, 
 leur Qualites Morales, et leur Litterature," &c. I am 
 indebted to Thomas Thompson, of Liverpool, for this 
 scarce volume, who kindly presented me with a copy of it, 
 which is rendered additionally valuable from its being one 
 presented by the Abbe in his own hand-writing to the 
 late William Phillips, of London. To Gerrit Smith of 
 Peterboro', U. S., I am also indebted for an English trans- 
 lation of the same, by D. B. Warden, Secretary of the 
 American Legation at Paris. This admirable work includes 
 a mass of information, the accuracy of which may be tho- 
 roughly relied upon, being the production of a man of 
 great erudition and rare virtues, well known in the 
 learned societies of his day. He was formerly Bishop of 
 Blois, a member of the Conservative Senate, of the Na- 
 tional Institute, the Royal Society of Gottingen, &c. 
 
 It was partially announced that a list of Subscribers 
 would be appended to the present volume, but as this 
 would have occupied nearly thirty pages, it was thought 
 preferable to extend the Biographical portion of the work, 
 which now exceeds by about one hundred pages the number 
 originally intended. The only object, in publishing such a 
 list, would have been to afford a demonstration of the 
 feeling and interest existing on behalf of the oppressed 
 race. Suffice it to say, that it embraces nearly a thousand 
 of the most conspicuous characters in the walks of benevo- 
 lence and philanthropy, both in Great Britain and America, 
 including the Sovereign of the most enlightened country 
 of the world. 
 
 The proceeds arising from the sale of the " Tribute for 
 the Negro " will be appropriated for the benefit of the 
 Negro race. On this ground, as well as in consideration 
 of the primary design of the publication, the friends of 
 
M< 
 
 pnfut. 
 
 humanity will be interested in promoting its circulation. 
 By so doing, they will advance the cause of freedom, by 
 establishing the claims of depressed, degraded, suffering, 
 and almost helpless millions. 
 
 It may be observed, that in making the Biographical 
 selection for this work, the author has been governed by 
 no sectarian prejudice. With due regard to the primary ob- 
 ject in view, he has embraced, in support of the proposition 
 maintained, all classes, irrespective of their particular re- 
 ligious tenets. The Episcopalian, the Presbyterian, the 
 Quaker, and the Moravian, are alike included, not even ex- 
 cepting the half-civilized barbarian, on whom the light has 
 but dimly shone. Whatever our own peculiar views may 
 be, charity compels us to believe that the virtuous and the 
 good are acceptable to the Universal Parent. A good life 
 is the soundest orthodoxy, and the most benevolent man 
 is the best Christian. Diversity of opinion is not a bar to 
 the favour of Heaven, and it ought not to operate to the 
 prejudice of our neighbour. We ought rather to bear and 
 forbear with each other, remembering that the Sacred 
 Mount of Divine Mercy is open alike to every humble 
 traveller — " God is no respecter of persons ; but in every 
 nation, he that feareth him, and worketh righteous- 
 ness, is accepted with him." 'Tis these that constitute the 
 " countless myriads " that shall be gathered from " all 
 nations, kindreds, and tongues," to ascribe, throughout 
 the boundless ages of eternity, hallelujahs and songs of 
 incessant praise before the throne of the King Supreme. 
 
 Having now completed my undertaking, after soliciting 
 the Divine blessing upon it, I bequeath it as a legacy to 
 the injured and oppressed. Though the design of the pub- 
 lication will, I trust, be deemed a sufficient apology for its 
 appearance, I am prepared for a diversity of sentiment 
 
 S 
 
tynhu. 
 
 being expressed as to its propriety or necessity. I should 
 count myself unworthy the name of a man or a Christian, 
 if the calumnies of the bad, or even the disapprobation of 
 the well-disposed, had deterred me from the performance of 
 that which a feeling of duty prompted me to undertake. I 
 court no man's applause, neither do I fear any man's frown. 
 Conscious of many imperfections, I feel thankful in having 
 completed this humble "Tribute" in aid of the cause of 
 Freedom, Justice, and Humanity ; and it will be a satis- 
 faction to reflect, that a portion of my time has been em- 
 ployed on behalf of the most oppressed portion of our race, 
 at least with a design to promote their welfare. 
 
 Leeds, \0th Month, 1848. 
 
 W. A. 
 
 
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 dL 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 fad fust 
 
 AN INQUIRY INTO THE CLAIMS OF THE NEGRO RACE TO 
 HUMANITY, AND A VINDICATION OF THEIR ORIGINAL 
 EQUALITY WITH THE OTHER PORTIONS OF MANKIND: 
 WITH A FEW OBSERVATIONS ON THE INALIENABLE 
 RIGHTS OF MAN; THE SIN OF SLAVERY, &c, &c. 
 
 CHAPTER I.— PAGE 3. 
 
 Sin of Slavery — Delusion respecting the moral and intellectual capacity 
 of the Negro — An important question — To despise a fellow-being on 
 account of any external peculiarity, a sin — Christianity the mani- 
 festation of universal love — Inquiry into the causes of the diversity 
 characterising various nations and people— Analogous in animals — 
 Connection between the physiological, moral, and intellectual char- 
 acters in Man — The diversities trifling in comparison with those 
 attributes in which they agree — Nothing to warrant us in referring 
 to any particular race an insurmountable deficiency in faculties — 
 Scripture testimony to unity of origin in the human race. 
 
 CHAPTER II.— PAGE 17. 
 
 The idea that moral and intellectual inferiority are inseparable from a 
 coloured skin, a fallacious one — Refuted by facts — Apparent in- 
 feriority of the Negro accounted for — Extent and pernicious conse- 
 quences of Slavery and the Slave Trade — Prevent the civilization of 
 the Negro — The same effects observable on any people under similar 
 treatment — Instanced in European Slaves — Loose his shackles, and 
 the Negro will soon refute the calumnies raised against him. 
 
 CHAPTER III.— PAGE 26. 
 
 False Theory of Rousseau and Lord Kaimes — Injurious to the best in- 
 terests of humanity, and contrary to Scripture — Injuries done to 
 the Negro on the ground of inferiority — Shocking effects resulting 
 from this idea — Civilized nations before the Christian era — Romans, 
 and their ancestors — Our own — Anecdote related by Dr. Philip — 
 
(totrtttB, 
 
 Remarks of Cicero respecting them — Christian guilt towards Abori- 
 gines — Dr. Johnson on European conquest — Slavery justified by 
 representing the Negro a distinct species — And even a brute — Argu- 
 ments of Long — Strange book published at Charleston — Chambers' 
 reply — Inferiority ascribed to other races — The Esquimaux — The 
 whole refuted by Dr. Lawrence. 
 
 CHAPTER IV.-PAGE 43. 
 
 Deduction of an affinity between the Negro and the brute creation, a 
 mere subterfuge — European physiognomy often similartotheNegro's 
 — Blumenbach's Negro cranise — Imperceptible gradations of one 
 race into auother — Further analogies in animals — Effects of the 
 civilizing process in improving the form of the head and features — 
 Exemplifications — Illustrated in the case of Kaspar Hauser — Testi- 
 mony of Dr. Philip — Dr. Knox on Negro cranise — His important 
 conclusion — Dr. Tiedeman's experiments — Conclusive observations 
 of Blumenbach — And others — The civilization of many African na- 
 tions superior to that of European Aborigines — No deviations in the 
 races of Man sufficient to constitute distinct species — Departures 
 from the general ride accounted for — Equal variations observable in 
 our own country — Remarkably exemplified in Ireland. 
 
 dl 
 
 CHAPTER V.-PAGE 56. 
 
 Complexion the most obvious external distinction in Man — Analogous 
 in animals — Chief cause of diversity of Colour — Peculiarities of 
 Structure and Complexion become hereditary — Illustrations — -In the 
 House of Austria — The Gipsies — Jews — Persons of the same blood 
 — Amongst the great and noble — The Colour of Man not always 
 corresponding with Climate explained — Persistency of Colour not 
 so great as supposed — Instances of Negroes becoming light-coloured 
 — Of Whites who bave become black — True Whites born among the 
 Black races — If Colour is a mark of inferiority in Man, it attaches 
 a stigma to a great portion of tbe inhabitants of the world — The 
 Hindoos — Their learning two thousand years ago — Natives of Terra 
 del Fuego much lighter than the Negro, but inferior in the scale of 
 intelligence — Colour of the Negro a merciful provision — Dr. Cop- 
 land's remarks on this subject — The inquiry into Unity of Species ad- 
 mirably summed up by Buffon. 
 
 CHAPTER VI.— PAGE 72. 
 
 Not in external Characteristics alone that Man is pre-eminently distin- 
 guished — Uniform traits in human nature — Superior Psychical en- 
 dowmeEts — Reason and intellect — Universal belief in a Supreme 
 
Cntttrtits. 
 
 XIX. 
 
 Being — And ideas of his attributes, &c. — Prevalence of similar 
 inherent ideas amongst the various Negro tribes — They possess the 
 same internal principles as the rest of mankind — A portion of that 
 Spirit which is implanted in the heart of " every man " — Further 
 coincidence when converted to Christianity — Early attempt to con- 
 vert the Slaves of the Caribbee Islands — Its singular success ; as 
 also in other Islands — Subsequently in Africa and the West Indies 
 — After restoring to the Negro his rightful liberties, it is our duty 
 to promote the cultivation of his moral aud religious faculties — Final 
 blending of all the various tribes in harmony. 
 
 CHAPTER VII.— PAGE 81. 
 
 Deep-rooted prejudice to eradicate respecting Colour in Man — Less in 
 Europe than in the New World — Evinced in the case of Douglass — 
 National expression of sympathy for him from the British public — 
 The " Douglass Testimonial " — British Christians respect the 
 Divine image alike in ebony and ivory — Effects of prejudice in South 
 Africa — Americans deeply implicated in this feeling — Have an 
 interest in keeping it up— Strongest in the Free States — Several 
 instances of its nature and extent — Circumstance exhibiting a striking 
 contrast in favour of the Sable race — Further effects of prejudice — 
 Public opinion on this subject very strong in the United States. 
 
 CHAPTER VIII.— PAGE 92. 
 
 Eesult of the idea of inferiority in the Negro race a prolongation of 
 their oppression — Unequal rights and privileges — Their tendency — 
 Human beings possess certain inalienable rights — All men created 
 equal — Acknowledgment of this great doctrine in the American De- 
 claration of Independence— Slavery a stain on the glory of America — 
 A lie to the Declaration of the Federal Constitution — Columbia may 
 yet redeem her character — No new laws required — Only that all 
 should be placed on an equality— No exemption of the Negro from 
 law, but should enjoy its protection — Observations on equitable laws 
 — Justice always the truest policy — America called to a great and 
 noble deed — Address to Columbia. 
 
 CHAPTER IX.— PAGE M. 
 
 Pernicious influence of Slavery — Those brought up in the midst of it 
 unconscious of its evils — Deceptiveness of the " Slavery Optic 
 Glass " — The products and gains of oppression tainted — Nothing 
 can sanction violence and injustice — To prosper by crime, a great 
 calamity — Melancholy situation of those implicated in Slavery — 
 Plea of the necessity of coercion — Negroes represented as most 
 
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 degenerate and ungovernable — This accounted for — Demoralizing 
 effects of Slavery — When its asperities have been mitigated, various 
 latent virtues and good qualities have been brought into exercise. 
 
 CHAPTER X.-PAGE 105. 
 
 To form a just estimate of the Negro character, we must observe him 
 under more favourable circumstances than those of Slavery — State- 
 ments of Travellers who have visited Africa, describing the natives 
 as virtuous, intelligent, &c. — Their ingenuity — Clarkson's interview 
 with the Emperor of Russia — His surprise at their proficiency — 
 A-Vadstrom's testimony before the House of Commons — Many other 
 testimonies — Dr. Channing says, " we are holding in bondage one 
 of the best races of the human family." 
 
 CHAPTER XL— PAGE 120. 
 
 The African race examined in an Intellectual point of view — Their origin 
 and noble ancestry — Ethiopians and Egyptians considered — Negroes 
 have arrived at considerable intellectual attainments, and have dis- 
 tinguished themselves variously — Exemplified in Amo — State of 
 learning at Timbuctoo in the sixteenth century — Many other in- 
 stances of their intellectual attainments — Further testimony of 
 Blumenbach to their capacity for scientific cultivation — Corrobora- 
 tive evidences — Demonstration of Negro capabilities in living wit- 
 nesses — The highest offices of State in Brazil filled by Blacks — 
 Coloured Roman Catholic Clergy — ■ Lawyers — Physicians — Dr. 
 Wright's testimony to the capabdities and intellect of the Negro. 
 
 CHAPTER XII.— PAGE 144. 
 
 The foregoing facts afford unquestionable evidence of the capabilities of the 
 Negro — Their desire for improvement — Obstacles to this — -Invidious 
 distinctions — Effects of Slavery — The improvidence, indolence, &c, 
 ascribed to the Negro, considered — Testimony of Dr. Lloyd — 
 Similar charges brought against the ancient Britons— Russians a 
 century ago — Admitting every thing in favour of distinct races, all are 
 capable of great improvement — Events in St. Domingo — Improve- 
 ment in Negroes brought to Europe — Comparisons — Effects of Edu- 
 cation, &c. — Fact related by Dr. Horn — White races liable to relapse 
 into barbarism — Instances of retrogression in Whites — The Greeks 
 and Romans — Case of Charlotte Stanley — Civilization a vague and 
 indefinite term — Remarkable instance of retrogression in America — 
 Progression in the Negro defended on the same ground — Time re- 
 quired — Accelerated in proportion as impediments are removed. 
 
 iyr 
 

 / 
 
 2HTP 
 
 Canfrufs. 
 
 
 CHAPTER XIII.— PAGE 162. 
 
 Refutation of the plea of coercion being necessary for the Negro — Palliated 
 by representing him as deficient in the finer feelings —This also refuted 
 — Testimony of Captain Rainsford — Remarks of Dr. Philip — The 
 Negro represented to be under a Divine anathema — Observations of 
 Richard Watson on this subject— Refuted on Christian grouuds — 
 All tribes stretching out their hands unto Cod -Results of mis- 
 sionary labours — Facts evincing the progress of the Negro in virtue 
 and religion— Instances illustrative of the highest religious suscepti- 
 bilities — Testimony of a Wesleyan Missionary — Such evidences 
 very conclusive — Beautiful remarks by Richard Watson. 
 
 CHAPTER XIV.— PAGE 173. 
 
 Slavery considered — A violation of the rights of Man — Remarks of Milton 
 — Condemned by Pope Leo X. — Remarks of Bishop Warburton — 
 How can Christians continue to be its upholders ? — Guilt of Britons 
 and Americans — Expiation of our sin by a noble sacrifice — We can 
 never repay the debt we owe to Africa — White Man instilling into 
 those he calls "savages" a despicable opinion of human nature — 
 We practice what we should exclaim against — No tangible plea for 
 Slavery — Criminal to remain silent spectators of its crimes — We 
 cannot plead ignorance — Seven millions of human beings now in 
 Slavery — ■ Four hundred thousand annually torn from Africa — 
 Slavery a monstrous crime —A robbery perpetrated on the very 
 sanctuary of man's rational nature — A sin against God —America's 
 foul blot — Slaves represented as happy — Remarks on this. 
 
 CHAPTER XV.— PAGE 181. 
 
 Sources of the calumnious charges against the Negro — Their character only 
 partially represented— Applicable remarks of Plutarch -Perverted 
 accounts of travellers to be guarded against — Opportunities of 
 actual observation limited — Importance of authentic facts — They 
 prove that all mankind are equally endowed, irrespective of Colour 
 or of clinie — Compassion for a sufferer heightened by youth, beauty, 
 and rank — As in Mary, Queen of Scots — No incompatibility between 
 Negro organization and intellectual powers — To demonstrate this the 
 design of the work— The author, in selecting instances for this pur- 
 pose, has been more thoroughly impressed with its truth — Negroes 
 only require freedom, education, and good government, to equal any 
 people— Expression of sympathy for the oppressed race of Africa. 
 
 <|NS) 
 
 
 ^■■■~~ 
 
CONTENTS 
 
 ^itrt #rah. 
 
 BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCHES OE AFRICANS, OR THEIR DE- 
 SCENDANTS ; WITH TESTIMONIES OF TRAVELLERS, 
 MISSIONARIES, &c. RESPECTING THEM. 
 
 Olatjdah Eqtjiano, or G-tjstavus Yassa His Narrative 19 
 
 Dedicates his Narrative to the British Parliament — Stolen from Africa — Sent to 
 Virginia, and sold into Slavery — Purchases his freedom — Remains in his mas- 
 ter's service — Voyage to Montserrat, Georgia, &c. — Obtains his discharge — 
 Sails for London — Accompanies an expedition to explore a North-West passage 
 — Religious impressions — Incidents connected therewith — Voyage to Cadiz — 
 Further Religious impressions — Perilous situation in a second voyage to Cadiz 
 — Providential deliverance — Accompanies Dr. Irving to Jamaica — Sails for 
 Europe again — Grievously imposed upon — Arrives in England — Enters into the 
 service of Governor Mc Namara — Proposal for him to go out as a Missionary to 
 Africa — Memorial to the Bishop of London — The Bishop declines to ordain him 
 — Sails for New York — Returns to London — Sails for Philadelphia — With other 
 Africans, presents an address of thanks to the Quakers in London — Appointed 
 a Government Commissary in an expedition to Sierra Leone — Incidents con- 
 nected therewith — Memorial to the Lords' Commissioners of the Treasury — 
 Presents a Petition to the Queen -Concluding remarks to his Narrative. 
 
 Job Ben Solliman ; an African Prince Abbe Gregoire 239 
 
 Sadiki ; a Learned Slave Madden's West Indies . . . 241 
 
 Redeemed by Dr. Madden — Writes a history of his life in Arabic. 
 
 Testimony oe Captain Pilkington Particular Providence .. . 249 
 
 Intelligent Free Blacks at Sierra Leone — The Timini, Sooso, and Mandingo 
 Nations — The Kroomen. 
 
 Placido The Heraldo" Sfc 252 
 
 A Slave of great natural genius — Seized for Conspiracy — His great fortitude — 
 Composes a beautiful Poem — Recites it when proceeding to execution. 
 
 The Happy Negro Andreio Searle' s Life . , . 256 
 
 His remarkable religious experience. 
 
 Richard Cooper Society of Friends 259 
 
 Testimony Respecting the Bushmen Philip's Mesearches 261 
 
 With several interesting examples. 
 Anthony William Amo ; a Learned Negro Abbe Gregoire 265 
 
 Studies at Halle — Skilled in several Languages— Publishes Dissertations, &c , 
 
 in Latin — Made a Doctor of the University of Wittemburg— And Counsellor of 
 
 State by the Court of Berlin. 
 Totjssaint L'Ouvertuke , Biog. JJniverselle, Sfc... 267 
 
 Born a Slave in St. Domingo — Of thorough Negro descent — His good qualities 
 
 153 
 
(Tnutnits. 
 
 obtain kind treatment — Accidental acquirement of knowledge — Insurrection of 
 the Negroes of St. Domingo — Toussaint refuses, for some time, to take part in 
 it — Finally joins the revolt — Noble conduct in first securing the safety of his 
 master and family — After various struggles, becomes Commander in Chief of 
 the French forces — Prosperity of the Island under his command — Anecdote 
 characteristic of his integrity — Assumes the title of President — Forms a new 
 Constitution — The excellencies of his character unfolded — His remarkable ac- 
 tivity — Description of him by one of his enemies — Captain Rainsford's remarks 
 respecting him — Incident exemplifying his integrity — Attains the highest point 
 of his prosperity — Buonaparte's alarm — Sends an expedition to St. Domingo — 
 Slaughter of Blacks — Affecting incidents — Toussaint arrested by treachery — 
 Taken captive to France — Imprisoned and destroyed by severe treatment — Un- 
 doubtedly a remarkable man. 
 
 Subsequent Histoey of St. Domingo . . . Facts of History 299 
 
 Dessalines, Christophe, and Petion, successive Negro Governors — Social con- 
 dition of. 
 
 Notice or a Son of Toussaint Irish Friend 306 
 
 Geoffbey L'Islet Abbe Gregoire 307 
 
 A Mulatto Officer of Artillery — Correspondent of the French Academy of Sci- 
 ences — Executes Maps and Plans, and keeps a Meteorological Journal — yersed 
 in Botany, Natural Philosophy, Zoology, and Astrouomy. 
 Kafie Genebosity Fringle's African Sketches. . . 308 
 
 J. E. J. Capitein Abbe Gregoire 309 
 
 A Negro born in Africa — Brought to Europe, and educated in Holland — Studied 
 languages, &c. at the Hague — Took his degrees, and returned as a Christian 
 Minister to Africa — Writes an Elegy in Latin — Publishes Dissertations, &c. 
 
 Cheistian Kindness in an Afbic an... Moffatt 312 
 
 Othello Abbe Gregoire 313 
 
 Writes an eloquent Essay against the Slavery of his race. 
 
 James Debham Abbe Gregoire 315 
 
 Originally a Slave — Becomes one of the most distinguished physicians at New 
 Orleans. 
 
 Anecdote of TwoNegboesin Feance ...Mott's Sketches 315 
 
 Kindness of a Coloubed Female History of Hayti 317 
 
 Thomas Jenkins; an African Prince... Chambers's Miscellany 317 
 
 Sent to England by Captain Swanston to educate — The Captain dying, the 
 Negro is thrown on the world — Eager pursuit of knowledge — Instructs him- 
 self in Latin and Greek— His religious impressions — Offers himself as a school- 
 master — Examined and accepted — Difficulties from prejudice against colour — 
 Final success — Spends a winter at college — Goes as a Missionary to the Mauri- 
 tius, and attains eminence as a teacher. 
 
 Notice of an Intelligent Negbo... Captain Wauchope,M.N.... 323 
 
 Negbo Chabacteb and Ability Captain Wauchope, 22. JV. ... 324 
 
 Hospitable Negbo Woman Park's Travels 327 
 
 Her kindness to the weary traveller— Song composed by Negroes extempore— 
 Beautifully versified— Remarks by Dr. Madden. 
 
 Attobah Cugoano Abbe Gregoire 329 
 
 Born in Africa and stolen for a Slave — Liberated by Lord Hoth— An Italian 
 author praises this Negro— His piety, modesty, integrity, and talents— Pub- 
 lishes Reflections on the Slave Trade. 
 
€ntnU. 
 
 William Hamilton Sturge 8f Harvey 's W. Indies. 
 
 Formerly a Slave in Jamaica — Suffers for attending a place of worship — Learns 
 to read and write by stealth — Keeps a journal — Purchases his freedom for £209. 
 
 Phillis Wheatley Her Works 
 
 A Negress stolen from Africa and sent to Boston — Bought by a lady to attend 
 her in old age — Exhibited extraordinary intelligence — Soon learned to read and 
 write — Became an object of astonishment — Her literary acquirements — Studied 
 Latin — Wrote and published thirty-nine poems — Several specimens of her poeti- 
 cal talent — Is liberated — Visit to England — Moved in first circles of society — A 
 proof of what education can effect in the Negro. 
 
 John Kizell Anecdotes of Africans 
 
 A Negro — Taken as a Slave to Charlestown — Sent to Sierra Leone, and employed 
 in negociations with native Chiefs. 
 
 Benjamin Banneker Able Gregoire et Passiom 
 
 Of pure African descent — Makes astronomical calculations — And publishes 
 almanacs at Philadelphia — His letter to the President of the United States — 
 The President's answer. 
 
 Faith of a Poor Blind Negro Motfs Biog. Sketches 
 
 A Pious and Enlightened Kafir Philip's Researches. 
 
 Intelligent and Eloquent Kafir ") _ . 7 , _ , 
 
 r. T-, \ ... Prinqie s Researches 
 
 Captive Female ) J 
 
 Jan Tzatzoe ; a Christian Kafir Chief. . . Christian Keepsake 
 
 His parentage — Is received into the Missionary School at Bethelsdorp — Strong 
 religious impressions — Travels with the Missionary Williams — Acts as inter- 
 preter to Lord Somerset — Renders valuable aid in establishing the Mission at 
 Wesleyville — Restrains his tribe from war — -Deprived of his hereditary lands, 
 and driven into the wilderness — With Andries Stoffles, a Hottentot, visits Great 
 Britain to procure compensation, and to solicit assistance in promoting the 
 moral and spiritual improvement of his countrymen — Notorious facts — Exam- 
 ined before a select Committee of the House of Commons — Extracts from the 
 printed evidence — Very explicit and conclusive — Address of Stoffles at Exeter 
 Hall — Testimony of E. Baines, M. P., on the occasion — Restitution awarded 
 him— Returns to Africa — Visited by James Backhouse — High testimony respect- 
 ing him — Lines by T. Pringle. 
 
 Andeies STOFFLES^a Christian Hot- j Missionary Magazine, 1838. 
 
 His early life and conversion — Testifies of the Grace of God to his countrymen 
 — His impressive manner — Imprisoned for preaching — Preaches to his fellow- 
 prisoners — His valuable assistance to Missionaries — Formation of the settlement 
 of Kat River — Embarks for England — His eloquent and animated addresses 
 His health declines and he returns to Africa — His happy death — His personal 
 appearance . 
 
 Extract of a Letter from John ) 
 
 Candler ^ ...Irish Friend 
 
 332 
 
 348 
 
 350 
 
 356 
 356 
 
 357 
 
 359 
 
 374 
 
 Grateful Slaves Madden's West Indies 
 
 Simeon Wilhelm Bickersteth's Memoir 
 
 Born in Africa — Received into the Missionary School at Bashia — His teachable, 
 gentle, and affectionate disposition — Accompanies E. Bickersteth to England — 
 His education under the Vicarof Pakefield— His health suffers — High testimony 
 respecting him — Makes considerable progress in learning Arabic — Begins Latin 
 — Powerful influence of Divine Grace exemplified in him — His decease. 
 
 Louis Desrouleaux RaynaVs European Set, 
 
 380 
 
 381 
 
 382 
 
 387 
 
(Tnnfrnts. 
 
 Afe 
 
 A confidential Slave — Purchases his freedom — Remarkable gratitude to his 
 former master. 
 
 Prince Gagangha Acqua Communicated 388 
 
 A son of an African King — After some singular incidents he arrives in England 
 — Meets with kind friends in London — His admiration and astonishment in 
 viewing the metropolis — Highly appreciates European knowledge — His" account 
 of the mode of procuring Slaves— Gradations by which intelligence occupied his 
 former ignorance and superstition — Visit to the British Museum — Progress of 
 his religious acquirements — Introduced to Lord John Russell and T. F. Buxton 
 — The latterpresentshim with a writing case — The inscription upon it — His sense 
 of the evils of Slavery— Scientific men much admired the organic structure of his 
 head — Returns to Africa — Subsequent gratifying particulars respecting him. 
 
 Benoit the Black Abbe Gregoire 397 
 
 Eminent for an assemblage of virtues. 
 
 Benjamin Cochrane Madden 's West Indies 397 
 
 A skilful Negro Doctor in Jamaica — Learned Mandingo Negroes — A Koran 
 written from memory by one of them. 
 
 Kosetta Anti- Slavery Reporter 399 
 
 A remarkable Narrative, evincing that the Negro character is not devoid of 
 humanity or magnanimity when fairly tested. 
 
 Disinterested Testimony to Negro \ 
 Ability and Faithfulness j 
 
 Alexandre Petion BelcJi amber s Biog . Die . §c. . . . 405 
 
 A dark Mulatto — President of Hayti — Educated in the Military School of Paris 
 — A skilful engineer — A man of fine talents — Unfortunate in his government — 
 Candler's testimony respecting him — Interesting and pleasing anecdote. 
 
 James W. C. Pennington Communicated 406 
 
 Minister of a Presbyterian Church in New York — A fugitive from Slavery — His 
 birth and parentage — Escapes from Slavery — Sheltered at the house of a Quaker 
 in Pennsylvania — Who gives him some instruction — Teaches a school near 
 Flushing— Religious impressions — Desires to become a minister — Studies at the 
 Theological Seminary at New Haven — Preaches eight years at Hartford — 
 Elected to a seat in various Conventions — Deputed to attend at the World's 
 Anti-Slavery Convention in London ; also the World's Peace Convention — Takes 
 part in them — Preaches in many chapels in England — Supplies the pulpits of 
 some of the most popular ministers — Favourably received on his return to 
 America — Presides over an assembly of Whites — Examines candidates in 
 Church History, Theology, &c. — His publications — Refutes calumny before a 
 large audience of Whites. 
 
 Ignatius Sancho His Life and Letters 410 
 
 Born on board a Slave-ship — Taken to England and presented to three ladies — 
 The Duke of Montague admires and takes an interest in him — On the death 
 of the Duke the Duchess admits him into her household — Marries and com- 
 mences business — Gains the public esteem — Applies himself to study — His re- 
 putation as a wit and humourist — Two volumes of his letters published — 
 Exhibit considerable epistolary talent, rapid andjust conception, anduniversal 
 philanthropy — Extracts from several of them — Interested in the unfortunate 
 Dr. Dodd — Writes on his behalf — Addresses Sterne — Sterne's reply — Concluding 
 observations. 
 
 Eva Bartels Sham's South Africa 425 
 
 A Mulatto woman of South Africa — Her conversion — An example of piety — 
 Zealous in inviting and bringing others to grace. 
 
 4U& 
 
 Robert Jowitt 404 
 
totetrtH. 
 
 John Mosely Hartford Courant 426 
 
 Well known for industry, prudence, and integrity — Devotes his property to 
 charitable objects. 
 
 Nancy Pitchford Hartford Courant 427 
 
 Lott CabeY Mott : — Chambers 427 
 
 Born a Slave in Virginia — Excessively profane — Becomes awakened — Learns 
 to read and write — His business abilities — Often rewarded with presents — Saves 
 850 dollars, and purchases his freedom and that of two of his children — After- 
 wards of his family — Purchases land in Richmond — Devotes his leisure to 
 reading — Interest in African Missions — Goes out to Sierra Leone — Substance of 
 his farewell sermon — Death of his second wife — Wide field of usefulness — His 
 great abilities place him in a station of influence — Description of him by an 
 American writer — Relieves the sufferings of the early emigrants — Makes liberal 
 sacrifices of property and time — Acts as physician — Made health Officer and 
 General Inspector — His melancholy death from an explosion — Proof that Blacks 
 are not destitute of moral worth and innate genius. 
 
 Testimony of Joseph Sturge Communicated 431 
 
 Respecting the Intellectual Powers of the Negro — Comparison between Black 
 or Coloured and White children. 
 
 Cornelius Holme's Moravian Missions ... 433 
 
 A Negro assistant Missionary in St. Thomas — His conversion and progress in 
 religion — Christian address to his children on his death bed. 
 
 Moravian Missions Oldendorp 436 
 
 Amongst the Negroes of the West Indies — Opposition to the conversion of the 
 Negroes — Visit of Count Zinzendorf — He returns to Europe — His appeal to the 
 Danish Government — Negroes addresses to the King and Queen of Denmark — 
 The Count takes one of the Negroes to visit the German Churches — Particulars 
 respecting David, Abraham, and others of the Black assistant Missionaries 
 — Susanna Jaos — Peter and Abraham— Their evangelical discourses — Abra- 
 ham's melancholy death — His steadfastness. 
 
 Intelligent Africans Evidence before Select Com. ... 441 
 
 A Negro Slave and Poet His Life by Br. Madden 442 
 
 Composes verses at the age of twelve — Cruel treatment — Made a mere automaton 
 L,earns to draw — Melancholy events— His sufferings — Trust in God — Treated 
 with greater kindness — Pursuit of knowledge under difficulties — Effects his 
 escape from Slavery — Specimens of his Poems translated from the Spanish — 
 To Calumny — Religion— The Firefly— The Dream, &c. 
 
 Frederick Douglass His Narrative 454 
 
 Born a Slave — Effects his escape — Writes his Narrative — Remark on it — His 
 feelings at the chance of being one day free — His intellectual capabilities — An 
 eloquent public speaker, 
 
 Negro Character and Ability Dr. Winterbottom 457 
 
 Dr.Winterbottom's opportunities of observing Negro character in Africa — Their 
 benevolence and hospitality — Mental powers — Some extremely intelligent. 
 
 Suana ; a Kafir Chief Philip's Researches 459 
 
 An enlightened Christian — His happy death— Was a poet — Specimen of his 
 abilities — Translation. 
 
 Jasmin Thoumazeau Motfs Biographical Sketches 460 
 
 Born in Africa — Sold as a Slave to St. Domingo — Obtains his freedom — Estab- 
 lishes a Hospital for Negroes — Medals decreed to him. 
 
 Paul Cuffe Memoir by W. A 461 
 
 An intelligent, enterprising, and benevolent Negro — His father stolen from 
 
tatBttts. 
 
 Africa — Sold into Slavery — Purchases his freedom and a farm of 100 acres — 
 Paul pursues knowledge under difficulties — His natural talents — Petition the 
 Legislature on behalf of the Free Negro population — They receive equal privi- 
 leges in consequence — Increases his property — Owns vessels, houses, and land 
 — Anecdote illustrative of prejudice — His good conduct removes it — Establishes 
 a public school at his own expense — Joins the Society of Friends — Becomes a 
 preacher amongst them — Teaches Navigation — His integrity — Mourns over the 
 condition of his African brethren — Visits Sierra Leone — Suggests improvements 
 in the colony — Institutes a Society for promoting the interests of its members 
 and the colonists — Epistle issued by it— He visits England at the invitation of 
 the African Institution — Good conduct of the Coloured crew at Liverpool — 
 African Institution acquiesce in Paul's plans — Authorize him to carry Free Ne- 
 groes from America to Sierra Leone to instruct the Colonists — Visits Sierra 
 Leone again — Thence to America — His joyful welcome there — Could not rest at 
 ease whilst thinking of the sufferings and degradation of his fellow-creatures — 
 Prepares for another voyage to Sierra Leone — Presented by the American war 
 — Improves and matures his plans — Sails with 38 Africans to Sierra Leone — 
 Proof of his zeal for the welfare of his race — Expends from his private funds 
 4000 dollars for the benefit of the Colony — Grant of land from the Governor — 
 Paul's address to the Negroes — His final departure for America — An affecting 
 scene — Seized with a complaint which proves fatal in 1817 — Sketch of his cha- 
 racter by Peter Williams — His remarkably happy close — Testimony of an 
 American paper — Concluding remarks. 
 
 ExteactofaLettee feomMaet-1 476 
 
 LAND. ) 
 
 Respecting two liberated Slaves — Remarkable proofs of their gratitude. 
 
 Ashton Wabnee His Narrative 
 
 A Slave in St. Vincent's — His freedom purchased by Daphne Crosbie, a bene- 
 volent Negress — He is re-enslaved — Asserts his independence — Makes his es- 
 cape — Arrives in England, and writes his Narrative — Though uneducated, very 
 intelligent — Destitution and the climate prove fatal — Dies in London — His re- 
 marks on Slavery — Testimony respecting him. 
 
 Alexandee Cetjmmell Communicated. 
 
 Of pure African parentage — One of the only four episcopal Coloured clergymen 
 in the United States — Remarkable example ofwhat the African can become by 
 cultivation — Extracts from his Eulogy on the Life and Character of Clarkson — 
 Abounds in pathos and rich touches of eloquence — Visits England — Addresses 
 meeting of Anti-Slavery Society — Preaches in St. George's Church, Everton — 
 Particulars of this occasion — Sketch of his sermon — A living proof of the capa- 
 bility of the African. 
 
 Anecdote Illtjsteative of Faith- \ 
 dullness, j 
 
 Maeossi ; the Bechtjana Boy Pringle' s African Sketches ... 491 
 
 An orphan boy, ten years of age, stolen by banditti — Falls under Pringle's pro- 
 tection — His affecting story immortalized by Pringle, in a beautiful and touch- 
 ing poem — Accompanies Pringle to England — An interesting and remarkabie 
 youth — His religious feelings — His death. 
 
 Exteaoedinaet Fidelity of a 1 
 
 Negeo Boy. J Irish Friend 496 
 
 The Amistad Captives Sturge's United States, Sfc. . . . 497 
 
 Africans from the Mendi country — Overcome the crew of the Slaver— The vessel 
 brought into Newhaven — They are lodged in jail — Interest excited in their be- 
 half — Their cruel treatment — Finally become liberated— Their progress in 
 
 477 
 
 479 
 
 Thome and Kimball 490 
 
€$ntmU. 
 
 learning — Their excursion through the States — Impression made — Fund raised 
 to convey them home with Missionaries — Cinque— A remarkable man — Sturge's 
 account of these Africans — Their superior intellect — Belief in a Supreme Being 
 — Embark for Sierra Leone. 
 
 Testimony of Dr. Thompson Parliament. Report 
 
 Llewellyn Cupido Michells James Backhouse 
 
 A descendant of a Hottentot chief — Received into a Missionary School — His 
 amiable disposition — Early religious impressions — Brought to England to 
 educate — Enters the family of James Backhouse— His health declines rapidly 
 — Influence of divine grace exemplified in him — His happy close. 
 
 The Grateful Negro MoU's Biog. Sketches 
 
 The Faithful Negress Idem 
 
 Francis Williams Abbe Gregoire 
 
 Born of African parents in Jamaica— Duke of .Montague struck with his talents — 
 Sent to England to educate— Publishes a poem — Returns to Jamaica — Teaches 
 a School — Composes poems in Latin — A specimen of one addressed to the 
 Governor of Jamaica — Translated into French by Abbe Gregoire — into English 
 by Long, and versified — Just observations of the Dean of Middleham. 
 
 Henry H. Garnett Communicated 
 
 Born in Maryland — Descended from an African chief — Escapes with his family 
 from Slavery— Hunted by men stealers — Becomes a cabin boy on board a 
 schooner — Enters the African Free School at New York — Admitted into Canal 
 Street Collegiate School — Studies Latin — Enters Canaan Academy — Events 
 there — His marriage — Religious impressions — Turns his attention to the gos- 
 pel ministry — Gains reputation at the Oneida Institute as a courteous and 
 accomplished man, an able and eloquent debater, and a good writer — Appears 
 as a public speaker — Graduates at Whitestoun, and receives his diploma-- 
 Ordained a minister at Troy — Obtains a hearing before the legislatures of New 
 York and Connecticut — His remarkable speeches — Publishes a Discourse on 
 the Past and Present Condition, and Destiny of the Coloured Race — Connected 
 with a newspaper — He is a pure Black. 
 
 Solomon Bayley Narrative and Letters. 
 
 Robert Hurnard interested in obtaining and publishing his Narrative — Prevails 
 upon him to write it— Account of his early life — Born a Slave— Various trials 
 and difficulties — His deep religious impressions — His growth in the truth beau- 
 tifully narrated — A. few of his letters — His call to the ministry — Visits Liberia 
 — Returns to America again — Just observation of Clarkson after reading the 
 Narrative of this pious Negro. 
 
 Hannibal, or Annibal Abbe Gregoire 
 
 A well-educated Negro— Becomes a lieutenant general and director of artillery 
 in Russia — His talented son — commenced the establishment of a fort and 
 fortress at Cherson. 
 
 Facts from Liberia Colonization Herald 
 
 Remarkable exhibition of Negro capability in Liberia, a colony of free negroes 
 — Their sound judgment and Christian character — Christian government — a 
 purely moral community — Public school — Religion and morality progressing — 
 Exclusion of ardent spirits— Improvement — The Governor J. J. Roberts, a 
 Slave iu Virginia a few years ago — His superior character and ability — Ex- 
 tract from his Inaugural address— Hilary Teague, a Coloured senator — The 
 son of a Virginian Slave — Extracts from an eloquent speech made by him, 
 embracing a most beautiful exposition of the history, trials, exertions and 
 
 502 
 503 
 
 505 
 506 
 507 
 
 510 
 
 513 
 
 523 
 
 523 
 
 % 
 
 %( 
 
 % I 
 
(£nnbtits. 
 
 aspiration of the Negro colonists — The abettors of Slavery challenged to exhibit 
 half the talent and ability evinced in the addresses of these Coloured legislators. 
 
 Joannes Jaageb Shaw's Memorials 534 
 
 A South African — His conversion — Very desirous of instruction — His progress 
 in knowledge — Zeal — Travels with Missionary Threlfall — Courage in danger — 
 A martyr to the Truth — Lines on the occasion, by Montgomery. 
 
 Testimonies of Hannah Kiiham ...Her Life 526 
 
 A Noble Slate Emancipated Gazette Officielle 538 
 
 Eustace Chambers' Journal 538 
 
 A remarkably benevolent and intelligent Negro, born in St. Domingo — Defini- 
 tion of the characteristics of his life by a Phrenologist — Saves his master's life 
 and many hundreds besides — Rescues the former from danger — They sail to- 
 gether to America — Succours unfortunate sufferers at Baltimore — His liberation 
 — Subsequent devotedness — Saves his master's life again — Death of the latter — 
 Eustace's remarkable benevolence — Accompanies General Rochambeau to En- 
 gland and France — Kindness to a poor widow— French academy grant him a 
 prize — Worthy of a noble monument. 
 
 William Wells Brown Sis Narrative 541 
 
 Escapes from Slavery — Harrowing scenes portrayedin his Narrative — Befriended 
 
 by a Quaker — Assists his fugitive brethren in Canada — His abilities evinced in 
 
 an article written by him on the Slave Trade. 
 
 A Mass of Eacts demonstrative of Negro capability remain in 
 
 the Author's hands — a few claim a passing notice — Zhinga, a 
 
 Negro Queen — Be Senteha, Xing of Kooranko — Assana 
 
 Yeera, a Negro King — Jejana, a South African Widow — 
 
 Lucy Cardwell — Joseph Eachel — John Williams — Jacob 
 
 Links — Peter Links — Zilpha Montjoy — Alice, a female 
 
 Slave — GeorgeHabdy — Qtjashi — Moses, a Negro of Virginia 
 
 — Zangaea— Charles Knight — Joseph May — Maqtjama — 
 
 Jacob Hodges — The Negbo Servant — Belinda Lucas — 
 
 Gomez — Afrikaner — Jupiter Hammon — Angelo Soli- 
 
 mann from 545 to 549 
 
 Living Witnesses, demonstrative of Negro capability 550 
 
 Joseph Thoene Thome and Kimball 550 
 
 Born a Slave — Remained one till twenty years of age — Now a lay preacher in 
 the Episcopal Church — His accomplished wife and family. 
 
 Thomas Haebis Thome and Kimball 551 
 
 Thome and Kimball's account of a visit to his family — Interesting conversation 
 — Lively discussions — Their equality with Whites — Facts respectingT. Harris — 
 Born a Slave — His business talents — Eminently distinguished by manly graces 
 and accomplishments. 
 
 S. A. Prescod Thome and Kimball 553 
 
 A young Coloured gentleman — Educated in England — Editor of a Newspaper 
 — Debarred from filling various offices— Excluded from the Society of Whites 
 — Dr. Lloyd's observation respecting him. 
 
 Me. Joedan.., Thome and Kimball 554 
 
 Improvement of Coloured people in Jamaica — Are Aldermen — Justices of 
 Peace, &c. — Mr. Jordan is a member of the Assembly — Owns the largest book 
 store in Jamaica, and an extensive printing office, issuing a paper twice a week 
 — Other papers issued by Coloured people — Many Coloured printers. 
 
 / 
 
 m 
 
i'unhuU. 
 
 Richard Hill Thome and Kimball 
 
 A Coloured gentleman of very superior abilities — Secretary of the special magis- 
 trate department of Jamaica — Member of the Assembly — High testimony re 
 specting him — Travels two years in Hayti — His published letters written in a 
 flowing and luxuriant style^Secretary to the Governor and mainspring of the 
 Government during administration of Lord Sligo and Sir Lionel Smith — A na- 
 turalist — Has recently published a valuable ornithological work. 
 
 London Bourne Thome and Kimball 557 
 
 Interesting account of a visit to his family — Genuine Negroes — Their intelli- 
 gence — Mr. Bourne a Slave till 23 years old — His freedom purchased by his 
 father for 500 dollars — And his mother and four brothers for 2500 dollars — Has 
 become a wealthy merchant — Highly respected for his integrity and business 
 talents — Many other Coloured persons and families of equal merit as those 
 named — Some are popular instructors, and one ranks high as a teacher of lan- 
 guages. 
 
 Concluding Observations 560 
 

 ® 
 
 "v/v/v/v/V* rvN ^^.^^/\^/\/~^^v/~w~^./\y%>^/\y'N h >\b 
 
 list nf ^nrtrnits artr) (0ngrnnings. 
 
 The Africans, Tzatzoe and St<>ifles, giving evidence before a Committee of the British 
 Parliament (for further description see page 3G5) 
 
 A Negro of Mozambique (from M. Peron's Voyages) 
 
 Olandah Equiano, or Gustavus Yassa ,,, 
 
 Toussaint L'Ouverture, the Black Chief of St. Domingo 
 
 Fac simile of Toussaint's Hand Writing 
 
 Temple erected by the Blacks of St. Domingo to commemorate their Emancipation 
 
 Jan Tzatzoe, a Christian Chief of South Africa 
 
 James W. C. Pennington, born a Slave ; a highly esteemed Gospel Minister . , , 
 
 Frederick Douglass, a fugitive Slave 
 
 Cinque, the Chief of the " Amistacl Captives " 
 
 Facing Title. 
 
 Page 43 
 
 ,, 192 
 
 „ 278 
 
 „ m 
 
 , 304 
 
 „ 359 
 
 , 468 
 
 ,. 456 
 
 .. 5iKt 
 
 THE MOROCCO COPIES ALSO CONTAIN, IN ADDITION TO THE 
 ABOVE, THE FOLLOWING ENGRAVINGS ON STEEL : 
 
 Gang of Slaves journeying to be sold in a Southern Market 
 
 Sale of Estates, Pictures, and Slaves, in the Rotunda. New Orleans 
 
 \j- ^\/"iS\SW *. 
 
 V \S\s\s\j ' _ ~w s^-j~*j 
 
INTRODUCTORY POEM 
 
 BERNARD BARTON. 
 
 A Tribute for the Negro Race ! 
 
 With all whose minds and hearts 
 Have known the power of Gospel Grace, 
 
 The love which it imparts. 
 
 Who know and feel that God is Love ! 
 
 And that His high behest, 
 Given from His throne in Heaven above, 
 
 Says — "Succour the oppressed!" 
 
 A Tribute for our Brother Man ! 
 
 Our Sister Woman too ! 
 With all whose feeling hearts can own 
 
 What unto each is due : 
 
 Who cherish holy sympathy 
 With human flesh and blood, 
 
 And feel the inseparable tie 
 Of that vast Brotherhood ! 
 
 w 
 
)% 
 
 Mtrntartortj fum. 
 
 That the same God hath fashion'd all, 
 
 Moulded in human frame ; 
 And bade them on His mercy call, 
 
 Pleading — A Father s Name ! 
 
 That the same Saviour died for each, 
 
 So each to Him might live ! 
 That the same Spirit sent to teach, 
 
 To all can Wisdom give. 
 
 A Tribute to the mental power 
 Of Blacks, as well as Whites ; 
 
 For Nature, in her ample dower, 
 Owns all her Children's rights : 
 
 And scorns, by casual tint of skin, 
 Those sacred rights to adjust, 
 
 Which, to the immortal Soul within, 
 Her God hath given in trust ! 
 
 A Tribute to fair Freedom's spells, 
 
 The boon of God on high ; 
 For — -ever — where His Spirit dwells, 
 
 There must be Liberty ! 
 
 That Spirit breaks each galling yoke — 
 
 Fetters of cruel thrall, 
 The brand's impress, the scourge's stroke, 
 
 It loathes, laments them all. 
 
 <pTTNS) 
 
 1 .y 
 

 SJH 
 
 3ntrnhtrtnrt| tymm. 
 
 Lastly, — A Tribute unto Him, 
 Our Father ! throned in Heaven ! 
 
 For all who yet, in life or limb, 
 Succumb to Slavery's leaven. 
 
 That He for such His arm may bare, 
 
 Their Liberator be ; 
 And in His Will and Power declare 
 
 " The Negro shall be free ! " 
 
 That as His mighty, outstretch'd hand 
 
 Led Israel forth of yore, 
 So He to Afric's injured land 
 
 Would Freedom — Peace restore. 
 
 That Gospel Love, and Gospel Grace, 
 May there His Power proclaim ; 
 
 Make glad each solitary place, 
 And glorify His Name ! 
 
 *?<r-) 
 
% Critmte far ttje J&gro. 
 
 
 %n Stnjuinf into til? rkiras nf tlj? Jfogrn 
 Ear? tn jntiMrafy nttfo it f iuMrctinn nf 
 tljrir nrigiunl Mjttnlittf mitlj % ntjjrr 
 pnrtiims nf Jtaknft ; mitif n fern nh- 
 OTittinus nu tljr itialtBttahtB rigjita nf 
 Mm, tju Ira nf Itartj, kt, ki. 
 
A TRIBUTE FOR THE NEGRO. 
 
 ^art fmt 
 
 AN INQUIEY INTO THE CLAIMS OF THE NEGEO 
 EACE TO HUMANITY, &c. 
 
 CHAPTEK I. 
 
 Sin of Slavery increasingly acknowledged — Delusion respecting the moral 
 and intellectual capacity of the Negro — An important question — To 
 despise a fellow-being on account of any external peculiarity, a sin — 
 Christianity the manifestation of universal love — Inquiry into the causes 
 of the diversity characterising various nations and people — Analogous 
 in animals — Remarks of Buffon and Lawrence on this subject — Connec- 
 tion between the physiological, moral, and intellectual characters in 
 Man — The diversities trifling in comparison with those attributes in 
 which they agree — Nothing to warrant us in referring to any particular 
 race an insurmountable deficiency in moral and intellectual faculties — 
 Scripture testimony to unity of origin in the human race. 
 
 In the present enlightened age, talent and piety have 
 combined their energies, in endeavouring to promote the 
 welfare and emancipation of the degraded and enslaved 
 African. The grievous sin of man making merchandise of 
 his fellow-creatures, and holding them in perpetual slavery, 
 has long been a subject of eloquent declamation, and has 
 for some time been denounced by the unanimous voice of 
 the British public. England has given to the nations a 
 noble example, in abolishing, at a great sacrifice, a system 
 of injustice and cruelty, in which she had long taken a 
 guilty part. 
 
 " 'Twas Britain's mightiest sons that struck the blow ! " 
 
 " And monarchs trembled at the o'erpowering sound, 
 And nations heard, and senates shook around, 
 And widely struck, by the victorious spell, 
 From Negro limbs, the enslaving shackles fell! " 
 
Yet notwithstanding the evils of Slavery are becoming 
 increasingly felt and acknowledged, it is evident that there 
 still exists, in the minds of many who deprecate the whole 
 system as unjust, a strong delusion with regard to the 
 moral and intellectual capacities of the Coloured portion of 
 mankind, and as regards their proper station in the scale 
 of intelligent existence. 
 
 It is an important question, whether the Negro is con- 
 stitutionally, and therefore irremediably, inferior to the 
 White man, in the powers of the mind. Much of the future 
 welfare of the human race depends on the answer which 
 experience and facts will furnish to this question ; for it 
 concerns not only the vast population of Africa, but many 
 millions of the Negro race who are located elsewhere, as well 
 as the Whites who are becoming mixed with the Black race 
 in countries where Slavery exists, or where it has existed till 
 within a very recent period. Many persons have ventured 
 upon peremptory decisions on both sides of the question ; 
 but the majority appear to be still unsatisfied as to the real 
 capabilities of the Negro race. Their present actual infe- 
 riority in many respects, comparing them as a whole with 
 the lighter coloured portion of mankind, is too evident to 
 be disputed ; but it must be borne in mind that they are 
 not in a condition for a fair comparison to be drawn between 
 the two. Their present degraded state, whether we consi- 
 der them in a mental or moral point of view, may be easily 
 accounted for by the circumstances amidst which Negroes 
 have lived, both in their own countries, and when they have 
 been transplanted into a foreign land. But if instances can 
 be adduced of individuals of the African race exhibiting 
 marks of genius, which would be considered eminent in 
 civilized European society, we have proofs that there is 
 no incompatibility between Negro organization and high 
 intellectual power. 
 
 It has been well observed by a late writer, that it is 
 important to elucidate this question, if possible, on several 
 
51 Ciitab for % Jfrgrn. 
 
 accounts ; and that if it be proved to be correct, the Negro 
 is qualified to occupy a different situation in society to that 
 which has been declared to belong to him, by the almost 
 unanimous acclaim of civilized nations. If the capabilities 
 and aptitudes of the Negro are such as some writers argue, 
 he is only fitted, by his natural constitution and endow- 
 ments, for a servile state ; and the zealous friends of his 
 tribe, Wilberforce and Clarkson, Allen and Gurney, with 
 many others, who were thought to have obtained an exalted 
 station among the great benefactors of the human race, 
 must be regarded as having been simply well-meaning en- 
 thusiasts, who, under an imagined principle of philanthropy, 
 argued with too much success for the emancipation of 
 domestic animals, of creatures destined by nature to remain 
 in that condition, and to serve the lords of the creation 
 in common with his oxen, his horses, and his dogs. If 
 science has led to this conclusion, as the true and just in- 
 ference from facts, the sooner it is admitted the better : 
 the opinion which is opposed to it must be unreasonable 
 and injurious. 
 
 But the purport of the present volume is to prove from 
 facts which speak loudly, that the Negro is indubitably, 
 and fully, entitled to equal claims with the rest of man- 
 kind ; — a task by no means difficult, no more so indeed, 
 to the impartial judge, than to demonstrate the self-evident 
 truths 
 
 " That smoke ascends, that snow is white." 
 
 The claims of the Negro are, however, called in question by 
 so many, and their rights as men denied by those who point 
 at the colour which God has given them, with the finger of 
 scorn, that some counteracting influence seemed desirable. 
 
 To despise a fellow-being, or attach a degree of infe- 
 riority to him, merely on account of his complexion, or any 
 other external peculiarity which may have been conferred 
 upon him, is to arraign the wisdom of the Allwise Creator, 
 and, consequently, an offence in the Divine sight. " He 
 
% Critmfr fur tip Jfcgrn. 
 
 who cannot recognise a brother," says Dr. Channing, " a 
 man possessing all the rights of humanity, under a skin 
 darker than his own, wants the vision of a Christian." It 
 proves him a stranger to justice and love, in those universal 
 forms by which our benign religion is characterised. Chris- 
 tianity is the manifestation and inculcation of universal 
 love ; its great teaching is, that we should recognise and 
 respect human nature in all its forms, in the poorest, most 
 ignorant, most fallen. We must look beneath " the flesh," 
 to " the spirit ;" for it is the spiritual principle in Man that 
 entitles him to our brotherly regard. To be just to this 
 is the great injunction of our religion : to overlook this, on 
 account of condition or colour, is to violate the great Chris- 
 tian law. The greatest of all distinctions in Man, the only 
 enduring ones, are moral goodness, virtue, and religion. A 
 being capable of these, is invested by God with solemn 
 claims on his fellow-creatures, and to despise millions of 
 such beings, to stamp them with inevitable inferiority, and 
 to exclude them from our sympathy, because of outward 
 disadvantages, proves, that in whatever we may surpass 
 them, we are not their superiors in Christian virtue. 
 
 But when erroneous opinions become thoroughly im- 
 bibed, it is difficult speedily, or, perhaps, in some instances, 
 ever, entirely to eradicate them from the mind, however 
 unfounded they may be. Although it is a common, and 
 very just observation, that two individuals are hardly to be 
 met with, possessing precisely the same features, yet there 
 is generally a certain distinctive cast of countenance com- 
 mon to the particular races of men, and often to the inhabi- 
 tants of particular countries. The differences existing in 
 various regions of the globe, both in the bodily formation of 
 Man and in the development of the faculties of his mind, 
 are so striking that they cannot have escaped the notice of 
 the most superficial observer. 
 
 There is scarcely any question relating to the history 
 of organized beings, calculated to excite greater interest, 
 
% <MMt far tire Jfcp. 
 
 than inquiries into the nature of those varieties in com- 
 plexion, form, and habits, which distinguish from each 
 other the several races of men. Our curiosity on this 
 subject ceases to be awakened when we have become accus- 
 tomed to satisfy ourselves respecting it with some hypo- 
 thesis, whether adequate or insufficient to explain the 
 phenomenon ; but, if a person previously unaware of the 
 existence of such diversities, could suddenly be made a 
 spectator of the various appearances which the tribes of 
 men display in different regions of the earth, it cannot be 
 doubted that he would experience emotions of wonder and 
 surprise. To enter into a full consideration of this interesting 
 subject is not within the province of this work. It will, how- 
 ever, be necessary to make a few observations upon it, so 
 far as to demonstrate that the whole family of Man is iden- 
 tically of the same species. Those who desire to enter more 
 largely into this study, may refer to Prichard's "Researches 
 into the Physical History of Mankind," or to Dr. Lawrence's 
 well known " Lectures," in which the able authors have 
 maintained, with the greatest extent of research, and fully 
 proved, a unity of species in all the human races. 
 
 Notwithstanding the great diversity which is found to 
 exist in the extent of mental acquirements, as well as of 
 the physiological peculiarities, and physical qualities, cha- 
 racterizing the inhabitants of various portions of the world, 
 there can be little doubt that this diversity is more attribu- 
 table to external or adventitious causes, to the circum- 
 stances in which they live, to their particular habits, their 
 progress in the culture of arts and sciences, and their ad- 
 vancement in civilization and refinement, and to a variety 
 of physical and moral agencies and local circumstances, 
 rather than to any singularity or variation in their original 
 natural organization and endowment. To the operation 
 of all these causes, may be added, the surprising effects of 
 education when almost universally applied, which are suf- 
 ficiently obvious wherever its influence extends. 
 
 <CTX 
 
1 CtfMe for ttj? jfjgm 
 
 That climate should also exert a powerful influence on 
 Man may be very reasonably supposed ; it has an analo- 
 gous influence on the other tribes of animated beings. 
 The animal kingdom presents us with numerous striking 
 instances of diversity in the texture and colour of their 
 coverings, occurring, undoubtedly, in the same species. 
 Sheep are particularly marked by the great difference of 
 their fleece, in different latitudes. In Africa, and very warm 
 countries, a coarse rough hair is substituted in the place of 
 its wool, which, in other situations, is soft and delicate. 
 The dog loses its coat entirely in Africa, and has a smooth 
 soft skin. The wool of the sheep is thicker and longer in 
 the winter and in hilly northern situations, than in the 
 summer and on warm plains. Climate, coupled with food, 
 appear to be the great modifying agents, in the production 
 of these and many other varieties in the animal world ; 
 but no attempt has been made to assign a separate origin 
 in their case. The white colour, in the northern regions, 
 of many animals, which possess other colours in more 
 temperate latitudes, as the bear, the fox, the hare, beasts of 
 burden, the falcon, crow, jackdaw, chaffinch, &c, seems 
 to arise entirely from climate. This opinion is strength- 
 ened by the analogy of those animals which change their 
 colour, in the same country, in the winter season, to white 
 or grey, as the ermine and weasel, hare, squirrel, reindeer, 
 white game, snow bunting, &c. The common bear is dif- 
 ferently coloured in different regions. 
 
 With regard to the physiological distinctions of Man, 
 there is no point of difference between the several races, 
 which has not been found to arise, in at least an equal 
 degree, among other animals as mere varieties, from the 
 usual causes of degeneration, &c. What differences are 
 there in the figure and proportion of parts in the various 
 breeds of horses ; in the Arabian, the Barb, and the 
 German ! How striking the contrast between the long- 
 legged cattle of the Cape of Good Hope and the short- 
 
 mf 
 
 >]n 
 
I (Trite far tip Jfoptt. 
 
 >w 
 
 legged of England ! The same difference is observed in 
 swine. The cattle have no horns in some breeds of Eng- 
 land and Ireland ; in Sicily, on the contrary, they have 
 very large ones. A breed of sheep, with an extraordinary 
 number of horns, as three, four, or five, occurs in some nor- 
 thern countries — as, for instance, in Ireland — and is ac- 
 counted a mere variety. The Cretan breed of the same 
 animals has long, large, and twisted horns. We may also 
 point out the broad-tailed sheep of the Cape, in which the 
 tail grows so large that it is placed on a board, supported by 
 wheels, for the convenience of the animal. " Let us compare," 
 says Buffon, " our pitiful sheep with the mouflon, from 
 which they derived their origin. The mouflon is a large 
 animal ; he is fleet as a stag, armed with horns and thick 
 hoofs, covered with coarse hair, and dreads neither the 
 inclemency of the sky nor the voracity of the wolf. He 
 not only escapes from his enemies by the swiftness of his 
 course, scaling with truly wonderful leaps, the most 
 frightful precipices ; but he resists them by the strength of 
 his body and the solidity of the arms with which his head 
 and feet are fortified. How different from our sheep, which 
 subsist with difficulty in flocks, who are unable to defend 
 themselves by their numbers, who cannot endure the cold 
 of our winters without shelter, and who would all perish if 
 man withdrew his protection ! So completely are the frame 
 and capabilities of this animal degraded by his association 
 with us, that it is no longer able to subsist in a wild state, 
 if turned loose, as the goat, pig, and cattle are. In the 
 warm climates of Asia and Africa, the mouflon, who is 
 the common parent of all the races of this species, appears 
 to be less degenerated than in any other region. Though re- 
 duced to a domesticated state, he has preserved his stature 
 and his hair ; but the size of his horns is diminished. Of all 
 the domesticated sheep, those of Senegal and India are 
 the largest, and their nature has suffered least degradation. 
 The sheep of Barbary, Egypt, Arabia, Persia, Tartary, &c, 
 
10 
 
 i €nhk for tire 3S*gra. 
 
 have undergone greater changes. In relation to Man, they 
 are improved in some articles, and vitiated in others ; but 
 with regard to nature, improvement and degeneration are 
 the same thing ; for they both imply an alteration of origi- 
 nal constitution. Their coarse hair is changed into fine 
 wool ; their tail, loaded with a mass of fat, and sometimes 
 reaching the weight of forty pounds, has acquired a mag- 
 nitude so incommodious, that the animals trail it with 
 pain. While swollen with superfluous matter, and adorned 
 with a beautiful fleece, their strength, agility, magnitude, 
 and arms are diminished. These long-tailed sheep are 
 half the size only of the mouflon. They can neither fly 
 from danger, nor resist the enemy. To preserve and mul- 
 tiply the species they require the constant care and sup- 
 port of Man. The degeneration of the original species is 
 still greater in our climates. Of all the qualities of the 
 mouflon, our ewes and rams have retained nothing but a 
 small portion of vivacity, which yields to the crook of the 
 shepherd. Timidity, weakness, resignation, and stu- 
 pidity, are the only melancholy remains of their degraded 
 nature."* 
 
 The pig-kind afford an instructive example, because 
 their descent is more clearly made out than that of many 
 other animals. The dog, indeed, degenerates before our 
 eyes ; but it will hardly ever, perhaps, be satisfactorily as- 
 certained whether there is one or more species. The extent 
 of degeneration can be observed in the domestic swine ; 
 because no naturalist has hitherto been sceptical enough 
 to doubt whether they descended from the wild boar ; and 
 they were certainly first introduced by the Spaniards into 
 the new world. The pigs conveyed in 1509, from Spain 
 to the West Indian island Cubagua, then celebrated for 
 the pearl fishery, degenerated into a monstrous race, with 
 toes half a span long.f Those of Cuba became more than 
 
 * Buffon, by Wood, vol. 4, page 7. 
 
 t Clavigero, Storia Antica del Messico, vol. 4, page 145. 
 
% €x\Mt for tljE Jfrgrn. 
 
 11 
 
 
 twice as large as their European progenitors. * How re- 
 markably, again, have the domestic swine degenerated from 
 the wild ones in the whole world : in the loss of the soft 
 downy hair from between the bristles, in the vast accumu- 
 lation of fat under the skin, in the form of the cranium, in 
 the figure and growth of the whole body. The varieties 
 of the domestic animal, too, are very numerous : in Pied- 
 mont, they are almost invariably black ; in Bavaria, red- 
 dish brown ; in Normandy, white, &c. The breed in 
 England, with straight back, is just the reverse of that in 
 the north of France, with high convex spine and hanging 
 head ; and both are different from the German breed ; to 
 say nothing of the solidungular race, found in herds in 
 Hungary and Sweden, known by Aristotle, with many 
 other varieties. 
 
 The ass, in its wild state, is remarkably swift and lively, 
 and still continues so in his native Eastern abode. 
 
 Common fowl, in different situations, run into almost 
 every conceivable variety. Some are large, some small, 
 some tall, some dwarfish. They may have a small and 
 single, or a large and complicated comb ; or great tufts of 
 feathers on the head. Some have no tail. The legs of 
 some are yellow and naked, of others, covered with 
 feathers. There is a breed with their feathers reversed in 
 their direction all over the body ; and another in India 
 with white downy feathers, and black skin. All these 
 exhibit endless diversities of colour. f 
 
 Most of the mammalia which have been tamed by Man 
 betray their subjugated state, by having the ears and tail 
 pendulous, a condition which does not belong to wild ani- 
 mals ; and in many, says Lawrence, the very functions of 
 the body are changed. 
 
 The application of these facts to the human species is 
 very obvious. If new characters are produced in the 
 
 * Herrera, Hechos de los Castellanos en las Islas, &c, vol. 1, page 239. 
 f Lawrence. 
 
 c Tff) 
 
12 
 
 % €xiMt for tjiB Jfogrn. 
 
 domesticated animals, because they have been taken from 
 their primitive condition, and exposed to the operation of 
 many, to them unnatural causes ; if the pig is remarkable 
 among these for the number and degree of its varieties, 
 because it has been most exposed to the causes of degene- 
 ration ; we shall be at no loss to account for the diversities 
 in Man, who is, in the true, though not ordinary sense of 
 the word, more a domesticated animal than any other.* 
 He, like the inferior animals, is liable to run into varieties 
 of form, size, stature, proportions, features, and colour, 
 which being gradually increased, through a long course of 
 ages, have become, to a certain extent, hereditary in families 
 and nations. 
 
 That the superficial observer, on beholding the great 
 variation existing between the inhabitants of one portion 
 of the world, and those of another, should be led to query, 
 " Are all these brethren ?" need not surprise us ; yet, if 
 we examine into the subject, we shall find that there is no 
 one of the varieties to which Man is liable, which does not 
 exist in a still greater degree in animals confessedly the 
 same species, and the numerous examples of the widest 
 deviation in the colour and physiological distinctions of 
 these, fully authorize the conclusion, that, however striking 
 may be the contrast between the fair European and the 
 ebon African, and however unwilling the former may be 
 to trace up his pedigree to the same Adam with the latter, 
 the superficial distinctions by which they are characterized, 
 are altogether insufficient to establish a diversity of species 
 or any insurmountable disparity between the two. 
 
 Having adverted to the diversities of external appear- 
 ance exhibited in the various races of Man, and alluded to 
 the physiological distinctions by which they are marked, 
 let us inquire to what extent their moral and intellectual 
 characters exhibit such peculiarities as the numerous modi- 
 fications of physical structure might lead us to expect ; 
 
 * Lawrence. 
 
HS2 
 
 1 Crikte far tip Hep. 
 
 whether the appetites and propensities, the moral feelings, 
 and dispositions, and the capabilities of knowledge and 
 reflection, are the same in all. There can be little doubt, 
 that the races of Man are no less characterized by a diversity 
 in the development of the mental and moral faculties, 
 than by those differences of organization which have been 
 already explained. There is an intimate connection be- 
 tween the mind and the body, and the various causes which 
 exert their influence physically, have, to a certain degree, 
 a corresponding effect upon the mental constitution of Man. 
 That climate, again, and other elements of the external 
 condition, are powerful agents in this respect, is ver} 7 pro- 
 bable, if we may judge from their analogous influence on 
 various animals. We are informed that the dog in Kamts- 
 chatka, instead of being faithful and attached to his master, 
 is malignant, treacherous, and full of deceit. He does not 
 bark in the hot parts of Africa, nor in Greenland ; and in 
 the latter country, loses his docility so as to be unfit for 
 hunting.* 
 
 There is a decided coincidence between the physical 
 characteristics of the varieties of Man, and their moral and 
 social condition, and it also appears that their condition in 
 civilized society produces considerable modification in the in- 
 tellectual qualities of the race. But this is a subject so ex- 
 tensive in its bearings, and in many particulars so intricate 
 and complex, that I shall not attempt its further investi- 
 gation here, but refer again to the works of Lawrence and 
 Prichard, in which it is very ably elucidated. 
 
 To whatever causes we may, ultimately, be able to 
 attribute the numerous varieties existing amongst mankind, 
 it is evident, if they have not been ordained to bind them 
 together, they were never ordained to subdue the one to 
 the other ; but rather to give means and occasions of mu- 
 tual aid. The good of all has been equally intended in 
 the distribution of the various gifts of heaven ; and certain 
 
 * Kees. 
 
% €x\h\t for tju Jfogrn. 
 
 it is, that the diversities among men are as nothing, in 
 comparison with those attributes in which they agree : it 
 is this which constitutes their essential equality. " All 
 men have the same rational nature, and the same powers 
 of conscience, and all are equally made for indefinite im- 
 provement of these divine faculties, and for the happiness 
 to be found in their virtuous use. Who that comprehends 
 these gifts, does not see that the diversities of the race 
 vanish before them ?"* 
 
 It was long since declared, and it has been repeated 
 thousands of times, that the Indian and the African, from 
 their nature, are incapable of civilization, and only adap- 
 ted to a state of servitude. Early in the sixteenth cen- 
 tury, the question was regarded as one of such moment that 
 Charles the Fifth ordered a discussion of the subject to 
 be conducted before him. The advocate in favour of this 
 idea was first heard, when a zealous champion, in answer, 
 warmed by the noble cause he was to maintain, and nothing 
 daunted by the august presence in which he stood, de- 
 livered himself with fervent eloquence that went directly 
 to the hearts of his auditors. "The Christian religion," 
 he concluded, " is equal in its operation, and is accommo- 
 dated to every nation on the globe. It robs no one of his 
 freedom, violates no one of his inherent rights, on the 
 ground that he is of a slavery nature, as pretended ; and it 
 well becomes your majesty to banish so monstrous an op- 
 pression from your kingdoms, in the beginning of your 
 reign, that the Almighty may make it long and glorious !" 
 
 I am convinced, that the more we examine into the 
 diversities characterizing the various families of Man, the 
 more thoroughly shall we be able to prove, that the coinci- 
 dence between them is greater than the diversity, and that 
 we shall find nothing to warrant us in referring to any par- 
 ticular race, any further than we should between the rough- 
 hewn and polished marble, a deficiency of those moral and 
 * Dr. Charming. 
 
dU1> 
 
 1 Crikte for tlj? jfep. 
 
 intellectual faculties, which it has pleased the all-wise and 
 beneficent Creator, who "hath made of one blood all the 
 nations of men," to bestow alike on every portion of the 
 human family. Thought, Reason, Conscience, the capacity 
 of Virtue and of Love, an immortal destiny, an intimate 
 moral connection with God, — these are the attributes of 
 our common humanity, which reduce to insignificance all 
 outward distinctions, and make every human being un- 
 speakably dear to his Maker. No matter how ignorant he 
 may be, the capacity of improvement allies him to the 
 more instructed of his race, and places within his reach, 
 the knowledge and happiness of higher worlds. " The 
 Christian philosopher," says Dr. Chalmers, " sees in every 
 man, a partaker of his own nature, and a brother of his 
 own species. He contemplates the human mind in the 
 generality of its great elements. He enters upon a wide 
 field of benevolence, and disdains the geographical barriers 
 by which little men would shut out one half of the species 
 from the kind offices of the other. Let man's localities be 
 what they may, it is enough for his large and noble heart, 
 that he is bone of the same bone." 
 
 A powerful argument may yet be adduced, which ap- 
 pears to me conclusive of the whole question relating to 
 man's unity of origin, and that is, the testimony of the 
 sacred Scriptures, which ascribe one origin to the whole 
 human family. Our Scriptures have not left us to deter- 
 mine the title of any tribe to the full honours of humanity 
 by accidental circumstances. One passage affirms, that 
 " God hath made of one blood all the nations of men, for 
 to dwell on all the face of the earth ;" that they are of one 
 family, of one origin, of one common nature : the other, 
 that our Saviour became incarnate, " that he, by the grace 
 of God, should taste death for every man." " Behold then," 
 says the pious Richard Watson, " the foundation of the 
 fraternity of our race, however coloured and however scat- 
 tered. Essential distinctions of inferiority and superiority 
 
Wk\ 16 
 
 51 €xihit far % Jfogrn. 
 
 had been, in almost every part of the Gentile world, 
 adopted as the palliation or the justification of the wrongs 
 inflicted by man on man ; but against this notion, Chris- 
 tianity, from its first promulgation, has lifted up its voice. 
 God hath made the varied tribes of men ' of one blood.' 
 Dost thou wrong a human being ? He is thy brother. Art 
 thou his murderer by war, private malice, or a wearing and 
 exhausting oppression ? ' The voice of thy brother's 
 blood crieth to God from the ground.' Dost thou, because 
 of some accidental circumstances of rank, opulence, and 
 power on thy part, treat him with scorn and contempt ? 
 He is thy ' brother for whom Christ died ; ' the incarnate 
 Redeemer assumed his nature as well as thine ; He came 
 into the world to seek and to save him as well as thee ; 
 and it was in reference to him also that He went through 
 the scenes of the garden and the cross. There is not, then, 
 a man on earth who has not a Father in heaven, and to 
 whom Christ is not an Advocate and Patron ; nay, more, 
 because of our common humanity, to whom he is not a 
 Brother." 
 
CHAPTER II. 
 
 The idea that moral and intellectual inferiority is inseparable from a co- 
 loured skin, a fallacious one — Eefuted by facts — The apparent inferiority 
 of the Negro principally arises from Slavery and the ravages of the Slave 
 trade — Extent of these — Their pernicious consequences — Prevent the 
 Negro from advancing in civilization or improvement — Justified on the 
 ground of Christianizing them, &c. — This plea philosophically false — 
 What can we expect from Negroes in their present condition — The 
 reproach falls on their treatment, &c. — Similar effects observable on any 
 people — Instanced in European Slaves — Loose his shackles, and the 
 Negro will soon refute the calumnies raised against him. 
 
 If, as I have already shown, the claims of all mankind 
 to one universal brotherhood are so clearly and unequivo- 
 cally denned, we can have no authority for impressing upon 
 a large portion of the great family the stigma of infe- 
 riority, under the mere pretext of some external peculia- 
 rities which the Creator has been pleased to confer upon 
 them. Nothing can be more fallacious, nothing has ever 
 been more pernicious in its consequences, than the as- 
 sumption, that moral and intellectual inferiority are insep- 
 arable from a coloured skin. Oh ! when will prejudice 
 give way, if not through the influence of Christian kind- 
 ness, before the pressure of facts ? How long shall the 
 White Man answer "No!" to the appeal of the injured 
 Negro, " Am I not a man and a brother ?" How long 
 shall we persist in turning a deaf ear to the united cry 
 of the whole ebon race of Africa : 
 
 " Deem our nation brutes no longer, 
 'Till some reason ye shall find, 
 Worthier of regard and stronger, 
 Than the colour of our kind. 
 
 " Slaves of gold ! whose sordid dealings 
 Tarnish all your boasted powers, 
 Prove that you have human feelings, 
 Ere you proudly question ours." 
 
IQ, 
 
 18 
 
 % €M$ for tjj* Jfogra, 
 
 I would invite all who entertain the opinion that the 
 dark coloured portion of mankind necessarily belong to 
 a race of beings inferior to the fairer portion of our 
 species, casting aside all previously imbibed prejudice, to 
 peruse the facts narrated in the following pages. They 
 will be found to exhibit many striking instances of good 
 and commendable traits existing naturally in the African 
 character, to which facts and testimonies innumerable might 
 be added, amply sufficient, considering the limited advan- 
 tages they have possessed, not only to refute the groundless 
 imputation of mental and moral deficiency, and prove their 
 title to the claim of being accounted intelligent and rational 
 creatures, but that they are also endowed with every cha- 
 racteristic constituting their identity with the great family of 
 MAN. Their physical, moral, and intellectual capabilities, 
 have been so far put to the test, that they can no longer be 
 charged with being deficient in intelligence, enterprise, or 
 industry. The facts brought forward in this volume are 
 sufficiently substantiated as to leave the question no longer 
 a doubtful or theoretical one, but to excite us at once to 
 regard them as brethren, in every sense of the word, entitled 
 to equal privileges with ourselves, to the enjoyment of all 
 those inalienable rights with which Man has been entrusted 
 by his Creator. Surely it will be impossible for us to peruse 
 these facts, without blushing for the enormities, which 
 beings with a fairer skin, and professing a religion which 
 inculcates " universal love and good will to men," are still 
 exercising over another portion of the same family. 
 
 Happy would it be for humanity's sake, if we could 
 draw the curtain of night over the many dark transactions 
 that disgrace the conduct of the White Man towards his 
 more sable brother, which consist indeed of little else than 
 a series of wrongs and outrages, inflicted on the innocent 
 and the defenceless ! It is a lamentable fact, that whatever 
 checks the atrocious traffic in the flesh and sinews of the 
 Negro may, from time to time, have experienced, it is still 
 
 Wk 
 
% dfrilmfe for tjm Urgrn. 
 
 pursued with increased energy and success, so much so, 
 that it is impossible to form any adequate idea of its 
 extent and horrors.* Africa is annually robbed of four 
 hundred thousand of her population, to glut the cu- 
 pidity, or to minister to the pride and luxury of nominal 
 Christians, and the followers of the False Prophet. From 2 
 to 300,000 of this mighty host perish by fire and sword in 
 their original capture ; by privation and fatigue, in their 
 transit to the coast ; and by disease and death, in their most 
 horrible forms, during the middle passage. The remainder 
 are sold into perpetual Slavery, and subjected, with their 
 offspring in perpetuity, to all the revolting incidents of that 
 degraded state. 
 
 To say nothing of the disgrace and the guilt which 
 this nefarious system attaches to the civilized nations who 
 are implicated in it, it is an utter impossibility, wirilst the 
 ravages consequent upon these violations of all the rights 
 and feelings of man continue to be perpetrated against the 
 natives of Africa, whilst the inhabitants of the whole con- 
 tinent, both on her defenceless coasts, and to her very 
 centre, continue to be hunted like wild beasts of the forest ; 
 I say, it is an utter impossibility, whilst this state of things is 
 permitted to exist, that Africa or her sons should experience 
 any advances, either in civilization or improvement. 
 
 The present apparent inferiority of the Negro race is 
 undoubtedly attributable in a great measure to the existence 
 of the Slave traffic in Africa, with all the baneful influences 
 necessarily attendant upon it, and subsequently, to the 
 degraded condition to which its unfortunate victims are 
 
 * When the contest against the Slave Trade first commenced, half a 
 century ago, it was calculated there were from two to three 
 millions OF SLATES IN the world ! There were recently, according to 
 documents quoted by Sir T. F. Buxton, Six TO SEVEN MILLIONS ! When, fifty 
 years ago, the Anti- Slavery operations began, it was estimated that ONE 
 
 HUNDRED THOUSAND SLAVES WERE ANNUALLY RAVISHED FROM AFRICA ! 
 
 There are now calculated to be FOUR HUNDRED THOUSAND 
 ANNUALLY torn from their homes and friends ! ! ! These are 
 the great facts regarding Slavery aud the Slave Trade at this moment ! 
 
jsA( 
 
 20 
 
 % €iMt fnr tjj? .ftgrn. 
 
 reduced, and held by their oppressors. It is only when 
 they are in possession of privileges and advantages equiva- 
 lent to the rest of mankind, that a fair comparison can 
 be drawn between the one and the other. The Negro, 
 by nature our equal, made like ourselves after the image 
 of the Creator, gifted by the same intelligence, impelled 
 by the same passions and affections, and redeemed by the 
 same Saviour, has now become reduced through cupidity 
 and oppression, nearly to the level of the brute, spoiled of 
 his humanity, plundered of his rights, and often hurried to 
 a premature grave, the miserable victim of avarice and heed- 
 less tyranny ! " Men have presumptuously dared to wrest 
 from their fellows the most precious of their rights — to 
 intercept, as far as they can, the bounty and grace of the 
 Almighty — to close the door to their intellectual progress 
 • — to shut every avenue to their moral and religious improve- 
 ment — to stand between them and their Maker. Oh ! awful 
 responsibility ; how shall they answer for such a crime ? " * 
 
 But the Slave, we are told, is taught religion and Chris- 
 tianity. This is a cheering sound to be wafted from the 
 land of bondage. It is cause of rejoicing to hear that any 
 portion of the Negroes taken into Slavery are instructed 
 in religion. But if ever this is the case, it forms the ex- 
 ception and not the rule. " In Georgia, any justice of the 
 peace may, at his discretion, break up any religious assem- 
 bly of Slaves, and may order each Slave present to be cor- 
 rected without trial, by receiving, on the bare back, 
 25 stripes with a whip, switch, or cow-skin." In North 
 Carolina, " to teach a Slave to read or write, or to sell, or 
 give him any book (Bible not excepted), is punished 
 with 39 lashes, or imprisonment." Such laws as these do 
 not speak very strongly for the argument that the Slave is 
 taught religion. " Woe to him that taketh away the key of <t 
 knowledge !" To kill the body is a great crime ; the Spirit 
 we cannot kill, but we may bury it in a deathlike lethargy, 
 
 >F 
 
% friimfr for tju ffltym. 
 
 and is this a light crime in the sight of Him who gave it ? 
 
 There can be no doubt that, generally speaking, not a 
 ray of Christian truth is afforded to the Negro Slave, but, 
 on the other hand, that it is often most cautiously with- 
 held. The majority of persons connected with Slave pro- 
 perty stand chargeable with criminal neglect, or the great 
 proportion of Slaves would not now be degraded and im- 
 moral Pagans. Not a few are criminally hostile and 
 persecuting. They have paled round the enclosures of 
 darkness and vice, intent upon nothing so much as to scowl 
 away the messengers of light and mercy, by whatever name 
 they may be called, and to seal up the wretched people 
 under their power, in ignorance and barbarism. Under 
 such circumstances, the state of the Negro Slave is most 
 deplorable. It may be emphatically said of a land of 
 Slavery, that " darkness covers the earth, and gross dark- 
 ness the people ; " and if a single ray of light glimmers 
 in the midst, it only serves to render the surrounding 
 darkness still more visible — more clearly to exhibit the 
 hideous abominations beneath which the Negro groans. 
 
 But even if the opportunity is said to be afforded him, 
 how can the Slave comprehend the principle of Love, the 
 essential principle of Christianity, when he hears it from 
 the lips of those whose relations to him express injustice 
 and selfishness ? And even suppose him to receive Chris- 
 tianity in its purity, and to feel all its power ; — is this to 
 reconcile us to Slavery ? Is a being who can understand the 
 sublimest truth that has ever entered the human mind, 
 who can love and adore God, who can conform himself to 
 the celestial virtue of the Saviour, for whom that Saviour 
 died, to whom heaven is opened, whose repentance now 
 gives joy in heaven, — is such a being to be held as pro- 
 perty, driven by force as the brute, and denied the rights 
 of man by a fellow-creature, by a professed disciple of the 
 just and merciful Saviour ? Has he a religious nature, 
 and dares any one hold him as a Slave ? 
 
 M 
 
®^?< 
 
 w^ 
 
 22 
 
 51 $ritafe fa tijB jfegm 
 
 I am aware that much has been said on various oc- 
 casions, respecting the compensations conquered and op- 
 pressed nations and people have received for the injuries 
 inflicted upon them, when they have fallen under the 
 sway of empires in a higher state of civilization than 
 themselves. The atrocious outrages of the Slave trade, 
 as we have heard, have been commended on this ground, as 
 affording a means of imparting to the Negroes the blessings 
 of civilization and Christianity, by transplanting them into 
 a land of civilized men and of Christians. Could any plea 
 be more philosophically false ? Providence is sometimes 
 pleased to bring good out of evil, but we are by no means 
 justified on this ground in doing evil that good may ensue. 
 On no occasion does God require the aid of our vices. 
 He can overrule them for good, but they are not the chosen 
 instruments of human happiness. 
 
 Our war of extermination against the Kafirs has al- 
 ready cost us upwards of three millions, and will probably 
 cost three millions more. How much better would it 
 be to substitute religion and commerce for the sword. 
 A dozen waggons laden with British goods would do more 
 for the civilization and conciliation of that tormented 
 country than all the bayonets of Europe. It is painful 
 to reflect that the history of Africa, a country so long 
 colonized by men professing that faith which teaches 
 us that "God hath made of one blood all the nations 
 of men, " should furnish so few points of relief to the dark 
 shades of a picture, which exhibits the inhabitants of that 
 continent as the wretched victims of the White Man's 
 avarice and cruelty. Yet, thanks be to God, there are some 
 bright spots amidst this gloom of darkness, some fertile spots 
 amidst this extensive waste and wilderness of iniquity and 
 wo, and wherever they meet the eye they cheer the heart. 
 These are principally the results of missionary enterprise, to 
 which our attention will be drawn when we have to consider 
 the advances of the Negro in a religious point of view. 
 
% €xihk for tire Jfrgrn. 
 
 23 
 
 To return again to the iniquities perpetrated so coolly 
 against the unoffending African, we cannot but admire 
 the subtle reasoning and humanity of those, whose hands 
 are imbrued in the traffic in human flesh, asserting in 
 defence of their nefarious deeds, that they may be the 
 means of Christianizing their unhappy victims, and of 
 advancing their moral condition ; and who, after tearing 
 the wretched Negroes from their native soil, transporting 
 them in chains across the wide ocean, and dooming them 
 to perpetual labour, complain that their understandings 
 shew no signs of improvement, that their tempers and dis- 
 positions are incorrigibly perverse, faithless, and treach- 
 erous. What can be expected from them, when they are 
 attended with everything that is unfavourable to their im- 
 provement, and are deprived of every means of bettering 
 their condition, or cultivating their minds ? " Destitute 
 of all instruction, worked like brutes, and punished more 
 severely ; crushed by the iron hand of oppression into the 
 very dust ; having everything to fear, and nothing to hope 
 for ; without any impelling motive but that of terror ; with 
 scarcely any possibility of enjoyment but what arises from 
 his mere animal nature, what virtue can we look for in the 
 poor Slave ? If his appetites and passions are checked, it 
 is not by the operation of principle, but by the dread of 
 corporeal punishment. Can anything manly or generous 
 be expected from those who are debased to the condition 
 of brutes, who are kept in a state of perpetual and abject 
 servility ? Can we suppose that a very nice sense of justice 
 will be entertained by those who are constantly treated 
 with injustice ; who know it, and feel it ; who see the 
 White Man sin with impunity, and the Black Man often 
 suffering without crime ? Can we be so unreasonable as to 
 look for undeviating honesty and integrity in those who 
 are conscious that they are the objects of continued 
 wrong, inflicted by those whom they regard as so much 
 their superiors in knowledge ? Are they not constantly 
 
 dlifi) 
 
 IB 
 
 (3) 
 
% ^titrate far tjtf J&grn; 
 
 taught by the conduct of White Men, that power is right ; 
 and that, therefore, whatever they are able to do with im- 
 punity they have a right to do ? Must they not feel that 
 fraud and cunning are the only weapons with which they 
 can engage the White Man, and obtain any advantage ? 
 Shall we then wonder, when we are told by all who know the 
 Negro character, that in the midst of all their ignorance, 
 there is a shrewdness which seems natural to them ; that 
 the system of oppression under which they live, cherishes 
 the habits of falsehood and petty theft ? Can purity and 
 chastity exist in such circumstances as theirs, where there 
 is no protection of the marriage union ; where all are al- 
 lowed to herd together as the beasts of the field, and have, 
 in the conduct of the White Man, so bad an example be- 
 fore their eyes ? What means are used to enlighten their 
 minds or form their morals ? Can any plant of virtue, 
 vegetate without the light of knowledge, and the culture 
 of instruction ? What are they suffered to know of Chris- 
 tianity, but its outward forms ; and what impressions must 
 they receive of it from their Christian (?) masters ? Can 
 they see anything in it which is attractive ? What motives 
 have they to embrace it ? Ignorant alike of the doctrines 
 and the duties, the divine consolation and the holy precepts 
 of Christianity, they remain Pagans in a Christian land, 
 without even an object of idolatrous worship ; ' having no 
 hope, and without God in the world.' Let not, then, the 
 abettors of Slavery, who trample their fellow-creatures 
 beneath their feet, tell us, in their own justification, of the 
 degraded state, the abject minds, and the vices of the 
 Slaves ; it is upon the system which thus brutifi.es a human 
 being that the reproach falls in all its bitterness." 
 
 It is absurd to tell us of the vast inferiority of the Negro 
 Race, whilst they are kept in a state of degradation, which 
 renders mental and moral improvement an impossibility, 
 which not only stints the growth of everything generous and 
 manly, but destroys every spring of virtuous action, and 
 
Jh>/£ 
 
 51 ftttatte for tjp Jfrgrn. 
 
 reduces them nearly to the condition of brutes. Similar 
 effects would be equally visible in those of any nation or com- 
 plexion, were they subjected to a treatment as cruel as that 
 which the Negro has long endured. " Treat men as wild 
 beasts," says a philosophical writer, "and you will make 
 them such." M. Dupuis, the British Consul at Mogadore, 
 observes, that " even the generality of European Christians, 
 after a long captivity and severe treatment among the Arabs, 
 appeared at first exceedingly stupid and insensible. If they 
 have been any considerable time in Slavery, they appear lost 
 to reason and feeling ; their spirits broken ; and their facul- 
 ties sunk in a species of stupor which I am unable adequately 
 to describe. They appear degraded even below the Negro 
 Slave. The succession of hardships, without any protecting 
 law to which they can appeal for any alleviation or redress, 
 seems to destroy every spring of exertion or hope in their 
 minds. They appear indifferent to everything around them ; 
 abject, servile, and brutish." * 
 
 There is ample proof that bondage and severity have a 
 certain tendency to degrade the mind, and to debase and 
 brutalize the feelings of mankind. It is impossible to mark 
 the state of degradation to which the Negro is reduced, and 
 not inquire, — how men can be elevated, while the burdens 
 which oppress them are so great ? — how they can be indus- 
 trious, when the sinews of industry are so much crippled ? 
 — or, how they can be expected to discover anything like 
 even a virtuous emulation, while precluded by their cir- 
 cumstances from rising above a condition of Slavery the 
 most hopeless and wretched ? But let the shackles be 
 loosed from the Negro ; let him feel the invigorating in- 
 fluence of freedom ; let hope enter his bosom ; and let him 
 be cheered and animated with the prospect of reward for 
 his exertions, and the foul calumny of his great and inevi- 
 table inferiority will soon be refuted in himself ! 
 
 * Wilberforce's- Appeal in behalf of the Negro Slaves of the West Indies. 
 
 JiUi 
 
 (fWS) 
 
^rw 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 Theory of Rousseau and Lord Kaimes — A false one — Injurious to the best 
 interests of humanity, and contrary to Scripture — Injuries done to the 
 Negro on the grounds of inferiority — Shocking effects resulting from 
 this idea — Civilized nations before the Christian era — Romans, and their 
 ancestors — Our own — Anecdote related by Dr. Philip — Cicero's remarks 
 respecting them — Christian guilt towards Aborigines — Lamentable facts 
 — Dr. Johnson on European conquest — Slavery justified by representing 
 the Negro a distinct species — And even a brute — This supported by some 
 writers — Arguments of Long — Strange book published at Charleston 
 ■ — Chamber's reply — Negroes said to admit their own inferiority— Re- 
 marks of Dr. Channing on this subject — Inferiority ascribed to other 
 races — The Esquimaux — The whole refuted by Dr. Lawrence. 
 
 Those who are acquainted with the writings of Rousseau, 
 Lord Kaimes, and others belonging to the same school, are 
 not ignorant of the attempt which has been made, in oppo- 
 sition to the Bible, to establish the theory, already alluded 
 to, which represents the human race as derived from dif- 
 ferent stocks. Apart from the authority on which the 
 Mosaic account of the creation of Man is built, the consi- 
 deration of God's having "made of one blood all the nations 
 of the earth," is much more simple and beautiful, and has 
 a greater tendency to promote love and concord, than that 
 which traces the different members of the human family to 
 different origins, giving rise to invidious distinctions, flat- 
 tering the pride of one class of men, and affording a pretext 
 to justify the oppression of another. Had this opinion, 
 which we are now combating, been perfectly innocuous in 
 its operation, or had it been confined to philosophers, we 
 might have left it to its fate ; but its prevalence, and the 
 use which has been made of it, show that it is as hostile to 
 the best interests of humanity as it is contrary to the truth 
 of Scripture. * 
 
 It is a singular fact, that the injuries done to the Negroes 
 * Dr. Philip. 
 
51 (tribute far \\)i Jfrgrn. 
 
 on the East and West coasts of Africa, the murders for- 
 merly committed by the colonists on the Hottentots and 
 Bushmen of South Africa, and the privations and sufferings 
 endured by the Slaves in America and the Colonies, 
 are justified on this principle, as involving in them a conse- 
 quent inferiority. " Expostulate with many farmers in 
 South Africa," says Dr. Philip, "for excluding their Slaves 
 and Hottentots from their places of worship, and denying 
 them the means of religious instruction, and they will tell 
 you at once that they are an inferior race of beings. 
 Asking a farmer in the district of Caledon, whether a Black 
 Man standing by him could read, he looked perfectly aston- 
 ished at the question, and supposed he had quite satisfied 
 my query by saying, ' Sir, he is a Slave.' In the same 
 manner, the cruelties exercised by the Spaniards upon the 
 Americans were justified by their wretched theologians, 
 by denying that the poor Americans were men, because they 
 wanted beards, the sign of virility among other nations." 
 
 The effects of this pretended idea of inferiority have 
 been carried to an extent, towards the African, truly awful 
 to contemplate. In their own country, they have become 
 the most wretched of the human race ; duped out of their 
 possessions, their land, and their liberty, they have entailed 
 on their offspring a state of existence, to which, even that 
 of Slavery might bear the comparison of happiness, and to 
 which death itself would be decidedly preferable. Such 
 may not be the case universally, but it is the treatment by 
 which the aborigines of Africa have been generally reduced 
 to a state of degradation and wretchedness, surpassed in 
 debasement only by the heartless barbarities of many 
 Europeans, who, pretending to believe that the natives 
 are destitute of the qualities, and excluded from the rights 
 of human beings, find no difficulty in classing them with 
 the beasts of the forest, and destroying them without com- 
 punction, that they may obtain undisturbed possession of 
 their country. The only consideration from which their 
 
 IT'NS) 
 
23 
 
 1 €xiktt for fttf S^gtn. 
 
 lives have often been either spared or preserved, seems to 
 have been, that in a state scarcely above that of oxen 
 or of dogs, they might perform every species of labour or 
 drudgery in the dwellings or farms of those who now occupy 
 the lands on which the herds of their ancestors formerly 
 grazed in freedom. 
 
 " A farmer, " says Barrow, in 1797, " thinks he cannot 
 proclaim a more meritorious action than the murder of one 
 of these people. A farmer from Graaff-Reinet, being asked 
 in the Secretary's office a few days before we left town, if 
 the savages were numerous or troublesome on the road, 
 replied, ' he had only shot four, ' with as much composure 
 and indifference, as if he had been speaking of four part- 
 ridges. I myself have heard one of the humane colonists 
 boast of having destroyed with his own hands nearly 
 three hundred of these unfortunate wretches." 
 
 A witness quoted by Pringle, says, " If the master took 
 serious dislike to any of these unhappy creatures, it was no 
 uncommon practice to send out the Hottentot on some 
 pretended message, and then to follow and shoot him on 
 the road." 
 
 But the sad effects of this notion of inferiority are no 
 where so conspicuously manifested as in the brutal treat- 
 ment to which the poor African has been doomed in the 
 New World, and in the degrading epithets by which he is 
 designated by his lordly task-masters. The oppressors of 
 the Negro have committed a serious moral mistake, in 
 perverting what should constitute a claim to kindness and 
 indulgence into a justification or palliation of their con- 
 duct in enslaving their fellow men, and of that revolting 
 and anti-christian practice, the traffic in human flesh ; a 
 practice branded with the double curse of degradation to the 
 oppressor and the oppressed. The very argument, which 
 has been used for defending the wrongs committed against 
 the African, appears to me to be a tenfold aggravation 
 of the enormity. Superior endowments, higher intellect, 
 
 W 
 
51 $riimti fnr tjjr j?rgra. 
 
 29 
 
 greater capacity for knowledge, arts, and science, should 
 be employed in extending the blessings of civilization, 
 and in multiplying the enjoyments of social life ; not as 
 a means of oppressing the weak and ignorant, or of 
 plunging those who are already represented as naturally 
 low in the intellectual scale, still more deeply into the 
 abyss of barbarism. 
 
 When we see a strong and well armed person, attack 
 one equally powerful and well prepared, we are indifferent 
 as to the issue ; or we may look on with that interest which 
 the qualities called forth by the contest are calculated to 
 inspire : but if the strong attack the weak, if the well 
 armed assail the defenceless, if the ingenuity, knowledge, 
 and skill, the superior arts and arms of civilized life are 
 combined, to rob the poor savage of his only valuable 
 property — personal liberty — we turn from the scene with 
 indignation and abhorrence. 
 
 " They who possess higher gifts should remember the 
 condition under which they are enjoyed : — ' From him to 
 whom much is given, much will be required ! ' What a 
 commentary on this head is furnished by Negro Slavery, 
 as carried on, and permitted, by religious nations, by 
 Christian Kings, Catholic Majesties, Defenders of the 
 Faith, &c. ! " * 
 
 For the sake of argument, let us admit that there may 
 exist an intellectual imbecility in the mind of the Negro ; 
 — instead of its justifying our inflicting upon him the 
 miseries of Slavery, does it not rather give him an additional 
 claim to our sympathy and Christian compassion ? If the 
 retreating forehead and depressed vertex do indicate an 
 inferiority in the mental capacity of the Negro, does it 
 prove that he is not a human being, — that he has not an 
 immortal soul, — or that he is not an accountable creature ? 
 Does it prove that he is not capable of every rational act, 
 and that he is unendowed with every social feeling which is 
 * LawTence. 
 
 M 
 
 Tf 
 
% €x\Mi for tjj* Jfogra. 
 
 essential to a man ? Does it prove that the Negro race are less 
 the children of " our Father who is in heaven," or authorize 
 us to refuse a practical recognition of their being a part 
 of the human family ? Monstrous absurdity ! If the dark- 
 coloured race is admitted to be inferior in intellectual 
 endowments, or physical proportions to the White, what, 
 before the Christian era, were many of those nations which 
 now stand amongst the most refined and intelligent ? 
 
 If we desire to ascertain how much the character of a 
 people depends upon the influence of the circumstances 
 under which they live, let us look at the contrast exhibited 
 between many nations which at one period attained to 
 the highest celebrity, and their present condition. If fur- 
 ther evidence of this fact be wanting, we may vary our 
 illustration, and show how nations which were once viewed 
 as deficient in mental capacity, have reached the highest 
 place in the scale of empire, while the very nations, which 
 at one period contemned them, have sunk into a state of 
 degeneracy. 
 
 Take a number of children from the nursery, place them 
 apart, and allow them to grow up without instruction and 
 discipline ; the first state of society into which they would 
 naturally form themselves would be that of the hunter. While 
 food could be obtained by the chase, they would never think 
 of cultivating the ground : inured to hardships, they would 
 despise many things, which, in a civilized state of society, 
 are deemed indispensable. In seasons of common danger, 
 they would unite their efforts in their own defence ; their 
 union, being nothing more than a voluntary association, 
 would be liable to frequent interruptions ; the affairs of 
 their little community would be, to them, the whole world ; 
 and the range of their thoughts would be limited to the 
 exercise which their fears and hopes might have, in rela- 
 tion to their own individual danger or safety. 
 
 The Romans might have found an image of their own 
 ancestors in the representation they have given of ours. 
 
 < RTj3) 
 
% €nh\t far tip Jfrgrn. 
 
 And we may form not an imperfect idea what our ancestors 
 were, at the time Julius Caesar invaded Britain, by the 
 present condition of some of the African tribes. In them 
 we may perceive, as in a mirror, the features of our pro- 
 genitors, and, by our own history, we may learn the extent 
 to which such tribes may be elevated by means favourable 
 to their improvement. * 
 
 When the inhabitants of a free country are heard justify- 
 ing the injuries inflicted upon the natives of Africa, or 
 opposing the introduction of liberal institutions among 
 any portion of them, on the vulgar ground that they are an 
 inferior class of beings to themselves, it is but fair to remind 
 them, that there was a period, when Cicero considered their 
 own ancestors as unfit to be employed even as Slaves in 
 the house of a Roman citizen. " Seated one day in the 
 house of a friend in Cape Town," says Dr. Philip, " with 
 a bust of Cicero in my right hand, and one of Sir Isaac 
 Newton on the left, I accidentally opened a book on the 
 table at that passage in Cicero's letter to Atticus, in which 
 the philosopher speaks so contemptuously of the natives 
 of Great Britain.-f- Struck with the curious coincidence 
 arising from the circumstances in which I then found my- 
 self placed, pointing to the bust of Cicero, and then to that 
 of Sir Isaac Newton, I could not help exclaiming, ' Hear 
 what that man says of that man's country ! ' " 
 
 Were it not so indubitably recorded on the page of 
 history, we should hardly be willing to believe that there 
 was a time when our ancestors, the ancient Britons, went 
 nearly without clothing, painted their bodies in fantastic 
 fashion, offered up human victims to uncouth idols, and 
 
 * Dr. Philip. 
 
 t " Britannici belli exitus expectatur : constat enim aditus insulse esse 
 munitos mirificis molibus : etiam illud jam cognitum est, neque argent! 
 scrupulum esse ullum in ilia insula, neque ullam spem prsedse nisi ex man- 
 cipiis : ex quibus nullos puto, te Uteris aut musicis eruditos expectare." 
 
 Epist. Ad. Atticum, 1. iv., Epist. 16. 
 
% ^rilrate for \\t Jfogrn. 
 
 lived in hollow trees, or rude habitations, which we should 
 now consider unfit for cattle. Making all due allowance 
 for the different state of the world, it is much to be ques- 
 tioned whether they made more rapid advances than have 
 been effected by many African nations, and that they were 
 really sunk into the lowest degree of barbarism is unques- 
 tionable. 
 
 Cicero relates that the ugliest and most stupid Slaves in 
 Rome came from England ! Moreover, he urges his friend 
 Atticus " not to buy Slaves from Britain, on account of 
 their stupidity, and their inaptitude to learn music and 
 other accomplishments." With Cassar's opinion of our an- 
 cestors, we are, perhaps, some of us not sufficiently ac- 
 quainted. He describes the Britons generally, as a nation of 
 very barbarous manners : " Most of the people of the in- 
 terior," he says, " never sow corn, but live upon milk and 
 flesh, and are clothed with skins." In another place, he 
 remarks, " In their domestic and social habits, the Britons 
 are as degraded as the most savage nations. They are 
 clothed with skins ; wear the hair of their heads unshaven 
 and long, but shave the rest of their bodies, except their 
 upper lip, and stain themselves a blue colour with woad, 
 which gives them a horrible aspect in battle."* 
 
 " Let us not then the Negro Slave despise, 
 Just such our sires appeared in Caesar's eyes." 
 
 Should we not laugh at Tacitus or Pliny, if from the 
 circumstances thus related, they had condemned the British 
 Islands to an eternity of Boeotian darkness — to be the 
 officina of hereditary bondage and transmitted helplessness ? 
 
 * Quoted by Dr. Prichard, who also, after much research, imagines " the 
 ancient Britons were nearly on a level with the New Zealanders or Tahitians 
 of the present day, or perhaps not very superior to the Australians." Re- 
 searches ; III, 182. At page 187 of the same volume, Dr. Prichard also 
 remarks, " Of all Pagan nations the Gauls and Britons appear to have had 
 the most sanguinary rites. They may well be compared in this respect 
 with the Ashanti, Dahomehs, and other nations of Western Africa." 
 
 W' 
 
^( 
 
 51 iritafe far ttjB ilrgrn. 
 
 33 
 
 Yet this is the sort of reasoning employed by the perpe- 
 trators and apologists of Negro Slavery. Alas, for Chris- 
 tian guilt ! can it be equalled by any Pagan crime ? First we 
 murder the aborigines of North America, to take possession 
 of their hunting grounds, and then we rob the distant land 
 of Africa of its inhabitants, to cultivate our stolen posses- 
 sions. Thus do one set of " barbarians melt away before 
 the sun of civilization," that we may fatten on their spoils, 
 and another is pronounced " non compos mentis" that we 
 may plunder them of the only property the God of nature 
 has given to Man ! 
 
 " We think unmoved of millions of our race, 
 Swept from thy soil by cruelties prolonged ; 
 Another clime then ravaged to replace 
 The wretched Indians ; — Africa now wronged 
 To fill the void where myriads lately thronged." 
 
 It is a lamentable fact, that in our treatment generally, 
 of what we term Savage nations, all respect for common 
 honesty, justice, and humanity, appears to be utterly for- 
 gotten by men otherwise generous, kind, and apparently 
 sensitively honourable. In an estimate formed by Dr. 
 Johnson of what mankind have lost or gained by European 
 conquest, having adverted to the cruelties which have been 
 committed, and the maimer in which the laws of religion 
 have been outrageously violated, he adds, " Europeans 
 have scarcely visited any coast, but to gratify avarice and 
 extend corruption, to arrogate dominion without right, 
 and practise cruelty without incentive," and he then gives 
 it as his opinion, that " it would have been happy for the 
 oppressed, and still more happy for the invaders, that their 
 designs had slept in their own bosoms." 
 
 The system of oppression under which the African race 
 suffer so grievously, renders it imperative on their oppres- 
 sors to allege some reasons, as plausible as they are able, 
 in their own defence. That Slave merchants, who traffic 
 
34 
 
 % €xiMt far tijB Jtegrn. 
 
 in human flesh, and Negro drivers, who use their fellow- 
 creatures worse than cattle, should attempt to justify their 
 conduct by depressing the African to a level with the 
 brute, is what might reasonably be expected. They lay 
 great stress on the alleged fact, that Negroes resemble 
 more nearly than Europeans, the monkey tribe ; and they 
 have even gone so far as to pronounce them, on the ground 
 of this approximation, not only a distinct species, but 
 " brute animals sent for the use of man." Thus do the 
 oppressors of their fellow-men satisfy their consciences by 
 pretending to believe that the unfortunate Negro is a 
 brute, or at best, only a connecting link between the brute 
 creation and Man. They desire to degrade him below the 
 standard of humanity, attempting to deface all title to the 
 Divine image from his mind ; thus do they reconcile the 
 cruel hardships under which the victims of their oppres- 
 sion are still doomed to groan, in the islands and on the 
 continent of the New World. 
 
 It has already been stated that some writers on natural 
 history, and particularly on that of Man, have regarded 
 the natives of Africa as inferior to Europeans in intellect, 
 and in the organization contrived for the development or 
 exercise of the mental faculties. By these writers it is 
 maintained that Negroes make a decided approach towards 
 the native inferiority of the monkey tribe — that they are 
 endowed by the Creator with the noble gift 01 reason in a 
 very inferior degree, when compared with the more 
 favoured inhabitants of Europe. Two descriptions of men 
 have come to this conclusion. The first are those who have 
 had to contend with the passions and vices of the Negro 
 in his purely Pagan state, and who have applied no other in- 
 strument to elicit the virtues they have demanded than 
 the stimulus of the whip and the stern voice of authority. 
 Who can wonder that they have failed ? They have ex- 
 pected "to reap where they have not sown," and "to 
 gather where nothing has been strown ;" they have required 
 
 9mC 
 
51 <£riirate far tip Iftgrn. 
 
 35 
 
 moral ends, without the application of moral means ; and 
 their failure, therefore, leaves the question of the capacity 
 of the Negro untouched, and proves nothing but their own 
 folly. In the second class may be included our minute 
 philosophers, who take the gauge of intellectual capacity 
 from the formation of the bones of the head, and link 
 morality with the contour of the countenance ; men who 
 measure mind by the rule and compasses, and estimate ca- 
 pacity for knowledge and salvation by a scale of inches 
 and the acuteness of angles. 
 
 Several of the writers alluded to, have spoken positively 
 of the Negro, as being only one remove from the brute, and 
 as forming the connecting link between the brute creation 
 and the human race. Montesquieu at once pronounces 
 them not human beings, but as occupying an intermediate 
 rank below the Whites, and destined by their Creator to 
 be the Slaves of their superiors. The historian Long 
 goes through a lengthy course of argument, and occupies 
 many quarto pages, to establish what he conceives a great 
 probability, if not certainty, that some of the African tribes 
 must have a close affinity with the ourang-outang. To 
 these may be added the perverted judgment of a Jamaica 
 historian, whose statements, made in 1774, may be ac- 
 counted for when it is mentioned that he was a Slaveholder, 
 while the Slave Trade was in all its vigour there. He 
 says : — " Their brutality somewhat diminishes when im- 
 ported young, after they become habituated to clothing 
 and a regular discipline of Life ; but many are never re- 
 claimed, and continue savages, in every sense of the word, 
 to their latest period. We find them marked with the 
 same bestial manners, stupidity, and vices, which debase 
 their brethren in Africa, who seem to be distinguished from 
 the rest of mankind, not in person only, but in possessing, 
 in abstract, every species of inherent turpitude that is to 
 be found dispersed at large among the rest of the human 
 creation, with scarcely a single virtue to extenuate this 
 
 <fflN£ 
 
 § =: 
 
 rv^ 
 
36 
 
 % €xiMt for fyi %tp&. 
 
 shade of character, differing in this particular from all other 
 men. When we reflect on the nature of these men, and 
 their dissimilarity to the rest of mankind, must we not 
 conclude that they are a different species of the same genus ?" 
 We might reasonably anticipate, that in the present en- 
 lightened age, opinions like these would have given way 
 before the many proofs which have been adduced to show 
 how grossly unfounded they are. But we have no occasion 
 to refer to the past century for effusions of a proud and 
 false philosophy, denying that the Negro has any claim to 
 humanity, or, to say the very least of him, that he is so 
 degenerate a variety of the human species, as to defy all 
 cultivation of mind, and all correction of morals. 
 
 It is but a few years since a strange book was published 
 at Charleston, in South Carolina, entitled " The Natural 
 History of the Negro Race," purporting to be a translation 
 from the French of J. H. Guenebault. Its professed object 
 is to prove, by investigation, that Negroes are not human 
 beings, in the full sense of that expression, but are an 
 inferior order of animals, forming a species between the 
 ourang-outang or chimpanzee, and the White race of man- 
 kind. This audacious attempt is made with some show of 
 ability. A very extensive physiological, metaphysical, and 
 historical investigation is instituted, and no point is left 
 unnoticed which is supposed to bear evidence against the 
 unhappy black-skinned race. 
 
 The volume commences with a long dedication to the 
 members of the Literary and Philosophical Society of 
 Charleston, setting forth, in the most affectedly pious man- 
 ner imaginable, the beneficence of the Deity in giving such 
 wonderful variety in all His works, which is of course in- 
 tended to smooth the way for what is to follow. The first 
 chapter refers to the general features, characteristics, figure, 
 and colour of the Negro species ; the second refers to the 
 race in particular nations ; the third is a comparison be- 
 tween the Negro, the White Man, and the ourang-outang ; 
 
& €ritmfr for tip Jfogm 
 
 the fourth enters into the subject of the comparative anatomy 
 of the Negro and the European ; the fifth treats of Negro dis- 
 eases and degenerations ; the sixth and seventh of Mulattos 
 and Creoles ; and, lastly, there is a defence of Slavery. 
 The author of this singular production asserts that " Every 
 thing serves to prove that Negroes form not only a race, 
 but undoubtedly a distinct species, from the beginning of 
 the world, as we see other species among other living 
 beings." "Some Negroes," he says, "have been brought up 
 with care and attention, have received in schools and colleges 
 the same education given to White children, and yet they 
 have been unable to reach the same degree of intellect." 
 " Negroes," he continues, " are conscious that an affinity 
 exists between them and monkeys, as, according to all travel- 
 lers, they look upon monkeys as wild and lazy Negroes. In 
 fact, when we consider the great analogy between monkeys, 
 Hottentots, and Papous, — so great that Galen, in the ana- 
 tomy of a Pitheque, mistook him for a man ; when we 
 remark how intelligent the ourang-outang is, how much 
 his bearing, actions, and habits, are similar to those of 
 Negroes, and how easily he is instructed, it seems that we 
 must acknowledge the most imperfect Negroes to be next 
 to the most perfect monkeys." 
 
 Space admits not of our entering into the pleading of 
 the author of South Carolina on this subject ; suffice it to 
 say, his argument in favour of the existence of Slavery is 
 drawn from an alleged inferiority in the Negro races, as 
 well as from the countenance which he asserts is given to 
 a state of perpetual servitude in the Old and New Tes- 
 taments. The inferiority of the Negro, in a mental, moral, 
 and religious point of view, as well as the perversion of the 
 Scriptures in support of Slavery, will be entered into 
 more fully in the subsequent pages. 
 
 The grand conclusion arrived at by the author, 
 from all his specious arguments, is, that — "For such 
 men, necessity is the only possible restraint — force, 
 
 K 
 
% Gfcitab far tire 3Rgnr. 
 
 the only law ; so decreed by their constitution and 
 climate." 
 
 The talented editors of the " Edinburgh Journal," in 
 reviewing this singular production, and quoting from it 
 more at length, make the following very appropriate con- 
 cluding observations : — " The answer to all these argu- 
 ments is, we think, not difficult. Supposing that the 
 Negroes differ in all the alleged respects from the Whites, 
 the difference, we would say, is not such as to justify the 
 Whites in making a property of them, and treating them 
 with cruelty. But the Negroes are not, in reality, beyond 
 the pale of humanity, either physically or mentally. Their 
 external configuration is not greatly different from that of 
 Whites. Their being the same mentally, is shewn by 
 the fact, that many Negroes have displayed intellectual and 
 moral features equal to those of Whites of high endow- 
 ment. We might instance Carey, Jenkins, Cuffe, Gustavus 
 Vassa, Toussaint, and many others. If any one Negro 
 has shewn a character identical with that of the White 
 race, the whole family must be the same, though in general 
 inferior. The inferiority is shewn to be not in kind, but 
 in degree ; and it would be just as proper for the clever 
 Whites to seize and enslave the stupid ones, as for the 
 Whites in general to enslave the Blacks in general. The 
 Blacks, moreover, have shewn a capability of improvement. 
 They have shewn that, as in many districts of even our 
 own island of Great Britain, many parts of mind appear 
 absent only when not brought out or called into exercise, 
 and that, by education, the dormant faculties can be awakened 
 and called into strength, if not in one generation, at least 
 in the course of several. The tendency of Slavery is to 
 keep down, at nearly the level of brutes, beings who might 
 be brightened into intellectual and moral beauty." 
 
 With regard to the assertion of the author of the strange 
 book alluded to, that " Negroes are conscious of their 
 affinity with monkeys," and consequently acknowledge 
 
 W 
 
 >>T 
 
a Criirate for tjj Jkgnr. 
 
 39 
 
 u 
 
 their own inferiority to the other races of mankind, I 
 utterly deny the truth of such an assertion, unless, in- 
 deed, his allusion has reference only to those in a state of 
 Slavery. If so, an answer may be given him in this par- 
 ticular, in the words of Dr. Charming : — 
 
 " The moral influence of Slavery is to destroy the pro- 
 per consciousness and spirit of a Man. The Slave, re- 
 garded and treated as property, bought and sold like a 
 brute, denied the rights of humanity, unprotected against 
 insult, made a tool, and systematically subdued, that he 
 may be a manageable, useful tool, how can he help regard- 
 ing himself as fallen below his race ? How must his spirit 
 be crushed ? How can he respect himself ? He becomes 
 bowed to servility. This word, borrowed from his con- 
 dition, expresses the ruin wrought by Slavery within him. 
 The idea that he was made for his own virtue and happi- 
 ness scarcely dawns on Iris mind. To be an instrument of 
 the physical, material good of another, whose will is his 
 highest law, he is taught to regard as the great purpose of 
 his being. The whips and imprisonment of Slavery, and 
 even the horrors of the middle passage from Africa to 
 America, these are not to be named in comparison with 
 this extinction of the proper consciousness of a human 
 being, with the degradation of a man into a brute. 
 
 " It may be said that the Slave is used to his yoke ; that 
 his sensibilities are blunted ; that he receives, without a 
 pang or a thought, the treatment which would sting other 
 men to madness. And to what does this apology amount? 
 It virtually declares, that Slavery has done its perfect work, 
 has quenched the spirit of humanity, that the Man is dead 
 within the Slave. It is not, however, true that this work 
 of abasement is ever so effectually done as to extinguish 
 all feeling. Man is too great a creature to be wholly 
 ruined by Man. "When he seems dead he only sleeps. 
 There are occasionally some sullen murmurs in the calm 
 of Slavery, showing that life still beats in the soul, that 
 
 W 
 
*4( 
 
 % €x\Mt for tjtf Jfcp. 
 
 the idea of Rights cannot be wholly effaced from the 
 human being. 
 
 " It would be too painful, and it is not needed, to detail 
 the processes by which the spirit is broken in Slavery. I 
 refer to one only, the selling of Slaves. The practice of 
 exposing fellow-creatures for sale, of having markets for 
 men as for cattle, of examining the limbs and muscles of a 
 man and woman as of a brute, of putting human beings 
 under the hammer of an auctioneer, and delivering them, 
 like any other article of merchandise, to the highest bidder, 
 all this is such an insult to our common nature, and so in- 
 finitely degrading to the poor victim, that it is hard to con- 
 ceive of its existence, except in a barbarous country. 
 
 " The violation of his own rights, to which he is inured 
 from birth, must throw confusion over his ideas of all 
 human rights. He cannot comprehend them ; or, if he 
 does, how can he respect them, seeing them, as he does, 
 perpetually trampled upon in his own person ?" 
 
 But, to return to our enlightened author of South Caro- 
 lina, — I shall dismiss him by remarking, that it is a strange 
 thing, in this nineteenth century, pre-eminent for the ad- 
 vancement of light and knowledge, to have occasion to assert, 
 that the idea of the least identity between the Negro and 
 any portion of the brute creation is as false and unfounded 
 as it is shocking and detestable. Such an absurd theory, 
 though always publishing its own falsehood, may serve its 
 purpose, when civilized men themselves turn savages to 
 advocate Slavery ; " but let facts bring out the truth, as 
 they do in the circumstance, that two native Africans have 
 recently gone back from England, to the plains which gave 
 them birth, as clergymen !" * 
 
 That very little importance can be attached to the allega- 
 tion of an external resemblance between the Negro and 
 inferior animals, may be clearly inferred from the fact, 
 that the same remark has been made, even by intelligent 
 * " Jamaica : Enslaved and Free." 
 
 %( 
 
f^ytp 
 
 travellers, respecting - particular people of other varieties of 
 the human race. Regnard concludes his description of the 
 Laplanders with these words : " voila la description de ce 
 petit animal qu'on appelle Lapon, et Ton peut dire qu'il 
 n'y en a point, apres le singe, qui approche plus l'homme." 
 An Esquimaux, who was brought to London by Cartwright, 
 when he first saw a monkey, asked " Is that an Esquimaux?" 
 His companion adds, " I must confess, that both the colour 
 and contour of the animal's countenance had consider- 
 able resemblance to the people of their nation." N. 
 del Techo calls the Caaiguas of South America, " tarn 
 simiis similes, quam hominibus ;" and J. R. Forster, in the 
 observations of his journey round the world, asserts, " the 
 inhabitants of the island of Mallicollo, of all the people 
 whom I have seen, have the nearest relationship to the 
 monkies." 
 
 Whether we investigate the physical or the moral 
 nature of Man, we recognize at every step the limited ex- 
 tent of our knowledge. That the greatest ignorance has 
 prevailed on this subject, even in modern times, and among 
 men of reputed learning and acuteness, is evinced by 
 the strange notipn very strenuously asserted by Monboddo 
 and Rousseau, and firmly believed by some, that Man and 
 the monkey, or at least the ourang-outang, belong to the 
 same species, and are not otherwise distinguished from 
 each other, than by circumstances which can be accounted 
 for, by the different physical and moral agencies to which 
 they have been exposed. The former of these writers 
 even supposes that the human race once possessed tails ! 
 and he says " the ourang-outangs are proved to be of our 
 species, by marks of humanity that are incontestible ;" a 
 poor compliment to Man, indeed. 
 
 " The completely unsupported assertions of Monboddo 
 and Rousseau," says Dr. Lawrence, "only show that they 
 were equally unacquainted with the structure and functions 
 of men and monkeys; not conversant with zoology and 
 
 W 
 
 
% €x\Mt for tju Jffgrn. 
 
 physiology, and therefore entirely destitute of the princi- 
 ples on which alone a sound judgment can be formed 
 concerning the natural capabilities and destiny of animals, 
 as well as the laws according to which certain changes of 
 character, certain departures from the original stock, may 
 take place." 
 
 " The peculiar characteristics of Man," continues the 
 above writer, " appear to me so very strong, that I not 
 only deem him a distinct species, but also put him into a 
 separate order by himself. His physical and moral attri- 
 butes place him at a much greater distance from all other 
 orders of mammalia, than those are from each other 
 respectively." 
 
■ ' ■ 
 
 ■3B(&3£© ©IF MSZAHBS^WS 
 
 FROM M . PERONS VOYAOE 
 
 J f MASStB LITHO LEEDS. 
 
CHAPTER IV. 
 
 Deduction of an affinity between the Negro and the brute creation, a mere 
 subterfuge — European physiognomy often similar to the Negro's — Hand- 
 some Africans described by many travellers — Some remarkably beautiful 
 — Not difficult to lose the impression of their colour — Blumenbach's 
 Negro cranise — Imperceptible gradations of one race into another — 
 Further analogies in animals — Effects of the civilizing process in im- 
 proving the form of the head and features — Exemplifications — Illustrated 
 in the case of Kaspar Hauser — Testimony of Dr. Philip on this subject 
 — Dr. Knox on Negro cranise — His important conclusion — Dr. Tiede- 
 man's experiments — Conclusive observations of Blumenbach — And 
 others — The civilization of many African nations superior to that of 
 European Aborigines — No deviations in the races of Man sufficient to 
 constitute distinct species — Departures from the general rule accounted 
 for — Equal variations observable in our own country — Remarkably ex- 
 emplified in Ireland. 
 
 It is evident then that the deduction of an affinity with the 
 brute creation, from the allegation of a resemblance between 
 the Negro and the Monkey, is a mere subterfuge. The 
 Negroes of Mozambique, whom Barrow describes as infe- 
 rior to many other Africans, may be instanced as exhibiting 
 those general characteristics which are mostly associated 
 with our ideas of Negro physiognomy. There are many 
 Europeans who have countenances exactly resembling these 
 and other Negroes ; and varieties and intermediate grada- 
 tions, almost imperceptible, may be traced, connecting all 
 the different races. We perceive, indeed, an astonishing 
 difference, when we place an ugly Negro (for there are 
 such, as well as ugly Europeans,) against a specimen of a 
 Grecian ideal model ; but when we examine the interme- 
 diate gradations, this striking diversity vanishes. " The 
 physiological characters of the Negro," says Dr. Lawrence, 
 " taken in a general sense, are as loosely defined as his 
 geographical distribution ; for among the Negroes, there 
 are some, who, in smoothness of the hair, and general 
 beauty of form, excel many Europeans. 
 
44 
 
 % €xMt for % JI Bgrn. 
 
 Clapperton describes the sultan of Boussa, as having 
 features more like a European than a Negro. Lander was 
 struck with the regularity of features, elegance of form, 
 and impressive dignity of manners and appearance in the 
 sable monarch Khiama. 
 
 " Of the Negroes of both sexes," says Blumenbach, 
 " whom I have attentively examined, in very considerable 
 numbers, as well as in the portraits and profiles of others, 
 and in the numerous Negro crania, which I possess, or 
 have seen, there are not two completely resembling each 
 other in their formation : they pass, by insensible grada- 
 tions, into the forms of the other races, and approach to 
 the other varieties, even in their most pleasing modifica- 
 tions. A Creole, whom I saw at Yverdun, born of parents 
 from Congo, and brought from St. Domingo by the Cheva- 
 lier Treytorrens, had a countenance, of which no part, not 
 even the nose, and rather strongly marked lips, were very 
 striking, much less, displeasing : the same features, with 
 an European complexion, would certainly have been gene- 
 rally agreeable." 
 
 The testimony of Le Maire, in his journey to Senegal 
 and Gambia, is to the same effect ; that there are Negresses, 
 except in colour, as handsome as European women. 
 
 Vaillant says of the Kafir women, that, setting aside the 
 prejudice which operates against their colour, many might 
 be accounted handsome, even in a European country. 
 
 The accurate Adanson confirms this statement in his 
 description of the Senegambians : — " Les femmes sont a 
 peu pres de la taille des homines, egalement bien faites. 
 Leur form est d'une finesse et d'une douceur extreme. 
 Elles ont les yeux noirs, bien fendus, la bouche et les levres 
 petites, et les traits du visage, bien proportionnes. II s'en 
 trouve plusieurs d'une beaute parfaite. Elles ont beaucoup 
 de vivacite, et sur tout un air aise de liberte qui fait plaisir." 
 
 The JalofFs, according to Mungo Park, although of a 
 deep black, have not the protuberant lip or the flat nose of 
 
Kli> 
 
 51 £riiitrir far tire Jfrgra. 
 
 the African countenance. Moore testifies concerning this 
 tribe to the same effect : — " The Jaloffs," says he, " have 
 handsome features." " Although their colour is a deep 
 black," says Golberry, " and their hair woolly, they are 
 robust and well made, and have regular features. Their 
 countenances," he adds, " are ingenuous, and inspire con- 
 fidence ; they are honest, hospitable, generous, and faith- 
 ful. The women are mild, very pretty, well made, and of 
 agreeable manners."* 
 
 Pigasetta states, that the Congo Negroes are very like 
 the Portuguese, except in colour; and Dampier, in his 
 account of Natal, describes the natives as having an agree- 
 able countenance. 
 
 Dr. Philip, speaking of a family of Bechuanas whom he 
 visited, says : — " We were very much struck with their fine 
 figures, and the dignified, easy manner with which they re- 
 ceivedus. Their countenances andmanners discovered marks 
 of cultivation, accompanied with an air of superiority, which 
 at once marked the class of people to which they belonged, 
 and which, under other circumstances, would have been 
 admired in an English drawing-room"^ 
 
 Isert, a Danish traveller, says : — "Almost all the Negroes 
 are of good stature, and those of Acra have remark- 
 ably fine features. The contour of the face, indeed, 
 among the generality of these people, is different from that 
 of Europeans ; but, at the same time, faces are found 
 among them, which, excepting the black colour, would in 
 Europe be considered beautiful."^ 
 
 Abdallah, a native of Guber, in West Africa, although 
 having the true Negro features and colour, is described as 
 having a very intelligent, preposessing countenance. § 
 
 " On my late tour, in August, 1825," says Dr. Philip, 
 " I first came in contact with the Bechuanas. I have 
 
 * Golberry's Travels, vol. I. + Philip's Eesearches. 
 
 X Philosoph. Mag. III. 144. § Annals of Oriental Literature, 537. 
 
46 
 
 % tiMb for fyz Jfcgra. 
 
 seldom seen a finer race of people ; the men were generally 
 well made, and had an elegant carriage; and many of the 
 females were slender, and extremely graceful. I could see 
 at once, from their step and air, that they had never been 
 in Slavery. They had an air of dignity and independence 
 in their manners, which formed a striking contrast to the 
 crouching and servile appearance of the Slave."* 
 
 On visiting a family of this tribe, Dr. Philip observes, 
 " I had in my train a young man who was a native of Lat- 
 takoo ; and when they found out there was a person in our 
 company who understood their language, they were quite 
 in raptures. I think I never saw two finer figures than 
 the father and the eldest son. They were both above six 
 feet ; and their limbs were admirably proportioned. The 
 father had a most elegant carriage, and was tall and thin ; 
 the son, a lad about 18 years of age, was equally well pro- 
 portioned, and had one of the finest open countenances that 
 can possibly be imagined. The second son was inferior in 
 stature, but he had a fine countenance also ; and, while 
 they indulged in all their native freedom, animated by the 
 conversation of my Bechuana, or began to tell the story of 
 their misfortunes, expressing the consternation with which 
 they were seized when they saw their children and parents 
 killed by an invisible weapon, and their cattle taken from 
 them, they became eloquent in their address ; their coun- 
 tenances, their eyes, their every gesture, spoke to the eyes 
 and to the heart ."f 
 
 " Teysho, chief counsellor of Mateebe, King of the 
 Wankeets of South Africa, is a handsome man," says the 
 same writer ; " and the ladies who were with him were fine 
 looking women, and had an air of superiority about them." J 
 
 We have the testimony of another recent traveller, and 
 
 resident for some time in South Africa. Thomas Pringle, 
 
 in speaking of the Bechuana, or great Kafir family, says : 
 
 "Some of them were very handsome. One man of the 
 
 * Philip's African Researches. f Idem. % Idem. 
 
 <PI1 
 
 % 
 
^ 
 
 Tamaha tribe, was, I think, the finest specimen of the human 
 figure I ever beheld in any country — fully six feet in height, 
 and graceful as an Apollo. A female of the same party, 
 the wife of a chief, was also a beautiful creature, with fea- 
 tures of the most handsome and delicate Eitropean mould."* 
 It has often been asserted, that independently of the 
 woolly hair and the dark complexion of the Negroes, 
 there are sufficient differences between them and the rest 
 of mankind, to mark them as a very peculiar tribe. This 
 may be the case to some extent. Yet from the foregoing 
 remarks of accredited travellers, it is evident that the 
 principal differences are not so constant as may generally 
 be imagined. Many Negroes, we have been informed, 
 strike Europeans as being remarkably beautiful. This 
 would not be the case if they deviated much from the 
 European standard of beauty. Slaves in the Colonies, 
 brought from the east coast of intertropical Africa, and 
 from Congo, are often destitute of those peculiarities, 
 which, in our eyes, constitute ugliness and deformity. " In 
 looking over a congregation of Blacks," observe Sturge 
 and Harvey, " it is not difficult to lose the impression of 
 their colour. There is among them the same diversity of 
 countenance and complexion, as among Europeans ; and 
 it is only doing violence to one's own feelings, to suppose 
 for a moment that they are not made of the same blood 
 as ourselves. "-f- 
 
 " Bone of our bone, flesh of our flesh, thou art, 
 Coheritor of kindred being thou ; 
 From the full tide that warm'd one mother's heart, 
 Thy reins and ours received the genial flow." 
 
 The six Negro craniae engraved in the two first decades 
 of Blumenbach, exhibit very clearly the diversity of 
 character in the African race ; and prove, most unequivo- 
 cally, that the variety existing in individuals amongst 
 
 * Pringle's " Sketches of South Africa." 
 t Sturge and Harvey's West Indies. 
 
 W 
 
 , ■ 
 
% €nkvk far IJrc- Jfogrn. 
 
 them, is certainly not less, but greater, than the difference 
 between some of them and many Europeans. 
 
 Amongst the numerous tribes or nations in each division, 
 comprising the five great varieties which naturalists have 
 assigned to Man, some come nearer to one, and some to the 
 other of the two immediately adjoining varieties. If we had 
 numerous specimens of each, we might arrange them in 
 such a manner, that the interval between the most perfect 
 Caucasian model, and the most exaggerated Negro or Mon- 
 golian specimens, should be filled with forms, conducting us 
 from one to the other, by almost imperceptible gradations. 
 We must, therefore, conclude that the diversities of features 
 and skulls are not sufficient to authorize us in assigning: 
 the different races of mankind in which they occur, to 
 species originally different. This conclusion will also be 
 strengthened by the analogies of natural history, to which 
 reference has already been made. The differences between 
 human crania are not more considerable, nor even so 
 remarkable, as some variations which occur in animals con- 
 fessedly of the same species. " The head of the wild boar 
 is widely different from that of the domestic pig. The 
 different breeds of horses and dogs are distinguished by 
 the most striking dissimilarities in the skull ; in which view, 
 the Neapolitan and Hungarian horses may be contrasted. 
 The very singular form in the skull of the Paduan fowl is 
 a more remarkable deviation from the natural structure, 
 than any variation which occurs in the human head." * 
 
 That the debasement of Slavery and oppression have a 
 tendency to disfigure the " human form divine," is unques- 
 tionable ; on the other hand it is equally well known, that 
 civilization, education, and the influence of religion, have 
 a powerful effect in improving both the form of the head 
 and features, as well as the expression of the countenance. 
 Many proofs might be adduced in corroboration of this 
 statement, which is sufficiently obvious in comparing 
 
 * Lawrence's Lectures. 
 
51 #titarfe for \\t Urgrn. 
 
 49 
 
 91 
 
 persons of various degrees of education, mental culture, 
 and refinement. 
 
 Sturge and Harvey state, that " a gentleman of great 
 intelligence, long resident in Antigua, remarked to them, 
 that the features of the Negroes had altered within his 
 memory, which he attributed to their elevation by educa- 
 tion and religious instruction. Their countenances ex- 
 pressed much more intelligence, and much less of the 
 malignant passions.*" M. Durand observes, " that there is 
 so great a difference between the Free Black people (in 
 the Gambia country) and Slaves, in their features, that 
 even an inexperienced eye distinguishes these classes of 
 people immediately." John Candler, in his " Brief Notices 
 of Hayti," in alluding to an alteration which he observed 
 in the general physiognomy of the people, draws from it 
 the following inference : — " Perhaps it is that the features 
 become more agreeable, in proportion as people recede 
 from the effects and influence of Slavery." 
 
 As an illustration of the remarkable effects of education 
 in altering the features of Man, and entirely changing the 
 expression of his contenance, we have one circumstance on 
 record which is very conclusive. I allude to the singular case of 
 Kaspar Hauser, who was confined in a dungeon in a state 
 of entire ignorance, till he was about eighteen years of age. 
 His biographer, Anselm Von Fuerbach, President of the Ba- 
 varian Court of Appeal, whose authority may be strictly 
 reHed upon,relates, "that on Kaspar's being thrown adrift in 
 the world, when he was first discovered by the inhabitants of 
 Nuremburg, his face was very vulgar : when in a state of 
 tranquillity, it was almost without any expression ; and its 
 lower features being somewhat prominent, gave him a 
 brutish appearance. His weeping was only an ugly con- 
 tortion of the mouth, and the staring look of his blue, but 
 clear bright eyes, had also an expression of brutish obtuse- 
 ness." Von Fuerbach expressed a wish at this period, 
 * " West Indies." 
 
% €xMt fax ijj* JfopC 
 
 that Kaspar's portrait might be taken by a skilful painter, 
 because he felt assured that his features would soon alter. 
 His wish was not gratified, but his prediction was soon ful- 
 filled. The effect of education produced a wonderful 
 alteration in his whole countenance ; indeed, the formation 
 of his face altered in a few months almost entirely ; his 
 countenance gained expression and animation, and the pro- 
 minent lower features of his face receded more and more, 
 so that his earlier physiognomy could scarcely any longer 
 be recognized.* 
 
 The alteration and improvement of the features, under 
 the influence of the civilizing process, is elucidated by so 
 many indubitable facts, that it is unnecessary to dwell 
 longer upon this subject. If the operation of this influence 
 could be applied more thoroughly and universally, it would 
 cause a nearer approximation to each other, between the 
 European and the African, and must tend, in a great mea- 
 sure, to obliterate those distinctions, on which the untenable 
 theories of diversity of origin have been founded, and 
 which have been adduced in favour of Negro Slavery. 
 Dr. Philip, from the facts which have come under his 
 observation, says, he has no hesitation in giving it as his 
 opinion, that the complexion, the form of the countenance, 
 and even the shape of the head, are much affected by the 
 circumstances under which human beings are placed at an 
 early age. In corroboration of the opinion here advanced, 
 he says, " I have had the satisfaction to remark at our Mis- 
 sionary stations, what appeared to me an improvement, not 
 only in the countenance, but even in the shape of the head, 
 for three successive generations." 
 
 If, as travellers inform us, many Africans differ from 
 Europeans in little else than colour, the peculiar construc- 
 tion of the head, on the faith of which, some would class 
 them as a distinct species, appears to be by no means a 
 constant character. Dr. Knox, who has entered minutely 
 * Life of Kaspar Hauser. 
 
 w 
 
(sUJA 
 
 51 Crtiuife far tip Urgrn. 
 
 into the study of Man, says, that in considering the lower 
 specimens of humanity, too much importance has been 
 attached to the cranium and the science of cranioscopy ; 
 for it is not in the skull, says he, but in the outer covering 
 of the body or skeleton, that nature has placed the great 
 marks of difference. " Strip off the integuments of Venus, 
 and compare her with a Bush Woman, and the difference 
 would be seen to be very slight." Dr. Knox, it may be 
 observed, after considerable research, arrives at this impor- 
 tant conclusion, " that there is an impassable gulf between 
 higher order the of animals and the Negro." 
 
 I am not very partial to phrenology, but if quantity of 
 brain and mental superiority have a connection with each 
 other, we have a high authority, that of Dr. Tiedeman, an 
 eminent German, for believing that no inferiority exists in 
 this respect, for he asserts that in quantity of brain they 
 equal the fair races. Dr. Tiedeman communicated a paper 
 to the British Royal Society, detailing the comparative 
 examination of the brains of a number of Negroes — size, 
 weight, conformation, &c, demonstrating that no material 
 difference exists, between them and the brains of the 
 White races. 
 
 Professor Blumenbach, the great German physiologist, 
 bestowed much labour and research on the question of 
 Negro capacity. He collected a large number of skulls, 
 and also a numerous library of the works of persons of 
 African blood or descent. He is, perhaps, the greatest 
 authority, in favour of the identity of species and equality 
 of intellect of the Black and White races. It is to Blumen- 
 bach, that we are indebted for the most complete body of 
 information on this subject, which he illustrated most suc- 
 cessfully by his unrivalled collection of the craniae of differ- 
 ent nations, from all parts of the globe. His admirable work 
 On the Varieties of the Human Species, contains a short 
 sketch of the various formations of the skull in different na- 
 tions ; but he has treated the subject at greater length, and 
 
 <RTNS) 
 
52 
 
 % $#tab for tin Jfop. 
 
 with more minute detail, in his Decades Craniorum, in which 
 the cranise themselves are represented of theirnatural size. 
 From the results of the observations of Blumenbach and 
 others, it appears then, that there is no characteristic what- 
 ever in the organization of the skull or brain of the Negro 
 which affords a presumption of inferior endowment either of 
 the intellectual or moral faculties. If it be asserted that the 
 African nations are inferior to the rest of mankind, from 
 historical facts, because they may be thought not to have 
 contributed their share to the advancement of human arts 
 and science, the Mandingoes may be instanced as a people 
 evidently susceptible of high mental culture and civi- 
 lization. They have not, indeed, contributed much 
 towards the advancement of human arts and science, but 
 they have evinced themselves willing and able to profit 
 by these advantages when introduced among them. The 
 civilization of many African nations is much superior to 
 that of the aborigines of Europe, during the ages which 
 preceded the conquests made by the Goths and Swedes in the 
 north, and by the Romans in the southern part. The old 
 Finnish inhabitants of Scandinavia had long, as it has been 
 proved by the learned investigations of Riihs, the religion 
 of fetishes, and a vocabulary as scanty as that of the most 
 barbarous Africans. They had lived from ages immemorial 
 without laws, or government, or social union ; every indi- 
 vidual in all things the supreme arbiter of his own actions ; 
 and they displayed as little capability of emerging from the 
 squalid sloth of their rude and merely animal existence. 
 When conquered by a people of Indo-German origin, who 
 brought with them from the East the rudiments of mental 
 culture, they emerged more slowly from their pristine bar- 
 barism than many of the native African nations have since 
 done. Even at the present day, there are hordes in various 
 parts of northern Asia, whose heads have the form belonging 
 to the Tartars, to the Sclavonians, and other Europeans, but 
 who are below many of the African tribes in civilization. 
 
% €xMt for tjji Jfrgrn. 
 
 It is evident, from what has already been adduced, that 
 there are no differences in the form or component parts of 
 the human body, amongst the various races of men, in any 
 degree similar to those which zoologists are accustomed to 
 employ, as distinctive characters. The peculiarities by 
 which they are distinguished from each other are not mate- 
 rial ones, existing only so long as the circumstances in 
 which they are placed, and which originally gave rise to 
 them, remain unchanged. There is no variation in the 
 number or form of the extremities, which being least acted 
 upon by situation and habitude, are usually considered as 
 the surest test of distinct species. All races of men have 
 the same number of fingers, of toes, and of teeth ; while 
 a very slight variation in any of these in animals consti- 
 tutes the mark of a distinct species. 
 
 The departures from the general rule, in various nations, 
 and frequently in individuals of the same country, are 
 easily solved, by the abundance or scarcity of food, and by 
 other causes favourable or otherwise to the development of 
 the human growth. We may witness partial demonstra- 
 tions of this in our own country ; a difference is every 
 where observable between the leisurely opulent classes and 
 those who are of necessity subjected to considerable mus- 
 cular exercise, and that in the open air. Take " the lady," 
 who lives almost constantly within doors, employed at the 
 utmost in netting or needlework, and contrast her slim and 
 delicate frame with the coarse robust figure of the fish- 
 woman or female field-labourer, who works hard in the 
 open air all day, and it is impossible to doubt that circum- 
 stances influeucing their physical conditions have made 
 them respectively what they are. A similar contrast is ob- 
 servable between the powerful frames of a set of male 
 rustics, such as we find in almost any of the provinces 
 of Britain, and the diminutive forms of the inhabitants 
 of London. The cause is obvious. Constant muscular 
 exercise in the open air, accompanied by nutriment 
 
 GUA2 
 
54 
 
 % ftftatt fnr \\t $?grn. 
 
 *f sufficient in quantity and healthful in kind, develope 
 the bone and muscle of the one order of persons to a pow- 
 erful degree, while the want of muscular exercise, and a 
 life spent mostly within doors, act on the other with an 
 opposite effect, notwithstanding the advantage of perhaps 
 a superior diet. Even the natural difference as to softness 
 and elegance between the sexes, may be reversed by the 
 operation of these causes. The women of Normandy, who 
 labour constantly in the fields, are become much more mas- 
 culine in form than the petit maitres of Paris ; and we 
 could, in our own country, point out many men, who, from 
 parlour life, are infinitely more feminine in stature and the 
 texture of the flesh, than many rustic women. It gene- 
 rally requires a series of generations to bring out these 
 results in their fullest extent; but even in the life of a 
 single individual the effect may often be traced. Thus we 
 often see, amongst the rustic population, females who are 
 comparatively elegant in form and of delicate complexion 
 in their early years, but who become coarse after a brief 
 experience of out-door labour. 
 
 When, in addition to hard labour and exposure to the 
 elements, there is an absolute deficiency of food and com- 
 fort, human beings become, in the course of a few generations, 
 much degraded in form and aspect. An interesting remark, 
 which bears upon this subject, has been made respecting 
 the natives of some parts of Ireland. " On the plantation 
 of Ulster, and afterwards on the success of the British 
 against the rebels of 1641 and 1689, great multitudes of 
 the native Irish were driven from Armagh and the south 
 of Down into the mountainous tract extending from the 
 barony of Flews eastward to the sea ; on the other side of 
 the kingdom the same race were expelled into Leitrim, 
 Sligo, and Mayo. Here they have been almost ever since, 
 exposed to the worst effects of hunger and ignorance, the 
 two great brutalizers of the human race." The descendants 
 of these exiles, are now distinguished physically, from their 
 
 W 
 
£ 
 
 % Criirafr for fji Jfogm 
 
 55 
 
 kindred in Meath, and in other districts, where they are 
 not in a state of personal debasement. They are remark- 
 able for " open projecting mouths, prominent teeth and 
 exposed gums : their advancing cheek-bones and de- 
 pressed noses carry barbarism on their very front." In Sligo 
 and northern Mayo, the consequences of two centuries of 
 degradation and hardship exhibit themselves in the whole 
 physical condition of the people, " affecting not only the 
 features, but the frame, and giving such an example of 
 human degradation from known causes, as almost compen- 
 sates by its value to future ages, for the suffering and 
 debasement which past generations have endured, in per- 
 fecting its appalling lesson. " Five feet two inches upon 
 an average, bow-legged, abortively-featured ; their clothing 
 a wisp of rags, &c, these spectres of a people that once 
 were well-grown, able-bodied, and comely, stalk abroad 
 into the daylight of civilization, the amiual apparitions of 
 Irish ugliness and Irish want." In other parts of the 
 island, where the people have never undergone the same 
 influences of physical degradation, it is well known that 
 the same race furnishes the most perfect specimens of 
 human beauty and vigour, both mental and bodily."* 
 
 a 
 
 CHJ/ 
 
 * Dublin University Magazine, vol. iv., p. 653, 
 
m 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 Complexion the most obvious external distinction in Man — Supposed to 
 subvert tbe theory of a Unity of Race — Analogous in animals — Chief 
 cause of diversity of Colour — Gradation in different latitudes — And 
 in the same latitudes, at various elevations — Peculiarities of Struc- 
 ture and Complexion become hereditary — Illustrations — In the House 
 of Austria — The Gipsies — Jews — The most striking instance of pecu- 
 liar National Countenance — Persons of the same blood — Amongst 
 the great and noble — The colour of Man not always corresponding 
 with Climate, explained — Persistency of Colour not so great as 
 supposed — Instances of Negroes becoming light-coloured — Of "Whites 
 who have become black — True Whites not unfrequently born among 
 the Black races — Several instances recorded — If Colour is a mark of in- 
 feriority in Man, it attaches a stigma to a great portion of the inhabi- 
 tants of the world — The Hindoos — Their learning two thousand years ago 
 — Natives of Terra del Fuego much lighter than the Negro, but inferior 
 in the scale of intelligence — Conclusion from the facts already stated — 
 Black colour of the Negro a merciful provision — Dr. Copland's remarks 
 on this subject — The inquiry into Unity of Species admirably summed 
 up by Buffon. 
 
 The most obvious external point of distinction among 
 mankind is the colour of the skin, a peculiarity of little 
 natural, but which has become one of great moral impor- 
 ance. It is the dark colour of the African that has been 
 especially urged, as subverting the theory of a unity of 
 races. Although a general survey of organized bodies, in 
 both the animal and vegetable kingdom, by no means leads 
 us to regard Colour as one of their most important distinc- 
 tions, but, on the contrary, will soon convince us that it 
 may undergo very signal changes without essential altera- 
 tions of their nature, (and the remark holds equally 
 good of the human subject), yet the different tints and 
 shades of the skin, offering themselves so immediately 
 to observation, and forcing themselves in a manner, on the 
 attention of the most incurious, have always been regarded 
 
si 
 
 ) ; " 
 
 \2 
 
 % <WMz far tin 3ftgra« 
 
 57 
 
 by the generality of mankind as the most characteristic 
 distinction of separate races. 
 
 That this idea is entirely an erroneous one, is proved (as 
 in other cases of variation) by a reference to various parts 
 of the animal creation, colour in them being in no instance 
 a mark of species. If we take a collective survey of the 
 diversities of colour, distinguishing particular breeds in 
 animals, we shall discover that, with considerable allow- 
 ance for the organization of new varieties in form and 
 organic structure, the primitive type and hue is stamped 
 upon each kind. Though the same animals vary in colour 
 in the same country, each has more frequently its own dis- 
 tinctive peculiarity. .ZElian informs us that Eubsea was 
 famous for producing white oxen.* Blumenbach remarks, 
 that '* all the swine of Piedmont are black, those of Nor- 
 mandy white, and those of Bavaria are of a reddish brown." 
 " The turkeys of Normandy," he states, " are all black ; 
 those of Hanover almost all white. In Guinea, the dogs 
 and the gallinaceous fowls are as black as the human inha- 
 bitants of the same country, "f 
 
 To enter into a full discussion of this subject would lead 
 us beyond our limits. A few more observations must suf- 
 fice. That colour in Man is much influenced by climate 
 is evident, and its variation appears to a considerable ex- 
 tent gradational throughout different parts of the globe. 
 " The heat of the climate," says Buffon, "is the chief cause 
 of blackness among the human species." Without assu- 
 ming, however, that solar heat is the alone agent affecting 
 the colour of Man, the action of the sun in darkening the 
 human tint is too obvious to be denied or unnoticed. How 
 swarthy do Europeans become who seek their fortunes in 
 the tropics or under the equator, who have their skins 
 parched by the burning suns of " Afric or either Ind." 
 The effects are soon visible in their complexion, in the 
 most distinct manner. A child, however fair, if allowed to 
 * iElian, lib. xii. cap. 36. f Prichard. 
 
 lire 
 
Jgpfc 
 
 I tttotte fur tyt Sfgrn. 
 
 romp in the open air, without any shade over the head, will 
 become what is called sunburt or dusky in a few months. 
 If we observe the gradations of colour in different 
 localities in the meridian under which we live, we shall per- 
 ceive a very close relation to the heat of the sun in each 
 respectively. Under the equator we have the deep black 
 of the Negro ; then the copper or olive of the Moors of 
 Northern Africa ; then the Spaniard and Italian, swarthy 
 compared with other Europeans ; the French still darker 
 than the English ; while the fair and florid complexion of 
 England and Germany passes, more northerly, into the 
 bleached Scandinavian white. At last, indeed, the grada- 
 tion is broken, for a dusky tint reigns along the whole 
 circuit of the Arctic border. The cause of this is not well 
 explained ; but the universal prevalence of a dusky hue 
 under that latitude, seems clearly to indicate that there is 
 something in the climate with which it is connected. 
 During their short but brilliant summer, the sun, perpetu- 
 ally above the horizon, shines with an intensity unknown 
 in temperate climates. May not the natives who spend 
 this season almost perpetually in the open air, in hunting or 
 fishing, receive from it that dark tint, which is not easily 
 effaced ? It may be partially smoke-brown, for the 
 tenants of all this bleak circuit necessarily spend half the 
 year in almost subterraneous abodes, heated by fires as 
 ample as they have fuel to maintain ; the smoke of which, 
 deprived of any legitimate vent, constantly fills their apart- 
 ments, and must have an effect in darkening the com- 
 plexion, to which it very closely adheres.* 
 
 It may be remarked, that in the central regions of 
 America there are many shades of colour in different parts, 
 amongst nations evidently one in origin, the variations bear- 
 ing a general reference to the situations in which the people 
 are respectively placed. For instance, the inhabitants of 
 high grounds in Central America, are pale compared with 
 * Murray's North America. 
 
$ €iMt fnr tin Jlrgrn. 
 
 59 
 
 those of the low districts. Here we cannot doubt that 
 climate has operated, either in clearing the dusky or ren- 
 dering dusky the white. 
 
 In the case of the aborigines of Hindostan, who are dark 
 in complexion, the action of climate is clearly observable ; 
 and is proved by the circumstances of the female inhabi- 
 tants of the harem, derived from the same stock, being 
 generally very fair. This is unquestionably the conse- 
 quence of their secluded life, which prevents that exposure 
 of person which their relations of the other sex neces- 
 sarily undergo. 
 
 Let us survey the gradations of colour on the continent 
 of Africa itself. The inhabitants of the north are whitest ; 
 and as we advance southwards towards the line, and those 
 countries in which the sun's rays fall more perpendicularly, 
 the complexion gradually assumes a darker shade. And 
 the same men, whose colour has been rendered black by 
 the powerful influence of the sun, if they remove to the 
 north, gradually become whiter (I mean their posterity), 
 and eventually lose their dark colour. 
 
 It is well known, that in whatever region travellers ascend 
 mountains, they find the vegetation at every successive level 
 altering its character, and gradually assuming the appearances 
 presented in more northern countries ; thus indicating, that 
 the state of the atmosphere, temperature, and physical agen- 
 cies in general, assimilate, as we approach alpine regions, to 
 the peculiarities locally connected with high latitudes. If, 
 therefore, complexion, and other bodily qualities belonging 
 to races of men, depend upon climate and external con- 
 dition, we should expect to find them varying in re- 
 ference to elevation of surface ; and if they should be 
 found actually to undergo such variations, this will be a 
 strong argument that these external characters do, in fact, 
 depend upon local conditions. Now, if we inquire respect- 
 ing the physical characters of the tribes inhabiting high 
 tracts in warm countries, we shall find that they coincide 
 
 TO 
 
 m 
 
% €x\hit fnr \\t %%m. 
 
 with those which prevail in the level or low parts of more 
 northern tracts. The Swiss, in the high mountains above 
 the plain of Lombardy, have sandy or brown hair. "What 
 a contrast presents itself to the traveller, who descends into 
 the Milanese territory, where the peasants have black hair 
 and eyes, with strongly marked Italian and almost Oriental 
 features. In the higher part of the Biscayan country, in- 
 stead of the swarthy complexion and black hair of the 
 Castilians, the natives have a fair complexion, with light 
 blue eyes, and flaxen, or auburn hair. * 
 
 In the intertropical region, high elevations of surface, 
 as they produce a cooler climate, occasion the appearance 
 of light complexions. In the higher parts of Senegambia, 
 which front the Atlantic, and are cooled by winds from the 
 Western Ocean, where, in fact, the temperature is known 
 to be moderate, and even cool at times, the light copper 
 coloured Fulahs are found surrounded on every side by 
 black Negro nations inhabiting lower districts ; and nearly 
 in the same parallel, but on the opposite coast of Africa, 
 are the high plains of Enarea and Kaffa, where the inhabi- 
 tants are said to be fairer than the inhabitants of southern 
 Europe, f 
 
 It must be observed, that all varieties of structure and 
 complexion which are congenital, that are a part of the ori- 
 ginal constitution impressed upon an individual from his 
 birth, or that arise from the development of a natural ten- 
 dency, are hereditary, or liable, with a greater or less degree 
 of certainty, to be transmitted to offspring. Persistency 
 in this respect is, however, far from invariable, and appa- 
 rently, much more uncertain as regards colour than any pecu- 
 liar formation of the body, as will be shown hereafter. In 
 general, the peculiarities of the individual are transmitted 
 to his immediate descendants ; in other instances they have 
 been observed to reappear in a subsequent generation, after 
 having failed, through the operation of some circumstances 
 * Prichard. f Idem. 
 
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vQ. 
 
 
 51 fritarf* far % Jftgtv. 
 
 61 
 
 r~TP 
 
 quite inexplicable, to show themselves in the immediate 
 progeny. This fact has been noticed by Lucretius : — 
 
 " Fit quoque ut interdum similes existere avoruni 
 Possint, et referant proavorum ssepe figuras ; 
 Proptera quia multa modis primordia multis 
 Mista suo celant in corpore sarpe parentes, 
 Quae patribus patres traduut a stirpe profecta. 
 Inde Venus varia producit sorte figuras, 
 Majorumque refert voltus vocesque, comasque." 
 
 Many striking instances of singularities of structure, 
 originating in the human kind, as well as among animals, 
 have occasionally arisen and been propagated through many 
 generations. The growth of supernumerary fingers or toes, 
 and corresponding deficiencies, are circumstances of this 
 description. Maupertius has mentioned this phenomenon ; 
 he assures us that there were two families in Germany, 
 distinguished for several generations, by six fingers on each 
 hand, and the same number of toes on each foot. * Many 
 similar peculiarities have been recorded as being transmit- 
 ted through successive generations, f 
 
 The thick lip introduced into the imperial house of Aus- 
 tria, by the marriage of the Emperor Maximilian with 
 Mary of Burgundy, is visible in their descendants to this 
 day, after a lapse of three centuries. J Haller observed, 
 that his own family had been distinguished by tallness of 
 stature for three generations, without excepting one out 
 of numerous grandsons descended from one grandfather. || 
 
 The gipsies afford an example of a people spread over 
 all Europe for the last four centuries, and nearly confined 
 by marriages, and their peculiar way of life, to their own 
 tribe. In Transylvania, where there are great numbers of 
 them, and the race remains pure, their features can be 
 more accurately observed. In every country and climate, 
 however, which they have inhabited, they preserve their 
 
 * Prichard. t Idem, vol. i., chap. iv. 
 
 X Coxe's Mem of the House of Austria. || Elem. Physiol, lib. xxix. 
 
 <m 
 
% €Mt far tjtf Mi$vl 
 
 distinctive character so perfectly, that they are recognized 
 at a glance, and cannot be confounded with the natives. 
 
 But, above all, the Jews exhibit the most striking in- 
 stance of a peculiar national countenance, so strongly 
 marked in almost every individual, that persons the least 
 accustomed to physiognomical observations, detect it in- 
 stantly; though not easily understood or described. Religion 
 has, in this case, most successfully exerted its power in 
 preventing communion with other races ; and this exclusion 
 of intercourse has preserved the Jewish countenance so 
 completely, in every soil and climate of the globe, that a 
 miracle has been thought necessary to account for the con- 
 tinued transmission. 
 
 It is owing to native or congenital peculiarity of form 
 and complexion being transmitted by generation, that we 
 perceive a general similitude in persons of the same blood. 
 Hence we can frequently distinguish one brother, by his 
 resemblance to another, or know a son by his likeness to 
 the father or mother, or even to the grand-parents. All 
 the individuals of some families are characterised by par- 
 ticular lines of countenance, and we frequently observe a 
 peculiar feature continued in a family for many generations. 
 
 The great and the noble, have generally had it more in 
 their power to select the beauty of nations in marriage ; 
 and thus, while without system or design, they have merely 
 gratified their own taste, they have distinguished their 
 order, as much by elegant proportions of person, and 
 beautiful features, as by its prerogatives in society. This 
 remark is universally applicable. " The same superiority," 
 says Cook, " which is observable in the erees, or nobles, 
 in all the other islands, is found here, (Sandwich Islands.) 
 Those whom we saw, were, without exception, perfectly 
 well formed : whereas, the lower sort, besides their general 
 inferiority, are subject to all the variety of make and 
 figure that is seen in the populace of other countries."* 
 
 * Lawrence's Lectures. 
 
ft J} 
 
 d 
 
 wh 
 
 % €xlMi far lire llrgro. 
 
 Dr. Philip was particularly struck with the difference 
 between the appearance of the chiefs and their families, 
 and the common people (in South Africa) ; the superior 
 class were taller in their stature ; " their countenances ap- 
 proached nearer to the European model than those of a 
 lower rank ; their complexions were lighter, and they had 
 an air of nobility about them, which indicated that they 
 were born to command."* " The men of Ashantee," says 
 Bodwick, " are very well made ; the women also are gen- 
 erally handsome ; but it is only among the higher orders 
 that beauty is to be found ; and among them, free from all 
 labour or hardship, I have not only seen the finest figures, 
 but in many instances, regular Grecian features, with 
 brilliant eyes, set rather obliquely in the head."* 
 
 When any characters have become thoroughly worked 
 into the system, it is only probable that they should for 
 some time survive the causes which gave them birth, especi- 
 ally when no very active ones are in operation. This may 
 serve for the solution of many cases, in which the colour 
 of Man and the climate do not appear to correspond. The 
 Chinese, descended from the Mongols, still retain a modi- 
 fied Mongol visage and shape. The natives of New South 
 Wales spring from the Oriental Negro, and continuing, 
 from their rude habits, exposed to the constant action of 
 sun and air, they have remained black. In like manner 
 may we account for Indostan being still peopled by races 
 of various form and colour. 
 
 These are cases especially urged by those who argue in 
 favour of a diversity of species in Man, on the ground of 
 features and colour. Instances are also adduced, in which 
 individuals transplanted into another climate than that of 
 their birth, are said to have retained their peculiarities of 
 form and colour unaltered, and to have transmitted the same 
 to their posterity for generations. But cases of this kind, 
 though often substantiated to a certain extent, appeal' to 
 * Philip's Researches. f Bodwick, p. 31S. 
 
w 
 
 64 
 
 % €nMt for tjp 3K^gm 
 
 have been much exaggerated, both as to the duration of 
 time ascribed, and the absence of any change. It is highly- 
 probable, that the original characters will be found under- 
 going gradual modifications, which tend to assimilate them 
 to those of the new country and situation. 
 
 The Jews, however slightly their features may have assi- 
 milated to those of other nations amongst whom they are 
 scattered, from the causes already stated, certainly form a 
 very striking example as regards the uncertainty of per- 
 petuity in colour. Descended from one stock, and pro- 
 hibited by the most sacred institutions from intermarrying 
 with the people of other nations, and yet dispersed, accord- 
 ing to the divine prediction, into every country on the 
 globe, this one people is marked with the colours of all : 
 fair in Britain and Germany; brown in France and in 
 Turkey ; swarthy in Portugal and in Spain ; olive in Syria 
 and in Chaldea ; tawny or copper-coloured in Arabia and 
 in Egypt ;• whilst they are " black at Congo in Africa."f 
 
 The researches of Dr. Prichard have dispelled many of 
 the ideas formerly entertained with respect to the general 
 persistency of colour and features in the human race, espe- 
 cially of colour, on which the greatest stress has been laid. 
 In some particular states of the constitution, the skin of 
 Whites becomes, either wholly or in part, black. On 
 the other hand, it is well known that the Black loses part of 
 his original tint in a state of civilization. It is remarked, 
 in the United States, that while Negroes kept at field- 
 labour retain their pristine colour, those who are domesti- 
 cated as servants become paler at the second and subse- 
 quent generations, and also lose their African features and 
 other peculiarities. There are also instances of Negroes 
 losing their original colour wholly or in part, under the in- 
 fluence of disease or some other constitutional affection. 
 Dr. Strach records the case of a man who was converted 
 by a fever into a perfect Negro in colour. Blumenbach 
 
 * Smith on the Complexion of the Human Species. t Prichard. 
 
Jlpf 
 
 51 Critwtc fer tjp Higra. 
 
 describes a young Negro, in London, who became white 
 in the middle of his body, and also about the knees, 
 without ill health having any concern, appparently, in pro- 
 ducing these appearances. Other instances are recorded 
 of Negroes, in different countries, without the action of 
 any apparent disease, gradually losing their black colour and 
 becoming as white as Europeans. An example of this kind 
 is recorded in the " Transactions of the Philosophical 
 Society." Klinkosch mentions the case of a Negro who 
 lost his blackness and became yellow ;* and Caldani de- 
 clares that a Negro, at Venice, was black when brought 
 during infancy to that city, but became gradually lighter 
 coloured, -j- There are throughout Africa several nations, 
 unquestionably Negro originally, who have acquired hand- 
 some forms and faces, as well as a lighter tint, in consequence 
 of their living in mountainous regions, approaching to the 
 temperate climate. 
 
 Instances of white people who have become black, in 
 consequence of migrating into tropical latitudes, are more 
 rare, and not so distinctly made out ; yet, according to 
 several accurately informed and scientific writers, such as 
 Waddington, Dr. Ruppell, and M. Rozet, there are black 
 races in Africa, among the genuine descendants of emi- 
 grants from Arabia. Detachments of the Arabian family 
 migrated, eleven or twelve hundred years ago, into northern 
 Africa, where they have founded states of some import- 
 ance, and, in some instances, they have passed into a per- 
 fectly black complexion ; although improved in form and 
 stature, and notwithstanding that they reside to the north 
 of the Negro countries. A remarkable fact in the history 
 of Loango, in the empire of Congo, is, that the country, 
 according to a statement which was fully credited by Olden- 
 dorp, himself a writer of most correct judgment and of 
 unimpeachable veracity, contains many Jews settled in it, 
 
 * Klinkosch, de vera natura Cuticulae ; Prag. 1775. 
 t Caldani Institut. Physiol. 170. 
 
66 
 
 % €x\h\i for \)t Hegra. 
 
 who retain their religious rites and the distinct habits 
 which keep them isolated from other nations. Though 
 thus separate from the African population, they are black, 
 and resemble the other Negroes in every respect as to 
 physical character.* It is probably in allusion to this case 
 that Pennington, in his " Text Book," says, " the descend- 
 ants of a colony of Jews, originally from Judea, settled 
 on the coast of Africa, are black."f M. Rozet declares 
 that there are many Negresses in the Algerine country, 
 whither they have doubtless been brought from the inte- 
 rior of Soudan, and very probably from Hatissa, who are of 
 a jet black colour, but with truly Roman countenances. % 
 In one case, a degradation resembling that instanced among 
 the Irish people, has been recorded to have taken place in 
 the oasis of Fezzan. " The general appearance of the men 
 in that locality is plain, and their complexion black ; the 
 women are of the same colour, and ugly in the extreme. 
 Neither sex is remarkable for figure, height, strength, 
 vigour, or activity. They have a very peculiar cast of 
 countenance, which distinguishes them from other Blacks ; 
 their cheek-bones are higher and more prominent, their 
 faces flatter, and their noses less depressed and more pointed 
 at the top than those of other Negroes. Their eyes are gen- 
 erally small, and their mouths of an immense width, but 
 their teeth are generally good ; their hair is woolly, though 
 not completely frizzled." They are a dull phlegmatic 
 people. Here we have, with black skins, Negro faces, and 
 woolly hair, a people descended from the white tribes of 
 Arabia, and who still speak the language of that country. 
 
 The Portuguese who planted themselves on the coast of 
 Africa a few centuries ago, have been succeeded by des- 
 cendants blacker than many Africans. § 
 
 Langsdorf mentions an English sailor who had been for 
 
 Oldendorp's Geschicte der Mission der Evangelischen Bruder, &c. 
 t Text Book, p. 26. % M. Kozet's Voyage, II. 140. 
 
 § Pennington's Text Book, p. 96. 
 
€1 
 
 %l 
 
 % <Tnlmte for \\i |?rgrn. 
 
 67 ^ 
 
 some years in Nukahiwah, one of the Marquesas Islands, 
 becoming so changed in colour that he was scarcely to be 
 distinguished from the natives.* 
 
 It is a remarkable circumstance attending the black 
 people in Africa, in India, and in Central America, that 
 amongst them Albinos are frequently born ; that is, per- 
 sons of a pure dead white, with white hair and red eyes. 
 This is thought to be a diseased condition ; but, besides 
 these, there are instances by no means unfrequent, of true 
 Whites being born amongst the Black races. This fact was 
 long doubted ; but it seems to be now set at rest. White 
 children, or Dondoes, are frequently born from Black 
 parents in all parts of Africa. Many of them are of what 
 we should call a fair complexion. Among the Funge, a 
 race of Shilukh Negroes, who, some hundred years ago, 
 conquered and settled in Sennaar, they are particular ly 
 numerous ; insomuch as to have formed a separate caste, 
 distinguished by the name of El Aknean (the red people.) 
 Buffon has given a minute description of a white Ne- 
 gress, born in the island of Dominica, of black parents, 
 who were natives of Africa, -j- A white Negro is described 
 by Dr. Goldsmith, who saw him exhibited in London. He 
 says, " upon examining this Negro, I found the colour to be 
 exactly like that of a European ; the visage white and 
 ruddy, and the lips of the proper redness." " However," 
 he adds, " there were sufficient marks to convince me of 
 his descent." % Burchell has given a description of a female 
 of a light complexion, born from the race of the Black 
 Kafirs in South Africa. " The colour of her skin was of 
 the fairest European, or, more correctly described, it was 
 more pink and white." Her features were those of her 
 race, the parents being genuine Kafirs. § Dr. Winterbot- 
 tom mentions two white Negroes of the Man dingo country, 
 from the testimony of an eye-witness. He describes from 
 
 * Langsdorf's Voyages, V. p. 90. f Pricliard. 
 
 X Goldsmith's Hist. Earth and Anim. Nat., ii. 24. § Prichard. 
 
 UTS 
 
 ))% 
 
% Ctitab fnr tju fegrn. 
 
 his own observation, a white Negro woman whom he saw 
 in the Sooson country, whose relatives were all black. No 
 doubt could be entertained of her being of genuine Negro 
 origin. Pallas has minutely described a white Negress 
 seen by him in London in 1761. She was born of Negro 
 parents in Jamaica, and was sixteen years of age. She was 
 of small stature, fair complexion, with ruddy lips and cheeks. 
 Her hair was quite woolly, and of a light yellow colour. 
 This girl had the Negro features strongly marked, and had 
 every appearance of genuine Negro descent. There are 
 many other well attested accounts of such persons, but it 
 would be tedious to enumerate them. The foregoing are 
 brought forward merely to show that the dark colour of the 
 Negro is neither constant, nor always entailed on posterity, 
 and therefore can form no criterion of a distinct species. 
 
 Besides the numerous varieties in colour, which the 
 different races of men present, there are other points of 
 distinction equally obvious, and found to exist with similar 
 regularity. Some of these are considered of minor import- 
 ance, as the shade of the hair, eyes, beard, &c. 
 
 If complexion be made to constitute the great mark of 
 inferiority in Man, if it be accounted the distinguishing 
 livery of degradation and servitude, the stigma is equally 
 attached to a great part of the inhabitants of the world ; 
 the sentence of imbecility must necessarily be passed on 
 a very large portion of mankind ; for " the dark-coloured 
 races," says Dr. Lawrence, " cover more than half of the 
 earth's surface." The colour of many of the Hindoos is 
 perfectly black, as black as any Negroes. The Brahmins of 
 the highest order are black. Yet the dark colour of the 
 Hindoos is often united with a delicacy of form and expres- 
 sion, arising from habits of mind and of life, which render 
 them in this respect, the antipodes of what the Negro is sup- 
 posed to be. This people, it is said, calculated eclipses 
 2000 years ago, and at a more recent period astonished 
 Alexander the Great, and his savans, by their advancement 
 
ft €xihk for % Jfrgrn. 
 
 in civilization. Here we have an incontrovertible evidence 
 that neither inferiority, nor imbecility, are the necessary 
 accompaniments of a coloured skin. It may be observed, 
 that there are portions of mankind much lighter in com- 
 plexion than Negroes, who are, nevertheless, their inferiors 
 in an intellectual point of view. Whilst the dark races of 
 Africa are often found to produce intellects of respectable 
 capacity, sometimes above mediocrity, the natives of 
 Terra del Fuego, who are much lower in the scale of human 
 intelligence, are far from being tinged with so deep a 
 dye, and have hair more nearly resembling that of the 
 European races. 
 
 Every one who will make himself acquainted with facts, 
 must be satisfied that the whole of the pretexts alleged in 
 support of the assumption of some of the races of Man 
 being irremediably inferior to others, are as entirely falla- 
 cious, as the opinion of such being the case, has been per- 
 nicious in its consequences. The deviations from a common 
 model in mankind, it has been proved, are less in degree than 
 those which are found to exist in many other parts of the 
 animal creation. Not one of the distinctive characters that 
 can be adduced, in any of the varieties constituting the great 
 family of Man, is sufficient to warrant the supposition of 
 anything approaching to distinct species. It has been 
 shown that there are differences equally great, and even 
 greater, between individuals of the same family, and fami- 
 lies of the same nation ; and we may discover particular 
 men, and even entire families, in this country, who are 
 intellectually weaker, than any reasonable person could 
 pretend the generality of the Africans to be. 
 
 Whatever may be the immediate or remote causes of the 
 dark complexion of the Negro, or otber races, philosophical 
 enquiry, if unable fully to solve the problem, has at all 
 events proved it to be a provision of mercy and benevolence. 
 It can be shown that hot water, in vessels of different 
 colours, and equal capacities, cools faster in the dark or 
 
 Tfb§ 
 
% 'dbritotte fnr tire ,&grn. 
 
 black ones. The black colour of the native of tropical 
 regions may justly, then, be considered as a wise expedient 
 provided by Omnipotence, for cooling or modulating the 
 fever of the blood, under the influence of a scorching sun. 
 To call in question the proper humanity of the Negro, to 
 scorn him on account of his colour, is to insult that Great 
 and Allwise Being, who, by the most beautiful and benevo- 
 lent provision, thus protects him from the deleterious influen- 
 ces around him. Copland, in his " Dictionary of Practical 
 Medicine," observes : — " The skin of the dark races is not 
 only different in colour, but is also considerably modified 
 in texture, so as to enable it to perform a greater extent 
 of function than the more delicately formed skin of the 
 white variety of the species. The thick and dark rete 
 mucosum of the former, is evidently more suited to the 
 warm, moist, and miasmal climates of the tropics, than that 
 with which the latter variety is provided. The skin of the 
 Negro is a much more active organ of depuration than that 
 of the White. It does not merely exhale a larger proportion 
 of aqueous fluid and carbonic acid from the blood, but it 
 also elaborates a more unctuous secretion ; which, by its 
 abundance and sensible properties, evidently possesses a 
 very considerable influence in counteracting the heating 
 effects of the sun's rays upon the body, and in carrying off 
 the superabundant caloric. Whilst the active functions, 
 aided by the colour of the skin, thus tend to diminish the 
 heat of the body, and to prevent its excessive increase by 
 the temperature of the climate, those materials that require 
 removal from the blood, are eliminated by this surface ; 
 which, in the Negro especially, perform excreting functions 
 very evidently in aid of those of respiration, and of biliary 
 secretion, &c." * 
 
 The interesting branch of philosophical investigation we 
 have been pursuing, is admirably summed up by Buffbn : 
 — " Upon the whole," says he, " every circumstance concurs 
 * Article — Climate. 
 
^m 
 
 % €x\Mt for \)i Jfcgra. 
 
 71 
 
 CssLi) 
 
 "FP 
 
 in proving, that mankind are not composed of species 
 essentially different from each other ; that, on the contrary, 
 there was originally but one species, which, after multiply- 
 ing and spreading over the whole surface of the earth, has 
 undergone various changes from the influence of climate, 
 food, mode of living, diseases, and mixture of dissimilar indi- 
 viduals ; that, at first, these changes were not so conspicuous, 
 and produced only individual varieties ; that these varieties 
 became afterwards more specific, because they were ren- 
 dered more general, more strongly marked, and more 
 permanent, by the continual action of the same causes ; 
 that they are transmitted from generation to generation, as 
 deformities or diseases pass from parents to children ; and 
 that, lastly, as they were originally produced by a train of 
 external or accidental causes, and have only been perpe- 
 tuated by time, and the constant operation of these causes, 
 it is probable that they will gradually disappear, or at 
 least that they will differ from what they are at present, 
 if the causes which produced them should cease, or if 
 their operation should be varied by other circumstances 
 and combinations." 
 
 In the consideration of the various points of distinction 
 which the external appearance of Man presents, one cir- 
 cumstance ought, therefore, to be deeply impressed on the 
 mind, viz. : — that neither peculiarity of conformation nor 
 colour, have the slightest reference to original endowment, 
 either in a mental or moral point of view, and consequently, 
 that no race whatever has been doomed to perpetual degra- 
 dation. In all human beings the same nature has been 
 implanted, in however different degrees ; and no man, 
 whatever be his colour, or form, or country, is so low in 
 the intellectual and moral scale as to be entirely deficient 
 of any one of the properties which constitute the most 
 splendid talent and virtue. 
 
CHAPTEft VI. 
 
 Not in External Characteristics alone that Man is pre-eminently distin- 
 guished — In Articulate Language — Its universality — Total absence among 
 brutes — Uniform traits in human nature — Superior Psychical endow- 
 ments — Reason and Intellect — Universal belief in a Supreme Being — 
 And ideas of his attributes, existence of the soul after death, and a state 
 of retribution — Prevalence of similar inherent ideas amongst the various 
 Negro tribes — They possess the same internal principles as the rest of 
 mankind — And a portion of that Spirit which is implanted in the heart 
 of " every man" — Further coincidence when converted to Christianity — 
 Early attempt to convert the Slaves of the Caribbee Islands — Its sin- 
 gular success ; as also in other Islands — Subsequently in Africa and the 
 West Indies — After restoring to the Negro his rightful liberties, it is 
 our duty to promote the cultivation of his moral and religious faculties — 
 Final blending of all the various tribes in harmony. 
 
 Our observations have, thus far, been confined almost 
 exclusively to the consideration of the physiological dis- 
 tinctions of Man. It is not, however, in external charac- 
 teristics alone that we are able to discriminate our species 
 from that portion of the inferior animal creation which 
 most nearly resemble us. It is neither in these solely, nor 
 even principally, that the great differences consist, by which 
 Man is so pre-eminently distinguished, and which separate 
 him, at so wide an interval, from the most anthropomor- 
 phous of animals. 
 
 The use of articulate language may be regarded as one 
 of the most peculiar and characteristic endowments of 
 mankind. The universality of its existence among our 
 species is a fact not less striking than its total absence 
 among brutes, even those which make the nearest approach 
 to perfection, and in whose organization nothing has been 
 discovered that precludes its use. We may have heard of 
 children being born dumb, but there is no tribe of men 
 without speech. There are uniform traits in human 
 nature and habitudes, both intellectual and moral, which 
 
vi-J 
 
 51 €rilmfe for tip JJrgra. 
 
 73 
 
 6^? 
 
 may be regarded as fixed, principles of action, as well as 
 the more variable ones, exhibited in the use of artificial 
 clothing, fire, the necessary arts of life, arms, and the prac- 
 tice of domesticating animals. These are all peculiar 
 characteristics of Man, inasmuch as they do not exist in 
 the brute creation, beyond what mere instinct may teach. 
 
 Perhaps there are no traits existing in animated 
 beings more characteristic of species, than the psychical 
 qualities with which Providence has severally endowed 
 them. Under this term may be included the whole of the 
 sensitive and perceptive faculties, reason, intellect, feel- 
 ings, sentiments, &c, or, what in the lower animals 
 approaches nearest to them. 
 
 Reason and intellect, with the feelings, sympathies, in- 
 ternal consciousness of mind, and the habitudes of life and 
 action resulting therefrom, are perhaps the most real and 
 essential characteristics of humanity. These are common 
 to all the races of Man ; they stamp him with an infinite 
 superiority over any of those animals which most nearly re- 
 semble him, and they will ever constitute an impassable gulf 
 between the one and the other. A full and complete in- 
 vestigation of these attributes, would require a comprehen- 
 sive survey of human nature in its various relations. Our 
 limits will not permit us to traverse so wide a field. The 
 reasoning powers of Man being everywhere self-evident, 
 what I shall endeavour now more particularly to illustrate, 
 is the universality of certain ideas or apprehensions, by 
 nature inherent in every portion of our species. 
 
 There are individuals, apparently amongst all the races 
 of men, who, even in an uncivilized and barbarous state, 
 entertain ideas, faint and imperfect though they may some- 
 times be, of the existence of a supernatural power, by 
 which all things exist and are controlled ; differing often 
 materially in their conceptions of its nature and attributes, 
 and having also various methods of worshipping and en- 
 deavouring to conciliate the favour of this Great Power, to 
 
 m 
 
74 
 
 % €i\h\t fur \)i 3£egm 
 
 which they hold themselves to be subject and responsible, &c. 
 Availing myself largely of the admirable "Researches" of 
 Dr. Prichard on this subject, I shall be enabled to demon- 
 strate the general prevalence of such ideas amongst the 
 Negro tribes, and, in addition to their conception of a 
 Supreme being, a belief in their responsibility to that 
 Being, their apprehension of the existence of the soul 
 after death, and also of a state of retribution. 
 
 It is commonly said that the religion of the African 
 nations, those at least who have not embraced Mahomed- 
 anism, is the superstition of Fetisses ; that is, of charms or 
 spells. This expression conveys a notion which is not 
 perfectly correct. The superstition of charms or spells 
 holds a place in the minds of the idolatrous Negroes, but 
 this does not preclude a very general prevalence in their 
 belief of the first principles of natural religion. It may 
 be observed, that among nations enjoying a much higher 
 degree of mental culture, the prevalence of superstitions 
 and practices, more or less resembling the Fetissism of 
 Africa, may be recognised. 
 
 Barbot, in his description of Guinea, relates, that 
 '■■ Father Godfrey Loyer, apostolical prefect of the Jaco- 
 bites, who made a voyage to the kingdom of Issini, and 
 studied the temper, manners, and religion of the natives, 
 declared they had a belief in one universally powerful 
 Being, to whom the people of the countries visited by 
 Father Loyer, address prayer." " Every morning," he says, 
 " after they rise, they go to the river side to wash, and 
 throwing a handful of water on their head, or pouring sand 
 with it to express their humility, they join their hands and 
 then open them, whispering softly the word ' Eksuvais.' 
 Then lifting up their eyes to heaven, they make this 
 prayer [translated], — ' My God, give me this day rice and 
 yams, give me gold, &c.' " 
 
 The excellent missionary, Oldendorp, who appears to 
 have had rare opportunities, and to have taken great pains 
 
51 £nMi far tjji 3k$u, 
 
 15 
 
 to become accurately acquainted with the mental history 
 of the Negroes, assures us that he recognised among them 
 an universal belief in the " existence of a God," whom 
 they represent as very powerful and beneficent. " He is 
 the maker of the world and of men; he it is who thunders 
 in the air, as he punishes the wicked with his bolts. He 
 regards beneficent actions with complacency, and rewards 
 them with long life. To him the Negroes ascribe their 
 own personal gifts, the fruits of the earth, and all good 
 things. From him the rain descends upon the earth. They 
 believe that he is pleased when men offer prayers to him 
 in all their wants, and that he succours them in dangers, 
 in diseases, and in seasons of drought. This is the chief 
 God, who lives far from them on high ; he is supreme over 
 all the other gods." 
 
 " Among all the Black nations," continues Oldendorp, 
 " with whom I have become acquainted, even among the 
 utterly ignorant and rude, there is none which did not be- 
 lieve in a God, which had not learnt to give him a name, 
 which did not regard him as the maker of the world, and 
 ascribe to him more or less clearly all the attributes which 
 I have here briefly summed up. Besides this supreme 
 and beneficent divinity whom all the various nations wor- 
 ship in some way or other, they believe in many gods of 
 inferior dignity, who are subject to the chief Deity, and 
 are mediators between him and mankind."* 
 
 " The Negroes," says Oldendorp, " profess their de- 
 pendence upon the Deity in different ways, especially by 
 prayers and offerings. They pray at different times, in 
 different places, and, as the Amina Negroes told me, in 
 every time of need. They pray at the rising and setting 
 
 * In this account of the religion of the Negroes, Oldendorp asserts that 
 he relates nothing which he has not received immediately and exactly from 
 the Negroes themselves. — See C. G. A. Oldendorp' s Geshichte der Mission 
 der Evangelischen Briider auf den Caraibaischen Inseln St. Thomas, St. 
 Croix, und St. Jan ; 1777, s. 318. 
 
 m 
 
 >v? 
 
% €xifak for tire Jfogrn. 
 
 of the sun, on eating and drinking, and when they go to 
 war. Even in the midst of the contest, the Amina sing 
 songs to their God, whom they seek to move to their assist- 
 ance by appealing to his paternal duty. The daily prayer 
 of a Watje Negress was, ' O ! God, I know thee not, but 
 thou knowest me ; thy assistance is necessary to me.' At 
 meals they say, ' O ! God, thou hast given us this, thou 
 hast made it grow ;' and when they work, ' O ! God, thou 
 hast caused that I should have strength to do this.' The 
 Sember pray in the morning, ' O ! God, help us ; we do 
 not know whether we shall live to-morrow ; we are in thy 
 hand.' The Mandingoes pray also for their deceased friends." 
 
 The Kafirs are not, as some have thought, destitute of 
 religious ideas. The Kosas believe in a Supreme Being, 
 to whom they give the appellation of Uhlunga, supreme, 
 and frequently the Hottentot name Utika, beautiful. They 
 also believe in the immortality of the soul. They have 
 some notion of Providence, and pray for success in war and 
 in hunting expeditions, and during sickness for health and 
 strength. They conceive thunder to proceed from the 
 agency of the Deity, and if a person has been killed by 
 lightning, they say that Uhlunga has been among them. * 
 
 The Watje Negroes assemble at harvest upon a pleasant 
 plain, when they thank God thrice upon their knees, under 
 the direction of a priest, for the good harvest, and pray to 
 him for further blessings. When they have risen, the 
 whole assembly testify their gratitude to God by their 
 rejoicing, and clapping of hands, f 
 
 " Of the Bliakefa, the priests of Karabari and of Sokko, 
 it is remarkable, that they give some instruction to the 
 people concerning the Divinity and prayer. The Negroes 
 come to them for this purpose, either singly, or in compa- 
 nies, when they pray with them, on their knees, that God, 
 whom they call Tschukka, will protect them from war, cap- 
 tivity, and the like." 
 
 * Pricliard's Kesearches. f Oldendorp. 
 
-0 
 
 % €tMt for tju Jfep. 
 
 77 
 
 " There is scarcely any nation of Guinea which does not 
 believe in the immortality of the soul, and that it continues 
 to live after its separation from the body, has certain neces- 
 sities, performs actions, and is especially capable of the 
 enjoyment of happiness or misery." * 
 
 " The Negroes believe almost universally that the souls 
 of good men, after their separation from the body, go to 
 God, and the wicked to the evil spirit, whence, at the death 
 of their chiefs, they make use of the expression, ' God 
 has taken their souls !' The Loango imagine the abode of 
 the blessed to be where Sambeau Pungo, that is, God, 
 dwells ; but hell, to be above, in the air, while others on 
 the contrary suppose it to be deep in the earth." 
 
 " Those who will candidly consider these facts," says 
 Dr. Prichard, " and give them their due weight, must allow 
 that they prove the same principles of action, and the 
 same internal nature in the African races as are recognized 
 in other divisions of mankind : and this conviction will be 
 increased by a careful perusal of all the details which the 
 Missionaries have afforded, of the progress of their conver- 
 sion, and of the moral changes which have accompanied it." 
 
 It is evident, from the foregoing statements, that the 
 Negroes of Africa exhibit, in their original and primitive 
 state of mind, untaught by foreign instructors, at least 
 within the reach of history, the same internal principles, 
 in common with the rest of the human family. However 
 latent, and even imperceptible it may sometimes be, they 
 are undoubtedly endowed with a portion of that Spirit, 
 which the Almighty has implanted in the heart of " every 
 man that cometh into the world." Let us endeavour to 
 ascertain how far the process of their conversion to Chris- 
 tianity, indicates a further coincidence of feeling and sen- 
 timent between them and the other divisions of mankind. 
 
 The first attempt to convert the Slaves of the Carib- 
 bean islands to Christianity, originated in a meeting of some 
 * Oldendorp. 
 
 
% €rilrate ftr tju Jfrgrn. 
 
 followers of Count Zinzendorf, with one Anthony, a Negro 
 from the island of St. Thomas, who had been baptized at 
 Copenhagen. This man represented in so strong colours 
 the wretchedness and ignorance of his countrymen and 
 relatives, and urged so zealously his entreaties on the bre- 
 thren to undertake their conversion, that the congregation 
 at Herrnhut, before whom he had been induced to appear, 
 were disposed to make the attempt under the most unfa- 
 vourable circumstances. The work proceeded slowly at 
 first, and amidst great opposition ; yet a small number of 
 hearers were soon collected, some of whom gave signs of 
 sincere conversion, and of disgust at their former courses 
 of life. When Bishop Spangenberg visited the mission in 
 1736, he found in it not less than 200 Blacks who attended 
 the services of the brethren, who evinced a great desire to be 
 instructed in the Christian religion. By the constant exhor- 
 tations of the brethren, a perceptible change was soon pro- 
 duced in the minds and characters of the Negroes. In 1793 
 Count Zinzendorf visited the island, and was filled with 
 astonishment at the greatness of the work which had 
 been accomplished. 
 
 The other Danish islands, St. Croix and St. Jan, were 
 afterwards visited by the Moravian Missionaries, whose 
 exertions were attended with like success. In 1768, the 
 number of Negroes who had been baptized in the three 
 islands by the missionaries during thirty-four years, 
 amounted to 4711. 
 
 It may be said that there is no evidence in this, that 
 Negroes are capable of receiving all the impressions 
 implied in conversion to Christianity. This evidence 
 can only be fully appreciated by those who read the bio- 
 graphical notices, and other particulars detailed by the 
 historians of the community to which Oldendorp belonged. 
 But no part of the evidence is more conclusive, than the 
 selection of short homilies composed by Negro preachers 
 or assistants, and addressed by them to congregations of 
 
% Critefr for tip Jfcgm 
 
 their countrymen. Some of these, though they do not 
 rival in strength of diction the discourses of Watts or 
 Doddridge, breathe the same spirit, and were evidently 
 written under the influence of the same sentiments and 
 impressions. A selection of these addresses has been ap- 
 pended by Oldendorp to his work, which I have so often 
 cited. Translations of a few of them will be found in the 
 subsequent pages of the present volume. 
 
 On the majority of the Negro race, the light of the 
 Gospel has never yet shone fully ; the seeds of truth im- 
 planted in their hearts have made but little progress. Yet 
 there are, both in Africa and the British West Indies, thou- 
 sands and tens of thousands of them who have been brought 
 to the "excellent knowledge of Christ," with all the spirit- 
 stirring, controlling, and cheering truths of religion, some 
 of whom now, even from childhood, assisted by the pious 
 instruction of the Missionary, catch with the first opening 
 of their understandings, the rays which emanate from the 
 Gospel sun. Numerous societies, too, and congregations 
 of adults, listen to the truths of the Gospel, meditate on 
 them at their labours, talk of them in the hut, sing them 
 in hymns, and in admonitory advices commend them to 
 their children. The light of religion has now penetrated, 
 so to speak, the solid darkness of minds, hitherto left with- 
 out instruction ; it has struck the spark of feeling into 
 hearts unaccustomed to salutary emotions : the darkness 
 is not yet dissipated, but that day has dawned upon the 
 ebon race of Africa, which never more shall close. 
 
 The facts recorded in the present chapter are very con- 
 clusive; they need no comment, demonstrating as they do, so 
 clearly, that the despised African is blessed with the same 
 living principle, the same psychical endowments, by which 
 Man is everywhere so pre-eminently distinguished. Let 
 then, the rightful liberties of the injured Negro be restored 
 to him, and, as a recompense for the long series of in- 
 juries inflicted on their unhappy race, let it be our concern 
 
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 to promote the cultivation of their intellectual and religious 
 faculties, and endeavour to bring the animal propensities 
 their uncivilized nature may possess, under the control of 
 their .moral sentiments. The intellectual faculties may at 
 first be small, the moral sentiments weak, and the animal 
 impulses powerful ; but every exercise of those which are 
 good will make them better ; while the bad, by being con- 
 trolled, will gradually become more controllable. Itisevident 
 that the Deity has designed Man to be to a great extent his 
 own creator, furnishing only the elements from which by an 
 active exercise of what he has, he may work out higher 
 gifts. And though the progress he makes may be so 
 slow, that, like some of the great astronomical movements, 
 its full effects cannot be detected by any single generation, 
 it is not the less sure. Human improvement becomes 
 always more and more rapid in its course, for every new 
 generation starts at the point at which the preceding one 
 had attained. There is every reason to hope, then, that 
 ultimately, civilization will become universal, and that all the 
 various tribes of the earth will be willing to join harmoni- 
 ously, in the exercise of those sentiments by which men on 
 earth may furnish a species of heaven. 
 
(9slU> 
 
 <en 
 
 1 
 
 CHAPTER TIL 
 
 Deep-rooted prejudice to eradicate respecting Colour in Man — Less in 
 Europe than the New "World — Evinced in the case of Douglass — 
 National expression of sympathy for him from the British public — The 
 "Douglass Testimonial" — British Christians respect the Divine image 
 alike in ebony and ivory — Effects of prejudice in South Africa — Ameri- 
 cans deeply implicated in this feeling— Have an interest in keeping it 
 up — Strongest in the Free States — Several instances of its nature and 
 extent — Circumstance exhibiting a striking contrast in favour of the 
 Sable race — Further effects of prejudice — Public opinion so strong in 
 the United States that it is dangerous to protest against the Unchristian 
 conduct practised towards persons of Colour. 
 
 Previous to the advent of that glorious era which 
 the conclusion of our last chapter predicts, much deep- 
 rooted prejudice, the growth of centuries, will require to be 
 overcome. A thorough change in public opinion must be 
 wrought, before an entire reconciliation can take place 
 between the White and Black races. Although the pre- 
 judice against the latter does not exist in Europe to the 
 extent to which it is carried in the New World, there are 
 too many on this side the Atlantic who entertain the falla- 
 cious idea that a black skin necessarily confers an inferiority 
 on its possessor ; and some of the professed friends of the 
 Coloured race, who deprecate Slavery as unjust, are still 
 unwilling to extend towards them the full rights of social 
 intercourse and Christian fellowship. 
 
 In consequence of our coming so little in contact with the 
 objects of this prejudice, opportunities do not often occur 
 to elicit the real feeling amongst us towards them ; and 
 when they do occur, whatever private opinions individuals 
 may hold, the popular feeling is so much on the side of 
 the Negro, that ideas of prejudice, for the most part, 
 remain quietly suppressed in the bosoms of those who 
 entertain them. But the gross indignity offered to Fre- 
 derick Douglass, and the unwarrantable injustice done to 
 
% €x\hk for \\t ftgrn. 
 
 him about a year ago, in depriving him of his purchased 
 right to a cabin passage in the ship "Cambria," is a circum- 
 stance which cannot be overlooked. That a British agent, 
 upon British soil, should be found to yield to a despicable 
 prejudice, and deliberately persevere in refusing, to an 
 honourable and noble-minded man, the enjoyment of un- 
 questionable rights, was an act as disgraceful to our country 
 as it must have been painful to the feelings of a fellow 
 creature. It affords but another feature of that hateful 
 system which drives the Negro to the cotton field, which 
 separates him from his family, and reduces him to the 
 condition of a chattel. The facts of the case may be stated 
 as follows : — 
 
 Frederick Douglass, a highly-respectable and talented 
 Coloured gentleman, from America, who had been for 
 some time advocating the rights of his oppressed brethren 
 in this country, being about to return to his native 
 land, applied to the London agent of the Cunard steamers 
 for a cabin passage to Boston from Liverpool, and engaged 
 a berth in the "Cambria," paying the stipulated sum. He 
 took the precaution of inquiring whether the fact of his 
 being a Man of Colour would be any bar to his enjoyment 
 of full social intercourse, and was told that he would be 
 entitled to all the rights and privileges of other cabin pas- 
 sengers. On the morning of the day of sailing, accom- 
 panied by several kind friends, he presented himself on 
 board the steamer at Liverpool, and having applied for the 
 cabin for which he had paid, he was politely informed that 
 it had been appropriated to another passenger, and that 
 unless he consented to take his meals alone, he could not 
 be admitted as a passenger. There was no time for legal 
 redress ; the " Cambria" was sailing the next morning, and 
 an affectionate family were awaiting the arrival of a hus- 
 band and father on the other side of the Atlantic. 
 
 This conduct was in strong contrast with the fact, that 
 during the nineteen previous months, his distinguished 
 
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 51 frtkfe far tip? Jfrgrn. 
 
 83 
 
 talents, his amiable manners, and his high moral worth, had 
 given him a ready admission into the best English society. 
 It was only when he came under commercial influences, 
 that his colour was discovered to be a sufficient reason, not 
 for denying to him, in advance, the right to acquire a con- 
 veyance in the ship on the advertised terms of passage, but 
 for breaking a solemn contract already entered into, and 
 ratified by the payment and acceptance of his money, and 
 the delivery to him of his berth certificate. Whence this 
 exclusion ? Was he unfit for social intercourse with the 
 other passengers ? Was he supposed to be a suspicious 
 character ? No such thing. God " who has made of one 
 blood all nations of men" had given him a darker complexion 
 than any of the other passengers, and for this he was in- 
 sulted, degraded, and socially excluded. The circumstance 
 was said to be mainly attributable to the saloon company 
 being partially composed of Americans. Be this as it may, 
 it must be remembered, that the act took place in England, 
 in Liverpool — and on board a steam-ship, a large propor- 
 tion of whose proprietors are Englishmen! — yes, these 
 free-born Englishmen consent, " for filthy lucre," to a regu- 
 lation which excludes from social intercourse some of the 
 the finest specimens of humanity which ever came from the 
 hand of God. Such treatment bowed Douglass's spirit to 
 the uttermost, and he parted from his friends on board 
 the steamer, the next morning, with absolute agony, yet 
 throughout, he evinced much Christian bearing and unsub- 
 dued moral firmness under the infliction of this outrageous 
 wrong. One of his friends, in allusion to this circumstance, 
 wrote as follows : — " I never felt the real dignity of his cha- 
 racter, as on this trying occasion. With the spirit of his 
 Lord and Master, he calmly bore the outrage. ' When he 
 was reviled, he reviled not again;' but he exhorted us to be 
 temperate, and above all, not to let blame attach to parties 
 who were guiltless." It is but justice to the Captain of the 
 " Cambria" to add, that he kindly and promptly placed his 
 
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84 
 
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 own cabin at Douglass's disposal, and assured him of every 
 attention. He consequently took his meals there, seeing 
 that his society, however highly it had been prized in 
 Great Britain, was not good enough for these represen- 
 tatives of the American republic. 
 
 The unlooked for, and unwarranted treatment, of one so 
 deservedly esteemed in this country, roused the sympathies 
 of the British public. From the cottage to the lordly 
 mansion — from the hamlet to the cities of our land, was felt 
 the injustice he had experienced, and the cry was Shame ! 
 Shame ! As a more full expression of the genuine feeling 
 of national sympathy, it was determined that an appropriate 
 Testimonial should be presented to the sufferer, whose only 
 crime was the complexion given him by his Creator ! A 
 public subscription was commenced, which soon exhibited 
 a sum total of £500. This sum was forwarded to Frederick 
 Douglass by the Boston mail steamer, along with a valuable 
 library of books collected by a lady in the south of Eng- 
 land. It was intended that the amount should be applied 
 in behalf of the millions, who still lie crushed under the 
 rod of the oppressor ; or in such a manner as shall tend to 
 elevate the moral and intellectual condition of the Coloured 
 people, and to assist in bursting those fetters which have 
 so long held them in thraldom. 
 
 In the Douglass Testimonial, the aristocracy of the skin 
 will have a substantial proof that British Christians respect 
 the Divine image, alike in ebony and ivory ; and that true 
 nobility of character, generous self-sacrifice for the good of 
 others, and an honest, daring advocacy of human rights, are 
 appreciated in this country without reference to complexion. 
 The friends of Negro liberty will be glad to learn that 
 Frederick Douglass has already provided himself with an 
 excellent press and printing materials, out of the proceeds 
 of the British subscription, and has established a weekly 
 anti-Slavery paper, at Rochester, State of New York, en- 
 titled The North Star. The object of The North Star, is 
 

 51 Ctikte for tire Jfrgrn. 
 
 ^ 
 
 85 
 
 to attack Slavery in all its forms and aspects, to advocate 
 universal emancipation, to exalt the standard of public 
 morality, to promote the moral and intellectual improve- 
 ment of the Coloured people, and to hasten the day of 
 freedom to the three millions of our enslaved fellowmen. 
 We wish it every encouragement and success, and cannot 
 doubt it will be a formidable instrument in bringing down 
 the walls of the modern Jericho.* 
 
 Of the effects of prejudice, in another quarter of the 
 world, we have strong proof in the following circumstance 
 related by Thomas Pringle in his " Residence in South 
 Africa." A clergyman, he states, refused to marry Chris- 
 tian Groepe, a Mulatto Hottentot, a most respectable and 
 well-educated man, because the poor woman could not ac- 
 curately repeat the Church Catechism ! " The fact is," 
 says Pringle, " there existed a strong prejudice among the 
 White Colonists against the full admission of the Coloured 
 class to ecclesiastical privileges, and the majority of the 
 colonial clergy were so little alive to the apostolic duties 
 of their sacred office, as to lend their sanction, directly or 
 indirectly, to these unchristian prejudices, which were also 
 countenanced by the Colonial laws." 
 
 "As for religion," says Dr. Philip, "it was considered a 
 serious crime to mention the subject to a native. They 
 were not admitted within the walls of the churches. By 
 a notice stuck above the doors of one of the churches, 'Hot- 
 tentots and dogs' were forbidden to enter." 
 
 Our trans-atlantic brethren are very deeply implicated 
 in the ungenerous and anti-Christian prejudice against 
 colour, and in America it may be said to pervade all classes 
 of the community. Their churches being often composed 
 of Slave-holders, or those connected in some way or other 
 
 * The price of the North Star is two dollars (8s. 6d.) per annum, if 
 paid in advance, or two dollars and a half (10s. 6d.) if payment be delayed 
 over six months. English subscribers will be liable to an additional charge 
 of 2d. per week postage. The names of subscribers may be sent to T. P. 
 Barkas, Grainger Street, Newcastle-on-Tyne. 
 
 ^ 
 
% €nfak far tip jfogra. 
 
 with the system, are nearly all more or less deeply imbued 
 with the predominating feeling in regard to the African race. 
 There is, indeed, an interest there, in keeping up this pre- 
 judicial feeling. Few, if any of the Christian communities, 
 are exempt from a portion of that load of guilt, which 
 pervades free and religious America like a feculent fog; 
 and unless there be a thorough change in this respect, and 
 the rights of mankind become fully recognised, and ex- 
 tended to every shade of colour, no other result can ration- 
 ally be contemplated, than a prolongation for generations 
 yet to come, of those manifold indignities, and similar re- 
 volting scenes of wrong and barbarity, which are now 
 inflicted on millions of the down-trodden race of Africa. 
 Happily this prejudice is steadily giving way, yet many 
 instances might be mentioned, of frequent occurrence, which 
 prove it to be still very strong ; and in general, the striking 
 language of De Beaumont, a recent French traveller in the 
 United States, will be found too true. " The prejudice 
 against colour," says he, "haunts its victim wherever he 
 goes, — in the hospitals, where humanity suffers, — in the 
 churches, where it kneels to God, — in the prisons, where it 
 expiates its offences, — in the grave-yards, where it sleeps 
 the last sleep." 
 
 I do not now altogether allude to the prejudice against 
 the Slave population, but to the general tone of feeling 
 against the whole mass of the descendants of Africa ; for 
 the extent to which it is carried, appears to be greatest, 
 according to every authority, in those States of America 
 which hold no Slaves. It seems remarkable, that the 
 strongest prejudice against Colour should exist in the Free 
 States, and against Free Coloured persons ! But such is 
 the case, and the feeling is stronger towards them in pro- 
 portion to their advancement in a moral or religious point 
 of view, or their rise in the scale of society. There is 
 never any objection expressed to mixing with Coloured 
 people while they are Slaves ; as such, the daintiest ladies 
 
% €tikte for tire Jfogm 
 
 87 
 
 and gentlemen do not hesitate to ride in the same carriage 
 with them, to have them about their persons, and to nurse 
 their children. "Their sufferings," says H. C. Ho wells, 
 "are just in proportion to their exaltation in society, to 
 their mental attainments, to the acuteness of their religious 
 feeling, and to their standing in social life. It is not the 
 class of Coloured people sunk in degradation, wretchedness, 
 ignorance, and filth, that are despised supremely in the 
 United States. Strange to tell, they are not the people 
 against whom the prejudice of the United States seems to 
 bear. No ; those who are sunk in degradation are sup- 
 posed to be in their proper position, and they are passed 
 by as the swine that wallow in the mire, with indifference, 
 it being scarcely thought worth while to point the finger 
 of scorn at them. I was once in the family of Mr. Forten, 
 a Coloured gentleman of Philadelphia, a man of the most 
 refined and courteous character, with a wife full of amia- 
 bility and Christianity, and elegance of deportment, with 
 a fine lovely family of sons and daughters, and I saw the 
 tears trickle down her cheeks when, speaking of the Coloured 
 people, and the indignities they were called to endure, 
 she said: — In proportion as Coloured persons are respect- 
 able, so are their sufferings ; we cannot even go out of our 
 own home without having a company of degraded crea- 
 tures running after us in the streets and calling out, 
 ' Nigger, nigger !' "* 
 
 The prejudice against colour is stronger in Barbadoes 
 than in any of the British colonies, although the Coloured 
 class of its population are numerous, wealthy, and respect- 
 able, comprising some of the first merchants of the 
 island. The public opinion of the colony is powerful, and 
 exercises an unfavourable influence, the Blacks being con- 
 sidered an inferior race by nature, born to a servile con- 
 dition ; and a spirit of caste is cherished between the 
 White, Black, and intermediate races. 
 
 * Speech, of H. C. HoweUs, A. S. Conv. 1840. 
 
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 "TP 
 
 CT9 
 
 " A Coloured gentleman," says Joseph Sturge, " in- 
 formed me, that last winter, his wife being about to take 
 a journey by rail to Philadelphia, she was compelled, 
 though in delicate health, to travel in the comfortless ex- 
 posed car, expressly provided for Negroes, though he 
 offered to pay double fare for a place for her in the 
 regular carriage."* 
 
 " To give some idea of the extent to which the prejudice 
 against persons of Colour operates," says George Thomp- 
 son, " I will state one or two facts. I had occasion to go 
 from the city of New York by means of a steam vessel. 
 I was on the deck of the vessel when a four-wheeled car- 
 riage came up, from which two very well-dressed persons 
 got out. They were persons of Colour, though not very 
 dark. They occupied a space about mid-ship, and I took 
 occasion to watch the conduct of the passengers and crew 
 towards them. The bell rang for supper, and I went down 
 into the cabin. Some time afterwards I returned to the 
 deck. A thick mist, almost equal to rain, had fallen. I 
 discovered this couple leaning upon a large heap of lug- 
 gage, and perceived that they were excluded from the com- 
 pany. I went down into the cabin and fetched up a friend, 
 Dr. Graham, with whom I had before conversed upon the 
 subject, and who had denied that such prejudices existed. 
 Come, Doctor, said I, and judge for yourself. He came 
 upon the deck. The gentleman and lady had removed 
 from the place where I had left them, and were standing 
 at the door of the kitchen, a situation which the cooking 
 and other things that were going on rendered very offen- 
 sive. The gentleman was earnestly entreating the cooks 
 to let his lady go in and sit down there during the night. 
 The Doctor said, why do you not go and put your wife into 
 a berth ? The gentleman replied, I would willingly give 
 twenty times the value for a berth, but I am not allowed. 
 1 saw that delicate female, who was in circumstances 
 * Sturge's United States. 
 
m 
 
 51 <£rttmft for tin Ifjgra. 
 
 89 
 
 that required sympathy and attention, sit down upon 
 a butter tub which was turned up for her, and there 
 she remained during the night. There was another case, 
 in which a gentleman took a Coloured man down into the 
 cabin with him. The captain instantly said, ' Take that 
 Coloured man away !' ' What,' said the gentleman, 'will you 
 not allow him to stay with me V c No ! nor you either if 
 you take his part.' ' Then I do take his part,' said the gen- 
 tleman. The captain then took the White gentleman by 
 the throat, and considerably maltreated him. He then put 
 him on shore, and left him midway." 
 
 " I was once travelling in a carriage," says George Brad- 
 burn, (a member of the Massachusetts legislature), " into 
 which twelve or thirteen persons, most of them my friends, 
 were crowded. Accompanying us was another carriage, in 
 which there were only two persons ; but they were Coloured 
 persons. For the purpose, as well of bearing testimony 
 against this prejudice, as of getting a more comfortable 
 seat, I got into the carriage with the two Coloured men. 
 At this, my friends felt themselves so much scandalized, 
 that one of them said, it had sunk me fifty per cent, in his 
 estimation ; and others doubted, if they could ever more 
 give me any of their votes." * 
 
 " In the state in which I live," says Col. Miller, " one 
 of the judges was once travelling in the night. A lady was 
 in the carriage. The night was cold. ' Madam,' says he, ' I 
 hope you do not feel the cold!' and again, 'madam, I hope 
 you do not suffer from the inclemency of the season.' He 
 paid her other compliments also. When they came to the 
 inn, the waiter brought in a light, when he found that it 
 was a Black lady to whom he had been so remarkably polite. 
 He was filled with confusion, and ran out of the room with 
 the waiter. People are shocked at the idea of regarding the 
 Coloured people as their equals. ' What !' they cry, ' are we 
 to live with the Niggers ? What ! all mixed up together, 
 * Speech in Anti Slavery Convention, 1840. 
 
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 as if we were all the same sort of flesh and blood ?' " * 
 A thousand instances of this kind might easily be cited, 
 but as they are not exactly within the scope of the present 
 work, further than being illustrative of the effects of that 
 prejudice which results from the idea of inferiority attach- 
 ing to the Negro race, I shall conclude with a few extracts 
 from John Candler's " Brief Notices of Hayti," the first ex- 
 hibiting a striking contrast much in favour of the Sable race. 
 " Our first visitor at Jacmel was a Mulatto gentlewoman, 
 the widow of a Black man, who had filled the office of 
 Collector of the Customs, and who occupied one of the 
 best houses in the place. She had lived in the United 
 States, spoke our language fluently, and came to pay 
 us respect as strangers. This kind-hearted matron paid us 
 several visits, entertained us at her table, and introduced 
 us to some of the best families of the place. Her conduct 
 was the more remarkable, as, in America, she had suffered 
 grievous persecution from the cruel prejudice existing in 
 that country against Colour. Her first husband was a sea 
 captain : on one occasion, she left the shore with him in a 
 boat, to take a final leave of him on board a vessel, and was 
 carried by the winds to a greater distance from home than 
 she expected. The boat re-conveyed her to the shore and 
 landed her at a strange place. Seeing a tavern, she made 
 her way to it to obtain lodging for the night : the landlady 
 looked at her repulsively, and spurned her from the door. 
 ' We take in no Niggers here,' was her coarse language ; 
 ' if you want to rest, go to the Nigger huts on the top of 
 the hill !' The poor lady told us her heart was too full to 
 bear this unchristian rebuke with meekness : she sat down 
 and burst into tears. She did, however, toil up to the 
 Negroes' huts, and was there received kindly. The Ameri- 
 cans, in their own estimation and boast, are the freest 
 people on the face of the globe : according to the terms of 
 their constitution, ' all men are free and equal ;' yet they 
 * Speech in Anti Slavery Convention, 1840. 
 
% €xiMt far ijjB Jfrgrn. 
 
 91 
 
 )/k 
 
 treat the houseless stranger, if tinged with a coloured hue, 
 as one of nature's outcasts ! Whenever a White man from 
 America or Europe falls sick in Jacmel, no one is so ready- 
 to offer to nurse, and show him kindness, as this poor de- 
 spised woman, whose mother was an African. What a 
 contrast ; and what a striking lesson does such a fact as this 
 teach to the proud republicans of ' Columbia's happy land.' 
 
 " The son and son-in-law of General Inginac, Secretary 
 of State for Hayti, on their return home a few years since 
 from Paris, where they had been received in a manner 
 suited to their rank and station in life, landed at New York, 
 with a view of visiting the United States ; but no tavern 
 or boarding-house keeper would receive them as guests, for 
 fear of giving offence to the inhabitants of that city. One 
 of the richest merchants at Port-au-Prince, whose father 
 was one of Christophe's Barons, assured me that he went 
 into a woollen draper's store in Philadelphia, and desiring 
 to be measured for a black coat, the storekeeper retorted 
 with an impudent falsehood, ' We have no cloth here, Sir:' 
 a hatter also, whose store was attended, when he called, by 
 some White customers, refused to sell him a hat ! 
 
 " Such," adds John Candler, " is the tyranny of public 
 opinion in this professedly free land, that a man dare not 
 protest against conduct like this, and call it as it is, bar- 
 barous and unchristian, without the danger of being treated 
 contemptuously." 
 
HQ 
 
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 kS3 
 
 CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 Result of the idea of inferiority in the Negro race a prolongation of their 
 oppression — Unequal rights and privileges — Their tendency — Human 
 beings possess certain inalienable rights — All men created equal — Ac- 
 knowledgment of this great doctrine in the American Declaration of 
 Independence — Slavery a stain on the glory of America — A lie to the 
 declaration of the Federal Constitution — Columbia may yet redeem her 
 character — No new laws required — Only that all should be placed on an 
 equality — No exemption of the Negro from law, but should enjoy its 
 protection — Slavery said to be only a nominal thing — A false statement 
 — Observations on equitable laws — Justice always the truest policy — 
 America called to a great and noble deed — Address to Columbia. 
 
 In countries where one class of beings look down upon 
 another as an inferior race. Slavery and intolerance pass 
 unnoticed, they are seldom regarded as inconsistencies 
 among those who have had the misfortune to be brought 
 up in the midst of them. It has been justly remarked by 
 an eminent writer, that, although by the institution of dif- 
 ferent societies, unequal privileges are bestowed on their 
 members, and although justice itself requires a proper re- 
 gard to such privileges, yet he who has forgotten that men 
 were originally equal, easily degenerates into the Slave, or, 
 in the capacity of a master, is not to be trusted with the 
 rights of his fellow-creatures. 
 
 While it is now universally admitted, that the natural 
 tendency of the exercise of uncontrolled authority is to 
 harden the heart, extinguish the moral sense, and give birth 
 to every species of crime and calamity, it is evident that 
 the wealthy part of the community are elevated in the scale 
 of being by the effective legislative enactments by which 
 the poor are protected from oppression. The barbarizing 
 effects of uncontrolled authority on minds in the least dan- 
 ger of being corrupted by its influence, may be seen in 
 every page of the history of human nature, and is well 
 illustrated in the invaluable tract of Bishop Porteus on the 
 
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 rC\ 11 
 
 CsWJi 
 
 01 
 
 5 
 
 1 iKritititr: fnr if* 3&grn. 
 
 Effects of Christianity on the temporal concerns of mankind. 
 After having pourtrayed with glowing indignation, the hor- 
 rid condition of those in a state of servitude among the 
 polished and civilized Greeks and Romans, we find the 
 following judicious remark: — "These are the effects which 
 the possession of unlimited power over our species has ac- 
 tually produced, and which (unless counteracted and sub- 
 dued by religious principle) it has always a natural ten- 
 dency to produce, even in the most benevolent and best 
 cultivated minds."' 
 
 When such is the general effect, what must it be where 
 one class of people is considered as inferior beings ? 
 Where all the avenues to preferment are closed to them, 
 where no prize is held forth to ambition, where their minds 
 are without wholesome stimulants, there can be no energy 
 in the national character. Different degrees of rank and 
 office are necessary in all well-constituted societies ; but 
 laws which are made for favouring one part of the commu- 
 nity, and depressing another, give rise to, and increase 
 those moral obliquities, which destroy the proportion and 
 mar the face of society. Invidious distinctions, by which 
 one class of men is enabled to trample upon another, 
 engender pride, arrogance, and an oppressive spirit in the 
 privileged order, while they repress everything noble and 
 praiseworthy in the oppressed. * 
 
 It has been justly remarked, that the noblest, the most 
 elevated distinction of a country, is a fair administration of 
 justice. Nothing can be done to elevate and improve a 
 people, if the administration of justice is corrupt ; but to 
 insure a pure administration of justice in a country, it must 
 be accessible to all classes of the community. In a state 
 of society where there is one law for the White Man and 
 another for the Black, and the sanctions of the law are bor- 
 rowed to render the latter the victims of oppression, moral 
 distinctions are confounded, and the names of virtue 
 * Dr. Philip. 
 
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% €xlMt far t{re Jfrgrii. 
 
 and vice come to be regarded as exchangeable terms. 
 Independent of printed statutes, there are certain rights 
 which human beings possess, and of which they cannot be 
 deprived but by manifest injustice. The wanderer in the 
 desert has a right to his life, to his liberty, his wife, his 
 children, and his property. The Negro has an undoubted 
 right to these, and also to a fair remuneration for his labour ; 
 to an exemption from cruelty and oppression ; to choose 
 the place of his abode, and to enjoy the society of his chil- 
 dren. No one can deprive him of these rights without 
 violating the laws of nature and of nations. 
 
 " 'Tis liberty alone that gives the flower 
 Of fleeting life its lustre and perfume ; 
 And we are weeds without it. All constraint, 
 Except what wisdom lays on evil men, 
 Is evil ; hurts the faculties, impedes 
 Their progress in the road of science ; blinds 
 The eyesight of discovery ; and begets, 
 In those that suffer it, a sordid mind, 
 Unfit to be the tenant of man's noble form." * 
 
 The great doctrine, that God hath " created all men 
 equal, and endowed them with certain inalienable rights," 
 and that amongst these are "life, liberty, and the pursuit of 
 happiness," is affirmed in the American Declaration of In- 
 dependence, and justified in the theory of its constitutional 
 laws. But there is a stain upon its glory ; Slavery, in its 
 most abject and revolting form, pollutes its soil ; the wait- 
 ings of Slaves mingle with its songs of liberty ; and the 
 clank of their chain is heard, in horrid discord, with the 
 chorus of their triumphs. The records of the States are 
 not less distinguished by their wise provisions for securing 
 the order and maintaining the institutions of the country, 
 than by their ingenious devices for riveting the chain, and 
 perpetuating the degradation of, their Coloured brethren ; 
 — their education is branded as a crime, — their freedom is 
 dreaded as a blasting pestilence, — the bare suggestion of 
 
 * Cowper. 
 
 m 
 
% €x\Mi fnr tjjr %%u. 
 
 95 
 
 their emancipation is proscribed as a treason to the cause 
 of American independence. These things are related with 
 sorrow, and with feelings deeply deploring the flagrant in- 
 consistency so glaringly displayed between the lofty prin- 
 ciples embodied in the great charter of the liberties of the 
 Union and the evil practices which have been permitted to 
 grow up under it. 
 
 The monstrous and wicked assumption of power by 
 man over his fellow man, which Slavery implies, is alike 
 abhorrent to the moral sense of mankind, to the immutable 
 principles of justice, to the righteous laws of God, and to 
 the benevolent principles of the Gospel. It ought, there- 
 fore, to be indignantly repudiated by all the fundamental 
 laws of truly enlightened and civilized communities. But 
 behold the debasing servitude in which millions of the 
 Negro race are still held in the United States, by a people 
 calling themselves Christian, and boasting of their country 
 as the freest on the earth. What a mockery of religion 
 was once the conduct of Great Britain towards the Slaves 
 in her colonies — what a mockery of religion is the present 
 conduct of America ; and what a lie to the declaration of 
 her federal constitution, that " all men by nature are free 
 and equal." 
 
 Columbia may yet redeem her character ; but if the 
 claims of the suffering Negro are not speedily heard, the 
 treatment of that people will continue to be one of the 
 foulest blots upon her national honour that ever stained 
 the escutcheon of the most degenerate nation. 
 
 " Columbia ! upon thy shore 
 The fetters clank : arise ! 
 And let thy noble eagle soar 
 Unsullied to the skies." 
 
 We ask for no new laws ; we simply require that the 
 different classes of inhabitants should have the same civil 
 rights granted to them. The liberty required is not an ex- 
 emption from the law, but the advantage of its protection ; 
 
MU 
 
 96 
 
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 the law grants no rights to the "White man which it 
 may not extend with perfect safety to all classes. All we 
 ask for is, that the enslaved tribes should be placed on an 
 equality with the long dominant race in civil and religious 
 liberty ; that the people who have been, for generations, 
 deprived of the inalienable rights conferred upon them by 
 their Creator, and oppressed by a system of Slavery, should 
 have the enjoyment of those rights restored to them. 
 
 It is argued by the abettors of Slavery, that it is only 
 a nominal thing, that the power of extreme punishments, 
 &c. are rarely resorted to, and are used reluctantly. In 
 every Slave country there are undoubtedly masters who 
 desire and purpose to practice lenity to the full extent 
 which the nature of their relation to the Slaves will allow. 
 Still, human rights are denied them. They lie wholly at 
 another's mercy, and we must have studied history in vain if 
 we need be told that they will be continually the prey of 
 absolute power. If the leg is galled by an iron chain it is 
 vain to prescribe ointment to cure the wound while the 
 fetter remains. The first step towards the improvement 
 of the Negroes must commence in removing the cause of 
 their present degradation. They have been corrupted and 
 debased by the uncontrollable power exercised over them 
 by their lordly masters ; legislative enactments bestowing 
 on them equal rights, would prove a salutary check to the 
 one, and afford a stimulus of hope to the other. The first 
 movement on the part of the legislature in their favour 
 should be, the introduction of measures to ameliorate their 
 condition, and teach their oppressors to respect them. 
 When it shall be seen that the laws of the country make no 
 distinction between the proud master and those whom he 
 considers as belonging to an inferior class of beings, the ad- 
 ministration of an impartial justice will generate within 
 the breast of the former ideas of common relationship, and 
 secure for the oppressed a milder treatment. 
 
 The establishment of law, forms an important era in the 
 
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 51 £rilmfr for t(u llrgrn. 
 
 civilization of a people, and the statute which prevents the 
 superior from oppressing or tyrannizing over his inferior, 
 is as favourable to the humanity of the one, as it is to the 
 happiness of the other. While equitable laws, and their 
 impartial administration, elevate the standard of morals, 
 raise the tone of thinking, exalt the character of a country, 
 and increase the patriotism of a people, they generate the 
 principles of love and justice in the hearts of a great and 
 effective part of the population. Let the Coloured people 
 be admitted to a full and fair participation of those privi- 
 leges from which they have been excluded, and rest assured 
 that justice being done to the one, will prove, ultimately, 
 the happiness and prosperity of the other. Justice is in 
 all cases the truest policy, it has proved itself so in the 
 abolition of Slavery in the British Colonies ; and what an 
 example is there upheld to those nations, who, in spite of 
 warning, and in defiance of Christian principle, persist in 
 continuing Slavery. 
 
 Columbia ! — thou art called to a great and to a noble 
 deed ; — delay it not. There is, indeed, a grandeur in the 
 idea of raising some millions of human beings to the enjoy- 
 ment of human rights, to the blessings of Christian civil- 
 ization, to the means of indefinite improvement. The 
 Slaveholding States are called to a nobler work of benevo- 
 lence than is committed to any other communities. Do 
 you comprehend its dignity? This you cannot do, till the 
 Slave is truly, sincerely, with the mind and heart, recog- 
 nized as a Man, till he ceases to be regarded as Property. 
 
 " When old Europe blazons proudly, 
 Volumes of historic fame ; 
 You, more loftily and loudly, 
 
 Echo young Columbia's name : 
 When we boast of Guadalquivirs, 
 
 Thames and Danubes, Elbes and Rhones ; 
 You rejoice in statelier rivers — 
 Mississippis — Amazons ! 
 " Many a poet, many a psean, 
 
 Shouts our mountain song3, and tells 
 
98 % €xik\t for tjp Jfogra. 
 
 Alpine tales, or Pyrenean — 
 
 Snowdon, Lomond, Drachenfels ! 
 
 But, across the Atlantic surges, 
 Andes higher claims prepares ; 
 
 Snow- crowned Chimborazo urges 
 Mightier sovereignty than theirs ! 
 
 " And if thus your worts of nature 
 
 Our sublimest works outdo ; 
 Should not Man — earth's noblest creature, 
 
 Should not Man be nobler too ? 
 From our crouching, cowed example, 
 
 When your Pilgrim fathers fled, 
 Reared they not a prouder temple, 
 
 Freedom's temple, o'er your head ? 
 
 " Tyrant-stories stain our pages ; 
 
 Priests and kings have forged our chains ; 
 Ye were called to brighter ages ; 
 
 Ye were born where Freedom reigns ; 
 Many a dreary, dark disaster, 
 
 Here has dug the free man's grave ; — 
 Ye have never known a master — 
 
 How can ye endure — A slave ?"* 
 
 * Dr. Bowring. 
 
CHAPTER IX. 
 
 Pernicious influence of Slavery — Those brought up in the midst ot it, ap- 
 parently unconscious of its evils — Their hearts become hardened, and 
 their feelings blunted — Deceptiveness of the " Slavery Optic Grlass " — 
 The products and gains of oppression tainted — Nothing can sanction 
 violence and injustice — To prosper by crime, a great calamity — Melan- 
 choly situation of those implicated in Slavery— Our prayers should 
 ascend both for the oppressor and the oppressed — Plea of the necessity 
 of coercion — Negroes represented as most degenerate and ungovernable — 
 These accounted for — Demoralizing effects of Slavery — When its asperi- 
 ties have been mitigated, various latent virtues and good qualities have 
 been brought into exercise. 
 
 In countries where Slavery exercises its pernicious in- 
 fluence upon the inhabitants, its tendency is to lead them 
 to regard those of a dark complexion as inferior beings, a 
 species of property, or deserving only to become such. 
 This has greatly aggravated, and its natural tendency is to 
 keep up the prejudicial feeling against the Negro. When 
 persons live, and are brought up in the very midst of cruelty 
 and Slavery, and are inured from their infancy to behold 
 the sufferings of the poor victims of oppression, to listen 
 to their cries, and behold them treated with impunity, as 
 creatures possessed of mere animal propensities, the vilest 
 of the vile, it is no marvel that they should imbibe those 
 feelings of prejudice which are thus early instilled into 
 their minds. Perceiving the mental and moral degradation 
 of the Slaves, and being taught to look down upon their 
 unfortunate fellows, as a race of beings in all respects in- 
 ferior to, and not entitled to the enjoyment of, or even fit 
 to be intrusted with, equal privileges as themselves, their 
 hearts become hardened, and their feelings blunted and 
 deadened towards them. 
 
 The practice which strikes one man with horror, may 
 seem to another, who was born and brought up in the 
 midst of it, to be not only innocent, but meritorious ; and it 
 
% €xi\mk far tire ftgrn. 
 
 is to be feared, there are many who grow up almost uncon- 
 scious of the responsibility of their station, and insensible 
 of the enormity of the evils they are committing. " A 
 man born among Slaves," says Dr. Channing, " taught 
 its necessity by venerated parents, associating it with all 
 whom he reveres, and too familiar with its evils to see and 
 feel their magnitude, can hardly be expected to look on 
 Slavery as it appears to more impartial and distant ob- 
 servers." — " Men," he continues, " may lose the power of 
 seeing an object fairly, by being too near as well as by 
 being too remote. The Slaveholder is too familiar with 
 Slavery to understand it. To be educated in injustice is 
 almost necessarily to be blinded by it more or less. To 
 exercise usurped power from birth, is the surest way to 
 look upon it as a right and as a good." Alas ! then, for the 
 unfortunate Negro ; — his oppressor, swallowing the gilded 
 bait of commerce, advancing rapidly to fame and fortune, be- 
 holds his victim through a very imperfect and defective lens. 
 The Slavery Optic Glass is not famed for developing all 
 the wonders of creation ; on the other hand, it disfigures 
 and disparages the Almighty's most glorious work, Man, 
 made after the image of his Maker. The atmosphere of 
 Slavery freezes, as it were, the current of sympathy ; like 
 a deadly upas tree, it corrupts every thing within its in- 
 fluence ; and so all those who acquire gain produced by the 
 " thews and sinews" of the poor Negro, become, sooner or 
 later, inclined to foster evil, and ere long embark with 
 
 " Those who travel far, and sail 
 To purchase human flesh ; to wreathe the yoke 
 Of vassalage round beauteous liberty, 
 Or suck large fortune from the sweat of Slaves." 
 
 Every morsel of food, thus forced from the injured, 
 ought to be more bitter than gall, and the gold cankered. 
 The sweat of the Slave taints the luxuries for which it 
 streams. Better were it for the selfish wrong doer, to live 
 as the Slave, to clothe himself in the Slave's raiment, to 
 
vTTJ> 
 
 51 -irftarfe for lire 3&p. 
 
 eat the Slave's coarse food, to till his fields with his own 
 hands, than to pamper himself by day, and pillow his head 
 on down at night, at the cost of a wantonly injured fellow- 
 creature. What man, without a conscience seared, can earn, 
 even his bread, " Not by the sweat, but by the blood of man ?" 
 Consider! ye who are sitting in ease and enjoyment ; think 
 how much cruelty is involved in the luxuries you enjoy. 
 
 " Think ! ye masters, iron-hearted, 
 Lolling at your jovial boards, 
 Think, how many backs have smarted 
 For the sweets your cane affords. 
 
 " Is there, as you sometimes tell us, 
 Is there One, who reigns on high ; 
 Has He bid you buy and sell us, 
 Speaking from His throne, the sky ? 
 
 " Ask Him, if your knotted scourges, 
 Fetters, blood-extorting screws, 
 Are the means which duty urges, 
 Agents of His will to use ?" 
 
 No earthly interest should induce any one to sanction vio- 
 lence and injustice; neither can it authorize the systematic 
 degradation of so large a portion of our fellow-creatures as 
 are now held in cruel Slavery. " The first question to be 
 proposed by a rational being is, not what is profitable, but 
 what is right. Duty must be primary, prominent, most 
 conspicuous among the objects of human thought and 
 pursuit. If we cast this down from its supremacy, if we 
 inquire for our interests, and then for our duties, we shall 
 err. We can never see the right, clearly and fully, but by 
 making it our first concern. No judgment can be just or wise, 
 but that which is built on the conviction of the paramount 
 worth and importance of duty. This is the fundamental 
 truth, the supreme law of reason ; and the mind which does 
 not start from this, in its inquiries into human affairs, is 
 doomed to great, perhaps, fatal error. Whoever places his 
 faith in the everlasting law of rectitude, must, of course, 
 regard the question of Slavery, first and chiefly as a moral 
 
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% €xihit to % JlBgrn, 
 
 question. All other considerations will weigh little with him 
 compared with its moral character and moral influences." 
 
 No greater calamity can befall a people than to prosper 
 by crime ; and there is, perhaps, no greater crime than that 
 of 'man enslaving his fellow-men. The blight which falls 
 on the soul of the wrong-doer, the desolation of his moral 
 nature, is a more terrible calamity than he inflicts. In 
 deadening his moral feelings, he dies to the proper happiness 
 of a man : in hardening his heart against his fellow-creatures, 
 he sears it to all true joy : in shutting his ear against the voice 
 of justice, he turns the voice of God within him into rebuke. 
 He may prosper, indeed, and hold faster the Slave by whom 
 he prospers ; but he rivets heavier and more ignominious 
 chains on his own soul than he lays on others. No punish- 
 ment is so terrible as prosperous guilt. No fiend, exhausting 
 on us all his power of torture, is so fearful as an oppressed 
 fellow-creature. The cry of the oppressed, unheard on 
 earth, is heard in heaven. God is just, and if justice reign, 
 the unjust must terribly suffer. 
 
 Melancholy is the situation of those who grow up uncon- 
 scious of their responsibility, and the enormity of the evil 
 they are committing, in being implicated in this great crime. 
 Whilst our tenderest sympathies are awakened for the 
 victims of their tyrannical barbarity, we should mourn deeply 
 over their oppressors ; our aspirations ought daily to ascend 
 before Him, who can unstop the deaf ear, and open the eyes 
 of those " who are blind," that He would, in His mercy, 
 show them the awful situation in which they stand. 
 
 Under the plea of a necessity for Slavery, Negroes have 
 been spoken of as the most degenerate creatures upon 
 earth. They are represented, as we have already been 
 informed, as the lowest class of human beings, if, indeed, 
 they are allowed to be included within the pale of humanity ; 
 as void of memory, filthy, and disgusting to a degree exceed- 
 ing credibility, and so ungovernable in their propensities, 
 that nothing will subdue them but severe coercion. 
 
1 €Mt fnr fljj jtfrgrn. 
 
 SvJJA 
 
 That the various bad qualities which have been ascribed 
 to Negroes, belong rather to their habits than to their 
 nature, and are derived both from the low state of civiliza- 
 tion in which nearly the whole race at present exists, as well 
 as from their unnatural situation in Slavery, is a proposition 
 not only consistent with the analogy of all the other races 
 of mankind, but immediately deducible from well established 
 facts. Moral evils are uniformly and necessarily inherent 
 under a system of oppression. It is a state hi which no 
 class of society, the dominant or the subject, is not vitiated, 
 — vitiated in temper, in principle, in conduct. All history 
 is proof of this ; and if history failed, the present state of 
 things, where Slavery exists, would supply ample testimony 
 to its truth. It may well be said, that " a debasement of 
 all the mental and moral faculties, the destruction of every 
 honourable principle, are the never-failing consequences of 
 Slavery ; so that even the most high-spirited and courageous 
 Negroes become, after remaining a few years in Slavery, 
 cunning, cowardly, and to a certain degree malevolent." 
 " It is the fact of experience, that Slavery is essentially 
 demoralizing, and that it compounds into the character all 
 the faithlessness and feculence of moral turpitude. There 
 is a class of mere human virtues, which may exist indepen- 
 dently of the direct influence of religion ; but even these 
 cannot, except by very accidental circumstances, vegetate 
 in this soil, nor flourish in the fog and impurities of this 
 stifling atmosphere ; they require a purer air, a brisk wafting 
 of the nobler passions, the excitement of hope, the warmth 
 of charity, and the mountain breeze of freedom." * 
 
 Nevertheless, when a master's absolute will has been 
 expressed in a kindly tone ; when authority has been en- 
 forced with a look which told that though he had the power 
 to command, he had not the heart to be a tyrant ; when he 
 has applied his attention to their comforts, not because they 
 were his Slaves, but because they were children of feeling, 
 * Eichard "Watson's Sermons. 
 
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 104 
 
 51 €xikit far tju Jfogrn. 
 
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 and members of the one family of mankind ; when he has 
 borne before them the impression that he has a Master in 
 heaven, while he is a master to them ; when the asperities 
 of Slavery have thus been mitigated by the manner in which 
 its powers and obligations have been carried out, many have 
 been the virtues called into operation ; many the soft, the 
 gentle, the devoted feelings brought into steady exercise ; 
 many the good, the trustworthy, and altogether praise- 
 worthy habits which have been formed and confirmed on 
 the part of Slaves ; and, under these circumstances, the 
 Slave has become so much alive to his master's interests, 
 so identified in all his feelings with his master's property, 
 and so attached to his person and his family, that he would 
 have regarded his emancipation as a decree of banishment, 
 if his freedom necessarily forced him from a master, to have 
 been whose Slave, he felt, had been his happiness. There 
 have been such cases ; and though most common with do- 
 mestic Slaves, they have been found among the other classes. 
 That this state of things has not been more generally 
 realized, is to be ascribed to no deficiency in the dispositions 
 of the Negroes, but from their masters not exercising 
 that kindly influence, which always so acts upon the human 
 heart as to bring out something of its own echo. 
 
 It is to the tyranny of managers and overseers, their 
 demoralizing conduct, and the abuse of their authority, 
 that we may mainly trace the cunning, the dissimu- 
 lation, and immoral habits of the enslaved Negro, which 
 have so long been attributed to his inherent character. 
 
 " The Negro, spoiled of all that nature gave 
 To free-born man, soon shrinks into a Slave ; 
 His passive limbs, to measured tasks confined, 
 Obey the impulse of another's mind ; 
 A silent, secret, terrible control, 
 That rules his sinews, presses too his soul. 
 Where'er their grasping arms the spoilers spread, 
 The Negro's joys, his virtues too are fled." 
 
 %( 
 
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e 
 
 CHAPTER X. 
 
 To form a just estimate of Negro character, we must observe him under 
 more favourable circumstances than those of Slavery— Statements of 
 travellers who have visited Africa, describing the natives as mild, 
 amiable, virtuous, generous, hospitable, lively, intelligent, and indus- 
 trious, &c. — Their ingenuity — Clarkson's interview with the Emperor of 
 Russia — The Emperor's surprise at the proficiency of Negroes — 
 Wadstrom's testimony before the House of Commons — Further testi- 
 monies of Major Laing, Dr. Knox, Eobin, Mungo Part, Dr. Charming, 
 J. Candler, Benezet, Barrow, Le Vaillant, Dr. Philip, Pringle, Shaw, 
 &c, &c. — Description of a Chief — Observations of the Editor of the 
 " Westminster Review" — Remarkable that Negroes should retain so 
 many good qualities when labouring under great disadvantages — Testi- 
 mony of H. C. Howells — Dr. Charming says " we are holding in bondage 
 one of the best races of the human family" — His delineation of the real 
 character of the Negroes. 
 
 In order to form a just estimate of the character and 
 capabilities of the Negro, we must observe him in a some- 
 what more favourable situation than in those dreadful 
 receptacles of human misery, the crowded deck of the Slave 
 ship, or in the less openly shocking, but constrained and 
 extorted, and consequently painful labours of the sugar 
 plantation or of the cotton field. Amongst the civilized 
 tribes of Africa, as well as amongst those who remain in a 
 more savage state, we may often meet with lofty sentiments 
 of independence, and instances of ardent courage and devoted 
 friendship, which would sustain a comparison with the most 
 splendid similar examples in the more highly advanced races. 
 Honourable and punctual fulfilment of treaties and com- 
 pacts, patient endurance of toil, hunger, cold, and all kinds 
 of hardship and privation, inflexible fortitude, and unsha- 
 ken perseverance in avenging insults or injuries, according 
 to their own peculiar customs and feelings, show that they 
 are not destitute of the more valuable moral qualities. 
 
 Many travellers, and those who have had the most 
 frequent intercourse with Africans, assure us that the 
 
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 106 
 
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 natural dispositions of the Negro race, are mild, gentle, 
 and amiable in an extraordinary degree. They bear ample 
 testimony to their being possessed of intellectual capacities 
 of no inferior order, assuring us also, how susceptible they 
 are of every generous and noble feeling of the mind, abound- 
 ing in benevolence, hospitality, generosity, and filial affec- 
 tion, thus demonstrating their capability of arriving at the 
 highest attainments of the human understanding. Not un- 
 frequently they are described as being conspicuous for the 
 nobler attributes of our nature, and instead of the inhabitants 
 of that vast continent being doomed to inevitable inferiority, 
 many are the pleasing proofs, that they are highly capable 
 of civilization, and that they would perhaps even excel in a 
 moral and religious point of view. 
 
 " Many of the dark races," says Dr. Lawrence in his 
 Lectures delivered at the Royal College of Surgeons, 
 " although little civilized, display an openness of heart, 
 a friendly and generous disposition, the greatest hospitality, 
 and an observance of the point of honour according to 
 their own notions, from which nations more advanced in 
 knowledge might often take a lesson with advantage. They 
 possess a natural goodness of heart, and warmth of affec- 
 tion." " I can see no reason," he adds, " to doubt that 
 the Negro is equal to any in natural goodness of heart. 
 It is consonant to our general experience of mankind, that 
 the latter quality should be deadened or completely extin- 
 guished in the Slave ship." 
 
 Major Denham and his followers describe the Negroes 
 as a kind-hearted race, lively, and intelligent. 
 
 That in his own country, the Negro is not that lazy, 
 worthless, and brutified being he is frequently described to 
 be, is clearly demonstrated by the testimony of many tra- 
 vellers. " The industry of the Foulahs," says Mungo Park, 
 "in agriculture and pasturage, is everywhere remarkable." 
 Speaking of the Negroes near one of the Sego ferries, he 
 says, — " The view of this extensive city, the numerous 
 
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 5L> 
 
 houses on the river, the crowded population, and the culti- 
 vated state of the country, formed altogether a prospect of 
 civilization and magnificence which I little expected to find 
 in the bosom of Africa." The same traveller, after relating 
 an affecting interview between a poor blind Negro widow 
 and her son, adds, " From this interview I was fully con- 
 vinced that whatever difference there is between the 
 European and the Negro in the conformation of the nose 
 and the colour of the skin, there is none in the genuine 
 sympathies and characteristic feelings of our common na- 
 ture." Of the truth of this observation he gives a striking 
 example in the conduct of the Negro woman who found 
 him, without food or shelter, sitting under a tree in the 
 country of Bambarra. This pleasing circumstance will 
 be found recorded in Park's own words in another part of 
 the present volume. 
 
 In reading Ledyard, Lucas, Mungo Park, and others, we 
 find that the inhabitants of the interior are more virtuous 
 and more civilized than those on the sea coast ; surpass 
 them also in the preparations of wool, leather, cotton, wood, 
 and metals ; in weaving, dyeing, and sewing. 
 
 Adanson, who visited Senegalin 1754, when describing 
 the country, says, " It recalled to me the idea of the primi- 
 tive race of men. I thought I saw the world in its infancy. 
 The Negroes are sociable, humane, obliging, and hospi- 
 table ; and they have generally preserved an estimable sim- 
 plicity of domestic manners. They are distinguished by 
 their tenderness for their parents, and great respect for the 
 aged ; a patriarchal virtue, which in our day is too little 
 known." Golberry says, that in Africa there are no beg- 
 gars except the blind. 
 
 Barrow gives a picture, by no means unpleasing, of the 
 Hottentots. Their indolence he attributes to the state of 
 subjection in which they live, as the wild Bushmen are par- 
 ticularly active and cheerful. " They are a mild, quiet, 
 and timid people ; perfectly harmless, honest, faithful ; and, 
 
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 though extremely phlegmatic, they are kind and affectionate 
 to each other, and not incapable of strong attachments. A 
 Hottentot would share his last meal with his companions. 
 They have little of that kind of art or cunning that savages 
 generally possess. If accused of crimes of which they have 
 been guilty, they generally divulge the truth. They seldom 
 quarrel among themselves, or make use of provoking lan- 
 guage. Though naturally fearful, they will run into the 
 face of danger if led on by their superiors. They suffer 
 pain with patience. They are by no means deficient 
 in talent." * 
 
 " In his disposition," says Barrow, " the Bushman is 
 lively and cheerful ; in his person, active. His talents are 
 far above mediocrity ; and, averse to idleness, they are sel- 
 dom without employment. They are very fond of dancing, 
 exhibit great industry and acuteness in their contrivances 
 for catching game, and considerable mechanical skill in 
 forming their baskets, mats, nets, arrows," &c, &c. f 
 
 That the Africans are very similar to the inhabitants of 
 other parts of the globe, and regulate their conduct towards 
 others according to the treatment they receive, may be 
 easily gathered from the statements of many writers. " The 
 feelings of the Negroes," says one, " are extremely acute. 
 According to the manner in which they are treated, they 
 are gay or melancholy, laborious or slothful, friends or 
 enemies. When well fed, and not maltreated, they are 
 contented, joyous, and ready for every enjoyment ; and the 
 satisfaction of their mind is painted in their countenance. 
 Of benefits and abuse, they are extremely sensible, and 
 against those who injure them they bear a mortal hatred. 
 On the other hand, when they contract an affection to a 
 master, there is no office, however hazardous, which they 
 will not boldly execute, to demonstrate their zeal and at- 
 tachment. They are naturally affectionate, and have an 
 ardent love for their children, friends, and countrymen. 
 * Barrow's Travels in South Africa. f Idem. 
 
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 The little they possess, they freely distribute among the 
 necessitous, without any other motive than that of pure 
 compassion for the indigent." * 
 
 The acute and accurate Barbot, in his large work on 
 Africa, says, " The Blacks have sufficient sense and under- 
 standing, their conceptions are quick and accurate, and 
 their memory possesses extraordinary strength. For, al- 
 though they can neither read nor write, they never fall into 
 confusion or error, in the greatest hurry of business and 
 traffic. Their experience of the knavery of Europeans has 
 put them on their guard in transactions of exchange ; they 
 carefully examined all our goods, piece by piece, to ascer- 
 tain if their quality and measure were correctly stated ; and 
 showed as much sagacity and clearness in all these transac- 
 tions, as any European tradesman could do." 
 
 Of those imitative arts, in which perfection can be at- 
 tained only in an improved state of society, it is natural to 
 suppose that the Negroes can have but little knowledge ; 
 but the fabric and colours of the Guinea cloths are proofs 
 of their native ingenuity ; and, that they are capable of 
 learning all kinds of the more delicate manual labours, is 
 proved by the fact, that nine-tenths of the artificers in the 
 West Indies are Negroes : many are expert carpenters, and 
 some watchmakers. The drawings and busts executed by 
 the wild Bushman in the neighbourhood of the Cape are 
 praised by Barrow for their accuracy of outline, and cor- 
 rectness of proportion. 
 
 Of those who have speculatively visited and described 
 the Slave coast, there are not wanting some who extol the 
 natural abilities of the natives. D'Elbee, Moore, and Bos- 
 man, speak highly of their mechanical powers and inde- 
 fatigable industry. Desmarchais does not scruple to affirm 
 that their ingenuity rivals the Chinese. 
 
 In 1818, when the sovereigns of Europe met in congress 
 at Aix la Chapelle, Thomas Clarkson obtained an inter- 
 * Hist, des Antilles, p. 483. 
 
% €xikit far tire Jfogrn. 
 
 view with the Emperor of Russia, and was received with 
 marked attention by that amiable monarch. Clarkson's 
 object was to interest him on behalf of the oppressed Slave. 
 The Emperor listened to his statements, and promised to 
 use his influence with the assembled monarchs, to secure 
 the suppression of the trade in human beings as speedily 
 as possible. 
 
 Describing this interview with the Emperor of Russia, 
 in which the subject of Peace Societies, as well as the 
 abolition of the Slave-trade was discussed, Thomas Clark- 
 son observes: — ""We then rose up from our seats, to 
 inspect some articles of African manufacture, which I had 
 brought with me as a present, and which had been laid on 
 the table. We examined the articles in leather first, one 
 by one, with which he was uncommonly gratified. He 
 said they exhibited not only genius, but taste, and that he 
 had never seen neater work either in Petersburgh or in 
 London. There was one piece of cotton cloth which attrac- 
 ted his particular notice, and which was undoubtedly very 
 beautiful. It called from him this observation, — ' Man- 
 chester,' says he, ' I think, is your great place for manufac- 
 tures of this sort, — do you think they can make a better 
 piece of cotton there V I told him I thought I had never 
 seen a better piece of workmanship of the kind anywhere. 
 Having gone over all the articles, the Emperor desired me 
 to inform him, whether he was to understand that these 
 articles were made by the Africans in their own country ; 
 that is, in their own native villages, or after they had 
 arrived in America, where they would have an opportunity 
 of seeing European manufactures, and experienced work- 
 men in the arts ? I replied, that such articles might be 
 found in every African village, both on the coast and in 
 the interior, and that they were samples of their own in- 
 genuity, without any connection with Europeans. 
 
 "'Then,' said the Emperor, 'you astonish me — you 
 have given me a new idea of the state of these poor people. 
 
% €x\h\t fur tjp jfegri. 
 
 ill 
 
 I was not aware that they were so advanced in society. 
 The works you have shown me, are not the works of brutes, 
 but of men endued with rational and intellectual powers, 
 and capable of being brought to as high a degree of pro- 
 ficiency as any other men. Africa ought to be allowed to 
 have a fair chance of raising her character in the scale of 
 the civilized world.' I replied, that it was the cruel traffic 
 in Slaves alone, which had prevented Africa rising to a 
 level with other nations ; and that it was only astonishing 
 to me that the natives there, had, under its impeding influ- 
 ence, arrived at the perfection which had displayed itself 
 in the specimens of workmanship which he had just seen." 
 
 Walstrom, in his admirable " Essay on Colonization," 
 in speaking of the African race, makes the following re- 
 marks : — " Their understandings have not been nearly so 
 much cultivated as those of Europeans ; but their passions, 
 both defensive and social, are much stronger. Their hos- 
 pitality to unprotected strangers, is liberal, disinterested, 
 and free from ostentation. Their kindness and respectful 
 attention to White persons, with whose characters they are 
 satisfied, arises to a degree of partiality, which, all things 
 considered, is perfectly surprising. On those parts of the 
 coast and country where the Slave-trade prevails, the in- 
 habitants are shy and reserved, (as well they may,) and on 
 all occasions go armed, lest they should be way-laid and 
 carried off. In maternal, filial, and fraternal affection, I 
 scruple not to pronounce them superior to any Europeans 
 I ever was among. So very successful have the European 
 Slave-dealers been, in exciting in them a thirst for spirits, 
 that it is now become one of the principal pillars of their 
 trade ; for the chiefs, intoxicated by the liquor with which 
 they are purposely bribed by the Whites, often make bar- 
 gains, and give orders fatal to their subjects, which, when 
 sober, they would gladly retract. 
 
 " On a question put to me in a committee of the British 
 House of Commons, I offered to produce specimens of 
 
 iS 
 
 1 
 
% €xlhh for tjji Jfrgrn. 
 
 their manufactures in iron, gold, filigree-work, leather, 
 cotton, matting, and basket-work; some of which, equal 
 any articles of the kind fabricated in Europe, and evince 
 that, with proper encouragement, they would make excel- 
 lent workmen. Even the least improved tribes make their 
 own fishing tackle, canoes, and implements of agriculture. 
 If even, while the Slave-trade disturbs their peace, and 
 endangers their persons, they have made such a progress, 
 what may we not expect if that grievous obstacle were re- 
 moved, and their ingenuity directed into a proper channel ? 
 The Slave-trade disturbs their agriculture still more than 
 their manufactures ; for men will not be fond of plan ting, who 
 have not a moral certainty of reaping. Yet, even without 
 enjoying that certainty, they raise grain, fruits, and roots, 
 not only sufficient for their own consumption, but even to 
 supply the demands of the European shipping, often to a 
 considerable extent ; in some islands and part of the coast, 
 where there is no Slave-trade, they have made great pro- 
 gress in agriculture. Though, on the whole, passion is 
 more predominant in the African character than reason ; 
 yet their intellects are so far from being of an inferior order, 
 that one finds it difficult to account for their acuteness, which 
 so far transcends their apparent means of improvement." 
 
 " The Blacks living in London," he adds, " are generally 
 profligate, because uninstructed, and vitiated by Slavery, 
 for many of them were once Slaves of the most worthless 
 description ; namely, the idle and superfluous domestic, 
 and the gamblers and thieves who infest the towns in the 
 West Indies. Some come to attend children and sick per- 
 sons on board, and others are brought by their masters by 
 way of parade. In London, being friendless, and despised 
 on account of their complexion, and too many of them being 
 really incapable of any useful occupation, they sink into 
 abject poverty." 
 
 Major Laing, in his " Travels in Western Africa," ob- 
 serves, " A destitute old man is unknown among the 
 
 m 
 
 fTINS) 
 
1 € riiwtr far tire- Urgrn. 
 
 113 
 
 ii» 
 
 
 Mandingoes. A son considers it his first duty to look after 
 and provide for his aged father's comfort ; and if he is unfor- 
 tunate enough to have lost his own, he perhaps looks for 
 some aged sire, who, being without children, requires the 
 care and attention of youth. There is no nation with which 
 I am acquainted, where age is treated with so much respect 
 and deference." 
 
 Writers on the history of mankind seem to be nearly 
 agreed in considering the Bushmen of South Africa as 
 the most degraded and miserable of all nations, and the 
 lowest in the scale of humanity ; yet there are accurate 
 observers, who cannot be suspected of undue preposses- 
 sion towards opposite sentiments and representations, who 
 have drawn a less unfavourable picture of the moral and 
 intellectual character of the Bushmen. Burchell, who 
 sought and obtained opportunities of conversing with them 
 and observing their manner of existence, though he found 
 them in the most destitute and miserable state, yet disco- 
 vered among them traits of kind and social feelings, and all 
 the essential attributes of humanity.* Among other inter- 
 esting remarks of this intelligent traveller, tending to the 
 same result, we find an observation, that the females among 
 the Bushmen displayed as much the signs of modesty as 
 Europeans. " The young women were as delicate in 
 feelings of modesty, as if they had been educated in the 
 most decorous manner." He adds, that they are pleasing 
 by a sprightly and interesting expression of countenance, 
 though far from beautiful, and although their features have 
 the peculiar type of the Bushmen race. Mr. Thompson 
 confirms this account, and even gives a still more favourable 
 description of the females of the Bushmen, -f- 
 
 Dr. Knox asserts, that the Negroes are capable of civili- 
 zation, and mentions the Kaffirs as being a very superior 
 race, " scorning to use poisoned weapons, or resort to sub- 
 tlety ; being strong, valiant, and chivalrous." 
 * Diet. Class d' Hist. Nat. Art. Homme. f Travels in Africa, I. 434. 
 
 >)* 
 
114 
 
 % €vUst far tire ftgrn. 
 
 Robin speaks of a Slave in Martinico, who, having gained 
 money sufficient for his own ransom, purchased with it 
 his mother's freedom. The most horrible outrage that can 
 be committed against a Negro, is to curse his father or his 
 mother, or to speak of either with contempt. 
 
 Mungo Park observes, that a Slave said to his master : 
 " Strike me, but curse not my mother ;" and that a Ne- 
 gress having lost her son, her only consolation was, that he 
 had never told a lie. Casaux relates that a Negro, seeing a 
 White Man abuse his father, said : " Carry away the child 
 of this monster, that it may not learn to imitate his 
 conduct." 
 
 " Of all the races of men," says Dr. Channing, " the 
 African is the mildest and most susceptible of attachment. 
 He loves, where the European would hate. He watches 
 the life of a master, whom the North American Indian, in 
 like circumstances, would stab to the heart." 
 
 " There is in the Negro race," says John Candler, " a 
 spirit of kindness not common to barbarous or half-civilized 
 nations ; such is the testimony of Mungo Park and other 
 African travellers. A few days before our arrival at the 
 Cape, a ship from Bremen, with 170 German emigrants, 
 bound for New Orleans, had been wrecked at Point Isa- 
 bella, and driven on shore in a heavy gale of wind. No 
 lives were lost ; much damage was sustained ; but the pas- 
 sengers and crew were brought in safety to the Cape. The 
 news of their arrival — strangers in a land speaking an un- 
 known tongue, dejected, care-worn, much of their little 
 property lost in the wreck, some of them sick, and nearly 
 all without food — aroused the feelings of these good people, 
 and awakened the liveliest sympathy. The authorities, all 
 Black or Coloured men, ordered houses to be opened for 
 their reception, into which beds and moveables were con- 
 veyed ; medical men proffered their assistance, and the 
 inhabitants supplied them with food and clothing. We 
 passed through some of the buildings where they were 
 
Cr^- 
 
 % (T'riliufp far tyt J>Jrgrn. 
 
 X -LU) 
 
 placed, and were cheered to witness the alacrity with which 
 they were served."* 
 
 Anthony Benezet,. a highly philanthropic and benevolent 
 individual, a member of the Society of Friends, established 
 a school in Philadelphia for the instruction of Negroes, in 
 which he himself taught gratuitously. No one had a better 
 opportunity of ascertaining their capabilities than he had : 
 and he says, " I can with truth and sincerity declare, that I 
 have found amongst the Negroes as great variety of talents 
 as among a like number of Whites ; and I am bold to 
 assert, that the notion entertained by some, that the Blacks 
 are inferior in their capacities, is a vulgar prejudice founded 
 on the pride or ignorance of their lordly masters, who have 
 kept their Slaves at such a distance, as to be unable to form 
 a right judgment of them." 
 
 Surely testimonies so creditable to the character and ca- 
 pabilities of the Negro race, proceeding spontaneously from 
 men in all respects intelligent and trustworthy, are sufficient 
 to refute those calumnies which describe them as insensible 
 to the blessings of freedom, and as incapable of appreciating 
 those blessings, and even designed for no other than a ser- 
 vile and ignominious rank in the human family. Surely 
 they are enough to convince us that they are able " to 
 manage their own concerns ;" that they need not the im- 
 pulse of the whip, having, in a state of freedom, no disin- 
 clination to work, and that willingly, from the natural 
 impulse only of their own reflections. 
 
 Volumes might be filled with equally honourable testi- 
 monies in favour of the calumniated Negro. Travellers 
 who have visited the interior of Africa, where the effects 
 of the Slave Trade are much less felt than upon the coasts, 
 assure us that the natural dispositions of the Negro are 
 mild, gentle, and amiable in an extraordinary degree ; and 
 that far from wanting ingenuity, they have made no con- 
 temptible progress in the more refined arts ; and have even 
 * Brief Notices of Hayti. 
 
 HIS 
 
 s 
 
 5) 
 
 m 
 
^( 
 
 116 
 
 % &nhk fnr % #%ra. 
 
 1 
 
 vW> 
 
 united into political societies of great extent and compli- 
 cated structure, notwithstanding the grievous obstacles 
 which are thrown in the way of their civilization, by their 
 remote situation, and their want of water carriage ; that 
 their disposition to voluntary and continued exertions of 
 body and mind, their capability for industry, the great pro- 
 moter of all human improvement, is not inferior to the 
 same principle in other tribes in similar situations : in a 
 word, that they have the same propensity to improve 
 their condition, their faculties, and their virtues, which 
 forms so prominent a feature of the human character over 
 all the rest of the world. 
 
 The travels of Barrow, Le Vaillant, and Mungo Park, 
 and the writings of Dr. Philip, Pringle, and Shaw, &c, 
 abound with incidents, honourable to the moral character 
 of the Africans, and prove that they betray no deficiency 
 in the amiable qualities of the heart. One of these travel- 
 lers gives us an interesting description of the Chief of a 
 tribe : — " His countenance was strongly marked with the 
 habit of reflection ; vigorous in his mental, and amiable in 
 his personal qualities, Gaika was at once the friend and 
 ruler of a happy people, who universally pronounced his 
 name with transport, and blessed his abode as the seat of 
 felicity." Many highly polished European kings would 
 appear to little advantage by the side of this sable Chief. 
 
 There is no just ground for supposing that Negroes in 
 general are inferior to any variety of the human race in 
 natural goodness of heart ; but it is consonant with our 
 experience of mankind, that this quality should be deadened, 
 or completely extinguished, in the Slave ship or the plan- 
 tation : indeed it is as little creditable to the head as to the 
 heart of their White tormentors, to expect a display of 
 amiable or moral qualities from the Negro, after his treat- 
 ment in oppression and Slavery. 
 
 " The Africans," writes the editor of the Westminster 
 Review, " are apt to imitate, quick to seize, ambitious to 
 
51 €:iMt for tjp jfrgrn. 
 
 117 
 
 achieve civilization. Whenever brought into contact with 
 Europeans, they copy their manners, imbibe their tastes, 
 and endeavour to acquire their arts. The imitative dispo- 
 sition and the imitative faculty, are both in them particu- 
 larly strong. They are neither unwilling nor unable to 
 learn the lessons and endure the toils and shackles of 
 civilized existence. In those qualities of acquiring and 
 progressing, which distinguish Man from the brute, they 
 resemble Man. They have now been for three centuries 
 in contact with Europeans, exposed during that period to 
 the most barbarous treatment and the most destroying and 
 depressing influences ; yet not only has nothing occurred to 
 indicate for them the fate of other unhappy races whom 
 European cruelty or European superiority has trodden out, 
 but they have actually advanced under circumstances the 
 most hostile to advancement." Even in their native Africa, 
 where they have received gunpowder and rum from the 
 very hands which ought to have imparted to them all the 
 better influences of civilized life ; cheated by knavish 
 agents, cajoled by European governments, and hunted with 
 bloodhounds, — still, under all these retrograding influences, 
 they have afforded admirable proofs that they are as sus- 
 ceptible of civilization as any other people on the face of 
 the earth. 
 
 It is indeed remarkable, that under the peculiar disad- 
 vantages to which the Negro race are subjected, so many 
 of their good qualities should often remain to a considerable 
 extent unimpaired. The African is, as we have said, naturally 
 so affectionate, imitative, and docile, that under the least 
 favourable circumstances, he often imbibes much that is 
 good. The influence of a wise and kind master, (the effects 
 of which have been already alluded to,) are visible in the 
 very countenance and bearing of his Slaves, and notwith- 
 standing all their degradation, sufficiently deep to erase 
 from them nearly every trace of the divine image, there are 
 occasionally to be found, even among Slaves, examples of 
 
 >V* 
 
% €Mt for tjjB ftgrn. 
 
 superior intelligence and virtue, strongly evincing the 
 groundlessness of the opinion that they are incapable of 
 filling a higher rank than that of Slavery, and demonstrating 
 also, that human nature is too generous and hardy to be 
 wholly destroyed in the most unpropitious state. We also 
 frequently witness in this class " a superior physical deve- 
 lopment, a grace of form and motion, which almost extorts 
 a feeling approaching respect." 
 
 H. C. Howells, of Pittsburg, U. S., made the following 
 statement in the Anti-Slavery Convention, in London, 
 in 1843. " There are in Pittsburg 2500 people of Colour 
 who stand as high in point of intellect, and of moral con- 
 duct, as the same number of the White population. With 
 all their disadvantages pressing them down to the dust, 
 there is a buoyancy raising them above everything. There 
 are among them whom I love as my dearest kindred, — men 
 who are imbued with the spirit of the gospel in no ordinary 
 degree, and whose fidelity would make them ornaments to 
 any station of life." * 
 
 Is it not evident then, to use the words of the excellent 
 Dr. Channing, whom I have so often quoted, that " we are 
 holding in bondage one of the best races of the human 
 family ?" " The Negro," says he, "is among the mildest 
 and gentlest of men. He is singularly susceptible of im- 
 provement from abroad. His children, it is said, receive 
 more rapidly than ours the elements of knowledge. How 
 far he can originate improvements, time only can teach. 
 His nature is affectionate, easily touched ; and hence he is 
 more open to religious impressions than the White Man. 
 The European races have manifested more courage, enter- 
 prise, invention ; but in the dispositions which Christianity 
 particularly honours, how inferior are they to the African. 
 When I cast my eyes over our southern region, the land 
 of bowie knives, lynch law, and duels, — of chivalry, honour, 
 and revenge, — and when I consider that Christianity is 
 * Report of Convention. 
 
 ^W 
 
(sUJA 
 
 51 €xikk far ijp Jfogra. 
 
 declared to be a spirit of charity, which seeketh not its 
 own, is not easily provoked, thinketh no evil, and endureth 
 all things,— can I hesitate in deciding to which of the races 
 in that land, Christianity is most adapted, and in which its 
 noblest disciples are most likely to be reared ? The Afri- 
 can carries with him, much more than we, the germs of a 
 meek, long-suffering virtue. A short residence among the 
 Negroes in the West Indies impressed me with their capa- 
 city of improvement. On all sides I heard of their religious 
 tendencies, the noblest in human nature." 
 
 TTP 
 
 m 
 
m 
 
 CHAPTER XI. 
 
 The African race examined in an Intellectual point of view — Their origin 
 and noble ancestry — Ethiopians and Egyptians considered — Some 
 Negroes have arrived at considerable intellectual attainments — Have 
 distinguished themselves variously — Exemplified in Amo — State of 
 learning at Timbuctoo in the sixteenth century — Abdallah — Hannibal — 
 Lislet — Fuller — Banneker — Derham — Capitein — Ignatius Sancho — 
 Gustavus Yassa — Lott Carey — Phillis Wheatley— Placido — Jasmin 
 Thoumazeau — Paul Cuffe — Toussaint L'Ouverture, and many others — 
 Further testimony of Blumenbach to their capacity for scientific culti- 
 vation — Corroborative evidence in the United States — "West Indies — 
 Liberia — Gmadenthal — Further demonstration of Negro capabilities in 
 living witnesses— Jan Tzatzoe — Pennington — Douglass — Eemond — 
 Crummell — Dr. M'Cune Smith — Edward Frazer, Wesleyan Minister in 
 Antigua — Eichard Hill, Esq. — Some of the highest offices of State in 
 Brazil filled by Blacks — Blacks and Mulattoes are distinguished officers 
 in the Brazilian army — Coloured Eoman Catholic Clergy — Lawyers — 
 Physicians — Dr. Wright's testimony to the capabilities and intellect of 
 the Negro. 
 
 With regard to the intellectual capabilities of the African 
 race, it may be observed, that Africa was once the nur- 
 sery of science and literature, and it was from thence that 
 they were disseminated among the Greeks and Romans. 
 Solon, Plato, Pythagoras, and others of the master spirits of 
 ancient Greece, performed pilgrimages into Africa in search 
 of knowledge ; there they sat at the feet of ebon philoso- 
 phers to drink in wisdom !* How many multitudes flocked 
 from all parts of the world to listen to the instructions of 
 the African Euclid, who, 300 years before Christ, was at 
 the head of the most celebrated mathematical school in the 
 world ? Africa had once her churches, her colleges, and 
 repositories of learning and of science ; once, she was the 
 emporium of commerce, and the seat of an empire which 
 contended with Rome for the sovereignty of the world ; 
 
 * It is said that the ancient Greeks represented Minerva, their favourite 
 Goddess of Wisdom, as an African Princess. 
 
 <Frr\o 
 
*?J 
 
 & tfrtiint? far tip Ifrgrn. 
 
 she has been termed the cradle of the ancient Church, and 
 she was the asylum of the infant Saviour. Say not then, 
 that Africa is without her heraldry of science and of fame ! 
 
 Antiochus the Great welcomed to his court, with the 
 most signal honours, the African Hannibal ; and the great 
 conqueror of Hannibal made the African poet, Terence, 
 one of his most intimate associates and confidants ! Being 
 emancipated by his master, who took him to Rome and 
 gave him a good education, the young African soon acquired 
 reputation for the talent he displayed in his comedies. 
 His dramatic works were much admired by the Romans for 
 their prudential maxims and moral sentences, and compared 
 with his contemporaries he was much in advance of them 
 in point of style. 
 
 Some of the most eminent Fathers and writers in the 
 primitive Church, Origen, Tertullian, Augustine, Clemens 
 Alexandrinus, and Cyril, were Africans. Can the enlight- 
 ened Negrophobists of America tell us why these tawny 
 Bishops of Africa, of Apostolic renown, were not colonized 
 into a Negro pew, when attending the ecclesiastical councils 
 of their day ? And how do they reconcile their actions with 
 the example of the Evangelist Philip, who, in compliance 
 with the intimation of the Spirit, went and joined the 
 Ethiopian in his chariot, preached to him the gospel of 
 Christ, and baptized him in his name ? 
 
 Most eminent writers and historians concur in the opinion 
 that the ancient Ethiopians were Negroes, though perhaps 
 exhibiting the peculiar features of the race in a less aggra- 
 vated degree than the dwellers on the coast of Guinea : to 
 the Ethiopians we are justified in ascribing the highest at- 
 tainments. They appear to have been the parents of 
 Egyptian science and civilization, and attained, as existing 
 monuments attest, a high eminence in many arts in the 
 very earliest periods of history. 
 
 Respecting the physical history of the ancient Egyptians, 
 it has been a matter of discussion to what department of 
 
 W' 
 
I €xlMt far tju Jljp. 
 
 mankind they belonged. The fact has been strongly main- 
 tained by some that they were Negroes. If we form an 
 opinion of them from the accounts left us by Herodotus 
 and other writers, who say that they were " woolly-haired 
 Blacks, with projecting lips," we cannot doubt that they 
 were perfect Negroes. Volney assumes it as a settled point 
 that this was really the case. But the authority of Hero- 
 dotus is of most weight, as he travelled in Egypt, and was 
 therefore well acquainted, from his own observation, with 
 the appearance of the people ; and it is well known that 
 he is generally very faithful in relating the facts, and 
 describing the objects, which fell under his personal ob- 
 servation. In his account of the people of Colchis, he 
 says, that they were a colony of Egyptians, and supports 
 his opinion by this argument, that they were " black in 
 complexion and woolly -haired." These are the exact 
 words (translated) used in his description of undoubted 
 Negroes. But neither the Copts, their descendants, 
 nor the mummies, of which so many thousands are 
 yet extant as unquestionable witnesses, allow the sup- 
 position to be maintained that their general complexion 
 was black.* 
 
 That the ancient Ethiopians were black, I have stated, 
 most eminent writers are agreed upon ; hence the Scripture 
 query, " Can the Ethiopian change his skin ?" Now, it is 
 a fact of history, that Egypt and Ethiopia were originally 
 peopled, contemporaneously, by the brothers, Misraim and 
 Cush, and were long confederated under one government, 
 being a similar people in politics and literature, &c. As 
 
 * Dr. Prichard, in his History of Man, has brought together, with great 
 learning and industry, most of the ancient testimonies illustrative of the 
 question. By the most extensive researches, he has endeavoured to prove 
 an affinity between the ancient Egyptians and Indians ; and to show that 
 both are marked by the characters of the Negro race. Those who de- 
 sire to study this question in detail, will find ample materials in Dr. 
 Prichard's wort, Vol. II., p. 282, 289, 330 ; in " Volneys Ruins of Em- 
 pires," App. 278 ; " Burkhardt's Travels ;" " Denon Descrip. de l'Egyptej" 
 &c. 
 
% €xihk far tin; Jfigra. 
 
 123 
 
 evidence of this, down to the time of Herodotus, eighteen 
 out of three hundred Egyptian sovereigns were Ethiopians.* 
 
 If it be not admitted that these nations were black, 
 they were undoubtedly of very dark complexion, having 
 much of the Negro physiognomy, as depicted in Egyptian 
 sculpture and painting, and from them the Negro population, 
 indeed the whole race of Africa, have sprung. Say not 
 then, I repeat it, that Africa is without her heraldry of 
 science and of fame ! Its inhabitants are the " off-shoots, — 
 wild and untrained it is true, but still the off-shoots, — of 
 a stem which was once proudly luxuriant in the fruits of 
 learning and taste ; whilst that from which the Goths, their 
 calumniators, have sprung, remained hard, and knotted, 
 and barren. "-j- 
 
 However, putting this noble ancestry entirely out of 
 view, which all Africans are, nevertheless, fully entitled to 
 claim as their own ; — instances are not unfrequent of un- 
 doubted Negroes, who have distinguished themselves in an 
 intellectual point of view ; and some who have been more 
 fortunately favoured with opportunities of education and 
 improvement, have arrived at intellectual attainments of 
 no mean order. They are not without their philosophers, 
 linguists, poets, mathematicians, ministers of the Gospel, 
 merchants, lawyers, generals, and physicians, eminent in 
 their several attainments, energetic in enterprise, and honour- 
 able in character. That examples of distinguished intellect 
 and ability are not more frequent among the Negro race, is 
 doubtless owing, chiefly, to the want of opportunities of 
 cultivation and means of improvement, added to the other 
 disadvantages under which they have laboured through 
 successive generations. Let us again revert to facts, for 
 I desire not to make any assertion without having the sup- 
 port of undubitable evidence. 
 
 Among tlie Turks, Negroes have sometimes arrived at 
 the most eminent offices. Different writers have given the 
 * Herod, Lib. IT., cap. 100. f Richard Watson. 
 
 )]N 
 
124 
 
 % fltitab fnr ijiB JlBgrn. 
 
 same account of Kislar Aga, who, in 1730, was chief of 
 the Black eunuchs of the Porte, and have described him 
 as possessing great wisdom and profound knowledge.* 
 
 In 1765, the English papers cited as a remarkable event, 
 the ordination of a Negro, by Dr. Keppel, Bishop of 
 Exeter.f Among the Spaniards and Portuguese, it is a com- 
 mon occurrence. The history of Congo gives an account of 
 a Black Bishop who studied at Rome. J 
 
 Correa de Serra, a learned secretary of the Academy of 
 Portugal, informs us that several Negroes have been 
 learned lawyers, preachers, and professors ; and that many 
 of them in the Portuguese possessions, have been signalized 
 by their talents. In 1717, the Negro, Don Juan Latino, 
 taught the Latin language at Seville. He lived to the age 
 of 117.§ 
 
 An African Prince, and many young Africans of quality 
 sent into Portugal in the time of king Immanuel, were 
 distinguished at the Universities, and some of them were 
 promoted to the priesthood. || 
 
 Near the close of the 17th century, Admiral Du Quesne, 
 saw at the Cape Verd Islands, a catholic Negro clergy, 
 with the exception of the Bishop and Curate of St. Jago. ^f 
 In 1734, Anthony William Amo, an African from the 
 coast of Guinea, took the degree of Doctor in Philosophy 
 at the University of Wittemburg. Two of his disserta- 
 tions, according to Blumenbach, exhibit much well digested 
 knowledge of the best physiological works of the time. 
 He was well versed in Astronomy, and spoke the Latin, 
 Hebrew, Greek, French, Dutch, and German languages. 
 In an account of his life, published by the academic 
 council of the University, his integrity, talents, industry, 
 and erudition are highly commended.*"* 
 
 * Observations sur la religion, &c., des Turcs ; p. 98. 
 f Gentleman's Mag., 1765, p. 145. % Prevot, General History of 
 
 Voyages, V. p. 53. § Gregoire. || Cledes's History of Portugal, 
 
 I. p. 594. Paris, 1735. % Gregoire. ** Gregoire. 
 
According to the statements of Leo Africanus, who 
 visited the city of Timbuctoo, on the Niger, in the 16th 
 century, the progress of learning must have been con- 
 siderable in its locality at that period. " In this city," 
 observes Leo, " there are great numbers of judges, of 
 teachers, of priests, and of very learned men, who are 
 amply supported by the royal bounty. An infinite quantity 
 of M.S. books are brought hither from Barbary ; and much 
 more money is derived from the traffic in these than from 
 all the other articles of merchandize." As if to prevent 
 us from referring these things to the Moors, Leo mentions 
 Abubakir, surnamed Bargama, the kings brother, with 
 whom he was well acquainted, as " a man very black in 
 complexion, but most fair in mind and disposition." * 
 
 Abdallah, a native of Guber, in "West Africa, although 
 having the true Negro features and colour, is described as 
 having a very intelligent, prepossessing countenance. " In 
 his mental faculties," says Dr. Steetzen, " he appeared to 
 be by no means inferior to Europeans." -j- 
 
 The capacity of the Negro for the mathematical and 
 physical sciences, is proved by Hannibal, a Colonel in the 
 Russian artillery, and Lislet of the Isle of France, who 
 was named a corresponding member of the French academy of 
 Sciences, on account of his excellent Meteorological Obser- 
 vations. Fuller, a Slave of Maryland, was an extraordinary 
 example of quickness in mental calculation. Being asked in 
 a company, for the purpose of trying his powers, how many 
 seconds a person had lived who was seventy years and some 
 months old, he gave the answer in a minute and a half. 
 On reckoning it up after him in figures, a different result 
 was obtained ; " have you not forgot the leap years ?" 
 asked the Negro. This ommission was supplied, and the 
 number then agreed precisely with his answer. Fuller 
 was a native of Africa, and could neither read nor write. 
 
 * Travels of Leo Africanus. 
 t Annals of Oriental Literature, p. 537. 
 
126 
 
 % frftafe for tju llrgrii. 
 
 This circumstance is related by Dr. Rush from his own 
 knowledge, a most creditable authority, and is quoted by 
 Dr. Lawrence, Gregoire, Rees, Chambers, &c. 
 
 Another instance occurred in the United States during 
 the last century, of a Coloured man showing a remarkable 
 skill in Mathematical Science. His name was Richard 
 Banneker, and he belonged also to Maryland. He was 
 altogether self taught, and having directed his attention to 
 the study of astronomy, his calculations were so thorough 
 and exact, as to excite the approbation of Pitt, Fox, 
 Wilberforce, and many other eminent persons. An 
 almanac winch he composed, was produced in the British 
 House of Commons, as an argument in favour of the mental 
 cultivation of the Coloured people, and of their liberation 
 from their wretched thraldom.* 
 
 Boerhaave and De Haen have given the strongest testi- 
 mony that our Coloured fellow-men possess no mean insight 
 into practical medicine ; and several have been known as 
 very dexterous surgeons. A Negress at Yverdun is men- 
 tioned by Blumenbach as being celebrated for real know- 
 ledge, and a "fine experienced hand.""j- 
 
 James Derham, originally a Slave in Philadelphia, be- 
 came one of the most distinguished physicians in New 
 Orleans. J 
 
 J. E. J. Capitein was brought from Africa when about 
 seven years old, and purchased by a Slave-dealer. Of his 
 early history but little is known, or by what means he 
 became instructed in the elements of the Latin, Greek, 
 Hebrew, and Chaldaic languages. He was a painter from 
 taste. He published at the Hague, an elegy in Latin verse, 
 on the death of his instructor. From the Hague he went to 
 the University of Leyden ; on entering which, he published 
 a Latin dissertation on the calling of the Gentiles. He 
 also published several sermons and letters at Leyden, one 
 
 * Gregoire. f Chambers' Tracts, v. vii. 
 X Mott's Biogr. Sketches. 
 
I 
 
 % 
 
 m 
 
 % €xflwk for tip Urgrn. 
 
 127 
 
 of which, went through four editions very quickly. He 
 took his degree at Leyden, and was ordained to the office 
 of a Christian minister in Amsterdam. He went to Elmina 
 on the Gold Coast, where it is probable he was either mur- 
 dered or sold into Slavery.*' 
 
 The son of the King of Nimbana came to England to 
 study, acquired a proficiency in the sciences, and learnt He- 
 brew, that he might read the Bible in the original. This 
 young man, of whom great expectations were entertained, 
 died soon after his return to Africa.f 
 
 Stedman was acquainted with a Negro who knew the 
 Koran by heart. 
 
 Higiemondo was an able artist. If the painter's business 
 is to impart life to nature, he was master of this, according 
 to the testimony of Sandrart. He resided in India. In 
 1788, he or Cugoano, a native African, were in the service 
 of Cosway, first painter of the Prince of Wales. J 
 
 Ignatius Sancho and Gustavus Vassa, the former born in 
 a Slave ship, on its passage to the West Indies, and the 
 latter in Guinea, on the coast of Africa, distinguished 
 themselves in England in modern times. Gustavus Vassa 
 exhibited talents, without much literary cultivation, to 
 which a good education would have been a great advan- 
 tage. Fortune bringing Ignatius Sancho to England, the 
 interest of the Duke of Montague became excited on his 
 behalf, and he befriended him. Some letters of Sancho's 
 were published in two volumes after his decease. These 
 letters exhibit a considerable display of epistolary talent, 
 of rapid and just conception, of wild patriotism, and of 
 universal philanthropy ; and when it is borne in mind that 
 they were written by an untutored African, and never 
 designed for publication, it must be admitted they evince 
 the possession of abilities in the writer, equal to a European. 
 Sancho supported a commerce with the Muses, amidst the 
 
 * Lawrence's Lectures. f Gregoire. 
 
 % Pennington's Text Book, p. 49. 
 
% €nhit fnr tji? Jfigrn. 
 
 trivial and momentary interruptions of a shop ; he studied 
 the Poets, and even imitated them with some success ; he 
 constructed two pieces for the stage ; the " Theory of Music" 
 he discussed, published, and dedicated to the Princess 
 Royal ; and painting was so much within the circle of his 
 judgment, that Mortimer came often to consult him ; 
 Garrick and Sterne were well acquainted with him ; the 
 latter corresponded with him.* 
 
 In proof of the musical talents of the Negro, it may be 
 mentioned that they have been known to earn so much in 
 America, as to purchase their freedom with large sums. 
 The younger Friedig, in Vienna, was an excellent per- 
 former both on the violin and violincello ; he was also a 
 capital draftsman, and made a very successful painting of 
 himself, f 
 
 Amongst others of the Negro race who have possessed 
 no mean share of the intellectual qualities, I may mention 
 Sadiki, a learned Slave in Jamaica, redeemed through the 
 intercession of Dr. Madden, who speaks most highly 
 also of his conduct, and of his great discernment and 
 discretion.]; 
 
 Job Ben Solliman, Prince of Bun da on the Gambia, a 
 learned Slave, translated M.S.S. for Sir Hans Sloane ; was 
 introduced to Court by the Duke of Montague, and 
 graciously received by the Royal Family and nobility, &c. § 
 
 Lott Carey, was born a Slave in Virginia, but by repeated 
 presents for his integrity, and subscriptions amongst mer- 
 chants, by whom he was highly esteemed, he purchased his 
 freedom. His intellectual ability, his firmness of purpose, 
 unbending integrity, correct judgment, and disinterested 
 benevolence, placed him in a conspicuous situation, and 
 gave him wide and commanding influence. || 
 
 Phillis Wheatley, was stolen for a Slave when a little 
 
 * Life of Ignatius Sancho. f Eees, Lawrence, &c. 
 
 % Dr. Madden' s West Indies. § Mott's Biog. Sketches. 
 II Mott and Chambers. 
 
;er- 
 
 & (Enlitttr for tjjc IJrgrn. 
 
 girl from her parents in Africa. In sixteen months she 
 acquired the English language so perfectly, that she could 
 read any of the most difficult parts of Scripture, to the 
 great astonishment of those who heard her ; and this she 
 learned without any instruction, except what was given her 
 in the family. She wrote poems between the age of 14 
 and 19, which were published in this country. The talented 
 editors of the Edinbro' Journal in quoting a portion from 
 one of her poems "On the Providence of God," observe, 
 " it shows a very considerable reach of thought, and no 
 mean powers of expression." Phillis visited England 
 and was admired in the first circles of society. * 
 
 Amongst learned Mulattoes, Castaing may be mentioned 
 as exhibiting poetic genius. His compositions ornament 
 various editions of poetry. Barbaud-Royer Boisrond, the 
 author of the " Precis des Gemissements des Sang-meles," 
 announces himself as belonging to this class ; and Michael 
 Mina (also called Miliscent) was a Mulatto of St. Domingo. 
 Julien Raymond, likewise a Mulatto, associated himself 
 with the class of moral and political sciences, for the sec- 
 tion of legislation. Without being able to justify in every 
 respect the conduct of Raymond, we may praise the energy 
 with which he defended Men of Colour and Free Negroes. 
 He published many works, the greater part of which relate 
 to the history of St. Domingo, and may serve a§ an antidote 
 to the impostures circulated by the colonists. The prin- 
 cipal of these is entitled, " Origine des troubles de St. 
 Domingo, "f 
 
 Caesar, a Negro of North Carolina, was the author of 
 several poems, which were published, and have become 
 popular, like those of Bloomfield.J 
 
 Durand and Demanet, who resided a long time in Guinea, 
 found Negroes with a keen and penetrating mind, a sound 
 judgment, taste, and delicacy. § 
 
 * Life of Phillis Wheatley. t Gregoire, p. 167. t Idem, p. 168. 
 § Durand, p. 58. — Demaiiet, Hist, del 'Afrique, II., p. 3. 
 
 W 
 
130 
 
 St €xih\t for tjp Jlfgrn. 
 
 On different parts of the coast of Africa there are Ne- 
 groes who speak two or three languages, and are interpre- 
 ters. * In general, they have a very retentive memory. 
 This has been remarked by Vaillant, and other travellers, f 
 
 Adanson, astonished to hear the Negroes of Senegal 
 mention a great number of stars, and converse pertinently 
 concerning them, believes that if they had good instruments, 
 they would become good astronomers. J 
 
 Henry Diaz, who is extolled in all the histories of Brazil, 
 was a Negro. Once a Slave, he became Colonel of a regi- 
 ment of foot soldiers of his own colour, to whom Brandano 
 bestows the praise of talents and sagacity. § 
 
 Mentor, born at Martinico, in 1771, was a Negro. In 
 fighting against the English he was made prisoner. In sight 
 of the coast of Ushant, he took possession of the vessel 
 which was conducting him to England, and carried her into 
 Brest. To a noble physiognomy he united an amenity of 
 character, and a mind improved by culture. He occupied 
 the legislative seat at the side of the estimable Tomany. 
 Such was Mentor, whose latter conduct has perhaps 
 sullied these brilliant qualities. He was killed at St. 
 Domingo. || 
 
 Cinque, the Chief of the Mendian Negroes, who planned 
 and carried into effect their own rescue by overpowering 
 the crew of the Slaver on which they were embarked, was 
 a man of uncommon natural capacity, and his great mental 
 superiority impressed all who came in contact with him. ^ 
 
 Placido was a gifted but unfortunate Negro, of whose 
 history more may perhaps be learnt hereafter. He was a 
 poet of no mean order. 
 
 A collection of poems, written by a Slave recently libe- 
 rated in the Island of Cuba, was presented to Dr. Madden, 
 in 1838, by a gentleman in Havannah. Some of these pieces 
 
 * Clarkson, p. 125. + Prevot, IV. 198. 
 
 % Voyage au Senegal, p. 149. § Gregoire. || Idem, p. 102. 
 
 *H Sturge's United States. 
 
DMii 
 
 % '(T'riimtr for f Jjb Jdrgrn. 
 
 131 m 
 
 had fortunately found their way to that place, and attracted 
 the attention of the literary people there, while the poor 
 author was in Slavery in Cuba. Dr. Madden made a 
 translation of a few of them into English. " I am sensi- 
 ble," says the Doctor, " I have not done justice to these 
 poems, but I trust I have done enough to vindicate in 
 some degree the character of Negro intellect, at least the 
 attempt affords me an opportunity of recording my con- 
 viction, that the blessings of education and good govern- 
 ment are alone wanting to make the natives of Africa, 
 intellectually and morally, equal to the people of any 
 nation on the surface of the globe." The author of the 
 poems is now living at Havannah, and gains his livelihood 
 by hiring himself out as an occasional servant. His father 
 and mother lived and died in Slavery in Cuba. He has 
 written his history in Spanish, in a manner alike creditable 
 to his talents and his integrity. This, with a few of his 
 compositions translated, will be found amongst the pages 
 of the present volume. As to the merit of the poems, they 
 are highly spoken of by a very talented Spanish scholar, 
 distinguished not only in Cuba, but in Spain, for his 
 literary attainments. The Cuban poet was introduced to 
 Dr. Madden by this gentleman in the following terms : — 
 " Mi querido Amigo esta carta se la entregara a v, el poeta 
 J. F. M. de quien hable a v, y cuyos versos y exelente in- 
 genio han llama da la atencion, aun en esta pais de todas 
 las personas despreocupadas y buenas." 
 
 Without attempting to enumerate all the Negroes who 
 have written poems, it may be mentioned that Blumenbach 
 possessed English, Dutch, and Latin poetry, by different 
 Coloured persons. 
 
 In Thomas Jenkins, the son of an African King, we have 
 an extraordinary specimen of Negro intellect. Through 
 accidental circumstances, he became placed in a situation 
 more favourable to improvement than falls to the lot 
 of many of his race. . He acquainted himself tolerably well 
 
 fit© 
 
% €x\Mt fnr tire fegm 
 
 with Latin and Greek, and initiated himself in the study 
 of mathematics, &c.* 
 
 Francis "Williams studied at Cambridge, and made con- 
 siderable progress in mathematics, and other branches of 
 science.-]" 
 
 Jasmin Thoumazeau was originally a Slave of St. 
 Domingo ; the Philadelphia Society, and the Agricultural 
 Society of Paris, both decreed medals to him. J 
 
 Paul Cuffe presents us with an example of great energy 
 of mind in the more common affairs of life. Born under 
 peculiar disadvantages, notwithstanding the pressure of 
 many difficulties, he qualified himself for any station of 
 life. A sound understanding, united with indomitable 
 energy and perseverance, mingled with a fervent but un- 
 affected piety and benevolence, were the prominent features 
 of his character. Religion, influencing his mind by its 
 secret guidance, and silent reflection, added, in advancing 
 manhood, to the brightness of his character, and confirmed 
 his disposition to practical good. His exertions to pro- 
 mote the happiness of his fellow-men, and to relieve their 
 sufferings, confer more honours upon him, than ever marble 
 statue or monumental trophy could do.§ 
 
 "Who is there that is not acquainted with the history of 
 the gallant, yet unfortunate Toussaint L'Ouverture, the 
 Negro Chief of St. Domingo, so intimately connected with 
 the history of Hayti, the remembrance of whose name will 
 ever be cherished by the friends of suffering humanity ? 
 Among the individuals of the African race who have dis- 
 tinguished themselves by intellectual achievement, he is pre- 
 eminent : and while society at large is waiting for evidence 
 of what the Negro race can do and become, it is rational 
 to build high hopes upon such a character as that of the 
 man, who, as a Dictator and a General, was the model upon 
 which Napoleon formed himself ;|| who was as inclined to 
 
 * Chambers' Tracts. 
 § Memoir of Paul Cuffe. 
 
 f Mott's Biogr. Sketches. % Idem. 
 
 See " Eiographie Universelle," art. Toussaint. 
 
^>TTP 
 
 51 €nMt for tjre lirgrn. 
 
 peace as he was renowned in war ; and who will ever be 
 regarded in history, as one of the most remarkable men of an 
 age teeming with social wonders. The author of " Brief 
 Notices of Hayti," describes Toussaint L'Ouverture as 
 " one of the ablest generals of his age." Here, then, we 
 have a man, in all respects worthy of the name of man. 
 Here is a man of a jet black complexion, who exhibited a 
 genius which would have been considered eminent in civi- 
 lized European society, and who, in true goodness and 
 wisdom, affords an incontrovertible demonstration that there 
 is no incompatibility between Negro organization and high 
 intellectual power. He was altogether African, — a perfect 
 Negro in his conformation, yet a fully endowed and well 
 accomplished man. In no respect does his nature appear 
 to have been unequal ; there was no feebleness in one di- 
 rection, as a consequence of unusual vigour in another. He 
 had strength of body, strength of understanding, strength 
 of belief, and, consequently, of purpose ; strength of affec- 
 tion, of imagination, and of will. He was, emphatically, a 
 great man : and what one of his race has been, others may 
 equally attain to. 
 
 Blumenbach observes, " that entire and large provinces 
 of Europe might be named, in which it would be difficult 
 to meet with such good writers, poets, philosophers, and 
 correspondents of the French Academy ; and that, more- 
 over, there is no savage people, who have distinguished 
 themselves by such examples of perfectibility and capacity 
 for scientific cultivation ; and consequently, that none can 
 approach more nearly to the polished nations of the globe 
 than the Negro.* Both in their native country, and in 
 places where they exist as Slaves, or as freed men, they 
 exhibit intellectual and moral characteristics of considerable 
 promise. They not only show a perfect capability of ac- 
 quiring the more delicate manual arts, but in the United 
 States of America, where many of them have existed for 
 
 * P. 118. 
 
 fg 
 
134 
 
 % €Mt for tju ftgrn. 
 
 some time as free citizens, in the midst of White people, 
 they exhibit a high development of the intellectual cha- 
 racter, several acting as ministers of religion, and doctors of 
 medicine. 
 
 I may also refer to what has been effected, within a few 
 short years in the British West Indies, so recently num- 
 bered among " the dark places of the earth, full of the 
 habitations of cruelty." The moral character of the Coloured 
 people in those Islands, many of whom are intelligent, well 
 educated, and possessed of property, has presented a visible 
 and cheering improvement, in spite of the demoralizing 
 effect naturally resulting from that most unchristian and 
 impolitic prejudice indulged against them on account of 
 their colour, by the Whites generally, and their being 
 considered as a degraded class. 
 
 At this moment, too, in the little colony of Liberia, 
 upon the western coast of Africa, formed by free Blacks 
 from the United States, we have, if recent accounts can be 
 relied upon, a community as purely moral and as remarkable 
 for prudent and skilful management as any perhaps in the 
 world. The history of the missions among the Hotten- 
 tots speaks to the same purpose. Those sent from Holland, 
 in 1792, who founded the establishment at Gnadenthal, 
 were told that they never would be able even to fix the at- 
 tention of this primitive people. On the contrary, their 
 instructions in school, and their discourses on Christianity, 
 were eagerly taken advantage of. Multitudes flocked 
 from a distance to live at the settlement, for the benefit 
 of the ministrations of the missionaries. It consequently 
 became a populous and thriving town. The Dutch 
 boors at first opposed the mission, thinking that the 
 Hottentots might become reluctant to serve them ; but 
 they soon came to see that the people who had become 
 Christianized under the instruction of the missionaries, were 
 far more useful and trustworthy servants than the sensual 
 and degraded Pagans whom they had previously been 
 
m 
 
 % €iikh for % 3fjgm 
 
 135 
 
 ^ 
 
 dQJJ) 
 
 obliged to employ. They were astonished to find the na- 
 tives, under this system, become quite a different people. 
 " Perhaps nothing in this account is more remarkable than 
 the fact, that so strong a sensation was produced through- 
 out the whole Hottentot nation, and even among the neigh- 
 bouring tribes of different people, by the improved and 
 happy condition of the Christian Hottentots, as to excite 
 a general desire for similar advantages. Whole families of 
 Hottentots, and even of Bushmen [a degraded and impo- 
 verished branch of the same people], set out for the borders 
 of Caffraria, and performed journeys of many weeks in 
 order to settle in Gnadenthal. It is a singular fact in the 
 history of barbarous races of men, that the savage Bush- 
 men, of their own accord, solicited from the colonial 
 government, when negotiations were opened with them with 
 the view of putting an end to a long and bloody contest, 
 that teachers might be sent amongst them, such as those 
 at Gnadenthal." * 
 
 The circumstances already recorded afford abundant 
 ground to hope that an improvement on a very exten- 
 sive scale, might, with little difficulty be effected, both as 
 regards the moral and intellectual condition of the Negro. 
 Notwithstanding the baneful influences of Slavery, and its 
 concomitant evil the Slave Trade, subjecting them to hard- 
 ships the most cruel and degrading ; and notwithstanding 
 the manifold disadvantages against which this unfortunate 
 race have still to contend ; — thanks be to God, we have 
 living witnesses not a few, who demonstrate in themselves 
 that the question of Negro capability is no longer a 
 theoretical one, but established by facts the most une- 
 quivocal. Come forth, then, ye living monuments, array 
 yourselves before a guilty world, and demand, each one of 
 you, " Am I not a man and a brother ?" 
 
 I have inserted in the present volume, some brief sketches 
 of persons of Colour, — Africans, or of African descent, 
 * Prickard, I., 185. 
 
 AN 
 
Jllpt 
 
 136 
 
 51 €ntate for tire Jfogrn, 
 
 now living, which fully justify these remarks. Such are 
 Jan Tzatzoe, the Christian chief of the Amakosae tribe, in 
 South Africa. This intelligent African, along with An dries 
 Stoffles, a pious and enlightened Hottentot, came over to 
 England some years ago with Dr. Philip, and moved in 
 the first circles of society in Great Britain. They were 
 examined before a committee of the House of Commons, 
 and also addressed a large audience in Exeter Hall. 
 Extracts from the report of the committee, &c, &c, will 
 be found in the succeeding pages. The engraving placed 
 opposite to the title page of the present volume represents 
 these Africans giving evidence before the committee ; 
 Dr. Philip is seated in the foreground, and James Read, 
 sen. and jun., Missionaries from South Africa, are standing, 
 the latter acting as interpreter. 
 
 Amongst other living witnesses, may be mentioned 
 James W. C. Pennington, a minister of the Gospel in the 
 United States, highly esteemed and respected by all who 
 are acquainted with him, and who was born a Slave. He 
 visited Great Britain a few years ago, when his company 
 was much sought after, and he moved in the best circles of 
 society. In 1841, he published "A Text Book of the 
 Origin and History, &c, &c, of the Coloured People," a 
 duodecimo of nearly 100 pages, including a mass of facts 
 and arguments on the subject. 
 
 Frederick Douglass, a fugitive Slave, so well-known, 
 is one of this class ; his eloquence and thrilling accents 
 speak for themselves. " I am inclined," says Thomas 
 Harvey, " to regard Douglass as raised up by Divine Pro- 
 vidence to disprove the notion of the natural inferiority of 
 the Coloured race. He was born and trained in Slavery ; 
 — made his escape in early manhood ; — supported himself 
 two or three years by hard labour, and then suddenly ap- 
 peared on the stage of public affairs, as an accomplished 
 public speaker, displaying not merely native talent, but 
 such results of cultivation as could have been obtained only 
 
u\ 
 
 2 (Eribiife for tip ifrgra. 
 
 13: 
 
 under such circumstances by very uncommon genius, and a 
 quickness of perception approaching to intuition. His re- 
 finement of mind and manners, the great sensitiveness of 
 his feelings, and his general high toned character, together 
 with his genius and force of mind, constitute him (when 
 viewed in relation to his origin, and the influences amidst 
 which he was born and nurtured) a moral and intellectual 
 phenomenon, well deserving the notice of the philosopher, 
 as well as the philanthropist." 
 
 C. A. Bissette, is an intelligent man of Colour ; his la- 
 bours in the Anti-Slavery cause have been great ; and his 
 zeal in that good cause untiring. 
 
 Nor should I forget to mention Charles L. Remond, en- 
 dowed as he assuredly is, with intellectual attainments of the 
 highest order, and possessing powers of eloquence rarely 
 surpassed : but, — ■ 
 
 " I would not praise thee, Remond — thou hast gifts 
 Bestowed upon thee for a noble end ; 
 And, for the use of which, account must be 
 Returned to Him who lent them. May this thought 
 Preserve thee in his fear; and may the praise 
 Be given only to His mighty name." 
 
 Dr. Madden speaks highly of a Negro minister, at 
 Kingston, Jamaica. He first went to hear him, he says, 
 from motives of curiosity, not unmixed with feelings of 
 contempt ; yet, he adds, there was an influence in the min- 
 istry of this man, which induced the White Man, " who 
 came to scoff," " to remain to pray." * 
 
 " There is a Coloured female," says Lewis Tappan, 
 " living in New York, with whom I am well acquainted, 
 who established the first Sunday school in it. She estab- 
 lished that school, by her personal efforts, for the education 
 of children, both White and Coloured; and it was the 
 foundation of all the Sunday schools that exist in and adorn 
 that city. She has also taken out of the almshouses forty 
 
 * Dr. Madden' s West Indies. 
 
M< 
 
 138 
 
 51 €xihk for tlj? %%n. 
 
 V'TFP 
 
 children, and educated them at her own expense, a large 
 number of them being White children. This woman is 
 now living, a highly respectable and worthy member of the 
 Church of Christ, — an honour to human nature, and to the 
 city of New York, demonstrating the capacity of the 
 Coloured people, and the moral excellency to which they 
 may attain." " I must bear my testimony," adds Lewis 
 Tappan, " in the most decided manner, not only to the 
 excellency of the free people of Colour, whom I have had 
 an opportunity of knowing in New York and the United 
 States, but to their general good conduct, their religious 
 character, and the equality of their capacity, in every point 
 of view, with that of other men." * 
 
 Mr. Athill, a Coloured gentleman, is Postmaster General 
 of Antigua, one of the first merchants in St. John's, and 
 was a member of the Assembly until the close of 1836, 
 when, on account of his continued absence, he voluntarily 
 resigned his seat. A high-born "White Man, the Attorney 
 General, now occupies the same chair which this Coloured 
 member vacated. \ 
 
 At the annual commencement of the Oberlin Institute, 
 the graduating class was composed of sixteen young men 
 and seven young ladies. Of the former, one was a Coloured 
 man of fine talents, named Wm. H. Day, of Northampton, 
 Mass. His oration is spoken of in the Cleveland Herald 
 as of a high character, both in respect to thought, language, 
 and manner. % 
 
 In a speech made in the Anti-Slavery Convention in 
 1843, Professor Walker, of the Oberlin Institute, related, 
 that on one occasion, at the desire of the Dean and faculty, 
 the students and people of the place, amounting to 1500, 
 assembled in the chapel to engage in religious exercises, and 
 to hear addresses from Coloured students exclusively. " The 
 day," says Professor Walker, "passed off most admirably. 
 
 * Speech in A. S. Cony. 1843. f Thome and Kimball's West Indies. 
 % Burritt's Christian Citizen. 
 
 ALLS) 
 
 ; h\ 
 
% Criirafe for tip? firgra. 
 
 The speakers showed themselves to be men of talent — 
 nature's orators, and I was astonished — confounded." * 
 
 Henry H. Garnett, formerly a Slave, is said to be nearly 
 equal in ability and eloquence to that extraordinary man 
 Frederick Douglass.-j- Henry Bibb, once a Slave, is also 
 a very intelligent and eloquent man. 
 
 Dr. James M'Cune Smith, a Coloured gentleman in New 
 York, being shut out of the American colleges by the pre- 
 judice against his complexion, took his degree in medicine 
 at the University of Glasgow, and obtained one of the first, 
 if not the first prize, among 500 students. He is a man of 
 superior education, of considerable eloquence, and is 
 hghly esteemed and respected in New York. J 
 
 Alexander Crummell, the minister of a Coloured Epis- 
 copal church in New York, is a highly intellectual Negro. 
 He visited London in 1848, and spoke at the annual meet- 
 ing of the Anti-Slavery Society. He addressed a Coloured 
 Convention at Troy, U.S., in 1847, at some length, in a 
 speech, which, for beauty and chasteness of language, 
 classic research, and its logical expression, commanded 
 the close attention of a refined and intelligent audience. 
 Many legal gentlemen, and others from the highest society 
 in Troy, were present, and must have received a favourable 
 opinion of what can be attained by Coloured men, crushed 
 to the earth even though they are, by the combined in- 
 fluence of Church and State. 
 
 Theodore S. "Wright, is a Coloured Presbyterian minister in 
 New York, — an amiable man, much and deservedly respected. 
 
 Stephen Gloucester, who recently visited England, is 
 also an esteemed minister in New York. 
 
 Samuel R. Ward, of Cortland, State of New York, 
 affords an example of high intellectual attainments in the 
 despised race. He is the pastor of a White Congregational 
 Church, and also edits a newspaper. 
 
 * Keport of Convention. t Anti-Slavery Eeporter. 
 
 J L. Tappan in Anti-Slavery Conv. 1843, &c. 
 
 fire. 
 
M 
 (£ 
 & 
 
 [C"' 
 
 m 
 
 140 
 
 % €nMi for tjjB %%w. 
 
 Thomas Van Rensallaer, editor of the Ram's Horn, may 
 likewise be adduced as evidence of considerable intellect 
 existing in the Negro race ; as also M. R. Delany, joint 
 editor of the North Star. 
 
 In the Anti-Slavery Convention of 1843, Dr. Lushing- 
 ton stated that Lord John Russell had appointed a Black 
 Man to the office of Chief Judge at Sierra Leone. * 
 
 The Wesleyan minister of Parham, in Antigua, (Edward 
 Frazer, who has visited England,) is a man of Colour ; he 
 was born a Slave in Bermuda. His history is remarkable. 
 He is not inferior either in education, qualifications, or 
 usefulness, to any of his brethren in the ministry, -f- 
 
 " I know a Coloured man," says Hiram Wilson, " in the 
 State of New York, who has been employed by the Anti- 
 Slavery Society as a public lecturer ; and from information 
 I have received, it appears that he was one of the most 
 popular lecturers they had in the field. He is jet black — 
 of unmixed African blood. I mention this, because it is 
 sometimes said, that, by virtue of a little European blood 
 flowing in their veins, they are brighter, and more ta- 
 lented. But this man is so distinguished, so renowned for 
 his virtues, his intelligence, and his talents, that he has 
 been installed as the pastor of a White congregation — a 
 Presbyterian church in New York, for nearly three years.";}; 
 
 George B. Vashon, a talented young Coloured gentleman 
 was recently admitted, after due examination, as Attorney, 
 Solicitor, and Counsellor of the Supreme Court of the 
 State of New York. On his examination, he evinced a 
 perfect knowledge of the rudiments of law, and a familiar 
 acquaintance with Coke, Littleton, Blackstone, and Kent. 
 This is not the first instance of Coloured persons being ad- 
 mitted to legal practice in the United States, for in the 
 Old Bay State, two Coloured lawyers have been pursuing 
 the even tenor of their way as recipients of its honours and 
 
 * Eeport of Convention, 1843. f Sturge and Harvey's West Indies. 
 X Speech in A. S. Conv. 1843. 
 
51 -(Mute for fyt &gtfc 
 
 (sM-i 
 
 (Skttp 
 
 emoluments for the last two years. One of these, Robert 
 Morris, jun., in addition to the excellence of his character, 
 has acquired correct business habits. The other, Macon B. 
 Allen, who successfully passed the ordeal of a rigid exami- 
 nation, now holds the office of Justice of the Peace for 
 Middlesex county, United States. 
 
 James Forten was an opulent man of Colour, whose long 
 career was marked by a display of capacity and energy 
 of no common kind. The history of his life is interesting 
 and instructive, affording a practical demonstration of the 
 absurdity as well as injustice of that prejudice, which 
 would stamp the mark of intellectual inferiority on his 
 complexion and race. * 
 
 A speech of the Hon. H. Teage, of the Colony of 
 Liberia, on the Coast of Africa, who is either a Black or 
 Coloured gentleman, is inserted in the present volume as 
 an evidence of the capacity and attainments of his race, 
 and of one whose education and life from early boyhood, 
 are Liberian. 
 
 Symphor L' Instant, an intelligent native of Hayti, who 
 has resided some time in Paris, was present and spoke at 
 the An ti- Slavery Convention in London, in 1.840. 
 
 William Lynch, Esq., one of the stipendiary Magistrates 
 in Dominica, is a man of Colour. He is justly valued by 
 those who have the pleasure of his friendship, both in Eng- 
 land and the West Indies, for his intelligence and piety, f 
 
 Richard Hill, Esq., Secretary to the Governor and sti- 
 pendiary Magistrate of Jamaica, is a Coloured man of 
 uncommon endowments of mind, and of noble personal 
 bearing. He is probably the ablest person in Jamaica, and 
 was the mainspring of the government during the best parts 
 of the administrations of Lord Sligo and Sir Lionel Smith. J 
 
 Two Coloured gentlemen are proprietors of one of the 
 largest book stores in Jamaica ; and one of them is the 
 
 * Sturge's United States. f Sturge and Harvey's West Indies. 
 
 J Thomas Hai*vey. 
 
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 editor of the Watchman. Other newspapers in the West 
 Indies are edited by Coloured persons, and many amongst 
 this class exhibit great intelligence and refinement. 
 
 I could produce a continuous catalogue of names suffi- 
 cient in themselves to fill a volume, equally conclusive of 
 Negro ability and intelligence as the foregoing. A few 
 more are mentioned in the concluding chapter of the pre- 
 sent volume, entitled " Living Witnesses," which also 
 contains additional information respecting some of those 
 already enumerated. 
 
 Although in Brazil there are more than two millions of 
 Slaves, some of the highest offices of State are filled by 
 Black men. There are also Blacks and Mulattoes amongst 
 the most distinguished officers in the Brazilian army. 
 Coloured lawyers and physicians are found in all parts of 
 that country, and, moreover, hundreds of the Roman 
 Catholic clergy are Black and Coloured men, who minister 
 to congregations made up indiscriminately of Blacks and 
 Whites. 
 
 " One evening, during my stay at Philadelphia," says 
 Joseph Sturge, " I took tea with twelve or fifteen Coloured 
 gentlemen, at the house of a Coloured family. The refined 
 manners and great intelligence of many of them, would 
 have done credit to any society. The Whites have a 
 monopoly of prejudice, but not a monopoly of intellect ; 
 nor of education and accomplishments ; nor even of those 
 more trivial, yet fascinating graces, which throw the charm 
 of elegance and refinement over social life." * 
 
 Dr. Wright, a clergyman of the Church of England, 
 who has resided many years in Africa, made the following 
 statements before the Anti-Slavery Convention in 1843, 
 with which conclusive evidence I shall close the present 
 chapter. " I went out to Africa," says Dr. Wright, " ori- 
 ginally as a missionary, under the auspices of the Society 
 for the Propagation of the Gospel. One of the first objects 
 * Sturge's United States. 
 
51 Ctikfc far tip Jbgrn, 
 
 to which my attention was directed, was the education of 
 the Negro. At that time he was oppressed, kept down, 
 crushed, and cruelly treated ; above all, every obstacle was 
 thrown in the way of his moral improvement. One of the 
 principal things that struck me on visiting the native 
 schools, or establishing them where they had not before 
 existed, was the equality in point of mind between the 
 African and ourselves. I had the pleasure of witnessing 
 while there, a great improvement in the condition of the 
 Negro. I saw many of the restrictions under which they 
 had been placed gradually removed. I saw the chains 
 struck off from the liberated African, and I beheld that same 
 individual rising in intellect and morals, and practising all 
 the social virtues of the father, the husband, and the citizen, 
 and that to such a degree, that he might be safely held up 
 as an example in a civilized country. I saw a passion for 
 literature gradually increasing. They subscribed for the 
 journals, and were anxious for information upon general, 
 political, and religious subjects. They founded churches, 
 supported ministers, and were desirous of classical attain- 
 ments. I am perfectly satisfied, from what I have both 
 seen and heard, that the Black Man only wants the same 
 opportunities which the White Man enjoys, in order to 
 raise himself to the highest degree to which intellect can 
 conduct him." * 
 
 * Proceedings of tlie A. S. Conv. 1843, p. 212. 
 
 (& 
 
 -Y~ T , 
 
 0>T 
 
CHAPTER XII. 
 
 The foregoing facts afford unquestionable evidence of the capabilities of the 
 Negro— Their desire for improvement— Obstacles to this— Invidious dis- 
 tinctions— Effects of Slavery— The improvidence, indolence, &c, ascribed 
 to the Negro, considered— Testimony of Dr. Lloyd— Similar charges 
 brought against the ancient Britons— Russians a century ago— Admitting 
 everything in favour of distinct races, all are capable of great improve- 
 ment—This applies equally to the Negro race— The superiority of 
 those favourably circumstanced— Events in St. Domingo— Improvement 
 in Negroes brought to Europe— Comparisons— Effects of Education, &c. 
 —Fact related by Dr. Horn— White races liable to relapse into bar- 
 barism—Instances of retrogression in Whites— The Greeks and Eomans 
 —Case of Charlotte Stanley— Civilization a vague and indefinite term— 
 — Remarkable instance of retrogression in America— Progression in the 
 Negro defended on the same ground— Time required— Accelerated in 
 proportion as impediments are removed. 
 
 The facts recorded in the two preceding chapters, afford 
 unquestionable evidence, that the Negro race is possessed 
 of capabilities of improvement equal to those of any other 
 people ; that they are equally susceptible and desirous of 
 rising in civilization, and also in the scale of intelligent 
 existence. But, until those invidious and Anti-Christian 
 distinctions of caste which now exist are removed, they 
 cannot be otherwise than a degraded and inferior people. 
 The want of principle, the absence of moral, and even of 
 decent manners, and the practice of crime among the Ne- 
 groes, have been the constant topics of complaint, especially 
 amongst those connected with them as property. But the 
 vices of the Slaves are the vices of their condition ; and 
 they are not only generated, but perpetuated, by the very 
 system which is pleaded as necessary for their cure. 
 
 " That Slavery should be most unpropitious to the Slave 
 as a moral being," observes Dr. Charming, " will be further 
 apparent if we consider that his condition is throughout, a 
 wrong, and that consequently, it must lead to unsettle all 
 his notions of duty. The injury to the character from 
 
11 
 
 <n>>£. 
 
 
 % xT'rihutt fnr tjjr SUrgrn 
 
 living in an atmosphere of wrong we can all understand. 
 To live in a state of society of which injustice is the chief 
 and all-pervading element, is too severe a trial for human 
 nature, especially when no means are used to counteract its 
 influence. Coloured delinquency is mostly left to ripen 
 into crime, with little interference from public or private 
 philanthropy. As might have been expected, Coloured are 
 more numerous than White criminals, in proportion to rela- 
 tive population ; and this is appealed to as a proof of their 
 naturally vicious and inferior character, when, in fact, 
 society at large is chargeable with their degradation. 
 The most common distinctions of morality are faintly 
 apprehended by the Slave. Respect for property — that 
 fundamental law of civil society — can hardly be instilled 
 into him. His dishonesty is proverbial. Theft from his 
 master passes with him for no crime. A system of force is 
 generally found to drive to fraud. How necessarily will 
 this be the result of a relation in which force is used to 
 extort from a man his labour, his natural property, without 
 any attempt to win his consent ! Can we wonder that the 
 uneducated conscience of the man who is daily wronged 
 should allow him in reprisals to the extent of his power ? 
 Thus the primary social virtue, justice, is undermined in 
 the Slave." 
 
 " That the Slave should yield himself to intemperance, 
 licentiousness, and in general, to sensual excess, we must 
 also expect. Doomed to live for the physical indulgences 
 of others, unused to any pleasures but those of sense, 
 stripped of self-respect, and having nothing to gain in life, 
 how can he be expected to govern himself? How naturally 
 — I had almost said necessarily — does he become the crea- 
 ture of sensation, of passion, of the present moment ! 
 What aid does the future give him in withstanding desire ? 
 The better condition, for which other men postpone the 
 cravings of appetite, never opens before him. The sense 
 of character, the power of opinion, another restraint on the 
 
 !5 fN?) 
 
146 
 
 $ $titmb for tjii Mrgra. 
 
 free, can do little or nothing to rescue so abject a class from 
 excess and debasement. In truth, power over himself is 
 the last virtue we should expect in the Slave, when we 
 think of him as subjected to absolute power, and made to 
 move passively from the impulse of a foreign will. He is 
 trained to cowardice, and cowardice links itself naturally 
 with low vices. Idleness, to his apprehension, is paradise, 
 for he works without hope of reward. Thus Slavery robs 
 him of moral force, and prepares him to fall a prey to 
 appetite and passion. 
 
 " That the Slave finds in his condition little nutriment 
 for the social virtues we shall easily understand, if we con- 
 sider that his chief relations are to an absolute master, and 
 to the companions of his degrading bondage ; that is, to a 
 being who wrongs him, and to associates whom he cannot 
 honour, whom he sees debased. His dependence on his 
 owner loosens his ties to all other beings. He has no 
 country to love, no family to call his own, no objects of 
 public utility to espouse, no impulse to generous exertion. 
 The relations, dependencies, and responsibilities, by which 
 Providence forms the soul to a deep, disinterested love, are 
 almost struck out of his lot. An arbitrary rule, a foreign, 
 irresistible will, taking him out of his own hands, and 
 placing him beyond the natural influence of society, extin- 
 guishes in a great degree the sense of what is due to him- 
 self, and to the human family around him. 
 
 " The effects of Slavery on the character are so various 
 that this part of the discussion might be greatly extended ; 
 but I will touch only on one other topic. Let us turn, for 
 a moment, to the great motive by which the Slave is made 
 to labour. Labour, in one form or another, is appointed 
 by God for man's improvement and happiness, and absorbs 
 the chief part of human life, so that the motive which ex- 
 cites to it has immense influence on character. It deter- 
 mines very much, whether life shall serve or fail of its end. 
 The man who works from honourable motives, from 
 
% €xiMt for tip X%n. 
 
 domestic affections, from desire of a condition which will open 
 to him greater happiness and usefulness, finds in labour an 
 exercise and invigoration of virtue. The day labourer, 
 who earns with horny hand and the sweat of his face, 
 coarse food for a wife and children whom he loves, is raised, 
 by this generous motive, to true dignity ; and, though 
 wanting the refinements of life, is a nobler being than those 
 who think themselves absolved by wealth from serving 
 others. Now the Slave's labour brings no dignity, is an 
 exercise of no virtue, but throughout, a degradation ; so 
 that one of God's chief provisions for human improvement 
 becomes a curse. The motive from which he acts debases 
 him. It is the whip. It is corporal punishment. It is 
 physical pain inflicted by a fellow-creature. Undoubtedly 
 labour is mitigated to the Slave, as to all men, by habit. 
 But this is not the motive. Take away the whip, and he 
 would be idle. His labour brings no new comforts to wife 
 or child. The motive which spurs him is one by which it is 
 base to be swayed. Stripes are, indeed, resorted to by civil 
 government, when no other consideration will deter from 
 crime ; but he who is deterred from wrong-doing by the 
 whipping-post is among the most fallen of his race. To 
 work in sight of the whip, under menace of blows, is to be 
 exposed to perpetual insult and degrading influences. 
 Every motion of the limbs, which such a menace urges, is 
 a wound to the soul. How hard must it be for a man, who 
 lives under the lash, to respect himself ! "When this mo- 
 tive is substituted for all the nobler ones which God 
 ordains, is it not almost necessarily death to the better and 
 higher sentiments of our nature ? It is the part of a man 
 to despise pain in comparison with disgrace, to meet it 
 fearlessly in well-doing, to perforin the work of life from 
 other impulses. It is the part of a brute to be governed 
 by the whip. Even the brute is seen to act from more 
 generous incitements. The horse of a noble breed will not 
 endure the lash. Shall we sink man below the horse ? " 
 
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 148 
 
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 It is often asserted that Negroes are by nature impro- 
 vident and without ambition. To account for this, if it 
 really be a fact that it is so, we are not to look to any 
 physical peculiarity in their natural constitution, but to 
 the circumstances under which they are usually placed. 
 They are said to be a stupid, indolent, and filthy race, but 
 this, as has already been stated, is not true. They may, 
 under oppression, lose their stimulus to industry. When 
 a people are oppressed and miserably poor, they are inva- 
 riably a degraded people ; and indolence and filth are the 
 inseparable attendants of dejection. Negroes, generally 
 speaking, have no motives to industry ; the lawful fruits of 
 their labour are not secured to them ; they are robbed, cheated, 
 and oppressed in every possible way ; and the filthiness of 
 their huts and persons, are no more than the natural con- 
 sequences arising from the state of mental depression in 
 which they are held. Cheerfulness and cleanliness are 
 much more nearly allied than is generally imagined. 
 
 Man is naturally indolent, and there are but two ways of 
 overcoming his inherent aversion to labour, — fear, or hope ; 
 the first arises from the apprehension of punishment, and is 
 the motive of the Slave ; the second is the more powerful, 
 being most agreeable to nature, and cannot exist, except the 
 labourer lias a fair compensation secured to him, as a remu- 
 neration for his exertion. Give the Negro a motive, and 
 he is active and industrious enough. Dr. Lloyd, who visited 
 the West Indies about ten years ago, in company with 
 some other philanthropists, observes, " We had some op- 
 portunity of observing the Negro's character, and we saw 
 nothing to warrant the assertion, that he is idle and lazy, 
 and requires cruelty and compulsion to make him labour." * 
 The same writer (or Dr. Madden) asserts, " The Negro is 
 not the indolent, slothful being he is everywhere consi- 
 dered ;" and adds, in another place, " I am well persuaded, 
 in respect to industry, physical strength, and activity, — 
 * Letters from the West Indies. 
 
 w 
 
$ €xlMi fnr tire llrgrn. 
 
 149 
 
 the Egyptian fellah, the Maltese labourer, and the Italian 
 peasant, are far inferior to the Negro." 
 
 Although vices the most notorious that can disgrace 
 human nature have been ascribed to the African race, similar 
 charges have been made against the ancient Britons, and 
 many other nations of the civilized world, and, perhaps 
 with equal justice. For the sake of demonstration, we 
 need only compare the general circumstances of any 
 European nation whatever, and the individual character 
 of its inhabitants both for talents and virtues, at two 
 distant epochs of its history, and we must at once acknow- 
 ledge how remarkable is the contrast in each particular 
 point. Need we be reminded again of Cicero's remark, 
 that the " ugliest and most stupid Slaves in Rome came 
 from England ? " Here we have demonstrated in ourselves 
 what stupid and degraded Slaves, such as Cicero writes of, 
 are capable of advancing to. The same race, who, in the 
 age of Tacitus, dwelt in solitary dens, amid morasses, have 
 built St. Petersburgh and Moscow ; and the posterity of 
 cannibals now feed on wheaten bread. Little more than 
 a century ago, Russia was covered with hordes of barba- 
 rians ; cheating, drinking, brutal lust, and the most ferocious 
 excesses of rage, were as well known, and as little blamed, 
 among the better classes of the nobles who frequented the 
 Czar's court, as the more polished and mitigated forms of 
 the same vices, are, at this day in St. Petersburgh ; literature 
 had never once appeared among its inhabitants in a form to 
 be recognized ; and you might travel over tracts of several 
 days' journey, without meeting a man, even among the 
 higher classes, whose mind contained the materials of one 
 moment's rational conversation. Although the various cir- 
 cumstances of external improvement will certainly not 
 disguise, even at this day, and among the individuals of the 
 first classes, the " vestigia ruris," still, no one can presume 
 to dispute that the materials of which Russians are made 
 have been greatly and fundamentally ameliorated ; that 
 
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 their capacities are rapidly unfolding, and their virtues 
 improving, as their habits have become changed, and their 
 communication with the rest of mankind extended. A 
 century ago, it would have been just as miraculous to read 
 a tolerable Russian composition, as it would be, at this day, 
 to find the same phenomenon at Houssa or Timbuctoo ; 
 and speculators who argue about races, and despise the 
 effect of circumstances, would have had the same right to 
 decide upon the fate of all the Russians, from an inspec- 
 tion of the Calmuc skulls, as they imagine they now have 
 to condemn all Africa to everlasting barbarism, from the 
 heads, the colour, and the wool of its inhabitants. 
 
 If it still be maintained that there will always be a 
 sensible difference between the Negro and the European, 
 what reason is there to suppose, that this disparity will be 
 greater than the difference between the Sclavonian and 
 Gothic nations ? Admitting every thing that can be urged 
 in favour of the distinction of races, no one has yet denied, 
 with any proof of the assertion, that all the families of 
 mankind are capable of great improvement. And though, 
 after all, some tribes might, as it is asserted, remain inferior 
 to others, it would be ridiculous to deduce from thence 
 either an argument against the possibility of greatly civilizing, 
 even the most untoward generation, or an inference against 
 the importance, even of the least considerable advances 
 which it may be capable of making towards perfection. 
 
 We need only cast our eyes upon a few unquestionable 
 facts, and compare the achievements of Negroes in several 
 situations, to be convinced that the general proposition 
 applies to them as well as the rest of mankind. The 
 superiority of those in the interior of Africa to those on 
 the Slave Coast, is a matter of fact. The enemies of the 
 Slave Trade reasonably impute the degeneracy of the mari- 
 time tribes to that baneful commerce. Its friends have on 
 the other hand, deduced from thence an argument against 
 the Negro character, which, they say, is not improved by 
 
51 €nhk for tire $frp. 
 
 intercourse with civilized nations. But the fact is 
 admitted. To see it exemplified, we have only to consult 
 the travels of Mungo Park ; and the same observation has 
 been made by Barrow, as applicable to the tribes south of 
 the line, who increase in civilization as you leave the Slave 
 Coast. Compare the accounts given by these travellers, as 
 well as some of those previously cited, of the skill, the 
 industry, the excellent moral qualities of the Africans in 
 Houssa, Timbuctoo, &c, with the pictures that have been 
 drawn of the same race, living in all the barbarity which 
 the supply of our Slave ships requires, and we must be con- 
 vinced that the Negro is as much improved by a change of 
 circumstances as the White.*" 
 
 It has been remarked, that some of the most sandy and 
 desert parts of Africa are covered with the greatest variety 
 of flowers ; and as civilization advances, may not the 
 blossoms of literature, of science, and of religion, yet be 
 spread as profusely over the whole of that vast continent ? 
 
 The state of Slavery, as has already been observed, is in 
 none of its modifications favourable to improvement ; yet 
 even in that condition the Negro has sometimes made con- 
 siderable advances in this respect. Compare the Creole 
 Negro with the imported Slave, and you will find, that 
 even amongst the most debasing, the most brutifying form 
 of servitude, the pitiless drudgery of the field and whip, 
 though it must necessarily eradicate most of the moral 
 qualities of the African, hag not prevented him from pro- 
 fiting in his intellectual faculties by intercourse with more 
 civilized men. f The events of the war in St. Domingo 
 read us a lesson on this point ; of Negroes organizing large 
 armies ; laying plans of campaigns and sieges, which, if not 
 scientific, have at least been to a certain degree successful 
 
 * Edinbro' Review, 
 t Facts are only recorded here, as such, without commending the practice 
 of war, which I believe to be utterly repugnant to the spirit and precepts 
 of our benign religion, inculcating " love and good-will to men." 
 
 fllN 
 
152 
 
 % €x\Mt far \)t Jfogrn. 
 
 against the finest European troops ; arranging forms of 
 government, and even proceeding some length in executing 
 the most difficult of human enterprises ; entering into com- 
 mercial relations with foreigners, and conceiving the idea 
 of contracting alliances ; acquiring something like a mari- 
 time force; and, at any rate, navigating vessels in the 
 tropical seas, with as much skill and foresight as that com- 
 plicated operation requires. 
 
 This is certainly a spectacle which ought to teach us the 
 effects of circumstances in developing the human faculties, 
 and to prescribe bounds to that presumptuous arrogance, 
 which would confine to one race the characteristic privilege 
 of the species, and exclude the other as irremediably bar- 
 barous. We have torn these men from their country, under 
 the vain and wicked pretence that their nature is radically 
 inferior to our own. We have treated them so as to stunt the 
 natural growth of their virtues and their reason. Yet their 
 ingenuity has flourished apace, even under all disadvantages, 
 and the Negro species is already much improved. All the 
 arguments in the brains of a thousand metaphysicians will 
 never explain away these facts. We may be told that brute 
 force and adaptation to a West Indian climate are the 
 only faculties which the Negroes possess, but something 
 more than this must concur to form and subsist armies, and 
 to distribute civil powers in a state. The Negroes, who, in 
 Africa it is said cannot count ten, and bequeath the same 
 portion of arithmetic to their children, must have improved, 
 both individually, and as a species, before they could use the 
 mariner's compass, and rig square-sailed vessels, and culti- 
 vate whole districts of cotton for their own profit in the 
 Caribbee Islands. 
 
 The very ordinary circumstance of the improvement 
 visible in the Negroes brought over to Europe as domestics, 
 and their striking superiority to the generality of their 
 countrymen, either in Africa or the New World, may per- 
 haps illustrate the doctrine now maintained, even to those 
 
 fTN£) 
 
51 (Erilmfr far tjp Jtfrgra. 
 
 153 
 
 (gVTP 
 
 whom the more general views of the case have failed in 
 convincing. It is certainly not assuming too much, to 
 suppose that there is a wider difference between one of 
 those Black servants and a native of the Slave Coast, than 
 between a London waterman and a subject of the Irish 
 kings who nourished a few centuries ago. Nor is there 
 any doubt that the fidelity, courage, and other good quali- 
 ties generally remarkable in Free Negroes, distinguish 
 them as much from Slaves, of whose cowardice and trea- 
 chery such pictures have been drawn, as the various feats 
 of valour recorded in the history of the Welsh, place 
 them above those wretched Britons who resisted their 
 Saxon oppressors only with groans.* 
 
 There are still regions in Europe, to which, if some of 
 our philosophers were to furnish maps depicting the illu- 
 mination of the human mind in different countries, they 
 would have to give a colouring of dark grey. Man may be 
 said to be, in a great measure, his own creator. "We are all 
 born savages, whether we are brought into the world in the 
 populous city or the lonely desert. It is the discipline of 
 education, and the circumstances under which we are placed, 
 which create the difference between the rude barbarian 
 and the polished citizen — the listless savage and the man 
 of commercial enterprize — the man of the woods and the 
 literary recluse. The mind of man, like a garden, requires 
 culture ; like the rough-hewn stone from the quarry, so 
 it remains until the hand of the sculptor has formed it into 
 its proper mould, or the polisher has exerted his magic in- 
 fluence in bringing to light all its latent beauties and in- 
 trinsic excellencies, which before lay concealed and lost in 
 its rough mass ! 
 
 Dr. Horn, in his travels through Germany, mentions 
 
 seeing at Salzburg but a few years ago, a girl twenty-two 
 
 years of age, by no means ugly, who had been brought up in 
 
 a hog-sty among the hogs, and who had sat there for many 
 
 * Westminster Review. 
 
 m* 
 
M< 
 
 154 
 
 51 €xlMt fnr tju J&rp. 
 
 years with her legs crossed. One of these had become 
 quite crooked ; she grunted like a hog ; and her gestures 
 were brutishly unseemly in a human dress. Many in- 
 stances might be adduced of individuals of the White 
 races existing in a state of wildness and barbarism, where 
 the advantages of education and civilization have been 
 withheld. Such are Kaspar Hauser ; Peter the Wild Boy ;* 
 the girl described by Condamine ;-f- a man found in the 
 Pyrennees ;J and the young savage of Aveyron, met with 
 near that place, and brought to Paris soon after the Revo- 
 lution, &c. § 
 
 There can be no doubt, that if the discipline of education 
 and the influences of civilized society were withdrawn, the 
 White races would be liable to relapse into a state of bar- 
 barism equal to that which is in any case instanced amongst 
 nations of a more sable skin. We have examples of degen- 
 eration from physical and moral causes in the Greeks and 
 Romans, and in the modern inhabitants of the Caucasus. 
 
 A singular instance of the propensity to relapse into a 
 wild and uncivilized state is presented in the history of 
 Charlotte Stanley, the gipsy girl, which is, I believe, a 
 well-attested circumstance. A lady of rank and fortune, 
 who had no children, took so great a liking to a beautiful 
 gipsy girl, that she took her home, had her educated, and 
 at length adopted her as her daughter. She was named 
 Charlotte Stanley, received the education of a young Eng- 
 lish lady of rank, and grew up to be a beautiful, well-in- 
 formed, and accomplished girl. In the course of time a 
 young man of good family became attached to her, and 
 wished to marry her. The nearer, however, this plan ap- 
 proached the period of its execution, the more melancholy 
 became the young bride ; and one day, to the terror of 
 
 * Described by Blumenbach in his Beytriige zur Naturgeschicte. 
 
 f Histoire d' une jeune Fille Sauvage, Paris, 1761. 
 
 X Leroy Exploitation de la Nature dans les Pyrennees, p. 8. 
 
 § Historical Account of the young Savage of Aveyron. 
 
her foster-mother and her betrothed husband, she was 
 found to have disappeared. It was known there had been 
 gipsies in the neighbourhood ; a search was set on foot, 
 and Charlotte Stanley was discovered in the arms of a 
 gipsy, the chief of the band. She declared she was his 
 wife, that no one had a right to take her away from him, 
 and the benefactress and the bridegroom returned incon- 
 solable. Charlotte afterwards came to visit them, and related 
 that as she grew up, she had felt more and more her con- 
 finement within the walls of the castle, and an irresistible 
 longing had at length seized her to return to her wild 
 gipsy life ; nor could she, although suffering many cruelties 
 from her gipsy husband, ever be induced to abandon the 
 roving life to which she had returned. The portrait of 
 Charlotte Stanley was preserved by the friend of her youth. 
 Her story is a kind of inversion to that of Preciosa, and 
 might make an interesting romance. * 
 
 " They wiled me from my green-wood home, 
 They won me from the tent, 
 And slightingly they spake of scenes, 
 Where my young days were spent. 
 
 They dazzled me with halls of light, 
 
 But tears would sometimes start, 
 They thought 'twas but to charm the eye 
 
 And they might win the heart. 
 
 They gave me gems to bind my hair, 
 
 I long'd the while for flowers 
 Fresh gather' d by my gipsy freres, 
 
 From Nature's wildest bowers. 
 
 They gave me books, — I lov'd alone 
 
 To read the starry skies ; 
 They taught me songs, — the songs I lov'd 
 
 Were Nature's melodies. 
 
 I never heard a captive bird, 
 
 But, panting to be free, 
 I long'd to burst the prison door, 
 
 And share his liberty. 
 
 * Kohl's England. 
 
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SI ®riWt fat tjit jSfgtn. 
 
 31 
 
 ' Twas kindly meant, and kindly hearts 
 
 Were theirs who bade me roam, 
 From Nature and her forests free, 
 
 To share her city's home. 
 
 The woods are green, the hedges white, 
 
 With leaves and blossoms fair, 
 There's music in the forest now, 
 
 And I too must be there. 
 
 do not chide the gipsy girl, 
 O call me not unkind ; 
 
 1 ne'er shall meet so dear a friend, 
 As her I leave behind. 
 
 Yet I must to the green-wood go, 
 
 My heart has long been there, 
 And nothing but the green-wood now, 
 
 Can save me from despair." 
 
 The meaning attached by many to the term civilization 
 is extremely vague and indefinite, and it is certainly an 
 intangible thing, which vanishes when individuals become 
 isolated in a new region, where it does not exist. The 
 liability to retrogression into a state of barbarism, in indi- 
 viduals of the White races, when placed away from all the 
 advantages and restraints of civilized life, is strikingly ex- 
 emplified in a remarkable occurrence, related in a letter 
 published in the " North American," in 1839. 
 
 At Wilkesbarre, in Pennsylvania, lived a family named 
 Slocum. During a time of warfare, in 1778, one day the 
 house was surrounded by Indians. There were in it a mo- 
 ther, a daughter about nine years of age, a son aged 
 thirteen, another daughter aged five, and a little boy aged 
 two and a half. The eldest sister took up the little boy 
 and ran out of the back door. The Indians then took 
 young Slocum, aged thirteen, and little Frances, aged five, 
 and prepared to depart. But finding young Slocum lame, 
 at the earnest entreaties of the mother, they set him down 
 and left him, but kept the little girl. The mother's heart 
 swelled unutterably, and for years she could not describe 
 the scene without tears. She saw an Indian throw her 
 
 JK) 
 
/ 
 
 m 
 
 % €tMi far tiff Urgrn. 
 
 157 t 
 
 child over his shoulder, and immediately turn into the 
 bushes. What were the conversations, the conjectures, the 
 hopes, and the fears respecting the fate of the child, I will 
 not attempt to describe, but this was the last she saw of 
 her little Frances. 
 
 As the boys grew up and became men, they were very 
 anxious to know the fate of their fair-haired sister. They 
 wrote letters, they sent inquiries, they made journeys, 
 through all the "West and into the Canadas. Four of these 
 journeys were made in vain. A silence, deep as the forest 
 through which they wandered, hung over her fate during 
 sixty years. 
 
 The reader will now pass over fifty-eight years, and sup- 
 pose himself far in the wilderness of Indiana. A very 
 respectable agent of the United States, the Hon. George 
 W. Ewing, travelled there, and weary and belated, with a 
 tired horse, stopped in an Indian wigwam for the night. He 
 could speak the Indian language. The family were rich for 
 Indians, and had horses and skins in abundance. In the 
 course of the evening, he noticed that the hair of the woman 
 was light, and that her skin under her dress was white. This 
 led to conversation. She told him she was a White child, 
 but had been carried away when a very little girl. She 
 could only remember that her name was Slocum, that she 
 lived in a small house on the banks of the Susquehanna, 
 and how many there were in her father's family, and the 
 order of their ages ! But the name of the town she could 
 not remember. On reaching his home, the agent wrote out 
 an account of what had been elicited, which he got printed. 
 In a while, it fell into the hands of Mr. Slocum of Wilkes- 
 barre, who was the little boy aged two years and a half 
 when Frances was taken. In a few days he was off to seek 
 his sister, taking with him his older sister, (the one who 
 aided him to escape,) writing to a brother in Ohio, (born 
 after the captivity,) to meet him to go with him. 
 
 The two brothers and sister now travelled on their way 
 
 M 
 
158 
 
 % €riirafc for tire lltgrn. 
 
 to seek little Frances, just sixty years after her captivity. 
 They reached the country of the Miami Indians and found 
 the wigwam. " I shall know my sister," said the civilized 
 sister, " because she lost the nail of her first finger. You, 
 brother, hammered it off in the blacksmiths' shop, when she 
 was four years old." They went into the cabin, and found 
 an Indian woman having the appearance of seventy-five, 
 painted and jewelled off, and dressed like the Indians in 
 all respects. Nothing but her hair and covered skin 
 indicated her origin. They got an interpreter, and began 
 to converse. She told them where she was born, her 
 name, &c, with the order of her father's family. " How 
 came your nail gone ?" said the oldest sister. " My brother 
 pounded it off when I was a little child in the shop !" 
 In a word, they were satisfied that this was Frances, their 
 long lost sister. They asked her what her Christian name 
 was. She could not remember. Was it Frances ? she 
 smiled, and said " Yes" It was the first time she had 
 heard it pronounced for sixty years ! Here, then, they 
 were met — two brothers and two sisters ! They were all 
 satisfied that they were brothers and sisters. But what a 
 contrast ! The brothers were walking the cabin, unable to 
 speak ; the oldest sister was weeping, but the poor Indian 
 sister sat motionless and passionless, as indifferent as a 
 spectator. There was no throbbing, no fine chords in her 
 bosom to be touched. 
 
 When Mr. Slocumwas relating this history, he was asked, 
 " But could she not speak English ?" " Not a word." 
 " Did she know her age ?" " No — had no idea of it." 
 " But was she entirely ignorant ?" " Sir, site dioVnt know 
 when Sunday comes /" This was indeed the consummation 
 of all ignorance in a descendant of the Puritans ! 
 
 But what a picture for a painter would the inside of that 
 cabin have afforded ? Here, were the children of civiliza- 
 tion, respectable, temperate, intelligent, and wealthy, able 
 to overcome mountains to recover their sister. There, was 
 
a 
 
 ft Ctitatf* far % #rgra. 
 
 the child of the forest, not able to tell the day of the week, 
 whose views and feelings were all confined to that cabin. 
 Her whole history might be told in a word. She lived 
 with the Delawares who carried her off till grown up, and 
 then married a Delaware. He either died or ran away, 
 and she then married a Miami Indian, a chief, I believe. 
 She had two daughters, both of whom were married, and who 
 lived in all the glory of an Indian cabin, deerskin clothes, 
 and cowskin head dresses. No one of the family could speak 
 a word of English. They had horses in abundance, and 
 when the Indian sister wanted to accompany her new rela- 
 tives, she whipped out, bridled her horse, and then, a la 
 Turc, mounted astride, and was off. At night she could 
 throw a blanket around her, down upon the floor, and at 
 once be asleep. 
 
 The brothers and sister tried to persuade their lost sister 
 to return with them, and, if she desired it, bring her 
 children. They would transplant her again to the banks of 
 the Susquehanna, and of their wealth make her home 
 happy. But no : she had always lived with the Indians ; 
 they had always been kind to her, and she had promised 
 her late husband on his death-bed, that she would never 
 leave the Indians. And there they left her and hers, wild 
 and darkened heathen, though sprung from a pious race. * 
 The strong disinclination and determination against 
 returning to civilized life, are strikingly evinced in the 
 case of this offspring of the Saxon race, captured in infancy. 
 But no one will urge that such a circumstance proves that 
 race less capable of civilization than another. No more so 
 in the case of the Negro, who having known something of 
 civilized life, may, like the gipsy girl, feel an irresistible 
 longing to return again to a roving state of existence. Yet 
 
 (?jAr> owing to a single circumstance of this kind on record, the 
 South Africans have been represented by some travellers 
 as incapable of being civilized. The case I allude to is 
 
 ^h 1 / I * Hist. Collect, of the State of Pennsylvania. 
 
160 
 
 % €nhU far tju Jfogrn. 
 
 that of Pegu, a Hottentot youth, whom Governor Van Der 
 Stell educated. He learnt the Dutch, Portuguese, and 
 other languages, which he could speak with fluency. In 
 1685, he went to India with Commissioner Van Rheede, 
 and continued with him till his death. He then returned 
 to the Cape, but would no longer remain in civilized life ; 
 he went to his tribe, and returned no more, becoming a 
 Chief amongst them. 
 
 " ' All ! why,' lie cried, c did I forsake 
 My native fields for pent-up halls, 
 The roaring stream, the wild-bird's lake, 
 For silent books and prison walls ? 
 
 A little will my wants supply, 
 
 And what can wealth itself do more ? 
 The sylvan wilds will not deny 
 
 The humble fare they gave before. 
 
 Where Nature's wild resources grow, 
 
 And out-door pleasure never fades, 
 My heart is fixed ; — and I will go 
 
 And die among my native shades.' 
 
 He spoke — and to the eastern springs 
 
 (His gown forthwith to pieces rent, 
 His blanket tied with leathern strings,) 
 
 This hunter of the mountains went." 
 
 It is worthy of remark, as the historian relates, that it is 
 to be feared the young African was disgusted with many of 
 the professing Christians with whom he came in contact ; 
 " and not being aware that some ' have a name to live who 
 are dead,' he forsook them altogether, and united again 
 with his own people." 
 
 On the same grounds, under propitious circumstances, 
 the progress of man in civilization and refinement, is equal 
 in ratio to that in which he is liable to relapse, when more 
 unfavourably circumstanced ; and we may rest assured there 
 is nothing in the physical or moral constitution of the Negro, 
 which renders him an exception to the general character of 
 species, or which prevents him from improving in all the 
 
% Cribnfo far tip llrgrn. 
 
 161 
 
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 b^y< 
 
 MM) 
 
 estimable qualities of our nature, when placed in a situa- 
 tion conducive to his advancement. 
 
 It would be absurd to expect that a statue or a painting 
 should become perfect at once, or to find fault with the 
 work of an artist before he has had time to complete it. The 
 husbandman does not expect a crop immediately after he 
 has sown his seed ; he must wait for it. The father does not 
 expect that his son will be a scholar when he first goes to 
 school ; nor does he, when he has finished the term of his 
 education, allege that he has acquired nothing, because he 
 has not attained the greatest heights in literature, or because 
 he may not be able to solve the most difficult problems in 
 science. Time has been required to make the White races 
 what they now are, and the general improvement of the Afri- 
 can will likewise probably be a work of some time ; yet we 
 have every reason to believe, that by cultivation, he may attain 
 to an equal point of civilization and intelligence with that 
 of any other people. Nay, under all possible disadvantages, 
 we find evident proofs of the progress he is capable of 
 making, whether insulated by the deserts of Africa from com- 
 munication with other nations, or surrounded by the Slave 
 factories of Europeans, or groaning under the cruelties of 
 the driver's whip. This progress would be accelerated, in 
 proportion as these grand impediments are removed. While, 
 on the one hand, Africa is civilized by the establishment of 
 a legitimate commerce between its fertile and populous 
 regions and the more polished nations of the world, those 
 Negroes who are already freed from their grievous thral- 
 dom in the New World, would rapidly improve in all the 
 best faculties of the mind. 
 
 v^ 
 
m 
 
 
 CHAPTER XIII. 
 
 Slavery defended on the plea of coercion being necessary for the Negro- 
 Refutation of this charge— Palliated by representing him as deficient in 
 the finer feelings— This also refuted— Testimony of Capt. Rainsford— 
 Remarks of Dr. Philip— AH arguments failing, the supporters of Slavery 
 assert the Negro to be under a Divine anathema — Observations of 
 Richard Watson on this subject— Refuted on Christian grounds— All 
 tribes stretching out their hands unto God— He is sending his messen- 
 gers into the African field— The results of missionary labours very satis- 
 factory and conclusive— Encouraging facts evincing the progress of the 
 Negro in virtue and religion— Instances illustrative of the highest reli- 
 gious susceptibilities— Gustavus Yassa— Solomon Bayley— Belinda Lucas 
 —Lucy Cardwell— Simeon Wilhelm— Paul Cuffe— Cornelius— J. W. C. 
 Pennington— Jan Tzatzoe— Andries Stoffles, &c, &c— Testimony of 
 Barnabas Shaw, a Wesleyan Missionary in South Africa— Such evidences 
 very conclusive— Beautiful remarks by Richard Watson. 
 
 Among the numerous reasons assigned for the rigorous 
 treatment to which the Negro race is subjected, it is 
 asserted, as observed in a previous chapter, that nothing 
 but a state of extreme coercion is sufficient to keep them 
 in any kind of order or control. That they should quietly 
 submit to the insults and cruelties which are so coolly dealt 
 out to them, would be contrary to human nature. When 
 human beings are forcibly torn from their homes, and sepa- 
 rated from all that is near and dear to them, and deprived 
 of every liberty they enjoy, can we be surprised if they 
 should evince some indignance, or manifest some signs of 
 unwillingness to submit to the cruel yoke imposed upon 
 them, and an occasional inclination to revolt ? Negroes 
 have sometimes exhibited a spirit of despondency, which 
 has led them to commit suicide ; they have sometimes 
 shown themselves irreconcileable to a state of Slavery, and 
 have frequently been driven to self-destruction by a spirit 
 of unyielding independence. In one of the small Danish 
 islands, where they were in open rebellion, finding 
 
 ^ 
 
51 €xiMi for tjp 3f jgtn. 
 
 163 
 
 m 
 
 themselves closely pressed, but determined not to submit, 
 they rushed in a body to the edge of a cliff overhanging the 
 sea, and plunged at once into the waves. * 
 
 But so far from the general character of the Negro being 
 so savage and untractable as to require strong coercion, 
 their patience and submissiveness, unless provoked by acts 
 of wanton cruelty, has been illustrated in their general con- 
 duct in the degraded capacity to which they have been 
 doomed. With spirits more resentful, the Negro tribes 
 would not have been for ages an easy prey to every plunderer 
 and hunter of men. " Their shores would have bristled 
 with spears, and their arrows have darkened the heavens ; 
 nor would the experiment of man-stealing have been twice 
 repeated. The same character distinguishes the Negroes 
 in their state of bondage. It has not required a violent hand 
 to keep them down ; their story is not that of surly sub- 
 mission, interrupted by frequent and convulsive efforts to 
 break their chains ; and the history of Slavery nowhere, 
 and in no age, presents an example of so much resignation 
 and quietness, under similar circumstances, where the 
 bondage has been so absolute, and the proportion of the 
 dominant part of society so small." 
 
 Another plea which has been urged as a palliation of the 
 sin of Slavery, is the alleged fact of the deficiency in the 
 victims of oppression of the finer feelings of our nature, 
 their want of affection for their offspring and kindred ties. 
 But this is as false in fact, as it is opposed to sound prin- 
 ciples of philosophy. Captain Rainsford observes, " The 
 most animated and attractive examples of pure and ardent 
 love to the husbands of their hearts, and the fathers of 
 their offspring, are as strikingly exhibited under the roofs 
 of various Negro huts, as are anywhere displayed in the 
 families of the White races. In the laudable duties x>f 
 married life, and the maternal offices to the precious pledges 
 of connubial intercourse, the transported and enslaved 
 * Jamaica : Enslaved and Free. 
 
 < CTNS0 
 
M(nV 
 
 164 
 
 % €rito for tire JJignr. 
 
 matrons of Africa, are not to be surpassed by the enlightened 
 and free females of the freest land." 
 
 The passions and instincts necessary for the preserva- 
 tion of the human species are little dependent upon the 
 reasonings and refinements of men, and are often more 
 strongly evinced in the lowest than in the highest grades of 
 society. Can we suppose, for a moment, that the Author 
 of our nature, who has imparted to the most timid brutes, 
 an attachment to their young, which makes them boldly 
 risk their lives in their defence, should leave any portion 
 of our race, in their more hopeless condition, without a 
 provision for them affording an equal security ? It is, on 
 the contrary, natural to suppose that the oppressions of the 
 parents should rather increase than lessen their attachment 
 to their children ; and, in point of fact, Negroes in 
 general are remarkable for an excess of affection for their 
 offspring. " The separations of parents and children," 
 says Dr. Philip, " have, indeed, furnished the most heart- 
 rending scenes that I have witnessed in South Africa ; and 
 in a letter now before me, from a respectable individual in 
 the colony, on this very subject, the writer states, 'heart- 
 rending, indeed, are the woeful lamentations I often hear 
 from Hottentot mothers about the loss of their children.' " 
 
 Let it not be said that the sable African has not the 
 sensibilities of other men. Even the brute has the yearn- 
 ings of parental love. If, then, the conjugal and parental 
 ties of the Slave may be severed without a pang, what a 
 curse must Slavery be, if it can thus blight the heart with 
 worse than brutal insensibility, if it can sink the human 
 mother below the polar she-bear, which " howls and dies 
 for her sundered cub !" But it does not and cannot turn 
 the Slave to stone ; though it does much to quench the na- 
 tural affections, it leaves sufficient of that feeling, which 
 the Negro originally possesses in an equal extent to any 
 other class of men, to make the domestic wrongs to which 
 he is subjected, occasions of frequent and deep suffering. 
 
 ^l& 
 
£1 €nMt for iju JJrgra. 
 
 All arguments failing those who coin dollars out of the 
 sweat and tears of the African, they would fain have the 
 world to believe, as a last resource, that these anomalous 
 beings have had a mark put upon them by the Almighty, 
 that they might be at once detested, avoided, and treated 
 only as beasts of the field. To this unfortunate race has 
 been applied the prophetic malediction of Noah, " Cursed 
 be Canaan ; a servant of servants shall he be to his bre- 
 thren," the descendants of Shem and Japheth ; and the dark 
 garment of the former is pointed out as indicating the fulfil- 
 ment of their earthly fate. It is not enough that they should 
 be stultified in intellect, and brutalized beyond correction in 
 morals ; they must be represented as under a Divine ana- 
 thema, as a part of an accursed race ; thus are they not 
 only denied the honours of humanity, but are even excluded 
 from the compassions of God. And, because they have 
 been represented as under the ban of the Almighty, it has 
 been concluded, that every kind of injury, may with im- 
 punity, be inflicted upon them by his creatures. 
 
 " Nothing," says Watson, " is more repulsive than to 
 see men resorting to the inspired writings for an excuse or 
 a palliative for the injuries which they are incited to inflict 
 on others by their own pride and avarice ; going up pro- 
 fanely to the very judgment-seat of an equal God, to plead 
 his sanction for their injustice ; establishing an alliance 
 between their own passions and their imperfections ; and 
 attempting to convert the fountain of his mercy into waters 
 of bitterness. But the case they adduce will not serve 
 them. The malediction of Noah (if we allow it to be one, 
 and not a simple prediction) fell not upon the Negro races ; 
 it fell chiefly on Asia, and only to a very limited extent 
 upon Africa ; it fell, as the terms of the prophecy explicitly 
 declare, upon Canaan ; that is, in Scripture style, upon his 
 descendants, the Canaanites, who were destroyed, or made 
 subjects by the Israelites ; and perhaps upon the Cartha- 
 ginians, who were subverted by the Romans. Here was 
 
 ^r 
 
166 
 
 % €xihit fnr ttje fegnu 
 
 its range and its limit ; the curse never expanded so as to 
 encompass a single Negro tribe ; and, Africa, with all thy 
 just complaints against the practices of Christian states, 
 thou hast none against the doctrines of the Christian's 
 Bible ! That is not a book, as some have interpreted it, 
 written, as to thee, e within and without,' in ' lamentation, 
 and mourning, and woe ;' it registers against thee no curse ; 
 but, on the contrary, exhibits to thee its fulness of bless- 
 ings ; establishes thy right to its covenant of mercy, in 
 common with all mankind; and crowds into the joyous 
 prospect which it opens into the future, the spectacle of 
 all the various tribes ' stretching out their hands unto 
 God,' acknowledging him, and receiving his blessing ! 
 
 " But, if the prediction of Noah were an anathema, and 
 if that malediction were directed against the Negro races ; 
 yet, let it be remarked, it belongs not to the gospel age. Here 
 the anathemas of former dispensations are arrested and re- 
 pealed ; for no nation can remain accursed under the full 
 establishment of the dominion of Christ, since 'all the 
 families of the earth ' are to be ' blessed in Him.' The 
 deleterious stream which withers the verdure of its banks, 
 and spreads sterility through the soils it touches in its 
 course, is at length absorbed and purified in the ocean, 
 ascends from thence in cooling vapours, and comes down 
 upon the earth in fruitful showers. Thus Christianity 
 turns all curses into benedictions. Its office is to bless, 
 and to bless all nations ; it is light after darkness, and quiet 
 after agitation. The restoring and the healing character is 
 that in which all the prophets array our Saviour ; and if 
 partiality is ascribed to Him at all, it is partiality in favour 
 of the most despised, and friendless, and wretched of our 
 kind. The scythe has gone before, and, in all ages, has 
 swept down the fairest vegetation, and left it to wither, or 
 to be trodden under foot; but 'He,' it is emphatically 
 declared, ' shall come down like rain upon the mown grass, 
 like showers that water the earth :' ' all nations shall be 
 
blessed in Him,' and ' all people,' in grateful return, 
 ' shall call Him blessed.' " 
 
 Blessed for ever, then, be His holy name, whose com- 
 passions fail not, whose mercies are new every morning, for 
 he hath already arisen in His strength, and said " the 
 oppressor shall no more oppress ;" I will send forth my 
 messengers into all the dark places of the earth ; light shall 
 spring forth ; their mourning shall be turned into rejoicing, 
 and I will yet lead them beside the still waters. Marvel- 
 lous indeed is the loving-kindness of Him, whose preroga- 
 tive alone it is, to send forth labourers into the harvest, in 
 conducting the steps of so many into the African field ; 
 infusing into the hearts of good men from year to year, a 
 special compassion for this race. The memory of those 
 who have chosen danger and toil to ease and luxury at 
 home, and who have now ceased from their labours, is 
 blessed. Their " reward is on high," and their " work 
 with God." Those who now endure the cross and glory in 
 it, whether they labour under the suns of the West Indies, 
 or breathe the pestilential air of Western Africa, or in the 
 southern parts of that continent, toil over hills and through 
 deserts, " to seek and to save that which is lost," — they 
 know that God is with them What gold could purchase 
 such instruments ? What education could form them ? 
 What implanted principles of human action, where wealth, 
 and honour, and ease, are all absent, could send them forth? 
 Are they not the instruments of Heaven, indicating by the 
 very nature of their preparation, the peculiar work to which 
 they are called, the special use to which they are to apply 
 themselves ? " They are indeed the agents to carry forth 
 our charities to the Heathen, to bear our light into the 
 misery over which we sigh. Without them we should sigh 
 in vain, and our sympathies would terminate in ourselves ; 
 by them we reach and relieve the cases of destitute millions, 
 and transmit the blessedness of which we are anxious that 
 all should partake. Thus, man is made a saviour of his 
 
 W 
 
168 
 
 % €x\h\t for \\)t Jftgrn. 
 
 m 
 
 fellow, and the creature of a day the instrument of con- 
 veying blessings which have no bound but a limitless 
 eternity itself ! " 
 
 Let us appeal to the results of the labours of these 
 devoted men, and see how far they warrant us in con- 
 cluding, that the Negro race is capable with ourselves of 
 receiving, and fully appreciating the great truths of our 
 religion. These results are altogether most satisfactory 
 and conclusive. 
 
 About the year 1824, a Jamaica missionary writes : — 
 " Not only has religion found its way into almost every 
 town and village of importance in the island, but in a greater 
 or less degree, into the majority of the estates, and other 
 larger properties. As soon as its sacred influence begins 
 to be felt on a property, or in a new township, the first 
 work of the converts is, to add to their cluster of cottages 
 a house for God. There they are heard, often before the 
 dawn of day, and at the latest hour preceding their repose, 
 pouring out their earnest and artless supplications at the 
 throne of grace, for strength to enable them to maintain 
 their Christian course."* 
 
 " The numbers of our hearers," writes brother Lang, " is 
 on the increase, and the preaching of the gospel evinces its 
 power on the hearts of the Negroes, which also appears in 
 their moral conduct. Some walk in true fellowship of 
 spirit with our Saviour, and have received the assurance 
 of the forgiveness of their sins : others are mourning on ac- 
 count of sin, and seeking salvation in Jesus. One Sabbath 
 lately, a Negro, from an estate about fifteen miles from Car- 
 mel (Jamaica), brought me a stick marked with seven 
 notches, each denoting ten Negroes, informing me that 
 there were so many Negroes on that estate engaged in 
 praying to the Lord. The awakening spreads, and we en- 
 tertain hopes that our Saviour will now gather a rich har- 
 vest in Jamaica." -f 
 
 * Jamaica : Enslaved and Free. 
 
 f Idem. 
 
Another Jamaica missionary writes, " It is also worthy of 
 observation, that instead of singing their old Negro songs 
 in the field, they now sing our hymns ; and I was much 
 pleased one night, when passing the Negro houses, to hear 
 them engaged fervently in prayer." * 
 
 Another missionary writes, " However debased by vice 
 the Negro Slaves were in the days of their ignorance, they 
 are now sober, chaste, industrious, and upright in all their 
 dealings. Nor is this all ; they are eager, punctual, and 
 persevering in all the services of devotion. Their domestic 
 circle is distinguished by the daily exercises of prayer and 
 praise ; and the Sabbath is called ' a delight, the holy of 
 the Lord,' and spent in the solemnities of His sacred worship. 
 This indeed is wonderful! In a country where the Sabbath 
 is devoted to public traffic ; where, comparatively speaking, 
 marriage is not so much as thought of ; and, where it is 
 common to indulge in the most debauched inclinations, 
 without the least restraint, — to see them keeping the 
 Sabbath-day holy, renouncing all their criminal connections, 
 and standing forth as examples of purity and religion, is 
 manifestly the Lord's doing ; for nothing short of the power 
 of God could obtain a victory like this over habit, example, 
 and such corruption of the human heart." f 
 
 The missionaries have elucidated how far the African 
 race are susceptible of religious impressions ; ' ' they have 
 dived," says Watson, "into that mine from which we were 
 often told no valuable ore or precious stone could be ex- 
 tracted ; and they have brought up the gems of an immortal 
 spirit, flashing with the light of intellect, and glowing with 
 the hues of Christian graces. The true God has now been 
 revealed to the minds of the African races, in the splendour 
 of his own revelations ; the heavens have been taught to 
 declare to them his glory, and the firmament to show forth 
 his handy work ; they know him now as their ' Father in 
 Heaven,' and have learned that his watchful providence 
 
 * Jamaica : Enslaved and Free, f Quoted in Watson's Sermons. 
 
 m 
 
1 €ritotte for tju Jfogrn. 
 
 extends to them. Rising suns, and smiling fields, and rolling 
 thunders, and sweeping hurricanes, all speak of Him to 
 Negro hearts ; and Negro voices mingle with our own in 
 giving to Him the praises 'due unto His name.' The 
 history of the incarnate God, and the scenes of Calvary 
 have been unfolded to their gaze ; they hear ' the word 
 of reconciliation,' are invited to a ' throne of grace,' and 
 there ' find mercy, and grace to help in time of need.' 
 They have the Sabbath with its sanctities ; and houses of 
 prayer, raised by the liberality of their friends, receive their 
 willing, pressing crowds. One to another they now say, 
 ' Come and let us go up to the house of the Lord ;' and tens 
 of thousands of them now, in every religious service, join 
 us in those everlasting anthems of the universal church, ' We 
 praise thee, O God ! we acknowledge thee to be the Lord !' " 
 
 Instances might be multiplied, almost without end, 
 illustrative of the racesof Africa being universally endowed 
 with religious susceptibilities equal to those of any other 
 people on the face of the earth ; and many are the examples 
 of purity, and of advancement in religious experience 
 and attainments, which might be brought forward as wit- 
 nesses to its truth. I will only mention the names of 
 Gustavus Vassa, Solomon Bayley, Belinda Lucas, Lucy 
 Cardwell, Simeon Wilhelm, Paul CufFe, L. C. Michells, 
 Richard Cooper, Africaner, Cornelius, Jan Tzatzoe, 
 Andries S toffies, J. W. C. Pennington, John Williams, Eva 
 Bartells, respecting each of whom information is given in 
 the sequel of this work. In S toffies, we have exhibited a 
 noble example of the Christian character. At an early 
 period, the truths of religion exerted a decisive and salutary 
 influence over his mind, leading him to profess himself a 
 disciple of the Saviour, and enabling him, under many dis- 
 advantages and temptations, to maintain his Christian pro- 
 fession unsullied till the close of life. 
 
 I cannot forbear relating another interesting fact, from 
 Shaw's Memorials of South Africa, which he beautifully 
 
 m 
 
records in the following words : — " The pious natives of 
 Khamies Berg, in South Africa, continued to improve both 
 in temporal and spiritual matters, and were as a city set on 
 a hill which cannot be hid : their light shone in worshipping 
 God in their families. Often have I heard them engaged 
 in prayer before the sun had gilded the tops of the mountains ; 
 nor were their evening devotions neglected. As I have stood 
 by the mission-house, with the curtains of night drawn 
 around us, I could hear them uniting in singing their 
 beautiful evening hymn. Then falling around their family 
 altar, though in a smoky hut, they felt the presence of the 
 Most High, and the fulfilment of his promise, t The habi- 
 tation of the just shall be blessed.' " 
 
 On another occasion, writes the Missionary Shaw ; — 
 " It was nearly midnight, when, on awaking, I heard the 
 sound of singing at a distance. I repaired to the window 
 to listen, when all nature seemed to favour the song. The 
 moon shone resplendently, and the stars glittered in their 
 spheres. There was no bleating of sheep, or lowing of 
 oxen ; no howling of wolves ; the night birds were still : 
 nor did a dog move his tongue. The midnight music was 
 so sweet, that, at the time, I supposed I had never heard 
 anything to equal it. The singers were going from hut to 
 hut, uniting in the praises of God, who had brought them 
 ' out of darkness into marvellous light ;' and as they ap- 
 proached the mission-house, I could distinguish the subject 
 of their song. It was a hymn of praise to the Saviour of 
 men, one verse of which, according to their custom, was often 
 repeated. The nightly fires brightened up as the singers 
 went onward, and they called on the head of each family to 
 engage in prayer. In their state of ignorance they had often 
 danced to the sound of the rommel-pot, while the moon was 
 walking in brightness ; but by means of the Gospel, they 
 had learnt a new song, which reminded me of the words of 
 Isaiah, ' Let the inhabitants of the rock sing, let them shout 
 from the top of the mountains.' Several children who had 
 
 <3 nNS} 
 
:4Q 
 
 DMib 
 
 172 
 
 51 €tlhit for tip Jftgnr. 
 
 been attentive to the Gospel began to show an extraor- 
 dinary attachment to the house of God, they bowed before 
 the Lord their Maker, and sung joyful Hosannas to the 
 Son of David." 
 
 With such evidences as these, we need no laborious and 
 critical investigation to determine whether " Ethiopia 
 shall soon stretch out her hands unto God ;" no prying into 
 the mystic counsels of heaven, to ascertain whether the 
 " time to favour her, yea, the set time be come." Go to 
 the free colonies, ye that doubt ; scarcely is there one of 
 them in which there have not been reared for the Negro, 
 sacred buildings for worship and instruction, devoted to 
 their own use, and which they regard as peculiarly their 
 own. " In crowded congregations, in those spacious edi- 
 fices, Ethiopia already stretches out her hands unto God, 
 and, led by the light which creates our Sabbath, meets us 
 at the same throne of grace, and receives, with us, the 
 benedictions of the common Father and the common Sa- 
 viour. And the prophetic promise is dawning upon parent 
 Africa also. Hottentots, Kafirs, Bechuanahs, Foulahs, and 
 Mandingoes in the west, some of all the tribes, are already 
 in the fold, and hear and love the voice of the great Shep- 
 herd. We hail you as brethren ! — the front ranks of all 
 those swarthy tribes which are deeply buried in the vast 
 interior of an unexplored continent, you, stretch out your 
 hands unto God, as a signal for the tribes beyond you ; 
 and the signal shall be followed, and every hand of thy 
 millions, Africa ! shall raise itself in devotion to thy pitying 
 Saviour, and every lip shall ere long modulate accents of 
 grateful praise to thy long concealed, but faithful God !" * 
 
 * Richard "Watson. 
 
CHAPTER XIV. 
 
 Slavery considered — A violation of the rights of Man — Kemarks of Milton 
 — Condemned by Pope Leo X. — Kemarks of Bishop Warburton — How 
 can Christians continue to be its upholders? — Guilt of Britons and Ameri- 
 cans — Expiation of our sin by a noble sacrifice — We can never repay the 
 debt we owe to Africa — White Man instilling into those he calls 
 " savages" a despicable opinion of human nature — We practise what we 
 should exclaim against — No tangible plea for Slavery — Criminal to re- 
 main silent spectators of its crimes — We cannot plead ignorance as an 
 excuse for silence or inactivity — Seven millions of human beings now in 
 Slavery — Four hundred thousand annually torn from Africa — Slavery a 
 monstrous crime — A robbery perpetrated on the very sanctuary of man's 
 rational nature — A sin against Grod — America's foul blot — Slaves repre- 
 sented as happy ! — Kemarks on this. 
 
 Although the consideration of the subject of Slavery is 
 not altogether within the province of this work, I shall not 
 feel satisfied without making some allusion to it in a few 
 words ; seriously putting the question to all those who are 
 concerned in the system, directly or indirectly, whether, in 
 the face of what has already been cited, they can still, with an 
 easy conscience, look down with an eye of scorn upon their 
 fellow-creatures of a darker hue, or continue to hold them 
 in unwilling bondage, or depress them as they do, with the 
 iron hand of Slavery. 
 
 Claims to personal liberty are the birthright of every 
 human being, irrespective of clime or of colour ; — claims 
 which God has conferred, and which man cannot destroy 
 without sacrilege, nor infringe without sin. They have 
 claims which are anterior to all human laws, and which are 
 superior to all political institutions, — immutable in their 
 nature. Thus writes our great poet Milton : — 
 
 " O execrable man, so to aspire 
 Above his brethren, to himself assuming 
 Authority usurpt, from God not given ; 
 He gave us only over beast, fish, fowl, 
 Dominion absolute ; that right we hold 
 
1 €xlhk for tjj? Iltgrn. 
 
 By his donation ; but man over men 
 He made not lord, such title to himself 
 Reserving, human left from human free." 
 
 Many condemnations against the system of one class of 
 men oppressing another might be adduced. Pope Leo X., 
 when the question was referred to him, declared " That 
 not only the Christian religion, but nature herself cried out 
 against Slavery." The continuance of the unmerited and 
 brutish servitude of the Negro, is undoubtedly nothing 
 short of a criminal and outrageous violation of the natural 
 rights of man. — " Gracious God ! " exclaims Bishop War- 
 burton, " to talk of men as of herds of cattle, of property 
 in rational creatures, creatures endowed with all our facul- 
 ties, possessing all our qualities but that of colour, our 
 brethren both by nature and by grace, shocks all the feel- 
 ings of humanity, and the dictates of common sense ! 
 Nothing is more certain in itself and apparent to all, that 
 the infamous traffic in Slaves directly infringes both divine 
 and human law. Nature created man free, and grace in- 
 vites him to assert his freedom." 
 
 How can Christian professors, — professors of a religion 
 breathing love and good will to man, continue to be the 
 undisguised and guilty supporters and advocates of the atro- 
 cious system of Slavery ? themselves the owners, and the 
 dealers in these " human chattels ;" who, as if in mockery 
 of the sacred name of liberty, are exposed for sale within 
 the very precincts of those 
 
 " Council Halls, 
 
 Where freedom's praise is loud and long, 
 
 While close beneath the outward walls 
 
 The driver plies his reeking thong — 
 
 The ha mm er of the man-thief falls !" 
 f 
 
 It makes one's very blood to boil, it makes one tremble 
 
 to think, that we Britons and our American descendants, 
 
 with all their boastful cry of " Liberty," are so guilty ; but 
 
 it is some consolation to reflect that we at least, have made 
 
% #fMe for ijjr Jilrgrn. 
 
 a greater sacrifice than was ever made by any nation to ex- 
 piate our sin. " On the page of history," it has been said, 
 " one deed shall stand out in whole relief — one consenting 
 voice pronounce — -that the greatest honour England ever 
 attained, was when, with her Sovereign at her head, she 
 proclaimed, — the Slave is Free !" — Yes, " in the pages of 
 history," says the estimable Hugh Stowell, " this act will 
 stand out the gem in our diadem." 
 
 Yet all the efforts we can make for the civil and religious 
 welfare of the Negro family will never repay the debt we 
 owe to the whole race of Africa for having robbed her of 
 her children, under every aggravated form of cruelty, to 
 increase our own comforts, to augment our private wealth, 
 and add to our public revenues, by toils which imposed a 
 daily stretch upon their sinews ; a task which had no ter- 
 mination, but with their lives. 
 
 The White Man may boast of his superior intellect, and 
 the peculiar advantages he enjoys, of a written revelation 
 of his duty from heaven, of which he has deprived the vic- 
 tims of his oppression ; yet with all his vaunted superiority, 
 he is instilling into the minds of those whom he chooses to 
 call savages and barbarians, the very reverse of that which 
 the Divine law inculcates, the most despicable opinion of 
 human nature. To the utmost of our power do we weaken 
 and dissolve the universal tie that should bind and unite 
 mankind. We practise what we should exclaim against as 
 the greatest excess of cruelty and tyranny, if nations of the 
 world, differing in colour from ourselves, were able to re- 
 duce us to a state of similar unmerited and brutish servitude. 
 We sacrifice our reason, our humanity, our Christianity, 
 to an unnatural sordid gain. We teach other nations to 
 despise and trample under foot all the obligations of social 
 virtue. We take the most effectual method to prevent the 
 propagation of the Gospel, by representing it as a scheme 
 of power and barbarous oppression, and an enemy to the 
 natural privileges and rights of man. 
 
I assert, that there does not exist in nature, in religion, 
 or in civil polity, a reason for robbing any man of his liberty ; 
 that there is neither truth, nor justice, nor humanity in the 
 declaration, that Slavery is consonant with the condition of 
 Negro-men. To devote one-fourth of the habitable globe 
 to perpetual blood-shed and warfare — to give up the vast 
 continent of Africa to the ravages of the man-robbers who 
 deal in flesh and blood — the marauders who sack the towns 
 and villages — the merchant-murderers who ply the odious 
 trade, who separate the child from the mother, the husband 
 from the wife, the father from the son, is a monstrous system 
 of cruelty, which, in any of its forms is intolerable and 
 unjust. " Cvy aloud and spare not," was the language of one 
 formerly; a language especially applicable at the present 
 day on the question before us, in relation to which Benezet 
 justly queries, " Can we be innocent, and yet silent spec- 
 tators of this mighty infringement of every human and 
 sacred right?" 
 
 There are questions affecting the highest interests of 
 society, on which it is criminal to be silent. There are 
 crimes and conspiracies against Man, in his collective and 
 individual capacity, which strip the guilty of all the respect 
 due to the adventitious circumstances connected with rank 
 and station ; and to know that such combinations exist, and 
 not to denounce them, is treason against the throne of 
 Heaven, and the immutable principles of Truth and Justice. 
 
 We cannot plead ignorance as an excuse either for silence 
 or inactivity : — 
 
 " Beliold the Negro ! 
 — The curse of man his branded forehead bears, 
 His bosom with the scorching iron sear'd, 
 His fettered limbs denied with streams of gore !" 
 
 " Hark ! from the "West a voice of woe ; 
 Ah ! yes ; it echoes o'er the wide Atlantic's wave ; 
 We hear the knotted scourge, the dying cry ; 
 Yonder the torturer's hands, the clanking chain ; 
 Fly to the rescue ! lingering loiterer fly !" 
 
% €xih\t for tjp Jfogm 
 
 ill 
 
 Behold tli em! men, women, and children, with tearful 
 eyes, and with uplifted hands, with branded and bleeding 
 bodies, with lacerated feet and clanking chains, supplicating, 
 on bended knees, for the restoration of their rights ! 
 
 " It is the voice of blood ; — think ! O think ! 
 
 Act — for tlie injured, dying Slave : 
 Nor let Mm linger longer — deeper sink — 
 
 But haste to help — to save. 
 
 Let not his injuries plead in vain, 
 
 Lest haply in thy dying day, 
 Thy soul should bear a guilty stain, 
 
 Which nought can wash away. 
 
 O help him, lest in hall and bower, 
 
 His crying blood thy joys molest ; 
 Or, speaking through the midnight hour, 
 
 Chase like a ghost thy rest. 
 
 O help him — bless him — for ye can : 
 
 Hear Reason's — hear Religion's plea, 
 Declare to all — he is a man — 
 
 Therefore — he shall be feee !" 
 
 When we reflect that there are now in the world, upwards 
 of Seven Millions of human beings detained in Slavery ; 
 who are held as goods and chattels, the property of other 
 human beings having similar passions with themselves ; 
 that they are liable to be sold and transferred from hand 
 to hand, like the beasts that perish ; that more than 400,000 
 are annually sold and removed from the land of their birth, 
 to distant regions; and this not in families, the nearest 
 connexions of life being frequently torn asunder ; and when 
 we further reflect, that in several, if not in most of the Slave- 
 holding States, the Slaves are systematically excluded from 
 the means of improving their minds — that in some, even 
 teaching them to read is treated as a crime ; and that all these 
 things exist amongst a people loudly proclaiming the freedom 
 and equality of their laws — a people professing subjection 
 to the requirements of Christianity, whose lawgiver has 
 taught us that he regards the injuries done to the least of 
 
&$, 
 
 178 
 
 % €xM* fnr tire jfcp. 
 
 his children as done to Himself ; and has commanded us 
 above all things to love one another, to do unto all men 
 as we would that they should do unto us — well may we 
 inquire, " Shall not the Lord visit for these things ? "Will 
 not he be avenged for this grievous sin ?" 
 
 The monstrous crime of human Slavery does not merely 
 affect the external property of man, but the inmost 
 essence of his spiritual being ; it is the iniquity of a 
 murderous robbery perpetrated on the very sanctuary of 
 man's rational nature. It is a deprivation of all the rights 
 and privileges of the individual enslaved, which consist in 
 the free exercise and expansion of his powers, "especially 
 of his higher faculties ; in the energy of his intellect, 
 conscience, and good affections ; in sound judgment ; in the 
 acquisition of truth ; in labouring honestly for himself and 
 his family; in loving his Creator, and subjecting his own 
 will to the Divine ; in loving his fellow-creatures, and 
 making cheerful sacrifices for their happiness ; in friendship ; 
 in sensibility to the beautiful, whether in nature or art ; 
 in loyalty to his principles ; in moral courage ; in self- 
 respect ; in understanding and asserting his rights ; and in 
 the christian hope of immortality. Such is the good of the 
 individual ; a more sacred, exalted, enduring interest than 
 any accessions of wealth or power to a State." * 
 
 The deprivation of the inestimable benefits of external 
 liberty, though in itself an irreparable injury, bears no 
 comparison with the loss of his rational powers, a crime 
 inflicted on the unhappy victim of Slavery, which entirely 
 changes the course of his destiny. God has endowed us 
 with intellectual powers that they should be cultivated ; 
 and a system which degrades them, and can only be upheld by 
 their depression, opposes one of his most benevolent designs. 
 Reason is God's image in man, and the capacity of acquiring 
 truth is among his best inspirations. To call forth the 
 intellect is a principal purpose of the circumstances in which 
 
 * Charming. 
 
we are placed, of the child's connection with the parent, 
 and of the necessity laid on him in mature life to provide 
 for himself and others. The education of the intellect is 
 not confined to youth ; but the various experience of later 
 years does vastly more than hooks and schools to ripen and 
 invigorate the faculties. 
 
 Now the whole lot of the Slave is fitted to keep his mind 
 in childhood and bondage. Though living in a land of 
 light, few beams find their way to his benighted under- 
 standing. No parent feels the duty of instructing him. No 
 teacher is provided for him but the driver, who breaks him 
 almost in childhood, to the servile tasks which are to fill up 
 his life. No book is opened to his } 7 outhful curiosity ; as 
 he advances in years, no new excitements supply the place 
 of teachers. He is not cast on himself, made to depend on 
 his own energies ; nor do any stirring prizes awaken his 
 dormant faculties. Fed and clothed by others like a child, 
 directed in every step, doomed for life to a monotonous 
 round of labour, he lives and dies without a spring to his 
 powers, often brutally unconscious of his spiritual nature. 
 Nor is this all. Y/hen benevolence would approach him 
 with instruction it is repelled. He is not allowed to be 
 taught. The light is jealously barred out. The voice which 
 would speak to him as a man, is put to silence. He must 
 not even be enabled to read the Holy Scriptures. His im- 
 mortal spirit is systematically crushed. 
 
 Slaver} 7 , then, is undoubtedly the most tremendous in- 
 vasion of the natural, inalienable rights of man, and some of 
 the noblest gifts of God, " life, liberty, and the pursuit of 
 happiness." What a spectacle do the United States present 
 to the people of the earth ? A land of professing Christian 
 republicans, uniting their energies for the oppression and 
 degradation of Three Millions of innocent human beings, 
 the children of one common Father, who suffer the most 
 grievous wrongs, and the utmost degradation, for no crime of 
 their ancestors or their own ! Slavery is a sin against God 
 
 IWfJ 
 
180 
 
 % €ritt for \\t Jftgrn. 
 
 as well as against Man ; — a daring usurpation of the prero- 
 gative and authority of the Most High ! and until this foul 
 blot be removed from America, she will never be the 
 glorious country her free constitution designed her to be 
 — never ! so long as her soil is polluted by a single Slave ! 
 But how so ? — We are told the Slave is happy ; that he 
 is gay ; that he is not that wretched and miserable being 
 he is mostly represented to be. After his toil, he sings, he 
 dances, he gives no signs of an exhausted frame or gloomy 
 spirits. " The Slave happy ! Why, then, contend for 
 rights ? Why follow with beating hearts the struggles of 
 the patriot for freedom ? Why canonize the martyr to 
 freedom ? The Slave happy ! Then happiness is to be 
 found in giving up the distinctive attributes of a man ; in 
 darkening intellect and conscience ; in quenching generous 
 sentiments ; in servility of spirit ; in living under a whip ; 
 in having neither property nor rights ; in holding wife and 
 child at another's pleasure ; in toiling without hope ; in 
 living without an end ! The Slave, indeed, has his plea- 
 sures. His animal nature survives the injury to his 
 rational and moral powers ; and every animal has its en- 
 joyments. The kindness of Providence allows no human 
 being to be wholly divorced from good. The lamb frolics ; 
 the dog leaps for joy; the bird fills the air with cheerful 
 harmony ; and the Slave spends his holidays in laugh- 
 ter and the dance. Thanks to Him who never leaves him- 
 self without a witness ; who cheers even the desert with 
 spots of verdure ; and opens a fountain of joy in the most 
 withered heart ! It is not possible, however, to contemplate 
 the occasional gaiety of the Slave without some mixture of 
 painful thought. He is gay, because he is too fallen to 
 feel his wrongs — because he wants proper self-respect. We 
 are grieved by the gaiety of the insane. There is a 
 sadness in the gaiety of him whose lightness of heart would 
 be turned into bitterness and indignation, were one ray 
 of light to awaken in him the spirit of a man." 
 
CHAPTER XV. 
 
 Sources whence the calumnious charges against the Negro emanate 
 — Their character only partially represented — Applicable remarks of 
 Plutarch — Perverted accounts of travellers to be guarded against — Op- 
 portunities of actual observation limited — Importance of authentic facts 
 — They prove that mankind are all equally endowed, irrespective of 
 Colour or of clime — Compassion for a sufferer heightened by youth, 
 beauty, and rank — A3 in Mary, Queen of Scots — The facts presented in 
 this volume prove there is no incompatibility between Negro organization 
 and intellectual powers — To demonstrate this the design of the work — 
 In selecting instances for this purpose, the author has been more 
 thoroughly impressed with the truth of his proposition — Negroes only 
 require freedom, education, and good government to equal any people — 
 Expression of sympathy for the oppressed race of Africa. 
 
 I must now be more concise, being desirous of presenting 
 my readers with the numerous biographical and historical facts 
 to which allusion has been made, in further demonstration 
 of the assertions I have already brought forward in favour 
 of the Negro family. A few observations will now suffice. 
 
 It must be observed, that the calumnious charges pre- 
 ferred against the unfortunate race of Africa, have chiefly 
 emanated from those who have been interested in pour- 
 traying their vicious, rather than their virtuous qualities. 
 Writers of this description are not likely to search for such 
 collateral facts as might lead to conclusions opposed to their 
 interests or prejudices ; on the contrary, where circum- 
 stances of a favourable nature are known to exist, there is 
 great danger of their being left in concealment. Plutarch 
 remarks, " When a painter has to draw a fine and elegant 
 form, which happens to have a blemish, we do not want 
 him entirely to omit it, nor yet to define it with exactness. 
 The one would destroy the beauty of the picture ; the other 
 would spoil the likeness." On a casual perusal of the 
 works of many writers on the Negro race, it is obvious that 
 most who have travelled amongst them, have not only 
 
% €vMt for tlR J£ep, 
 
 marked distinctly, but aggravated their blemishes, and have 
 so far disparaged their more pleasing features, as to create 
 disgust towards a people, who, if they cannot boast of forms 
 to call forth admiration, exhibit, nevertheless, but few of those 
 physical and moral deformities so largely ascribed to them. 
 There is a propensity, too, in some travellers, to aim at 
 novelty and effect, which so overbalances all other consider- 
 ations, as frequently to give rise to very erroneous state- 
 ments. For instance, a French writer on South Africa, 
 describes whole tribes of natives which never existed, 
 except in his own romantic imagination. Another traveller 
 informs his readers that the Hottentots " shoot their arrows 
 with great force, sending them sometimes through the body 
 of an ox ;" a third states that, " sometimes persons may be 
 seen at Grreenpoint riding on Zebras, which are brought from 
 the interior, and generally kept at livery ;" while a fourth 
 informs his readers, that " the roads in the vicinity of Cape 
 Town are repaired with the tails of cows and oxen."* 
 
 I merely mention these circumstances to put the reader 
 on his guard, and to exercise cautiousness in receiving all 
 reports he may read respecting the African, as gospel. 
 Superficial travellers are themselves liable to be imposed 
 upon by erroneous statements they may sometimes have 
 made to them, by interested parties, or through an inte- 
 rested channel, to serve some sinister motives of the narra- 
 tors ; ignorant of which, they often relate circumstances 
 far from the real truth, as facts, under the false impression 
 that they have seen everything with their own eyes, and 
 heard everything with their own ears. 
 
 In order to form a correct estimate of the character of a 
 people, we must not look into the journals of hasty 
 travellers for information they may have gathered from 
 hearsay during their short visits; but to such as have 
 resided among them, and have made themselves intimately 
 
 * These incorrect statements are quoted by way of caution, in Shaw's 
 Memorials of South Africa. 
 
% €x\hk fur ilje %%n. 
 
 183 
 
 c© 
 
 ^£? 
 
 acquainted with, their language, their customs, and their 
 manners. 
 
 When we observe men judging of any portion of the 
 human race through the medium of their prejudices and 
 passions, and from insulated facts seizing on general prin- 
 ciples, we may rest assured they are unsafe guides. They 
 draw a comparison between the present state of the semi- 
 barbarous races and a higher standard of civilization ; and 
 without bestowing one grain of praise, they find fault only 
 on account of what has not yet been effected for them. 
 In detailing the degraded state of the Negro, they are silent 
 as to the great causes of that which they disclaim against, 
 which has already been satisfactorily explained, as resulting 
 from the treatment he has so long experienced at the hands 
 of Europeans, with the almost entire absence of all counter- 
 acting and meliorating circumstances. 
 
 The opportunities of actual observation that fall to the 
 lot of impartial individuals, are so limited, and the remarks 
 of travellers and historians writing on this subject, either from 
 ignorance or misrepresentation, are so much perverted, that 
 it appeared to the author of the present work, desirable to 
 correct them by a narration of facts from sources indubitably 
 authentic, illustrative of the moral, intellectual, and religious 
 attainments of our sable brethren. These, with various 
 testimonies on their behalf, are valuable and important, in 
 conveying unequivocal proofs of the real character and 
 capabilities of the African race. They are sufficient, I 
 trust, fully to demonstrate that the same mental and moral 
 endowments are equally dispensed to all the various races 
 of mankind, irrespective of colour or of clime ; and I do 
 sincerely hope, that they may be the means of engender- 
 ing a more friendly feeling, on the part of the White man, 
 towards those whom he has so long held in oppression 
 and treated with scorn and disgrace. 
 
 But before a thorough reconciliation can ever be effected, 
 all those grossly exaggerated reports of the physical and 
 
 - 
 
184 
 
 % tribute fnr tire JlBgrn. 
 
 moral deformities of the Negro must be counteracted. 
 Though their race may not generally reach the standard of 
 perfection according to our ideas of beauty and symmetry, 
 we must cease to represent them in the most odious point 
 of view. It is well known how much the adventitious cir- 
 cumstances of youth and beauty heighten our compassion 
 for a sufferer. Add rank to these advantages, and say, too, 
 that the individual is a highly accomplished female, and 
 sympathy for her case will be raised to its utmost height. 
 Had Mary, Queen of Scots, been as defective in personal 
 charms as she was in prudence, less sympathy would have 
 been excited by her unfortunate end. Knox might have 
 made an ugly and deformed woman weep without creating 
 much indignation ; but the fascinations of Mary's beauty, 
 added to her rank, has sunk her crimes, and the benefits 
 of the Reformation, in the same grave ; and that which 
 entitled our reformer to the highest praise, the triumph of 
 his principles, has loaded him with the reproaches of a par- 
 tial and frivolous world. On the same principle, when the 
 liberties of a people are to be extinguished, or when greater 
 severities are to be inflicted, if, besides assigning to them 
 certain disqualifications for freedom, and the necessity of 
 restraining their vices, ugliness and deformity can be thrown 
 into the picture, few will interest themselves in the fate of 
 the oppressed. Misrepresentation and calumny having 
 prepared the way, the work of Slavery and extermination 
 may proceed with impunity. * 
 
 Many of the African race, as we have already been 
 informed, particularly the youth, have interesting coun- 
 tenances, and under more auspicious circumstances, would 
 speedily lose those displeasing peculiarities of appearance, 
 which in all countries are, in a greater or less degree, the 
 inseparable concomitants of penury and suffering. The 
 plant, which in the desert, is stunted in its growth 
 and presents but a scanty foliage, becomes the pride 
 * Philip's African Researches. 
 
51 €Mt fnr tijB Jftgrn. 
 
 of the surrounding scenery when nourished by a more 
 generous soil. 
 
 "Facts," it is said, "are stubborn things," and such is 
 indeed the case ; they cannot be controverted. The false 
 philosophy which imputes to the Negro a constitutional 
 inferiority, must henceforth be refuted, more by facts and 
 experience, than by reasoning. If, as I before observed, 
 instances can be adduced, of individuals of the African race 
 who have exhibited marks of genius that would be considered 
 eminent in civilized European society, we have proof that 
 there is no incompatibility betwen Negro organization and in- 
 tellectual power. The design of the succeeding part of this 
 volume is to bring into view many remarkable cases of this 
 description. How far it is successful in demonstrating, by a 
 relation of facts and testimonies, that our Coloured fellow- 
 creatures are not necessarily inferior in their moral, intellec- 
 tual, or religious capabilities, to other branches of the hu- 
 man family, and that superior abilities attach no more to a 
 white than to a sable skin, I must leave my readers to draw 
 their own conclusion. For my own part, I am fully convinced 
 that the blessings of freedom, education, and good govern- 
 ment, are alone wanting to make the natives of Africa, 
 either in an intellectual or moral point of view, equal to the 
 people of any country on the surface of the globe. Were 
 these blessings more abundantly conferred upon them, 
 there can be no doubt that they would produce more 
 Phillis Wheatleys, Paul Cuffes, and Gustavus Vassas, to 
 refute the unfounded calumnies which have been heaped 
 upon their unfortunate race, to demonstrate before all the 
 world, that the Creator has not left them destitute of his 
 noblest gifts to Man, nor of the power of improving those 
 he has bestowed upon them. 
 
 I repeat it again, — " Let not the abettors of Slavery, 
 who trample their fellow-creatures beneath their feet, tell 
 us any more in their own justification, of the degraded 
 state, the abject minds, and the vices of the Negro Slave ; 
 
 ( FmNS) 
 
186 
 
 % fritafe for tju Jfrgrn. 
 
 «£ is ?^>ow £/je system which thus brutifies a human being 
 that the reproach falls in all its bitterness." 
 
 ** Yes, to deep sadness sullenly resigned, 
 He feels his body's bondage in his mind, 
 Puts off his generous nature, and to suit 
 His manner to his fate, puts on the brute. 
 Oh ! most degrading of all ills that wait 
 On man, a mourner in his best estate ; 
 All other sorrow virtue may endure, 
 And find submission more than half a cure, 
 But Slavery ! virtue dreads it as her grave, 
 Virtue itself is meanness in the Slave." 
 
 Helpless, injured, and oppressed Africans ! many tears 
 have been shed over your unhappy fate and your accumu- 
 lated wrongs ; many sleepless nights have been occupied in 
 devising means to meliorate your condition, but every 
 attempt in your behalf must centre in fervent aspiration to 
 Him who alone can change, even the hard and stony hearts 
 of your taskmasters ; whose eye is over all His works ; and 
 who will yet arise for your deliverance. 
 
 It is not for finite mortals to ask, why, in the inscrutable 
 wisdom of Him who overrules all events, he has thus far 
 permitted one portion of His creatures so cruelly to 
 oppress another ; or through what instrumentality He will 
 at length redress the wrongs of the sufferer, bind up his 
 broken heart, and heal his wounds. 
 
 " Time yet will come, 'tis His decree, 
 When tyrant force shall fail ; 
 When Justice, all who trample thee, 
 For evermore must wail." 
 
 Unfortunate fellow-creatures, innocent sufferers, how- 
 ever you may still continue to be despised and afflicted, 
 have comfort in believing that this is not the place of your 
 rest ; endless joys are laid up for you in that blessed country 
 where the oppressor can no more oppress ; for, doubtless, 
 you are, equally with all mankind, the objects of redeem- 
 in": love ! 
 
if 
 
 " Ethiopia from afar, 
 
 Shall adore the sacred name ; 
 Mercy break the cruel bar 
 
 That obstructs religion's flame. 
 
 Charity responsive glows, 
 
 Ardour fills the throbbing breast; 
 Mourns tho wretched captive's woes, 
 
 Pants to sec those woes redress'd. 
 
 Pensive thought awakes to languish, 
 
 O'er the mass of human ill ; 
 Weeps the abject Negro's anguish, 
 
 Crush'd beneath a tyrant's will. 
 
 Ocean's deep, resistless tide, 
 
 Covers many a lovely gem ; 
 Nor can complexion virtue hide — 
 
 Noble actions shine in them. 
 
 Who could count the hollow groan?, 
 Wafted o'er the Atlantic wave, 
 
 With the deep and bitter moans, 
 Ceasing only in the grave ! 
 
 Unobserv'd his sighs may heave, 
 Silent may hia tears descend ; 
 
 Will none such agony relieve ? 
 No one prove the Negro's friend ? 
 
 If by age and sorrow hoary, 
 
 His food may yet be angels' bread ; 
 
 For him a Saviour left His glory, — 
 For him a dear Redeemer bled. 
 
 Oh ! may the Gospel's joyful sound, 
 Hours of grief and labour cheer ; 
 
 Religion's holy flame be found, 
 To smooth the chain he still must wear 
 
 Bereft of every earthly joy, 
 
 Hope, sweetly rise to things above, 
 
 Where no distracting cares annoy, 
 Where all is harmony and love." 
 
 paF 
 
v\zv/£s 
 
 €& of 
 f art JM 
 
 ^ 
 
(3) r?^ 7 ^^^(ScT^ ^-4%Q) 
 
 $ €xlhlt for tjie Agra, 
 
 ^K ^ingrn|i|itrn:l itetrljrs nf Mririms nr ijmr #^j) 
 tontnimts, tnitfr tetanies nf €xml- v 
 to, ®is3innam0 ; fci. xiB$txlw§ tjum. 
 
 ' To injured Afric', liberal reader turn, 
 There from her sable sons this maxim learn ; 
 To no complexion is the charm confined, 
 In every climate grows the virtuous mind." 
 
 'Ab .ffithiope virtutem disce, et ne crede colori." — From the 
 Ethiopian learn virtue, and trust not to colour. 
 
 Q^# 
 
A TRIBUTE FOR THE NEGRO. 
 
 ^art $umt 
 
 BIOGEAPHICAL SKETCHES OF AFEICANS OE THEIE 
 DESCENDANTS, fto. 
 
 Truth, by Its own sinews shall prevail; 
 
 And in the course of Heaven's evolving plan, 
 
 By truth made free the long scorned African, — 
 
 His Maker's image radiant in his face, — 
 
 Among earth's noblest sons shall find his place." 
 
 The false philosophy which has imparted to the Negro 
 a constitutional inferiority, must, as I have observed, 
 henceforth, be refuted, more by facts and experience, than 
 by reasoning. The remaining portion of the present 
 volume is occupied with a variety of such facts ; consisting 
 of a series of Biographical Sketches of Africans or their 
 Descendants, with Testimonies of Travellers, Missionaries, 
 &c, as to their real character and capabilities. These 
 exhibit an undoubted refutation of those unfounded 
 calumnies, which have been heaped upon the unfortunate 
 race of Africa. 
 
 In making a selection of a few out of the numberless 
 instances that might have been produced, equally forcible, 
 the Author may observe, that he has been more thoroughly 
 impressed with the truth of an equality in the various races of 
 mankind the further he has proceeded in the investigation of 
 the subject. Renewed evidence has been afforded him in 
 carefully surveying a great variety of cases, that the African 
 character is susceptible of all the finest feelings of our 
 nature, and that the intellectual capacity of the Negro, 
 under circumstances more favourable than have generally 
 
% €rMi fnr tin* Agra. 
 
 fallen to his lot, would bear a comparison with that of any 
 other portion of our species. 
 
 OLAUDAH EQTJIANO; OR GUSTAVUS VASSA. 
 
 The following brief sketch of the life of Gustavus Vassa, 
 or Olaudah Equiano, the name by which he was known in 
 his native country on the coast of Africa, is condensed from 
 from various editions of his " Narrative," a small octavo 
 volume of 350 pages, written by himself about the year 
 1787, exhibiting in its composition considerable talent. 
 " The individual is to be pitied," says the Abbe Gregoire, 
 " who, after having read the memoir of Vassa, does not 
 feel for the author, sentiments of affection and esteem." 
 
 This intelligent Negro dedicated his "Narrative" to 
 the British Houses of Parliament in the following terms : — 
 
 " To the Lords Spiritual and Temporal, and the Commons 
 of the Parliament of Great Britain. 
 
 "My Lords and Gentlemen, 
 
 " Permit me, with the greatest deference and respect, to 
 lay at your feet the following genuine narrative ; the chief 
 design of which is to excite in your august assemblies a 
 sense of compassion for the miseries which the Slave Trade 
 has entailed on my unfortunate countrymen. By the horrors 
 of that trade, was I first torn away from all the tender con- 
 nexions that were naturally dear to my heart ; but these, 
 through the mysterious ways of Providence, I ought to 
 regard as infinitely more than compensated by the intro- 
 duction I have thence obtained to the knowledge of the 
 Christian religion, and of a nation which, by its liberal 
 sentiments, its humanity, the glorious freedom of its 
 government, and its proficiency in arts and sciences, has 
 exalted the dignity of human nature. 
 
trSTATTS YASSA 
 
 C /'///'/'/ A Oo 
 
 7//////Y 
 
 Manchester: 
 
 WILLIAM IRWIN. 39. OLDHAM 
 
ft €nkk far tjje Jfjp. 
 
 193 
 
 " I am sensible I ought to entreat your pardon for address- 
 ing to you a work so wholly devoid of literary merit ; but, 
 as the production of an unlettered African, who is actuated 
 by the hope of becoming an instrument towards the relief 
 of his suffering countrymen, I trust that such a man, 
 pleading in such a cause will be acquitted of boldness and 
 presumption. 
 
 " May the God of Heaven inspire your hearts with pe- 
 culiar benevolence on that important day when the question 
 of Abolition is to be discussed, when thousands, in conse- 
 quence of your decision, are to look for Happiness or 
 Misery ! 
 
 " I am, 
 
 " My Lords and Gentlemen, 
 
 " Your most Obedient, 
 " And devoted humble Servant, 
 " Olaudah Equiano, or Gustavus Vassa." 
 
 " No. 4, Taylor's Buildings, 
 " St. Martin's Lane, 
 
 " October 30, 1790." 
 
 " I believe it is difficult," writes this intelligent Negro, 
 " for those who publish their own memoirs, to escape the 
 imputation of vanity ; nor is this the only disadvantage 
 under which they labour : it is also their misfortune, that 
 whatever is uncommon, is rarely, if ever, believed, and 
 what is obvious, the reader is apt to turn from with 
 disgust, and to charge the writer with impertinence. Those 
 memoirs only are thought worthy to be read or remembered 
 which abound in great or striking events ; those in short, 
 which in a high degree excite either admiration or pity : 
 nearly all others are consigned to contempt and oblivion. 
 It is, therefore, I confess, not a little hazardous in a private 
 and obscure individual, and a stranger too, thus to solicit 
 the indulgent attention of the public, especially when I 
 
m 
 
 194 
 
 % €riirafr fnr % Jfogm 
 
 own that I offer here, the history of neither a saint, a hero, 
 nor a tyrant. I believe there are few events in my life 
 which have not happened to many, but when I compare 
 my lot with that of most of my countrymen, I acknow- 
 ledge the mercies of Providence in every occurrence of 
 my life. 
 
 If then, the following Narrative does not prove sufficiently 
 interesting to engage general attention, let my motive be 
 some excuse for its publication. I am not so foolishly 
 vain, as to expect from it either immortality or literary 
 reputation. If it affords any satisfaction to my numerous 
 friends, at whose request it has been written, or in the 
 smallest degree promotes the interests of humanity, the end 
 for which it was undertaken will be fully attained, and 
 every wish of my heart gratified. Let it therefore be 
 remembered, that in wishing to avoid censure, I do not 
 aspire to praise. 
 
 That part of Africa known by the name of Guinea, in 
 which the trade for Slaves is carried on, extends along the 
 coast above 3400 miles, from Senegal to Angola, and 
 includes a variety of kingdoms. Of these, the most con- 
 siderable is the kingdom of Benin, both as to extent and 
 wealth, the richness and cultivation of the soil, the power 
 of its king, and the number and warlike disposition of the 
 inhabitants. It is situated nearly under the line, and 
 extends along the coast about 170 miles, but runs back 
 into the interior part of Africa to a distance hitherto, I 
 believe, unexplored by any traveller ; and seems only ter- 
 minated by the empire of Abyssinia, nearly 1500 miles 
 from its first boundaries. In a charming and fruitful vale, 
 called Essaka, in one of the most remote and fertile pro- 
 vinces of this kingdom, I was born in the year 1745. 
 
 As our country is one in which nature is prodigal of her 
 favours, our wants, which are few, are easily supplied. All 
 our industry is turned to the improvement of those bless- 
 sings, and we are habituated to labour from our early 
 
51 CrUrafe for tjn JfrgtK, 
 
 J 95 
 
 years ; and by this means we have no beggars. Our 
 houses never exceed one story, and are built of wood, 
 thatched with reeds ; and the floors are generally covered 
 with mats. The dress of both races consists of a long piece 
 of calico or muslin, wrapped loosely round the body ; our 
 beds are also covered with the same cloth. 
 
 The land is uncommonly rich and fruitful, and produces 
 vegetables in abundance, and a variety of delicious fruits ; 
 also Indian corn, cotton, and tobacco. Our meat consists 
 of cattle, goats, and poultry. The ceremony of washing 
 before eating is strictly enjoined, and cleanliness is considered 
 a part of the religion. The people believe there is one 
 Creator of all things, and that He governs all events. 
 
 My father being a man of rank, had a numerous family: 
 his children consisted of one daughter, and several sons, of 
 whom I was the youngest, my name being OlaudahEquiano. 
 I generally attended my mother, who took great pains 
 in forming my mind, and training me to exercise. In this 
 way I grew up to about the eleventh year of my age, when 
 an end was put to my happiness in the following manner : 
 
 One day, when our people were gone to their work, 
 and only my dear sister and myself were left to watch the 
 house, two men and a woman came, and seizing us both, 
 stopped our mouths that we should not make a noise, ran 
 off with us into the woods, where they tied our hands, 
 and took us some distance to a small house, where the 
 robbers halted for refreshment and spent the night. We 
 were then unbound, but were unable to take any food, 
 and being quite overpowered by fatigue and grief, our 
 only relief was some sleep, which allayed our misfortune 
 for a short time. The next morning, after keeping the 
 woods some distance, we came to an opening, where we 
 saw some people at work. I began to cry out for their 
 assistance, but my cries had no other effect than to make 
 them tie us faster, and again stop our mouths, and they 
 put us into a sack until we got out of sight of these people. 
 
^( 
 
 )(§^P^Ve 
 
 
 ^©^^ 
 
 196 
 
 1 €xihk fnr tlj? Jfogtn. 
 
 — b --D^ 
 
 When they offered us food, we could not eat, often bathing 
 each other in tears. Our only respite was sleep — but 
 alas! even the privilege of weeping together was soon 
 denied us. The next day proved a day of greater sorrow 
 than I had yet experienced, for my sister and I were torn 
 asunder while clasped in each other's arms : it was in vain 
 that we besought them not to part us ; she was torn from 
 me, and immediately carried away, while I was left in a 
 state of distraction not to be described. I wept and 
 grieved continually, and for several days did not eat any- 
 thing but what they forced into my mouth. 
 
 After travelling a great distance, suffering many hard- 
 ships, and being sold several times, — one evening, to my 
 surprise, my dear sister was brought to the same house. 
 As soon as she saw me, she gave a loud shriek and ran 
 into my arms : I was quite overpowered ; — neither of us 
 could speak, but for a considerable time clung to each 
 other in mutual embraces, unable to do anything but weep. 
 When the people were told that we were brother and sister, 
 they indulged us with being together, and one of the men 
 at night lay between us, and allowed us to hold each other's 
 hand across him. Thus, for a while we forgot our misfor- 
 tunes in the joy of being together ; but even this small 
 comfort was soon to have an end, for scarcely had the 
 fatal morning appeared, when she was torn from me for 
 ever ! for I never saw her more ! 
 
 I was now more miserable, if possible, than before. The 
 small relief which her presence gave me from pain was 
 gone, and the wretchedness of my situation was redoubled 
 by my anxiety after her fate, and my apprehension lest her 
 sufferings should be greater than mine, when I could not 
 be with her to alleviate them. Yes ; thou dear partner of 
 all my childish sports ! thou sharer of my joys and sorrows ! 
 happy should I have ever esteemed myself, to encounter 
 every misery for you, and to procure your freedom by 
 the sacrifice of my own ! Though you were early forced 
 
 7{?~ 
 
from my arms, your image has been always rivetted in my 
 heart, from which neither time nor fortune have been able to 
 remove it : so that, while the thoughts of your sufferings 
 have damped my prosperity, they have mingled with adver- 
 sity, and increased its bitterness. To that Heaven which 
 protects the weak from the strong, I commit the care of 
 your innocence and virtues, if they have not already 
 received their full reward, and if your youth and delicacy 
 have not long since fallen victims to the violence of the 
 African trader, the pestilential stench of a Guinea ship, 
 the seasoning in the European colonies, or the lash and 
 lust of a brutal and unrelenting overseer. 
 
 At length, after many days' travelling, during which I 
 had often changed masters, although I was many days' 
 journey from my father's house, I attempted to escape. 
 The whole neighbourhood was raised in the pursuit of me. 
 In that part of the country, the houses and villages were 
 skirted with woods, or shrubberies, and the bushes were 
 so thick that a man could readily conceal himself in them, 
 so as to elude the strictest search. The neighbours con- 
 tinued the whole day looking for me, and several times 
 many of them came within a few yards of the place where 
 I lay hid. I expected every moment, when I heard a 
 rustling among the trees, to be found out and punished ; 
 but they never discovered me, though they were often so 
 near that I even heard their conjectures as they were 
 looking about for me ; and I now learned from them, that 
 any attempt to return home would be hopeless. Most of 
 them supposed I had fled towards home ; but the distance 
 was so great, and the way so intricate, that they thought I 
 could never reach it, and that I should be lost in the 
 woods. When I heard this, I was seized with a violent 
 panic, and abandoned myself to despair. Night, too, began 
 to approach, and aggravated all my fears, for I became 
 alarmed with the idea of being devoured by wild beasts. 
 I had before entertained hopes of getting home, and had 
 
 W 
 
% €xlhk fax tjrc Sfigrn. 
 
 determined when it should be dark to make the attempt ; 
 but I was now convinced it was fruitless, and began to 
 consider, that, if possibly I could escape all other animals, 
 I could not those of the human kind, and that, not know- 
 ing the way, I must perish in the woods. Thus was I like 
 the hunted deer : 
 
 " Every leaf, and every whispering breath 
 
 Convey'd a foe, and every foe a death." 
 
 The horror of my situation became quite insupportable. 
 I at length quitted the thicket, and with trembling steps, 
 and a sad heart, returned to my master's house, and crept 
 into his kitchen, which was an open shed, laying myself 
 down with an anxious wish for death to relieve me from all 
 my pains. I was scarcely awake in the morning before I was 
 discovered, and being closely reprimanded by my master, 
 I was soon sold again. 
 
 I was now carried to the left of the sun's rising, through 
 many dreary wastes and dismal woods, amidst the hideous 
 roarings of wild beasts. The people I was sold to used to 
 carry me very often either on their shoulders or their 
 backs. All the people I had hitherto seen resembled my 
 own nation, and having learned a little of several lan- 
 guages, I could understand them pretty well : but now 
 after six or seven months had passed away from the time I 
 was kidnapped, I arrived at the sea coast, and I beheld that 
 element, which before I had no idea of. It also made me 
 acquainted with such cruelties as I can never reflect upon 
 but with horror. The first object that met my sight was 
 a Slave-ship riding at anchor, waiting for her cargo ! I 
 was filled with astonishment, which was soon converted 
 into terror which I am quite at a loss to describe. 
 
 When I was taken on board, being roughly handled 
 and closely examined by these men, whose complexion 
 and language differed so much from any I had seen or 
 heard before, I apprehended I had got into a world of bad 
 
 M 
 
97? 
 
 
 51 Ctitarfe for flu IJrgra. 
 
 spirits. When I looked round the ship, too, and saw 
 a multitude of Black people of all descriptions chained 
 together, every one of their countenances expressing 
 dejection and sorrow, I no longer doubted my fate 
 and being quite overpowered with horror and anguish, I 
 fell motionless on the deck and fainted. When I revived 
 a little, the horrible faces of the White men frightened me 
 again exceedingly. But I had not time to think much 
 about it before I was, with many of my poor country 
 people, put under deck in a loathsome and horrible place. 
 In this situation we wished for death, and sometimes refused 
 to eat ; and for this we were beaten. Such were now my 
 horrors and fears, that if ten thousand worlds had been my 
 own, I would have freely parted with them all to have 
 exchanged my condition with that of the meanest Slave in 
 my own country. 
 
 After enduring more hardships than I can relate, we 
 arrived at Barbadoes. When taken on shore, we were 
 put into a pen like so many beasts, and from thence sold 
 and separated, — husbands and wives, parents, and children, 
 brothers and sisters, without any distinction. Their cries 
 excited some compassion in the hearts of those who were 
 capable of feeling ; but others seemed to feel no remorse, 
 though the scene was so affecting. 
 
 On a signal given, (the beat of a drum), the buyers 
 rush at once into the yard where the Slaves are confined, 
 and make choice of those they like best. The noise and 
 clamour with which this is attended, and the eagerness visible 
 in the countenances of the buyers, serve not a little to 
 increase the apprehension of the terrified African, who 
 may well be supposed to consider them as the ministers of 
 that destruction to which they think themselves devoted. 
 In this manner, without scruple, are relations and friends 
 separated, most of them never to see each other again. I 
 remember in the vessel in which I was brought over, in 
 the men's apartment there were several brothers, who, in 
 
 $ 
 
 >v\- 
 
200 
 
 % €x\Mt far tire Jiigm 
 
 the sale were sold in different lots ; and it was very moving 
 on this occasion to see and hear their cries at parting. 
 
 O, ye nominal Christians ! might not an African ask you, 
 learned you this from your God, who says unto you, " Do 
 unto all men as you would they should do unto you ?" Is 
 it not enough that we are torn from our country and friends 
 to toil for your luxury and lust of gain ? Must every tender 
 feeling he likewise sacrificed to your avarice ? Are the 
 dearest friends and relations, now rendered more dear by 
 their separation from their kindred, still to be parted from 
 each other, and thus be prevented from cheering the gloom 
 of Slavery, with the small comfort of being together and 
 mingling their sufferings and sorrows ? Why are parents 
 to lose their children, brothers their sisters, or husbands 
 their wives ? Surely this is a new refinement in cruelty, 
 which, while it has no advantage to atone for it, thus aggra- 
 vates distress, and adds fresh horrors even to the wretched- 
 ness of Slavery ? 
 
 I was, with some others, sent to America. "When we 
 arrived at Virginia we were also sold and separated. I now 
 totally lost the small remains of comfort I had enjoyed in 
 conversing with my countrymen ; the women too, who used 
 to wash and take care of me, were all gone different ways, 
 and I never saw one of them afterwards. 
 
 Not long after this, Captain Pascal, coming to my master's, 
 purchased me, and sent me on board his ship called the 
 Industrious Bee. I had not yet learned much of the 
 English language, so that I could not understand their 
 conversation. I wanted to know as well as I could where 
 we were going. Some of the people of the ship used to tell 
 me they were going to carry me back to my own country, 
 and this made me very happy. I was quite rejoiced at the 
 idea of going back ; but I was reserved for another fate, 
 and was soon undeceived when we came within sight of the 
 English coast. It was on board this ship that I received 
 the name of Gustavus Vassa. 
 
# frilmfe far tips Urgrn. 
 
 There was on board this ship a young lad, Richard Baker, 
 an American, who had received an excellent education, and 
 was of a most amiable temper. Soon after I went on board 
 he shewed me a great deal of partiality and attention, and 
 in return, I grew extremely fond of him. We at length 
 became inseparable, and for the space of two years he was 
 of very great use to me, being my constant companion 
 and instructor. Such friendship was cemented between us 
 as we cherished till his death, which, to my very great 
 sorrow, happened in 1759, in the Archipelago, on board 
 his Majesty's ship Preston ; an event which I have never 
 ceased to regret, as I lost at once a kind interpreter, an 
 agreeable companion, and a faithful friend, who, at the age 
 of fifteen, discovered a mind superior to prejudice, and 
 who was not ashamed to notice, to associate with, and to be 
 the friend and instructor, of one who was ignorant, a 
 stranger, of a different complexion, and a Slave ! 
 
 In the summer of 1757, I was taken by a press-gang, 
 and carried on board a man-of-war. After passing about 
 a year in this service, on the coast of France and in America, 
 on my return to England I received much kindness, and 
 was sent to school, where I learned to read and write. I 
 could now speak English tolerably well, and I perfectly 
 understood everything that was said. I not only felt myself 
 quite easy with these new countrymen, but relished their 
 society and maimers. I looked upon them as men superior 
 to us, and I had a strong desire to resemble them, to 
 imbibe their spirit, and imitate their manners ; I therefore 
 embraced every occasion of improvement, and every new 
 thing I observed I treasured up in my mind. Shortly after 
 my arrival in England, my master sent me to wait upon 
 the Miss Guerins, who had treated me with much kindness 
 before. They often used to teach me to read, and took 
 great pains to instruct me in the principles of religion, and 
 at the same time gave me a book called " A Guide to the 
 Indians," written by the Bishop of Sodor and Man. 
 
 m 
 
 
202 
 
 % ttirate for \)t Jlrgrn. 
 
 My master receiving the office of lieutenant on board the 
 Namur, he took me with him up the Mediterranean. I 
 parted from my kind patronesses, the Miss Guerins, with 
 reluctance, and after receiving from them many friendly 
 cautions how to conduct myself, and some valuable pre- 
 sents, I took leave of them with uneasiness and regret. 
 My desire for learning induced some of my shipmates to 
 instruct me, so that I could read the Bible ; and one of 
 them, a sober man, explained many passages to me. 
 
 [I am already making more full extracts from the Narra- 
 tive of Gustavus Vassa than I at first intended, but must 
 now pass over much that is interesting. A few remarks 
 made by this enlightened and intelligent Negro, in record- 
 ing some providential deliverances, I cannot omit.] 
 
 In these, and in many more instances, says Vassa, I thought 
 I could plainly trace the hand of God, without whose per- 
 mission a sparrow cannot fall. I began to raise my fear 
 from man to Him alone, and to call daily on his holy name 
 with fear and reverence, and I trust He heard my supplica- 
 tions, and graciously condescended to answer me according 
 to His Holy Word, and to implant the seeds of piety in 
 me, even one of the meanest of His creatures. 
 
 As I had now served my master faithfully several years, 
 and his kindness had given me hopes that he would grant 
 my freedom, when we arrived in England I ventured to 
 tell him so ; but he was offended, for he had determined 
 on sending me to the West Indies. Accordingly, at the 
 close of the year 1762, finding a vessel bound thither, he 
 took me on board, and gave me in charge to the captain. 
 I endeavoured to expostulate with him by telling him he 
 had received my wages, and all my prize money ; but it 
 was to no purpose. Taking my only coat from my back, 
 he went off in his boat. I followed them with aching eyes, 
 and a heart ready to burst with grief, till they were 
 out of siffht. 
 
 <FTK- 
 
Thus, at the moment that I expected all my toils to end, 
 I was plunged, as I supposed, into a new Slavery ; in com- 
 parison of which, all my service had hitherto been perfect 
 freedom ; whose horrors, always present in my mind, 
 now rushed on it with tenfold aggravation. I wept very 
 bitterly for some time, and began to think that I must 
 have done something to displease the Lord, that He thus 
 punished me so severely. This filled me with painful 
 reflections on my past conduct ; I recollected that on the 
 morning of our arrival at Deptford, I had rashly sworn 
 that as soon as we reached London I would spend the day 
 in rambling and sport. My conscience smote me for this 
 unguarded expression : I felt that the Lord was able to 
 disappoint me in all things, and immediately considered my 
 present situation as a judgment of Heaven, on account of 
 my presumption in swearing. I therefore acknowledged, 
 with contrition of heart, my transgression to God, and 
 poured out my soul before Him with unfeigned repentance ; 
 and with earnest supplications I besought Him not to 
 abandon me in my distress, nor cast me from His mercy 
 for ever. In a little time, my grief, spent with its own 
 violence, began to subside ; and after the first confusion of 
 my thoughts was over, I reflected with more calmness on 
 my present condition. I considered that trials and disap- 
 pointments are sometimes for our good, and I thought God 
 might perhaps have permitted this, in order to teach me 
 wisdom and resignation ; for he had hitherto shadowed me 
 with the wings of His mercy, and by His invisible, but 
 powerful hand, brought me by a way I knew not. These 
 reflections gave me a little comfort, and I rose at last from 
 the deck with dejection and sorrow in my countenance, 
 yet mixed with some faint hope that the Lord would 
 appear for my deliverance. 
 
 [Before the vessel sailed, it waited some days off Ports- 
 mouth for the West India convoy ; and whilst there, Gus- 
 tavus Vassa tried every means of escaping to land he could 
 
 TIT© 
 
 w 
 
204 
 
 <^m 
 
 51 <$nhk kt \\)i Ifrgru. 
 
 h* 
 
 devise, but all in vain. On the last day but one of 1762, 
 the Eolus frigate, which was to escort the convoy, made a 
 signal for sailing.] 
 
 What tumultuous emotions agitated my soul, continues 
 Vassa, when the convoy got under sail, and I a prisoner 
 on board, now without a hope ! I kept my eyes upon the 
 land in a state of unutterable grief, not knowing what to 
 do, and despairing how to help myself. "While my mind was 
 in this situation, the fleet sailed on, and I lost sight of land. 
 In the first expression of my grief I reproached my fate, and 
 wished I had never been born. I was ready to curse the 
 tide that bore us, the gale that wafted my prison, and 
 even the ship that conducted us ; and I called on death 
 to relieve me from the horrors I felt, and desired that I 
 might be in that place — 
 
 " WTiere Slaves are free and men oppress no more. 
 — Fool that I was, inured so long to pain, 
 To trust to hope, or dream of joy again. 
 Now dragg'd once more beyond the western main, 
 To groan beneath some dastard planter's chain ; 
 Where my poor countrymen in bondage wait 
 The long enfranchisement of lingering fate : 
 Hard lingering fate ! while, ere the dawn of day, 
 Roused by the lash, they go their cheerless way ; 
 And as their souls with shame and anguish burn, 
 Salute with groans unwelcome morn's return, 
 And, chiding every hour the slow-paced sun, 
 Pursue their toils till all his race is run. 
 No eye to mark their sufferings with a tear : 
 No friend to comfort, and no hope to cheer : 
 Then, like the dull unpitied brutes, repair 
 To stalls as wretched, and as coarse a fare ; 
 Thank Heav'n, one day of misery was o'er, 
 Then sink to sleep, and wish to wake no more." 
 
 The turbulence of my emotions, however, naturally gave 
 way to calmer thoughts, and I soon perceived that what fate 
 had decreed, no mortal on earth could prevent. The captain, 
 whose name was Doran, treated me very kindly, but we had a 
 tempestuous voyage. On the 13th of February, 1763, from 
 

 m 
 
 Nib 
 
 £1 <£rilrotr far tjir lirgrn. 
 
 the mast head, we descried our destined island, Montserrat : 
 and soon after I beheld those 
 
 " Regions of sorrow, doleful shades, where peace 
 And rest can rarely dwell. Hope never comes 
 That conies to all, but torture without end." 
 
 At the sight of this land of bondage, a fresh horror ran 
 through all my frame, and chilled me to the heart. My 
 former Slavery now rose in dreadful review before my 
 mind, and displayed nothing but misery, stripes, and chains ; 
 and, in the first paroxysm of my grief, I called upon God's 
 thunder, and His avenging power, to direct the stroke of 
 death to me, rather than permit me to become a Slave again, 
 and be sold from lord to lord. 
 
 When the ship had discharged her cargo, and was ready 
 for sailing again, Captain Doran sent for me ashore, and 
 I was told by the messenger that my fate was determined. 
 With trembling steps and faltering heart I came to the 
 captain, and found him with one Mr. Robert King, a 
 Quaker, the first merchant of the place. After telling 
 me the charge he had to get me a good master, he said he 
 had got me one of the best on the island. Mr. King also 
 said he had bought me on account of my good character, 
 (to maintain which I found to be of great importance,) and 
 that his home was in Philadelphia, where he expected soon 
 to go ; and he did not intend to treat me hard. He asked 
 me what I could do, and said, as 1 understood something 
 of the rules of arithmetic, he would put me to school, and 
 fit me for a clerk.* 
 
 I soon found that my master fully deserved the good 
 character which Captain Doran had given me of him. He 
 possessed a most amiable disposition, and was very chari- 
 table and humane. He treated his Slaves better than any 
 other man on the island, so he was better and more faith - 
 
 * The Society of Friends have long renounced the holding of Slaves, 
 Which is entirely prohibited by their rules. 
 
 205 
 
 « 
 
206 
 
 % €x\h\t for tip 3fegrn. 
 
 fully served by them in return. In passing about the 
 different estates on the island, I had an opportunity of 
 seeing the dreadful usage and wretched situation of the poor 
 Slaves, and it reconciled me to my condition, and made me 
 thankful and bless God for being placed with so kind a 
 master. He was several times offered one hundred guineas 
 for me, but to my great joy, he would not sell me. 
 
 Having obtained three pence, I began a little trade, and 
 soon gained a dollar, then more ; with this I bought a 
 Bible. Going in a vessel of my master's to Georgia and 
 Charleston, a small venture I took, answered on my return 
 a very good purpose. In 1765, my master prepared for 
 going to Philadelphia. With his crediting me for some 
 articles, and the little stock of my own, I laid in consider- 
 able, which elated me much ; and I told him I hoped I 
 should soon obtain enough to purchase my freedom, which 
 he promised me I should have when I could pay him what 
 he gave for me. 
 
 With my kind master and captain's indulgence, and my 
 own indefatigable industry and economy, I obtained the 
 sum required for my liberty. So, one morning while they 
 were at breakfast, I ventured to remind my master of what 
 he promised, and to tell him I had got the money, at which 
 he seemed surprised. The captain told him I had come 
 honestly by it, and he must now fulfil his promise. My 
 master then told me to go to the Secretary at the Register 
 Office and get my manumission drawn, and he would sign 
 it. These words of my master were like heaven to me : 
 in an instant all my trepidation was turned into unutterable 
 bliss ; and I most reverently bowed myself with gratitude, 
 unable to express my feelings, but by the overflowing of 
 tears, and a heart replete with thanks to God. As soon as 
 the first transports of my joy were over, and I had ex- 
 pressed my thanks in the best manner I was able, I rose 
 with a heart full of affection and reverence, and left the 
 room, in order to obey my master's joyful mandate of going 
 
m> 
 
 
 y 
 
 % €MU fnr % #rgra. 
 
 to the Register Office. As I was leaving the house I called 
 to mind the words of the Psalmist, in the 126th Psalm, 
 and like him, " I glorified God in my heart, in whom I 
 trusted." These words had been impressed on my mind 
 from the very day I was forced from Deptford to the pre- 
 sent hour, and I now saw them, as I thought, fulfilled and 
 verified. My imagination was all rapture as I flew to the 
 Register Office ; and in this respect, like the apostle Peter, 
 (whose deliverance from prison was so sudden and extraor- 
 dinary, that he thought he was in a vision) I could scarcely 
 believe I was awake. Heavens ! who could do justice to 
 my feelings at this moment ? Not conquering heroes them- 
 selves, in the midst of a triumph — not the tender mother 
 who has just regained her long-lost infant, and presses it 
 to her heart ! All within my breast was tumult, wildness, 
 and delirium ! My feet scarcely touched the ground, for 
 they were winged with joy, and, like Elijah, as he rose to 
 Heaven, they " were with lightning sped as I went on ! " 
 Every one I met I told of my happiness, and blazed about 
 the virtues of my amiable master and captain. 
 
 The Registrar signed the manumission that day ; so that, 
 before night, I who had been a Slave in the morning, 
 trembling at the will of another, was become my own 
 master, and completely free. I thought this was the 
 happiest day I had ever experienced ; and my joy was still 
 heightened by the blessings and prayers of many of the 
 Sable race, particularly the aged, to whom my heart had 
 ever been attached with reverence. 
 
 Having obtained my freedom, any heart was now fixed 
 on London, where I hoped to be ere long ; but my master 
 and Captain Doran entreated me not to leave them. Here, 
 gratitude bowed me down and induced me to remain. 
 None but the generous mind can judge of my feelings, 
 struggling between inclination and duty. I entered as a 
 sailor on one of Mr. King's vessels, with the intention of 
 making a voyage or two, entirely to please my honoured 
 
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 tiTg) 
 
 ijk® 
 
% €x\Mi far tire Jfogn£ 
 
 patrons ; but I determined that the year following, if it 
 pleased God, I would see Old England once more. 
 
 Our first voyage was to Montserrat. When we were 
 preparing to return, and were taking some cattle on board, 
 one of them ran at the captain, and butted him so furiously 
 in the breast that he never recovered the blow. He was 
 so affected that he was unable to do duty, and he died 
 before we reached our port. This was a heavy stroke to 
 me, for he had been my true friend ; and I loved him as a 
 father. The whole care of the vessel now rested upon me. 
 In the course of nine or ten days, we made the island of 
 Antigua, and the day after, we came safe to Montserrat. 
 Many were surprised when they heard of my conducting 
 the sloop into the port, and I now obtained a new appella- 
 tion, and was called Captain. This elated me not a little, 
 and it was quite flattering to my vanity, to be thus styled 
 by as high a title as any free man in this place possessed. 
 
 As I had now, by the death of my captain, lost my 
 great benefactor and friend. I had little inducement to 
 remain longer in the West Indies, except from gratitude to 
 Mr. King, which I thought I had pretty well discharged 
 in bringing back his vessel safe, and delivering his cargo to 
 his satisfaction. I began to think of leaving this part of 
 the world, of which I had been long tired, and returning 
 to England, where my heart had always been ; but Mr. 
 King still pressed me very much to stay with his vessel, 
 and he had done so much for me, that I found myself 
 unable to refuse his requests, and consented to go another 
 voyage to Georgia, as the mate from his ill state of health, 
 was quite useless in the vessel. 
 
 Accordingly a new captain was appointed, and having 
 refitted our vessel, we sailed for Georgia ; but steering a 
 more westerly course than usual, we soon got on the 
 Bahama banks, where our vessel was wrecked, but no 
 lives lost. Getting on one of the islands, with some salt 
 provision we had saved, we remained there many days, and 
 
 9Th< 
 
% €xiktt for tip Jffrgrn. 
 
 209 
 
 suffered much for want of fresh water. When we were 
 almost famished with hunger and thirst, we were found, 
 and carried to New Providence, where we were kindly 
 treated. From thence we were taken to Savannah, so to 
 Martinico, and to Montserrat, having been absent about 
 six months, during which I had more than once experienced 
 the delivering hand of Providence, when all human means 
 of escaping destruction seemed hopeless. I saw my friends 
 with a gladness of heart which was increased by my absence 
 and the dangers I had escaped, and I was received with 
 great friendship by them all, but particularly by Mr. King, 
 to whom I related the various hardships we had encoun- 
 tered, and the loss of his sloop, with the cause of her being 
 wrecked. "When I told him I intended to go to London 
 that season, and that I had come to visit him before my 
 departure, the good man expressed a great deal of affection 
 for me, and sorrow that I should leave him. I thanked 
 him for his friendship, but as I wished very much to be in 
 London, I declined remaining any longer there, and begged 
 he would excuse me. I then requested he would be kind 
 enough to give me a certificate of my behaviour while in 
 his service, which he very readily complied with, and gave 
 me the following : — 
 
 " To all to whom this may concern. 
 
 " The bearer hereof, Gustavus Vassa, was my Slave up- 
 wards of three years ; during which time he has always 
 behaved himself well, and discharged his duty with honesty 
 and assiduity." 
 
 " R. KING." 
 
 Having obtained this, I parted from my kind master, 
 after many sincere professions of gratitude and regard, and 
 prepared for my departure to London. Having agreed 
 for my passage, I took leave of all my friends, and 
 embarked, exceedingly glad to see myself once more on 
 board a ship, steering the course I had long wished for. 
 
 dlvfe) 
 
K), 
 
 210 
 
 % €xihit far % Jfogfn. 
 
 With a light heart I bade Montserrat farewell ; and with 
 it, I bade adieu to the sound of the cruel whip, and all 
 other dreadful instruments of torture ; and adieu to op- 
 pressions, although to me, less severe than to most of my 
 countrymen. I wished for a grateful and thankful heart 
 to praise the Lord God on high for all his mercies ! In this 
 ecstacy I steered the ship all night. 
 
 We had a most prosperous voyage, and at the end of 
 seven weeks my longing eyes were once more gratified with 
 a sight of London, after having been absent from it above 
 four years. I immediately received my wages, and I had 
 never earned seven guineas so quickly in my life before. I 
 had thirty-seven guineas in all when I got clear of the ship. 
 I now entered upon a scene quite new to me, but full of 
 hope. I set my mind on getting more learning, and at- 
 tended school diligently. My money not being sufficient, 
 I hired myself to service awhile ; but having a desire to go 
 into the Mediterranean, I engaged on board a ship, where 
 the mate taught me navigation. 
 
 In the spring of 1773, an expedition was fitted out to 
 explore a north-west passage to India, conducted by the 
 Honourable Constantine John Phipps, since Lord Mul- 
 grave, in his Majesty's sloop of war the Race Horse. Dr. 
 Irving being anxious for the reputation of this adventure, 
 concluded to go, and I accompanied him. I attended him 
 on board the Race Horse, the 24th of May, 1773, and we 
 proceeded to Sheerness, where we were joined by his Ma- 
 jesty's sloop the Carcass, commanded by Captain Lutwidge, 
 and on the 25th of the same month we were off Shetland. 
 On the 20th of June, we began to use Dr. Irving's appara- 
 tus for making salt water fresh ; I used to attend the dis- 
 tillery, and frequently purified from 20 to 40 gallons a day. 
 The water thus distilled was perfectly pure, well tasted, 
 and free from salt, and was used on various occasions on 
 board the ship. On the 28th we reached Greenland, where 
 I was surprised to find the sun did not set. The weather 
 
% €xlhk far tjp lirgra. 
 
 211 
 
 now became extremely cold, and we saw many very high 
 and curious mountains of ice ; and also a great number of 
 very large whales, which used to come close to our ship, 
 and spout the water up to a very great height in the air. 
 On the 29th and 30th of July, we saw one continued plain 
 of smooth unbroken ice, bounded only by the horizon ; and 
 we fastened to a piece of ice that was eight yards eleven 
 inches thick. We had generally sunshine, and constant 
 daylight, which gave cheerfulness and novelty to the whole 
 of this striking, grand, and uncommon scene ; and, to 
 heighten it still more, the reflection of the sun from the ice 
 gave the clouds a most beautiful appearance. "We remained 
 here till the 1st of August, when the two ships got com- 
 pletely fastened by the loose ice that set in from the sea. 
 This made our situation very dreadful and alarming ; so 
 that on the seventh day we were in great apprehension of 
 having the ships squeezed to pieces. The officers now held 
 a council to know what was best to be done in order to 
 save our lives. Our deplorable condition, which kept up 
 the constant apprehension of our perishing in the ice, 
 brought me gradually to think of eternity in such a manner 
 as I had never done before, having the fear of death hourly 
 upon me. Our appearance became truly lamentable ; pale 
 dejection seized every countenance ; many, who had been 
 blasphemers before, in this our distress began to call on 
 the good God of Heaven for his help ; and in the time 
 of our utter need he heard us, and against hope or human 
 probability, delivered us ! In this perilous situation we 
 remained eleven days, when the weather becoming more 
 mild, and the wind changing, the ice gave way ; and in 
 about thirty hours, with hard labour, we got into open 
 water, to our infinite joy and gladness of heart. 
 
 On the 19th of August, we sailed from this uninhabited 
 extremity of the world, where the inhospitable climate 
 affords neither food nor shelter, and not a tree or shrub of 
 any kind grows among its barren rocks ; but all is one 
 
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 <5) 
 
212 
 
 % €xihit hx i\)t 3fep. 
 
 desolate and expanded field of ice, which even the constant 
 beams of the sun for six months in the year cannot pene- 
 trate or dissolve. 
 
 We arrived at Deptford on the 30th, and thus ended our 
 Arctic voyage, to the no small joy of all on board, after 
 having been absent four months ; in which time, at the im- 
 minent hazard of our lives, we explored nearly as far 
 towards the Pole as 8 1 ° north, and 20° east longitude ; 
 being much further than any navigator had ever ventured 
 before ; in which we fully proved the impracticability of 
 finding a passage that way to India. 
 
 Our voyage to the North Pole being ended, I returned 
 to London with Dr. Irving, with whom I continued for 
 some time, during which I began seriously to reflect on the 
 many dangers I had escaped, particularly those of my last 
 voyage, which made a lasting impression on my mind ; and 
 which, by the grace of God, proved afterwards a mercy to 
 me : causing me to reflect deeply on my eternal state, and 
 to seek the Lord with full purpose of heart, ere it was too 
 late. I rejoiced greatly ; and heartily thanked the Lord 
 for directing me to London, where I was determined to 
 work out my own salvation, and in so doing, procure a 
 title to heaven. I used every means for this purpose, but 
 not being able to find any person that would show me any 
 good, I was much dejected, and knew not where to seek 
 relief. The only comfort I experienced was in reading the 
 Holy Scriptures, where I saw that what was appointed for 
 me I must submit to. 
 
 Still, I continued to travel in much heaviness, and fre- 
 quently murmured against the Almighty; and, awful to 
 think, I began to blaspheme ! In these severe conflicts, 
 the Lord was pleased, in much mercy, to give me to see, 
 and in some measure to understand, the great and awful 
 scene of the judgment day, that no unclean person, no 
 unholy thing, can enter into the kingdom of God. I would 
 then, if it had been possible, have changed my nature with 
 
i £rito far tju Jlrgrn. 
 
 213 
 
 the meanest worm on the earth ; and was ready to say to 
 the mountains and rocks, fall on me, but in vain. In the 
 greatest agony, I prayed to the Divine Creator, that he 
 would grant me time to repent of my follies and vile 
 iniquities, which I felt were grievous ; and in His manifold 
 mercies, He was pleased to grant my request, and the sense 
 of His mercies was great on my mind. This was the first 
 spiritual mercy I ever was sensible of ; I invoked Heaven 
 from my inmost soul, and fervently begged that God would 
 never again permit me to blaspheme His most holy name. 
 The Lord, who is long-suffering, and full of compassion to 
 such poor rebels as we are, condescended to hear and 
 answer. I felt that I was altogether unholy, and saw 
 clearly what a wicked use I had made of the faculties with 
 which I was endowed, and which were given me to glorify 
 God. I prayed to be directed, if there were any holier 
 persons than those with whom I was acquainted, that the 
 Lord would point them out to me. I appealed to the 
 searcher of hearts, whether I did not wish to love him 
 more, and serve him better. Notwithstanding all this, the 
 reader may easily discern, that if a believer, I was still in 
 nature's darkness. At length I hated the house in which I 
 lodged, because God's most holy name was blasphemed in 
 it ; then I saw the word of God verified, " Before they 
 call, I will answer ; and while they are yet speaking, I 
 will hear." 
 
 I had a great desire to read the Bible the whole day at 
 home ; but not having a convenient place for retirement, I 
 left the house in the day, rather than stay amongst the 
 wicked ones ; and as I was walking, it pleased God to 
 direct me to a house, where there was an old sea-faring 
 man, who had experienced much of the love of God shed 
 abroad in his heart. He began to discourse with me, and, 
 as I desired to love the Lord, his conversation rejoiced me 
 greatly ; and indeed I had never before heard the love of 
 Christ to believers set forth in such a manner, and in so 
 
% tfCritab for % Jfogrn. 
 
 clear a point of view. Here I had more questions to put 
 to the man than his time would permit him to answer : 
 and in that memorable hour there came in a dissenting 
 minister ; he joined in our discourse, and asked me some 
 few questions, inviting me to a love-feast that evening, 
 which offer I accepted, and thanked him. After he went 
 away, I had some further discourse with the old Christian, 
 added to some profitable reading, which made me exceed- 
 ingly happy. When I left him he reminded me of coming 
 to the feast ; I assured him I would be there. Thus we 
 parted, and I weighed over the heavenly conversation that 
 had passed between these two men, which cheered my then 
 heavy and drooping spirit more than anything I had met 
 with for many months. However, I thought the time long 
 in going to my supposed banquet. It lasted about four 
 hours, and ended in singing and prayer. This kind of 
 Christian fellowship I had never seen, nor ever thought of 
 seeing on earth ; it fully reminded me of what I had read 
 in the Holy Scriptures of the primitive Christians, who 
 loved each other and broke bread, partaking of it, even 
 from house to house. I could not but admire the good- 
 ness of God, in directing the blind, blasphemous sinner, into 
 the path that I knew not of, even among the just ; and 
 that instead of judgment he shewed mercy, hearing and 
 answering the prayers and supplications of every returning 
 prodigal : 
 
 " O ! to grace how great a debtor 
 Daily I'm constrain'd to be !" 
 
 After this, I was resolved to win Heaven if possible ; and 
 if I perished, I thought it should be at the feet of Jesus, in 
 praying to him for salvation. After having been an eye- 
 witness to the happiness which attended those who feared 
 God, I knew not how, with any propriety, to return to my 
 lodgings, where the name of God was continually profaned. 
 I paused in my mind for some time, not knowing what to 
 do ; whether to hire a bed elsewhere, or go home again. 
 
51 €xiMt far tire llrgrn. 
 
 215 
 
 At last, fearing an evil report might arise, I went home, 
 with a farewell to card-playing and vain jesting, &c. I saw 
 that time was very short, eternity long, and very near ; and 
 I viewed those persons alone blessed who were found 
 ready at midnight call, or when the judge of all cometh. 
 
 The next day I took courage, and went to see my new 
 
 and worthy acquaintance, the old man, Mr. C ; who, 
 
 with his wife, a gracious woman, were at work weaving 
 silk. Their discourse was delightful and edifying. I knew 
 not at last how to leave them, till time summoned me 
 away. As I was going, they lent me a little book, entitled, 
 " The Conversion of an Indian," which was of great use to 
 me, and at that time a means of strengthening my faith ; 
 in parting, they both invited me to call on them when I 
 pleased. This delighted me, and I took care to derive all 
 the improvement from it I could ; and so far I thanked 
 God for such company and desires. I prayed that the 
 many evils I felt within might be done away, and that I 
 might be weaned from my former carnal acquaintances. 
 This was quickly heard and answered, and I was soon con- 
 nected with those whom the Scriptures call the excellent 
 of the earth. I heard the gospel preached, and the thoughts 
 of my heart and actions were laid open by the preachers, 
 and the way of salvation by Christ alone, was evidently set 
 forth. Thus I went on happily for nearly two months. 
 
 A short time after this, I went to Westminster chapel ; 
 
 the Rev. Mr. P preached from Lam. iii. 39. It 
 
 was a wonderful sermon ; he clearly shewed, that a living 
 man had no cause to complain for the punishment of his 
 sins ; he evidently justified the Lord in all his dealings 
 with the sons of men ; he also shewed the justice of God 
 in the eternal punishment of the wicked and impenitent. 
 The discourse afforded me much joy, intermingled with 
 many fears about my soul. When it was ended, I addressed 
 the reverend gentleman, who freely commended me to read 
 the Scriptures, and hear the word preached ; not to neglect 
 
 Wl 
 I 
 
 tf^Q 
 
% €x\Mt far i\t Jfrgrn. 
 
 fervent prayer to God, who has promised to hear the sup- 
 plications of those who seek Him in godly sincerity ; so I 
 took my leave of him with many thanks, and resolved to 
 follow his advice, so far as the Lord would condescend to 
 enable me. 
 
 During this time I was out of employment, nor was I 
 likely to get a situation suitable for me, which obliged me 
 to go once more to sea. I engaged as steward of a ship 
 bound from London to Cadiz. In a short time after I was 
 on board, I heard the name of God much blasphemed. I 
 concluded to beg my bread on shore, rather than go again 
 to sea amongst a people who feared not God, and I entreated 
 the captain three different times to discharge me ; he would 
 not, but each time gave me greater and greater encourage- 
 ment to continue with him, and all on board shewed me 
 very great civility ; notwithstanding all this, I was unwilling 
 to embark again. At last some of my friends advised me, 
 saying it was my lawful calling, particularly Mr. G. S. the 
 governor of Tothill-fields Bridewell, who pitied my case, 
 and read the eleventh chapter of the Hebrews to me, with 
 exhortations. He prayed for me, and I believed that he 
 prevailed on my behalf, as my burden was then greatly 
 removed. The good man gave me a pocket Bible and 
 " Alleine's Alarm to the Unconverted" before we parted. 
 Next day I went on board again. We sailed for Spain, and 
 I found favour with the captain. It was the fourth of 
 September when we sailed from London; we had a delight- 
 ful voyage to Cadiz, where we arrived on the twenty-third. 
 
 I had many opportunities of reading the Scriptures, and 
 wrestled hard with God in fervent prayer, who has declared 
 in his blessed book that he will hear the groanings and 
 deep sighs of the poor in spirit, which I found verified to 
 my utter astonishment and comfort. In the evening, as I was 
 reading and meditating on the fourth chapter of the Acts, 
 twelfth verse, under the solemn apprehensions of eternity, 
 and reflecting on my past actions, I began to think I had 
 
 m?A 
 
% friimfr for \\i JJrgrn. 
 
 217 
 
 lived a moral life, and that I had proper grounds for be- 
 lieving I had an interest in the divine favour ; but still me- 
 ditating on the subject, not knowing whether salvation was 
 to be had partly for our own good deeds, or solely as the 
 sovereign gift of God ; — in this deep consternation, the 
 Lord was pleased to break in upon my soul with his bright 
 beams of heavenly light ; and in an instant as it were, 
 removing the veil, and letting light into a dark place, I 
 saw clearly with the eye of faith the crucified Saviour 
 bleeding on the cross on Mount Calvary : the Scriptures 
 became an unsealed book, I saw myself a condemned cri- 
 minal under the law, which came with its full force to my 
 conscience. I saw the Lord Jesus Christ in his humiliation, 
 loaded and bearing my reproach, sin, and shame. I then 
 clearly perceived that by the deeds of the law no flesh 
 living could be justified. I was then convinced that by the 
 first Adam sin came, and by the second Adam (the Lord 
 Jesus Christ) all that are saved must be made alive. It 
 was given me at that time to know what it was to be born 
 again.* I saw the eighth chapter to the Romans, and the 
 doctrines of God's decrees, verified agreeable to his eternal, 
 everlasting, and unchangeable purposes. The Word of 
 God was sweet to my taste, yea, sweeter than honey and 
 the honeycomb. Christ was revealed to my soul as the 
 chiefest among ten thousand. These heavenly moments 
 were really as life to the dead, and what John calls an 
 earnest of the Spirit, -j- This was indeed unspeakable, and I 
 firmly believe undeniable to many. Now, every leading- 
 providential circumstance that happened to me, from the 
 day I was taken from my parents to that hour, was before 
 my view, as if it had but just then occurred. I was 
 sensible of the invisible hand of God, which guided and 
 protected me, when in truth I knew it not : still the Lord 
 pursued me although I slighted and disregarded it; his 
 mercy melted me down. When I considered my poor 
 * John iii. 5. f John xvi. 13, 14, &c. 
 
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 z* 
 
 m 
 
 -^ N A 
 
Mk\ 218 
 
 % $ritate far \\i Jl^grn. 
 
 wretched state I wept, seeing what a great debtor I was to 
 sovereign free grace. Now, the Ethiopian was willing to 
 be saved by Jesus Christ, the sinner's only surety, and 
 also to rely on none other person or thing for salvation. 
 Self was obnoxious, and good works he had none, for it 
 is God that worketh in us both to will and to do. Oh ! 
 the amazing things of that hour can never be told — it was 
 joy in the Holy Ghost ! I felt an astonishing change ; the 
 burden of sin, the gaping jaws of hell, and the fears of 
 death, that weighed me down before, now lost their horror ; 
 indeed I thought death would now be the best earthly 
 friend I ever had. Such were my grief and joy as I be- 
 lieve are seldom experienced. I was bathed in tears, and 
 said, " What am I that God should thus look on me the vilest 
 of sinners ? " I felt a deep concern for my mother and 
 friends, which occasioned me to pray with fresh ardour ; 
 and in the abyss of thought, I viewed the unconverted 
 people of the world in a very awful state, being without 
 God and without hope. 
 
 It pleased God to pour out upon me the spirit of prayer 
 and the grace of supplication, so that in loud acclamations 
 I was enabled to praise and glorify his most holy name. 
 When I got out of the cabin, and told some of the people 
 what the Lord had done for me, alas, who could understand 
 me or believe my report ! — None but those to whom the 
 arm of the Lord was revealed. I became a barbarian to them 
 in talking of the love of Christ : his name was to me as 
 ointment poured forth ; indeed it was sweet to my soul, 
 but to them a rock of offence. I thought my case singular. 
 Every hour in the day until I came to London, I much 
 longed to be with some to whom I could tell of the wonders 
 of God's love towards me, and join in prayer to Him whom 
 my soul loved and thirsted after. I had uncommon com- 
 motions within, such as few can understand. Now, the 
 Bible was my only companion and comfort ; I prized it 
 much, with many thanks to God that I could read it for 
 
% €xifok for tip Jfogro, 
 
 myself, and was not left to be tossed about or led by man's 
 devices and notions. The worth of a soul cannot be told. 
 — May the Lord give the reader an understanding in this. 
 Whenever I looked into the Bible I saw things new, and 
 many texts were immediately applied to me with great 
 comfort, for I knew that to me the word of salvation was 
 sent. Sure I was that the Spirit which indited the word 
 opened my heart to receive the truth of it as it is in Jesus 
 — that the same Spirit enabled me to have faith in the 
 promises that were precious to me, and enabled me to be- 
 lieve to the salvation of my soul. By free grace I was 
 persuaded that I had a part in the first resurrection, and 
 was enlightened with the " light of the living."* I wished 
 for a man of God with whom I might converse : my soul 
 was like the chariots of Aminadab. -j- These, among others, 
 were the precious promises that were so powerfully applied 
 to me : " All things whatsoever ye shall ask in prayer, 
 believing, ye shall receive." " Peace I leave with you, my 
 peace I give unto you." I saw the blessed Redeemer to 
 be the fountain of life, and the well of salvation. I expe- 
 rienced him to be all in all ; he had brought me by a way 
 that I knew not, and he had made crooked paths straight. 
 Then in his name I set up my Ebenezer, saying, " Hitherto 
 he hath helped me :" and could say to the sinners about me, 
 behold what a Saviour I have ! Thus I was, by the teach- 
 ing of that all-glorious Deity, the great One in Three, and 
 Three in One, confirmed in the truths of the Bible, those 
 oracles of everlasting truth, on which every soul living 
 must stand or fall eternally, agreeably to the passage in 
 Acts, " Neither is there salvation in any other, for there is 
 none other name under heaven given among men whereby 
 we must be saved, but only Jesus Christ." May God give 
 the reader a right understanding in these facts ! " To him 
 that believeth, all things are possible, but to them that are 
 unbelieving nothing is pure. J 
 
 * Job xsxiii. 30. 
 
 t Canticles vi. 12. 
 
 X Titus i. 15. 
 

 220 
 
 % €nbxfa fnr tjit iJjgrfl; 
 
 We remained at Cadiz until our ship got laden. We 
 sailed about the fourth of November ; and, having a good 
 passage, arrived in London the month following, to my 
 comfort, with heartfelt gratitude to God for his rich and 
 unspeakable mercies. 
 
 On my return, I had but one text which puzzled me, or 
 that the devil endeavoured to buffet me with, viz., Rom. 
 xi. 6, and, as I had heard of the minister, Mr. Romaine, 
 and his great knowledge in the Scriptures, I wished much 
 to hear him preach. One day I went to Blackfriars church, 
 and, to my great satisfaction and surprise, he preached from 
 that very text. He very clearly shewed the difference 
 between human works and free election, which is according 
 to God's sovereign will and pleasure. These glad tidings 
 set me entirely at liberty, and I went out of the church 
 rejoicing. I went to Westminster chapel, and saw some of 
 my old friends, who were glad when they perceived the won- 
 derful change that the Lord had wrought in me, particu- 
 larly Mr. G — S — , my worthy acquaintance, who was a 
 man of a choice spirit, and had great zeal for the Lord's 
 service. I enjoyed his correspondence till he died in the 
 year 1784. I was examined at that chapel, and received 
 into church fellowship amongst them : I rejoiced in spirit, 
 making melody in my heart to the God of all mercies. 
 Now, my whole wish was to be dissolved, and to be with 
 Christ — but, alas ! I must wait mine appointed time. 
 
 When our ship was ready for sea again, I was entreated by 
 the captain to go in her once more, so I again embarked for 
 Cadiz, in March, 1775. We had a very good passage until 
 we arrived off the Bay of Cadiz ; when, as we were going 
 into the harbour, the ship struck against a rock, and 
 knocked off a garboard plank, which is the next to the keel : 
 in an instant all hands were in the greatest confusion, and 
 began with loud cries to call upon God to have mercy on 
 them. Although I saw no way of escaping death, I felt no 
 dread in my then situation, having no desire to live. I 
 
% €nh\i for tip! Jfegri 
 
 even rejoiced in spirit, thinking this death would be sudden 
 glory. But the fulness of time was not yet come. The 
 people near to me, were much astonished at seeing me 
 thus calm and resigned, but I told them of the peace of 
 God, which through sovereign grace I enjoyed, and these 
 words were that instant in my mind : 
 
 " Christ is my pilot wise, 
 My compass is His word ; 
 My soul each storm defies, 
 While I hare such a Lord. 
 I trust His faithfulness and power 
 To save me in the trying hour. 
 
 Though rocks and quicksands deep, 
 
 Through all my passage lie, 
 Yet Christ shall safely keep, 
 And guide me with his eye." 
 
 We ran the ship ashore at the nearest place, to keep her 
 from sinking, and after many tides, with a great deal of 
 care and industry, we got her repaired again. When we 
 had despatched our business at Cadiz, we went to Gibraltar, 
 and thence to Malaga. I was very much shocked at the 
 bull-baiting and other diversions which prevailed here on 
 Sunday evenings, to the great scandal of Christianity and 
 morals. 
 
 We sailed for England in June. When we were about 
 north latitude 42°, we had contrary wind for several days, 
 which made the captain exceedingly fretful and peevish : 
 and God's holy name was often blasphemed by him. One 
 day, as he was in this impious mood, a young gentleman 
 who was a passenger on board, reproached him, and said 
 he acted wrong ; for we ought to be thankful to God for 
 all things, as we were not in want of anything on board ; 
 and though the wind was contrary for us, yet it was fair 
 for some others, who, perhaps, stood in more need of it 
 than we. I immediately seconded this young gentleman 
 with some boldness, and said we had not the least cause to 
 murmur, for that the Lord was better to us than we 
 
 m 
 
SJii 
 
 222 
 
 51 €x\hit for tire Jfogrn. 
 
 deserved, and that he had done all things well. Before 
 that time on the following day, much to our great joy and 
 astonishment, we saw the providential hand of our benign 
 Creator, whose ways with His blind creatures are past 
 finding out. At noon, the man at the helm cried out, — 
 " A boat !" I was the first on deck, and descried a 
 little boat at some distance, but, as the waves were high, 
 it was as much as we could do sometimes to discern her ; 
 however we stopped the ship's way, and the boat, which 
 was extremely small, came alongside with eleven miserable 
 men, whom we took on board immediately. To all human 
 appearance, these people must have perished in the course 
 of one hour or less ; the boat being small, it barely con- 
 tained them. "When we took them up they were half 
 drowned, and had no victuals, compass, water, or any other 
 necessary whatsoever, and had only one bit of an oar to 
 steer with, and that right before the wind ; so that they 
 were obliged to trust entirely to the mercy of the waves. 
 As soon as we got them all on board, they bowed them- 
 selves on their knees, and, with hands and voices lifted up 
 to Heaven, thanked God for their deliverance ; and I trust 
 that my pra} r ers were not wanting amongst them at the 
 same time. The mercy of the Lord quite melted me, and 
 I recollected the words in the 107th Psalm, which I 
 thus saw verified : — " They cried unto the Lord in their 
 trouble, and He delivered them out of their distresses." 
 " O that men would praise the Lord for his goodness, and 
 for his wonderful works to the children of men." The 
 poor distressed captain said, " that the Lord is good ; for, 
 seeing that I am not fit to die, He therefore gave me a 
 space of time to repent." I was very glad to hear this 
 expression, and took an opportunity when convenient of 
 talking to him on the providence of God. They told us 
 they were Portuguese, and were in a brig loaded with 
 corn, which shifted that morning at five o'clock, owing to 
 which the vessel sunk that instant with two of the crew ; 
 
% €xikk fur % Jfrgrn. 
 
 2,3 7-3 
 
 223 
 
 and how these eleven got into the boat (which was lashed 
 to the deck) not one of them could tell. We provided 
 them with every necessary, and brought them all safe to 
 London, and I hope the Lord gave them repentance unto 
 eternal life. 
 
 I was happy once more amongst my friends and brethren 
 till November, when my old friend Dr. Irving bought a 
 remarkably fine sloop, about 150 tons. Having a mind for 
 a new adventure in cultivating a plantation in Jamaica, and 
 the Musquito Shore, he asked me to go with him, saying, that 
 he would trust me with his estate in preference to any one. 
 I accepted the offer, knowing that the harvest was fully 
 ripe in those parts, and hoped to be an instrument under 
 God, of bringing some poor sinner to my well-beloved 
 Master, Jesus Christ. We embarked in November. On 
 our passage, I took all the pains that I could to instruct an 
 Indian prince we had on board the doctrines of Christianity, 
 of which he was entirely ignorant ; and to my great joy, 
 he was quite attentive, and received with gladness the truths 
 that the Lord enabled me to set forth to him. 
 
 On the 5th of January we made Antigua and Mont- 
 serrat, and on the 14th arrived at Jamaica. On the 18th 
 of February we arrived at the Musquito Shore, and then 
 sailed to the southward, to Cape Gracias a Dios, where 
 there was a large lake, which received the emptying of two 
 or three very fine large rivers, and abounded much in fish 
 and land tortoise. Some of the native Indians came on 
 board, and we used them well, and told them we were 
 come to dwell amongst them, at which they seemed 
 pleased. So the Doctor and I, with some others, went with 
 them ashore ; and they took us to different places to view 
 the land, in order to choose a place to make a plantation 
 of. We fixed on a spot near a river's bank, in a rich soil ; 
 and, having got our necessaries out of the sloop, we began 
 to clear away the woods, and plant different kinds of 
 vegetables, which had a quick growth. 
 
% €xifak far % 3&gra. 
 
 I often wished to leave this place and sail for Europe ; 
 for our heathenish mode of procedure and living was very- 
 irksome to me. The word of God saith, " What does it 
 avail a man if he gain the whole world and lose his own 
 soul ?" This was much and heavily impressed on my 
 mind ; and though I did not know how to speak to the 
 Doctor for my discharge, it was disagreeable for me to 
 stay any longer, but about the middle of June I took 
 courage enough to ask him for it. He was very unwilling 
 at first to grant me my request ; but I gave him so many 
 reasons for it, that at last he consented to my going, and 
 gave me the following certificate of my behaviour : — 
 
 "The bearer, Gustavus Vassa, has served me several years 
 with strict honesty, sobriety, and fidelity. I can, therefore, 
 with justice recommend him for these qualifications ; and 
 indeed, in every respect I consider him an excellent ser- 
 vant. I do hereby certify that he always behaved well, 
 and that he is perfectly trust-worthy." 
 
 CHARLES IRVING." 
 
 " Musqidto Shore, June 15, 1776." 
 
 Though I was much attached to the Doctor, I was happy 
 when he consented. I got every thing ready for my 
 departure, and hired some Indians, with a large canoe, to 
 carry me off. All my poor countrymen, the Slaves, when 
 they heard of my leaving them, were very sorry, as I had 
 always treated them with care and affection, and did every 
 thing I could to comfort the poor creatures, and render 
 their condition easy. Having taken leave of my old friends 
 and companions, on the 18th of June, accompanied by the 
 Doctor, I left that part of the world, and went southward 
 above twenty miles along the river. There I found a 
 sloop, the captain of which told me he was going to 
 Jamaica, and having agreed for my passage with him, the 
 Doctor and I parted, not without shedding tears on both 
 
% MMt far tjp %%m. 
 
 225 m 
 
 sides. The vessel then sailed till night, when she stopped 
 in a lake within the same river. A schooner belonging to 
 the same owners came in, and, as she was in want of hands, 
 Hughes, the owner of the sloop, asked me to go as a sailor, 
 and said he would give me wages. I thanked him ; but I 
 said I wanted to go to Jamaica. He then immediately 
 changed his tone, and swore, and abused me very much, 
 and asked how I came to be freed. I told him, and said 
 that I came into that vicinity with Dr. Irving, whom he 
 had seen that day. Then he desired me to go in the 
 schooner, or else I should not go out of the sloop as a free 
 man. I said this was very hard, and begged to be put on 
 shore again ; but he swore that I should not. Without 
 another word, he made some of his people tie ropes round 
 each of my ancles, and also to each wrist, and another rope 
 round my body, and hoisted me up without letting my feet 
 touch or rest upon any thing. Thus I hung, without any 
 crime committed, and without judge or jury, merely be- 
 cause I was a free man, and could not by the law get any 
 redress from a White person in those parts of the world. 
 I was in great pain from my situation, and cried and begged 
 very hard for some mercy, but all in vain. My tyrant, in 
 a rage, brought a musket out of the cabin, and loaded it 
 before me and the crew, and swore that he would shoot 
 me if I cried any more. I had now no alternative ; I there- 
 fore remained silent, seeing not one White man on board who 
 said a word in my behalf. I hung in that manner from 
 between ten and eleven o'clock at night till about one in the 
 morning ; when, finding my cruel abuser fast asleep, I 
 begged some of his Slaves to slacken the rope that was 
 round my body, that my feet might rest upon something. 
 This they did at the risk of being cruelly used by their 
 master, who beat some of them severely at first for not 
 tying me when he commanded them. Whilst I remained 
 in this condition, till between five and six o'clock next 
 morning, I trust I prayed to God to forgive this blasphemer, 
 
 All© 
 
 fg 
 
 %G 
 
JA< 
 
 226 
 
 % €rikfe for fire jfegrn. 
 
 who cared not what he did, but when he got up out of his 
 sleep in the morning was of the very same temper and dis- 
 position as when he left me at night. "When they got up 
 the anchor, and the vessel was getting under way, I once 
 more cried and begged to be released ; being fortunately 
 in the way of hoisting the sails, they released me. 
 
 "When I was let down, I spoke to Mr. Cox, a carpenter, 
 whom I knew on board, on the impropriety of this conduct. 
 He also knew Dr. Irving, and the good opinion he ever 
 had of me. This man then went to the captain, and 
 told him not to carry me away in that manner; that I 
 was the Doctor's steward, who regarded me very highly, 
 and would resent this usage when he should come to 
 know it; on which he desired a young man to put me 
 ashore in a small canoe he brought with him. I got hastily 
 into the canoe and set off, whilst my tyrant was down 
 in the cabin ; but he soon spied me out, when I was not 
 above thirty or forty yards from the vessel, and running 
 upon the deck with a loaded musket in his hand, he 
 presented it at me, and swore heavily and dreadfully, that 
 he would shoot me that instant, if I did not come back on 
 board. As I knew the wretch would have done as he 
 said without hesitation, I put back to the vessel again ; 
 but, as the goodLord would have it, just as I was alongside, 
 he was abusing the captain for letting me go from the 
 vessel, which the captain returned, and both of them soon 
 got into a very great heat. The } r oung man that was with 
 me now got out of the canoe ; the vessel was sailing on fast, 
 with a smooth sea, and I then thought it was neck or 
 nothing, so at that instant I set off again, for my life, in 
 the canoe, towards the shore ; and fortunately the confusion 
 was so great amongst them on board, that I got out of the 
 reach of the musket shot unnoticed, while the vessel sailed 
 on with a fair wind a different way, so that they 
 could not overtake me without tacking ; but even before 
 that could be done I should have been on shore, which I 
 
51 (Erilrote for tju JJrgrn. 
 
 227 
 
 Slid) 
 
 soon reached, with many thanks to God for this unex- 
 pected deliverance. 
 
 After a tiresome and perilous journey, I got on board a 
 sloop, expecting daily to sail for Jamaica, having agreed 
 to work my passage. I was not many days on board before 
 we sailed ; but, to my sorrow and disappointment, though 
 used to such tricks, we went to the southward along the 
 Musquito shore, instead of steering for Jamaica. I was 
 compelled to assist in cutting a great deal of mahogany 
 wood on the shore as we coasted along it, and load the 
 vessel with it before she sailed. I was on board sixteen 
 days, during which, in our coasting, we fell in with a smaller 
 sloop, the Indian Queen, commanded by John Baker, how 
 told me if he could get one or two free hands, he would 
 sail immediately for Jamaica. He also pretended to show 
 me some marks of attention and respect, and promised to 
 give me forty-five shillings sterling a month if I would go 
 with him. I thought this much better than cutting wood 
 for nothing, and therefore told the other captain that I 
 wanted to go to Jamaica in this vessel, but he would not 
 listen to me ; and, seeing me resolved to go in a day or 
 two, he got the vessel under sail, intending to carry me 
 away against my will, which mortified me extremely. But 
 with the assistance of a shipmate, I went on board the 
 Indian Queen on July the 10th. 
 
 A few days after, we sailed; but again, to my great 
 mortification, this vessel went to the south, nearly as far as 
 Carthagena, trading along the coast, instead of going to 
 Jamaica, as the captain had promised me, and worst of all, 
 he was a very cruel man, and a horrid blasphemer. It was 
 the 14th of October before we arrived at Kingston in 
 Jamaica. When we were unloaded, I demanded my wages 
 as agreed for, amounting to £8 5s., but the captain 
 refused to give me one farthing, although it was the 
 hardest earned money I ever worked for in my life. Dr. 
 Irving did all he could to help me to get my money ; and 
 
% €xihtt for fyi jfep£ 
 
 we went to every magistrate in Kingston (and there were 
 nine), but they all refused to do anything for me, and said 
 my oath could not be admitted against a "White man. Nor 
 was this all, for the captain threatened that he would 
 beat me severely if he could catch me, for attempting to 
 demand my money ; and this he would have done, but 
 that I got, by means of Dr. Irving, under the protection 
 of captain Douglas, of the Squirrel man-of-war. I thought 
 this exceeding hard usage ; though I found it to be too 
 much the practice there, to pay Free Negroes for their 
 labour in this manner. 
 
 In November, I found a ship bound for England, when I 
 embarked with a convoy, having taken a last farewell of Dr. 
 Irving. In January we arrived at Plymouth : I was happy 
 once more to tread on English ground ; and, after passing 
 some little time at Plymouth and Exeter, among some pious 
 friends, whom I was happy to see, I went to London with 
 a heart replete with thanks to God for past mercies. 
 
 Such were the various scenes which I was a witness to, 
 and the fortune I experienced until the year 1777. Since 
 that period my life has been more uniform, and the inci- 
 dents of it fewer than in any other equal number of years 
 preceding ; I therefore hasten to the conclusion of a Narra- 
 tive, which I fear the reader may think already sufficiently 
 tedious. I had suffered so many impositions in my com- 
 mercial transactions in different parts of the world, that I 
 became heartily disgusted with a seafaring life, and was 
 determined not to return to it, at least for some time. 
 
 In 1779, I served Governor Macnamara, who had been 
 a considerable time on the coast of Africa. Understanding 
 I was of a religious turn of mind, he thought I might 
 be of service in converting my countrymen to the faith 
 of the gospel. I at first refused, telling him how I had 
 been served on a like occasion by some White people, the 
 last voyage I went to Jamaica, when I attempted the con- 
 version of the Indian Prince. But he told me not to fear, 
 
for he would apply to the Bishop of London to get me 
 ordained. On these terms I consented to the Governor's 
 proposal to go to Africa, in hope of doing good amongst 
 my countrymen. In order to have me sent out properly, 
 we wrote the following letter to the Bishop of London : — 
 
 " the memorial of gustavus vassa, 
 
 " Sheweth, 
 
 " That your memorialist is a native of Africa, and has 
 a knowledge of the manners and customs of the inhabitants 
 of that country. 
 
 " That your memorialist has resided in different parts of 
 Europe for twenty-two years last past, and embraced the 
 Christian faith in the year 1759. 
 
 " That your memorialist is desirous of returning to 
 Africa as a missionary, if encouraged by your Lordship, in 
 hopes of being able to prevail upon his countrymen to 
 become Christians; and your memorialist is the more 
 induced to undertake the same, from the success that has 
 attended the like undertakings when encouraged by the 
 Portuguese through their different settlements on the 
 coast of Africa, and also by the Dutch : both governments 
 encourage the Blacks, who, by their education are qualified 
 to undertake the same, and are found more proper than 
 European clergymen, unacquainted with the language and 
 customs of the country. 
 
 " Your memorialist's only motive for soliciting the office 
 of a missionary is, that he may be a means, under God, of 
 reforming his countrymen and persuading them to embrace 
 the Christian religion. Therefore your memorialist humbly 
 prays your Lordship's encouragement and support in the 
 undertaking. 
 
 "GUSTAVUS VASSA." 
 
 This letter was also accompanied by one from Governor 
 Macnamara, and also one from Dr. Wallace, who had resided 
 
 J; 
 
m 
 
 )\7 
 
 230 
 
 51 €xihk fnr tip Jfrgrn. 
 
 in Africa for many years. "With these letters I waited on 
 the Bishop, by the Governor's desire, and presented them 
 to his Lordship. He received me with much condescension 
 and politeness ; but, from some scruples of delicacy, and 
 saying the Bishops were not of one opinion in sending a 
 new missionary to Africa, he declined to ordain me. 
 
 Shortly after this, I left the Governor, and served a 
 nobleman in the Dorsetshire militia, with whom I was 
 encamped at Coxheath for some time. In 1783, I visited 
 eight counties in Wales, from motives of curiosity. 
 
 In the spring of 1784, I thought of traversing old ocean 
 again, and sailed for New York. Our ship having got 
 laden, we returned to London in January 1785. When 
 she was ready again for another voyage, the captain being 
 an agreeable man, I sailed with him again for Philadelphia 
 in March in the same year. I was very glad to see this 
 favourite old town once more ; and my pleasure was much 
 increased in seeing the worthy Quakers freeing and easing 
 the burthens of many of my oppressed African brethren. 
 It rejoiced my heart when one of these friendly people took 
 me to see a free school they had erected for every deno- 
 mination of Black people, whose minds are cultivated there, 
 and forwarded to virtue ; and thus they are made useful 
 members of the community. Does not the success of this 
 practice say loudly to the planters, in the language of 
 Scripture — " Go ye, and do likewise !" 
 
 In October 1785, I was accompanied by some Africans, 
 and presented the following address of thanks to the 
 Friends or Quakers, in Whitehart-court, London : 
 
 " Gentlemen, 
 
 " By reading your book, entitled A Caution to Great 
 
 Britain and her Colonies, * concerning the calamitous state 
 
 of the enslaved Negroes, we, part of the poor, oppressed, 
 
 needy, and much degraded Negroes, desire to approach 
 
 * Written by Anthony Benezet? 
 
 &Dq 
 
% frirt for ijp Jfrgrn. 
 
 231 
 
 you with this address of thanks, with our inmost love and 
 warmest acknowledgment ; and with the deepest sense of 
 your benevolence, unwearied labour, and kind interposition, 
 towards breaking the yoke of Slavery, and to administer a 
 little comfort and ease to thousands and tens of thousands 
 of very grievously afflicted and heavy burthened Negroes. 
 
 " Gentlemen, could you, by perseverance, at last be 
 enabled, under God, to lighten in any degree the heavy 
 burthen of the afflicted, no doubt it would, in some mea- 
 sure, be the possible means of saving the souls of many of 
 the oppressors ; and if so, sure we are, that the God whose 
 eyes are ever upon all his creatures, and always rewards 
 every true act of virtue, and regards the prayers of the 
 oppressed, will give to you and yours those blessings 
 which it is not in our power to express or conceive, but 
 which we, as a part of those captivated, oppressed, and 
 afflicted people, most earnestly wish and pray for." 
 
 These gentlemen received us very kindly, with a promise 
 to exert themselves on behalf of the oppressed. 
 
 On my return to London, I was very agreeably surprised 
 to find, that the benevolence of Government had adopted 
 the plan of some philanthropic individuals to send the 
 Africans from hence to their native quarter, and that some 
 vessels were then engaged to carry them to Sierra Leone ; 
 an act which redounded to the honour of all concerned in 
 its promotion, and filled me with much rejoicing. There 
 was then in the city, a select Committee for the Black poor, 
 to some of whom I had the honour of being known. As 
 soon as they heard of my arrival, they informed me of the 
 intention of Government ; and, as they seemed to think me 
 qualified to superintend part of the undertaking, they asked 
 me to go with the Black poor to Africa. I pointed out 
 many objections to my going ; and particularly expressed 
 some difficulties on the account of the Slave dealers, as I 
 should certainly oppose their traffic in the human species 
 by every means in my power. However, these objections 
 
$ €xih\t for tjrt ftgrn. 
 
 were over- ruled by the Committee, who prevailed on me to 
 consent to go, and recommended me to the honourable 
 Commissioners of his Majesty's Navy, as a proper person 
 to act as Commissary for Government in the intended expe- 
 dition ; and they accordingly appointed me in November 
 1786, to that office, and gave me sufficient power to act, 
 having received my warrant and the following order from 
 the Officers and Commissioners of his Majesty's Navy: — ■ 
 
 " To Mr. Gustavus Vassa, Commissary of Provisions and 
 Stores for the Black Poor going to Sierra Leone." 
 
 " Whereas, you are directed, by our warrant, to receive 
 into your charge, from Mr. Joseph Irwin, the surplus pro- 
 visions remaining of what was provided for the voyage, as 
 well as the provisions for the support of the Black poor, 
 after the landing at Sierra Leone, with the clothing, tools, 
 and all other articles provided at Government's expence ; 
 and as the provisions were laid in at the rate of two months 
 for the voyage, and for four months after the landing, but 
 the number embarked being so much less than we expected, 
 whereby there may be a considerable surplus of provisions, 
 clothing, &c. ; — these are, in addition to former orders, to 
 direct and require you to appropriate or dispose of such 
 surplus to the best advantage you can for the benefit of 
 Government, keeping and rendering to us a faithful account 
 of what you do herein. And for your guidance in prevent- 
 ing any White persons going, who are not intended to have 
 the indulgence of being carried thither, we send you here- 
 with a list of those recommended by the Committee for the 
 Black poor, as proper persons to be permitted to embark, 
 and acquaint you that you are not to suffer any others to 
 go who do not produce a certificate from the Committee, 
 of their having their permission for it. For which this 
 shall be your warrant. Dated at the Navy-Office, January 
 16, 1787. 
 
 " J. Hinslow, Geo. Marsh, W. Palmer." 
 
 w 
 
I proceeded immediately to the execution of my duty on 
 board the vessels destined for the voyage, where I conti- 
 nued till the March following. 
 
 During my continuance in the employment of Govern- 
 ment I was struck with the flagrant abuses committed by 
 the agent, and endeavoured to remedy them, but without 
 effect. Government were not the only objects of pecula- 
 tion ; but the poor people suffered infinitely more ; their 
 accommodations were most wretched ; many of them wanted 
 beds, and many more, clothing and other necessaries. 
 
 I could not silently suffer Government to be cheated, and 
 my countrymen plundered and oppressed, and even left 
 destitute of almost the necessaries for their existence. I 
 therefore informed the Commissioners of the Navy of the 
 agent's proceeding ; but my dismission was soon after pro- 
 cured by means of a gentleman in this city, whom the agent, 
 conscious of peculation, had deceived by letters, and who, 
 moreover, empowered the same agent to receive on board, 
 at the Government expense, a number of persons as passen- 
 gers, contrary to the orders I received. By this I suffered 
 a considerable loss in my property ; however, the Commis- 
 sioners were satisfied with my conduct, and wrote to Capt. 
 Thompson, expressing their approbation of it. 
 
 Thus provided, they proceeded on their voyage ; and at 
 last, worn out by treatment, perhaps not the most mild, 
 and wasted by sickness, brought on by want of medicine, 
 clothes, bedding, &c. they reached Sierra Leone just at 
 the commencement of the rains. At that season of the 
 year it is impossible to cultivate the lands ; their provisions 
 were therefore exhausted before they could derive any 
 benefit from agriculture ; and it is not surprising that many, 
 especially the Lascars, whose constitutions are very tender, 
 and who had been cooped up in ships from October to 
 June, and accommodated in the manner described, should 
 be so wasted by their confinement as not long to survive it. 
 
 Thus ended my part of the expedition to Sierra Leone ; 
 
 &> 
 
 K9 
 
 2h 
 
 )?3k5) 
 
234 
 
 1 €rikfe for tjp %%i% 
 
 which, however unfortunate in the event, was humane and 
 politic in its design, nor was its failure owing to Govern- 
 ment ; every thing was done on their part ; but there was 
 evidently sufficient mismanagement attending the conduct 
 and execution of it to defeat its success. 
 
 I should not have been so ample in my account of this 
 transaction, had not the share I bore in it been made the 
 subject of partial animadversion ; even my dismission 
 from employment was thought worthy of being made by 
 some a matter of public triumph. The motives which 
 might influence any person to descend to a petty contest 
 with an obscure African, and to seek gratification by his 
 depression, perhaps it is not proper here to inquire into or 
 relate, even if its detection were necessary to my vindica- 
 tion ; but I thank Heaven it is not. I wish to stand by 
 my own integrity, and not to shelter myself under the im- 
 propriety of another ; and I trust the behaviour of the 
 Commissioners of the Navy to me, entitle me to make this 
 assertion. After I had been dismissed, March 24, I drew 
 up a memorial thus : — 
 
 " To the Right Honourable the Lords Commissioners of his 
 Majesty's Treasury. 
 
 " The Memorial and Petition of Gustavus Vassa, a 
 Black Man, late Commissary to the Black Poor going 
 to Africa. 
 
 " HUMBLY SHEWETH, 
 
 " That your Lordships' memorialist was, by the Hon- 
 ourable the Commissioners of his Majesty's Navy, on the 
 4th of December last, appointed to the above employment 
 by warrant from that Board ; 
 
 " That he accordingly proceeded to the execution of his 
 duty on board of the Vernon, being one of the ships ap- 
 pointed to proceed to Africa with the above poor ; 
 
 r* 
 
" That your memorialist, to his great grief and astonish- 
 ment, received a letter of dismission from the Honourable 
 Commissioners of the Navy, by your Lordships' orders ; 
 
 " That, conscious of having acted with the most perfect 
 fidelity and the greatest assiduity in discharging the trust 
 reposed in him, he is altogether at a loss to conceive the 
 reasons of your Lordships having altered the favourable 
 opinion you were pleased to conceive of him, sensible that 
 your Lordships would not proceed to so severe a measure 
 without some apparent good cause ; he therefore has every 
 reason to believe that his conduct has been grossly misre- 
 presented to your Lordships, and he is the more confirmed 
 in his opinion, because, by opposing measures of others 
 concerned in the same expedition, which tended to defeat 
 your Lordships' humane intentions, and to put the govern- 
 ment to a very considerable additional expense, he created 
 a number of enemies, whose misrepresentations, he has too 
 much reason to believe, laid the foundation of his dismis- 
 sion. Unsupported by friends, and unaided by the advan- 
 tages of a liberal education, he can only hope for redress, 
 from the justice of his cause. In addition to the mortifica- 
 tion of having been removed from his employment, and the 
 advantage which he reasonably might have expected to 
 have derived therefrom, he has had the misfortune to 
 have sunk a considerable part of his little property in 
 fitting himself out, and in other expenses arising out of 
 his situation, an account of which he here annexes. Your 
 memorialist will not trouble your Lordships with a vindi- 
 cation of any part of his conduct, because he knows not of 
 what crimes he is accused ; he, however, earnestly entreats 
 that you will be pleased to direct an inquiry into his be- 
 haviour during the time he acted in the public service ; 
 and, if it be found that his dismission arose from false re- 
 presentations, he is confident that in your Lordships' justice 
 he shall find redress. 
 
 "Your petitioner therefore humbly prays that your 
 
*K( 
 
 yTTP 
 
 236 
 
 % <SMi far % Jfrgrn. 
 
 Lordships will take his case into consideration, and that 
 you will be pleased to order payment of the account above 
 referred to, amounting to £32 4s, and also the wages in- 
 tended, which is most humbly submitted. 
 " London, May 12, 1787." 
 
 The above petition was delivered into the hands of their 
 Lordships, who were kind enough, in the space of some 
 few months afterwards, without hearing, to order me £50. 
 
 My life has since passed in an even tenor, and great part 
 of my study and attention has been to assist my much 
 injured countrymen. 
 
 On March 21st, 1788, I had the honour of presenting 
 the Queen with a petition on behalf of my African bre- 
 thren, which was received most graciously by Her Majesty. 
 
 " To the QUEEN'S most Excellent Majesty. 
 
 " Your Majesty's well known benevolence and humanity 
 embolden me to approach your royal presence, trusting 
 that the obscurity of my situation will not prevent your 
 Majesty from attending to the sufferings for which I plead. 
 
 " Yet I do not solicit your royal pity for my own dis- 
 tress ; my sufferings, although numerous, are in a measure 
 forgotten. I supplicate your Majesty's compassion for 
 millions of my African countrymen, who groan under the 
 lash of tyranny in the West Indies. 
 
 " The oppression and cruelty exercised to the unhappy 
 Negroes there, have at length reached the British legisla- 
 ture, and they are now deliberating on its redress ; even 
 several persons of property in Slaves in the West Indies, 
 have petitioned parliament against its continuance, sensible 
 that it is as impolitic as it is unjust — and what is inhuman 
 must ever be unwise. 
 
 "Your Majesty's reign has hitherto been distinguished 
 by private acts of benevolence and bounty; surely the 
 more extended the misery is, the greater claim it has to 
 
% €vUst for tire Jfegm 
 
 your Majesty's compassion, and the greater must be your 
 Majesty's pleasure in administering to its relief. 
 
 " I presume, therefore, gracious Queen, to implore your 
 interposition, with that of your royal consort, in favour of 
 the wretched Africans ; that, by your Majesty's benevolent 
 influence, a period may now be put to their misery ; and 
 that they may be raised from the condition of brutes, to 
 which they are at present degraded, to the rights and 
 situation of free men, and admitted to partake of the bles- 
 sings of your Majesty's happy Government ; so shall your 
 Majesty enjoy the heartfelt pleasure of procuring happi- 
 ness to millions, and be rewarded in the grateful prayers of 
 themselves, and of their posterity. 
 
 " And may the all-bountiful Creator shower on your 
 Majesty, and the royal family, every blessing that this world 
 can afford, and every fulness of joy which divine revela- 
 tion has promised us in the next. 
 
 " I am your Majesty's most dutiful and devoted 
 " Servant to command, 
 
 " GUSTAVUS VASSA, 
 " The Oppressed Ethiopian." 
 
 I hope, continues our intelligent African, in his Narra- 
 tive, to have the satisfaction of seeing the renovation of 
 liberty and justice, resting on the British Government, to 
 vindicate the honour of our common nature. These are 
 concerns which do not perhaps belong to any particular 
 office : but, to speak more seriously, to every man of senti- 
 ment, actions like these are the just and sure foundation 
 of future fame ; a reversion, though remote, is coveted by 
 some noble minds as a substantial good. It is upon these 
 grounds that I hope and expect the attention of gentlemen 
 in power. These are designs consonant to the elevation 
 of their rank, and the dignity of their stations ; they are 
 ends suitable to the nature of a free and generous Govern- 
 ment ; and, connected with views of empire and dominion, 
 
 % Q 
 
% 'Mklt for tjre Jfogrn. 
 
 suited to the benevolence and solid merit of the legislature. 
 It is a pursuit of substantial greatness. May the time 
 come, when the Sable people shall gratefully commemorate 
 the auspicious era of extensive freeedom. Then shall those 
 persons particularly be named with praise and honour, 
 who generously proposed and stood forth in the cause of 
 humanity, liberty, and good policy, and brought to the 
 ear of the legislature designs worthy of royal patronage 
 and adoption.* May Heaven make British senators the 
 dispersers of light, liberty, and science, to the uttermost 
 parts of the earth : then will be 'glory to God in the high- 
 est, on earth peace, and good-will to men.' ' It is right- 
 eousness that exalteth a nation, but sin is a reproach to any 
 people ; destruction shall be to the workers of iniquity, 
 and the wicked shall fall by their own wickedness.' May 
 the blessings of the Lord be upon the heads of all those who 
 commiserate the case of the oppressed Negroes, and the 
 fear of God prolong their days ; and may their expectations 
 be filled with gladness ! ' The liberal devise liberal things, 
 and by liberal things shall they stand.' They can say with 
 pious Job, 'Did not I weep for him that was in trouble? 
 was not my soul grieved for the poor V 
 
 I have now only to request the reader's indulgence, and 
 conclude. I am far from the vanity of thinking there is 
 any merit in this Narrative : I hope censure will be sus- 
 pended, when it is considered, that it was written by one 
 who was as unwilling, as unable, to adorn the plainness 
 of truth by the colouring of imagination. My life and 
 fortune have been extremely chequered, and my adven- 
 tures various. Even those I have related are considerably 
 abridged. If any incident should appear uninteresting or 
 trifling, I can only say, as my excuse for mentioning it, 
 that almost every event of my life made an impression on 
 
 * Granville Sharp, Thomas Clarkson, James Ramsay, men of virtue, an 
 honour to their country, ornamental to human nature, happy in them- 
 selves, and benefactors to mankind ! 
 
my mind, and influenced my conduct. I early accustomed 
 myself to observe the hand of God in the minutest occur- 
 rence, and to learn from it a lesson of morality and religion ; 
 and in this light every circumstance I have related was to 
 me of importance. After all, what makes any event 
 important, unless by its observation we become better and 
 wiser, and learn ' to do justly, to love mercy, and to walk 
 humbly before God V To those who are possessed of this 
 spirit, there is scarcely any book or incident so trifling that 
 does not afford some profit, while to others the experience 
 of ages seems of no use ; and even to pour out to them the 
 treasures of wisdom is throwing the jewels of instruction 
 away. 
 
 N.B. In putting together the foregoing sketch of Gus- 
 tavus Vassa, from his " Narrative," the author has not been 
 able to avail himself of the last edition, which was published 
 in 1794, and would probably detail the events of his life 
 to a later period. The Abbe Gregoire, in his Inquiry into 
 the Intellectual and Moral Faculties of the Negroes, says, 
 "that Vassa married in London, and had a son, Sancho, to 
 whom he gave a good education, and who became assistant- 
 librarian to Sir Joseph Banks, and secretary to the Com- 
 mittee for Vaccination. 
 
 JOB BEN SOLLIMAN. 
 Job Ben Solliman, was an African of great distinction 
 in his own country, being the son of the Mahomedan King 
 of Bunda, on the Gambia. In 1730, whilst travelling 
 across the countries of Jagra, with a servant and some 
 cattle, he was seized, and carried to Joar, where he was 
 sold to captain Pyke, commander of the ship Arabella, who 
 carried him off to America, and sold him to a planter in 
 Maryland. Here he lived about a year, being treated with 
 unusual kindness by his master. 
 
1 #flmfe far tjre Jfogra. 
 
 Being well versed in the Arabic tongue, he wrote a 
 letter in that language, which he had the good fortune to 
 get conveyed to England. This letter falling into the hands 
 cf a gentleman named Oglethorpe, he sent it to Oxford to 
 be translated, and became inspired with so good an opinion 
 of the author, that he immediately sent orders to have him 
 bought of his master. But Oglethorpe, setting out for 
 Georgia himself soon after, before he returned from thence, 
 Solliman, by a train of extraordinary adventures, had 
 already been brought to England. Waiting on the learned 
 Sir Hans Sloane, he was found to be a perfect master of 
 the Arabic tongue, by translating several manuscripts and 
 inscriptions upon medals into English, of which he had ac- 
 quired a competent knowledge during his servitude, and 
 on his passage to England. Sir Hans Sloane recommended 
 him to the Duke of Montague, who, being pleased with his 
 sweetness of disposition and mildness of temper, his dignified 
 and pleasing manners, as well as with his genius and capacity, 
 introduced him to court, where he was graciously received 
 by the royal family, and most of the nobility, from whom 
 he received distinguished marks of favour and esteem. 
 
 After remaining in England about fourteen months, he 
 was very desirous of returning to his native country, and 
 to see his father, the King of Bunda, once more, to whom 
 he sent letters from England. He received many valuable 
 presents from Queen Caroline, the Duke of Cumberland, 
 the Duke of Montague, the Earl of Pembroke, several 
 ladies of quality, and also from the African Company, who 
 ordered their agents to shew him great respect, and re-con- 
 ducted him to Bunda. He arrived there safely. One of 
 his uncles residing there, embraced him, and said, " During 
 sixty years, thou art the first Slave I have seen return 
 from America !" 
 
 Solliman wrote many letters to his friends in Europe 
 and America, which were translated and perused with 
 interest. At his father's decease he became his successor, 
 
and was much beloved by his subjects. Moore, in his 
 travels, met with him and gives some further account of 
 him. He possessed an uncommonly retentive memory. 
 While in England, he wrote a copy of the Koran in Arabic, 
 entirely from remembrance. It was probably to this cir- 
 cumstance that the Abbe Gregoire alluded, when he states 
 that "he knew the Koran by heart." In vol. xx. of the 
 Gentleman's Magazine, 1750, is a portrait of Job Ben 
 Solliman, with one of the Prince of Anamaboe. 
 
 SADIKI; A LEARNED SLAVE. 
 
 Dr. Madden, in a letter to J. S. Buckingham, Esq., 
 M.P., dated Kingston (Jamaica), Sept. 15, 1834, gives the 
 following particulars respecting a Slave who had been of 
 exalted rank in his own country : — 
 
 "A Negro was recently brought before me, belonging to 
 a Mr. Anderson, of this town, to be sworn in as constable 
 on his master's property. I discovered by the mere accident 
 of seeing the man sign his name in very well-written Arabic, 
 that he was a man of education, and on subsequent inquiry, 
 a person of exalted rank in his own country, who had been 
 kidnapped in a province bordering on Timbuctoo. He 
 had been sold into Slavery in Jamaica nearly 30 years ago, 
 and had preserved the knowledge of the learning of his 
 country, and obtained the character of one a little more 
 enlightened than the majority of his savage brethren, and 
 that was all. The interest I took in all Oriental matters 
 (if no other motive influenced me), induced me to enter 
 minutely into this man's history. I had him to my house : 
 he gave me a written statement of the leading events of his 
 life. I found the geographical part of his stoiy correct : 
 he became a frequent visitor of mine in his leisure time ; 
 and I soon discovered that his attainments, as an Arabic 
 scholar, were the least of his merits. I found him a person 
 of excellent conduct, of great discernment and discretion. 
 
 f& 
 
 % i 
 
242 
 
 % fritete for tire Jfegnt 
 
 I think if I wanted advice on any important matter, in 
 which it required extra prudence and a high sense of moral 
 rectitude to qualify the possessor to give counsel, I would 
 as soon have recourse to the advice of this poor Negro as 
 any person I know. 
 
 "By what name under Heaven, that is compatible 
 with moderation, that is musical to ears polite, must that 
 system be called by, which sanctioned the stealing away of 
 a person like this, as much a nobleman in his own country, 
 as any titled chief is in ours, and in his way, (without 
 any disparagement to the English noble), as suitably 
 educated for his rank ? Fancy one of the scions of our 
 nobility, a son of one of our war chiefs — Lord London- 
 derry's, for example — educated at Oxford, and, in the 
 course of his subsequent travels, unfortunately falling into 
 the hands of African robbers, and being carried into 
 bondage. Fancy the poor youth marched in the common 
 Slave coffle to the first market place on the coast. He is 
 exposed for sale : nobody inquires whether he is a patrician 
 or a plebeian: nobody cares whether he is ignorant or 
 enlightened: it is enough that he has thews and sinews for 
 a life of labour without reward. Will you follow him to 
 the Slave ship that is to convey him to a distant land ? — a 
 vessel, perhaps similar to that visited by Dr. Walsh on his 
 passage to Brazil, ' where 562 human beings were huddled 
 together, so closely stowed that there was no possibility of 
 lying down or changing their position night or day.' — 
 Well, like Sterne, let us take the single captive : he survives 
 the passage, and has seen the fifth part of his comrades 
 perish in the voyage : he is landed on some distant island, 
 where he is doomed to hopeless Slavery. The brutal 
 scramble for the Slaves has ceased : he is dragged away by 
 his new master, but not before he is branded with a heated 
 iron, which may only sear his flesh, while the iron brand 
 of Slavery, the burning thought of endless bondage, ' en- 
 ters into his soul.' " 
 
2 (Tnimto for tin? Jfrgrn. 
 
 243 
 
 Dr. Madden, having made up his mind to redeem the 
 interesting Negro he has introduced to our notice, (who 
 was known in Jamaica by the name of Edward Doulan,) 
 made application to his master, and requested he would 
 nominate a local magistrate, to act with the special justice 
 of some parish, for the purpose of valuing his Slave. 
 
 " I was given to understand by Mr. Anderson," says Dr. 
 Madden, " that the man was invaluable to him — that he 
 kept his books, (in Arabic characteis) — and that the 
 accounts of the whole of his vast business were kept by 
 him — in short, that no sum of money which could be 
 awarded to him could compensate him for the loss of the 
 man's services. I also heard, indirectly, that the attempt 
 to procure his liberty had already been made, unsuccess- 
 fully, some years ago, by the Duke de Montebello, when 
 he visited Jamaica, on his return from his South American 
 travels, who had ineffectually applied at the Colonial 
 Office, to be assisted in devising means for procuring his 
 freedom. But, though a Duke had failed, I had the 
 modesty to think it was no reason why I should. 
 
 " I waited on Mr. Anderson, his master, who was a per- 
 fect stranger to me, and frankly stated to him what my 
 wishes and intentions were. I know not with what 
 earnestness I pressed the matter, but I found myself talk- 
 ing to a man whose disposition, if nature ever writes a 
 legible hand on human features, was as benevolent as any 
 I ever met with. I expressed the wish I felt to obtain 
 the man's release : he said, I need say no more on the sub- 
 ject. The man was invaluable to him ; his services were 
 worth more to him than those of Negroes for whom he 
 had paid £300 ; but the man had been a good servant to 
 him — a faithful and a good Negro — and he would take no 
 money for him — he would give him his liberty ! ! ! I 
 pressed him to name any reasonable sum for his release, 
 but he positively refused to receive one farthing in the way 
 of indemnity for the loss of the man's services. 
 
 w 
 
sk 
 
 244 
 
 SI €xihlt for tire 3fegrn. 
 
 " The following day was appointed to execute the act of 
 manumission, at the public office of the special magistrate. 
 The time appointed for carrying the release into effect 
 having become known, a great number of the respectable 
 inhabitants of Kingston attended : the office was indeed 
 crowded at an early hour with persons of all complexions, 
 who had come to witness the ceremony. Mr. Anderson 
 and his Negro, Edward Doulan, being in attendance, the 
 manumission papers were prepared ; but before they were 
 signed, the nature of the circumstances which had led to 
 the effort that had been made to obtain the man's freedom, 
 and the manner in which that boon had been granted by 
 his master, were dwelt on at some length ; and the merits 
 of the fidelity of the one, and the generosity of the other, 
 were feebly perhaps described, however forcibly they 
 might be felt. The scene was one of no ordinary interest. 
 Beside the bench stood a Negro of exalted rank in his own 
 country, in the act of obtaining his liberty, after many a 
 long year of Slavery, and near him his venerable master, 
 ' prepared to give unto his servant that which was just and 
 equal, knowing that he also had a master in heaven.' 
 There were tears of joy on some of the black features 
 before me, and there were smiles of satisfaction even on 
 white faces in that assemblage. It is said the gods are 
 pleased to behold the successful exertions of a good man 
 struggling with adversity ; but if we are justified in esti- 
 mating what is pleasing to that intelligence by the extent 
 of the advantages conferred on man by human beneficence, 
 perhaps the sight of a good master, voluntarily making a 
 faithful bondsman free, and laying down authority which 
 it may not be in his nature to abuse, but yet which he 
 knows it is not safe for mortal man to be entrusted with, 
 is one of the exhibitions of humanity, in which its affinity 
 with a higher nature, appears at a distance less remote than 
 in almost any other situation in which we can conceive it." 
 
 After the Negro's liberation, Dr. Madden solicited 
 
% €xlhk for \\t Ur-grii. 
 
 245 
 
 subscriptions for him, and had the satisfaction of presenting 
 him with twenty pounds. This sum was principally pro- 
 cured by the presentation of an address to the inhabitants 
 of Kingston, accompanied by a history of his life, written 
 in Arabic, and couched in terms at once creditable to his 
 acquirements as a scholar, and his character as a man of dis- 
 cretion and integrity. How he could have attained so 
 competent a knowledge of his native language, at so early 
 an age as that at which he had been taken from his 
 country, and have kept up his knowledge of it in the un- 
 favourable circumstances in which he was placed in a 
 foreign land, it is difficult to conceive. "We have only 
 space for a few extracts from the history of this interesting 
 Slave, which may be seen more at length in Dr. Madden's 
 " Twelve months in the West Indies," ii. p. 183 : — 
 
 My name is Aboii Beer Sadiki, born in Timbuctoo, 
 and brought up in Geneh. I acquired the knowledge of 
 the Alcoran in the country of Gounah, in which there are 
 many teachers for young people, who come from different 
 parts for their instruction. My father's name is Kara- 
 Mousa, Scheriff; (the interpretation of which is, "of a noble 
 family.") The names of my father's brothers are Aderiza, 
 Abdriman, Mahomet, and Abon Beer. Their father, my 
 grandfather, lived in the country of Timbuctoo and Geneh ; 
 some say he was the son of Ibrahim, the founder of my 
 race in the country of Geneh. After the death of my 
 grandfather, jealousy arose among the sons and the rest of 
 the family, which scattered them into the different parts 
 of Soudan. 
 
 My father gathered a large quantity of gold and silver 
 in the country of Gounah, some of which he sent to his 
 father-in-law : he also sent horses, mules, and rich silks, 
 from Egypt, as presents for Ali Aga Mahommed Tassere, 
 my grandfather, in the country of Bournoo and Cassina. 
 He afterwards took the fever, which was the cause of his 
 death in Gounah, where he was buried. At this time I 
 
 ^k<5^ 
 
 (HIS) 
 
 M 
 
 <T\ 
 
 ^^©J^^i 
 
246 
 
 % fritafc far \\)i Jfrgrn, 
 
 was a child, but some of my old relations told me after- 
 wards, all about the life of my departed father. About 
 five years after his death, I got the consent of my teacher 
 to go to the country of Gounah to see the grave of my 
 father. He said, with the blessing of God, he would accom- 
 pany me. He then prepared proper provision for our jour- 
 ney, and we took along with us many of his eldest scholars 
 to bear us company. We departed, and, after long fatigue, 
 we arrived at Cong ; from there we went to Gounah, and 
 stopped there for about two years, as we considered the 
 place a home, having much property therein. 
 
 Abdengara, king of Buntuco, having slain Iffoa, the king 
 of Bandara, in battle, also wanted to kill Cudjoe, the cap- 
 tain of an adjoining district. When the king of Gounah 
 heard that Abdengara had come in with his army to fight 
 him, he called all his men to meet the enemy in the coun- 
 try of Bolo, where they commenced fighting from the 
 middle of the day until night. After that they went to 
 their different camps : seven days after that, they gathered 
 up again, and commenced the war in the town of Anacco, 
 where they fought exceedingly, and there were many lives 
 lost on both sides ; but Abdengara's army, being stronger 
 than the king of Gounah's, took possession of the town. 
 Some of Gounah's people were obliged to fly to Cong, and 
 on that very day they made me a captive. As soon as I 
 was made prisoner, they stripped me, and tied me with cord, 
 and gave me a heavy load to carry, and led me into the 
 country of Buntocoo, — from thence to Cumsay, where the 
 king of Shantee reigned, whose name is Ashai, — and from 
 thence to Agimaca, which is the country of the Fantees ; 
 from thence to the town of Dago, by the sea-side (all the 
 way on foot and well loaded) ; there they sold me to the 
 Christians in that town. One of the ship's captains pur- 
 chased me, and delivered me over to one of his sailors : the 
 boat immediately pushed off, and I was carried on board 
 of the ship. We were three months at sea before we 
 
& €xiMt for tjp llrgrn. 
 
 arrived in Jamaica, which was the beginning of bondage. 
 But, praise be to God, who has everything in his power to 
 do as he thinks good, and no man can remove whatever 
 burden he chooses to put on us, as He has said, " Nothing 
 shall fall on us except what He shall ordain ; He is our 
 Lord, andlet all that believe in Him put their trust in Him." 
 My parents are of the Mussulman religion : they are 
 particularly careful in the education of their children, and 
 in their behaviour, but I am lost to all those advantages : 
 since my bondage, I am become corrupt ; and I now con- 
 clude, by begging the Almighty God to lead me into the 
 path that is proper for me, for He alone knows the 
 secrets of my heart, and what I am in need of. 
 
 ABON BECR SADIKI. 
 
 Kingston, Jamaica, Sept. 20, 1834. 
 
 "The above," says Dr. Madden, "was written in Arabic. 
 The man speaks English well and correctly for a Negro, 
 but does not read or write it. I caused him to read the 
 original, and translated it word by word : and, from the 
 little knowledge I have of the spoken language, I can 
 safely present this version of it as a literal translation." 
 
 Some further information respecting Sadiki would have 
 been interesting ; all I can find in Dr. Madden's West 
 Indies, is an extract from a letter he addressed to two 
 highly respectable clergymen : — ■ 
 
 " Reverend Gentlemen, 
 
 "I beg leave to inform you that I am rejoiced and well 
 pleased in my heart for the great boon I have received in 
 the Testament, both of the old and new law of our Lord 
 and Saviour, in the Arabic language." 
 
 Also a letter he wrote to one of his fellow-countrymen, 
 a Slave in Jamaica, in reply to one received from him : — 
 
 " Kingston, Jamaica, Oct. 18th, 1834 
 
 " Dear Countryman, 
 " I now answer your letter. My name in Arabic is Abon 
 
 (PTK 
 
 
% €x\Mt to tjp ifrgrn. 
 
 Beer Sadiki, and in Christian language, Edward Doulan ; 
 born in Timbuctoo, and brought up in Geneh. I finished 
 reading the Koran in the county of Gounah, at which 
 place I was taken captive in war. My master's name in this 
 country is Alexander Anderson. Now, my countryman, 
 God hath given me a faithful man, a just and a good mas- 
 ter ; he made me free ; and I know truly that he has shown 
 mercy to every poor soul under him. I know he has 
 done that justice which our King William the Fourth com- 
 manded him to do (God save the King), and may he be a 
 conqueror over all his enemies from east to west, from 
 north to south, and the blessing of God extend over all his 
 kingdom, and all his ministers and subjects. I beseech 
 you, Mahomed Caba, and all my friends, continue in 
 praying for my friend, my life, and my bread fruit, which 
 friend is my worthy Dr. Madden, and I hope that God may 
 give him honour, greatness, and gladness, and likewise his 
 generation to come, as long as Heaven and earth continue. 
 Now, my countryman, these prayers that I request of you 
 are greater to me than anything else I can wish of you ; and 
 you must pray that God may give him strength and 
 power to overcome all his enemies, and that the King's 
 orders to him be held in his right hand firmly. 
 
 The honour I have in my heart for him is great ; but God 
 knows the secrets of all hearts. Dear countryman, I also 
 beseech you to remember in your prayers my master, 
 Alexander Anderson, who gave me my liberty free and 
 willingly ; and may the Almighty prosper him, and protect 
 him from all dangers. 
 
 " "Whenever you wish to send me a letter, write it in 
 Arabic ; then I shall understand it properly. 
 " I am, &c. 
 
 "EDWARD DOULAN." 
 (Abon Beer Sadiki, in Arabic.) 
 
 "These letters," writes Dr. Madden, "are selected from 
 
 q-mc- 
 
& (Trilmir fnr tip Sfepr. 
 
 249 
 
 a great many addressed to me by the Negroes, both in 
 English and Arabic ; and, if these limits allowed me to 
 send you all of them, I think you would come to the con- 
 clusion, that the natives of some parts of Africa are not so 
 entirely ignorant as they are represented to be, and that 
 the Negroes generally, are as capable of mental improve- 
 ment as their White brethren, at least, that is my firm 
 conviction ; but it is not from letters, but from oral com- 
 munication with them, from close observation of their men- 
 tal qualities, both in the east and in the west, that I have 
 formed that opinion." 
 
 The learned Doctor gives a letter from a number of free 
 African Negroes of Kingston, signed by four of them. 
 " Some of the ideas contained in it," he remarks, " are highly 
 poetical, and the language in which they are expressed, 
 simple and not inelegant." 
 
 TESTIMONY OF CAPTAIN PILKINGTCN RESPECTING 
 THE NEGRO. 
 
 Captain Pilkington, being appointed Chief Civil Engineer 
 on the Western Coast of Africa, proceeded with his wife to 
 Sierra Leone, in 1847. 
 
 " I remained," he writes, " about two years and a half 
 in this settlement, during which period I was engaged in 
 the erection of many public buildings in its various towns, 
 which afforded me frequent opportunities of observing the 
 character and conduct of the Free Blacks, whom I found 
 to be both intelligent and docile. I witnessed their deport- 
 ment on the bench, as magistrates — as pleaders at the bar 
 — and as grand and petty jurors ; and I may safely affirm 
 that I had every reason to admire the upright, the faithful, 
 and the conscientious mode in which they discharged the 
 duties of these offices. In a Report of the Commissioners 
 of Inquiry to that Colony, it is stated, that ' Neither of 
 the two individuals practising as solicitors or attornies, have 
 been professionally educated. One is an European, who 
 
 2K 
 
 )^ 
 
250 
 
 % €rito for i\t Jfogrn. 
 
 acts also as King's Advocate and Registrar of the Vice- 
 admiralty Court ; the other, a person of Colour, born and 
 educated in England, and engaged in mercantile pursuits.' 
 Surely nothing can more indisputably prove the tranquility 
 of this settlement, containing a population of 22,000 inhabi- 
 tants, than the fact, that there were only two lawyers there, 
 and even these (the smallest number that can be engaged 
 in a court of law, viz., one for plaintiff, one for defendant) 
 could not gain a subsistence by the professional emolu- 
 ments alone !" 
 
 Owing to the insalubrity of the climate, captain Pilking- 
 ton resolved to purchase a prize vessel then in the harbour, 
 and undertake a trading voyage on the coast. " Having 
 effected the purchase," says he, " I proceeded up the Rio 
 Pongas, visiting the Timini and Susoo nations. I sailed 
 also up the Kissy river as far as it was navigable for a large 
 vessel, and pursued my voyage to its source in my boat. 
 In the course of this expedition, I also visited several pro- 
 vinces of the Mandingo nation, the inhabitants of which 
 paid uniform respect to my person and property. Con- 
 scious that a stranger must be unacquainted with their 
 usages and laws, they require of him nothing more than 
 that he should mention to his host or landlord the whole 
 business which he desires to undertake amongst them. If 
 he does this, he is safe from the infliction of penal enact- 
 ment, should he violate the native laws ; but if not, he is 
 considered as taking the entire responsibility of his conduct 
 upon himself, and is treated accordingly. This I regard 
 as a great privilege granted to the foreigner, and as exhi- 
 biting a considerate rectitude of principle, highly honour- 
 able to the head and heart of this simple-minded people. 
 Nor was this practice restricted to the Mandingoes only ; as 
 wherever I touched, I found it the prevalent custom on that 
 part of the African coast. These people are chiefly Mahome- 
 dans, and have attained to a remarkable degree of civiliza- 
 tion, under the influence of a law that no * bookman ' 
 
 '<&\ 
 
% €xihk far tire Jfrgrn. 
 
 251 km 
 
 shall be sold as a Slave, the natural tendency of which may 
 be easily imagined. Yet the only book they read is the 
 Koran, which the ' book-men ' constantly carry about 
 their person, as a triumphant token of their learning, dig- 
 nity, and privileges. 
 
 " Leaving these nations, I sailed to the southward, and 
 touched at the Kroo country, where I found a very hardy, 
 active, and intelligent race of men, devoted to labour and 
 to agricultural pursuits, which may in a great degree be 
 owing to a difficulty of access to the interior, which cuts 
 them off from all temptation of engaging in the odious 
 Slave trade — the easiest, but most infamous, of all the 
 modes of procuring a livelihood. That they are inherently 
 industrious, is evinced by their habit of navigating in small 
 canoes to Sierra Leone, a distance of 120 leagues, for the 
 sole purpose of obtaining employment. The Krooman's 
 canoe is cut out of a solid piece of soft wood, pointed at 
 both ends, in length scarcely exceeding that of the navi- 
 gator, and is so light that he carries it customarily from the 
 sea to his hut, in the roof of which he places it for protec- 
 tion from the sun. Instead of oars, he uses a paddle about 
 two feet long, very broad at the bottom, which he plies 
 with both hands, on either side of the barque, as occasion 
 may require, he himself sitting at the bottom, with his legs 
 across, in the Turkish fashion. It is really surprising to 
 witness the activity with which he brings down this canoe 
 to the sea side ; with what dexterity he launches it ; the 
 nicety with which, whether in a sitting or standing posture, 
 he balances its action ; and with what velocity he impels 
 it over the surface of the water. 
 
 " This people likewise employ themselves in the cultiva- 
 tion of rice, which, when in season, may be purchased of 
 them in great quantities. Here, again, their industry is 
 obvious ; for, being obliged to deliver it on board the ves- 
 sel of the purchaser, they have to transport it in their 
 canoes in very small portions. Their enterprise readily 
 
 <CT1NS} 
 
% €nh\t for tip J&grri. 
 
 induces them, without apprehension, to trust themselves 
 with those who trade along the coast as I did, to render 
 such services as their active habits and local knowledge 
 enable them to do. They are, in consequence, acquainted 
 not only with the different African dialects, but the lan- 
 guages of commercial Europe. I have known instances of 
 the same Krooman speaking English, French, and Dutch. 
 They justly estimate the value of a good character, and 
 invariably desire a written statement of their conduct from 
 their respective White employers." 
 
 PL A CI D . 
 
 In the summer of 1844, eleven persons were executed 
 together at Havannah, in Cuba, for having been concerned 
 in an alleged conspiracy, to obtain liberty for the Black 
 population — the Slaves of the Spanish inhabitants. One 
 of these, the leader of the revolt, was Gabriel de la Con- 
 cepcion Valdes, more commonly known by the name of 
 Placido, the Cuban poet. 
 
 Little is known of this Negro beyond a few particulars 
 contained in one or two brief newspaper notices, which ap- 
 peared shortly after his execution, announcing the fact in 
 this country. The Heraldo, a Spanish newspaper, in giv- 
 ing an account of the execution, speaks of him as " the 
 celebrated poet, Placido;" andsays, " this man was born with 
 great natural genius, and was beloved and appreciated by 
 the most respectable young men of Havannah, who united 
 to purchase his release from Slavery." Placido appears to 
 have burned with a desire to do something for his race ; 
 and hence he employed his talents not only in poetry, but 
 also in schemes for altering the political condition of Cuba. 
 The Spanish papers, as might be expected, accuse him of 
 wild and ambitious projects, and of desiring to excite an 
 insurrection in Cuba, similar to the memorable Negro 
 insurrection in St. Domingo fifty years ago. Be that as it 
 may, Placido was at the head of a conspiracy formed in 
 
% €xiMt far tire Jfegm 
 
 253 
 
 m 
 
 Cuba in the beginning of 1844. The conspiracy failed, and 
 Placido, with a number of his companions, was seized by 
 the Spanish authorities. 
 
 The following is the account given of the execution in 
 a letter from Havannah, which appeared in the Morning 
 Herald newspaper : — " What dreadful scenes have we not 
 witnessed here these last few months ! what frightful 
 developments ! what condemnations and horrid deaths ! 
 But the bloody drama seems approaching its close ; the 
 curtain has just fallen on the execution of the chief con- 
 spirator, Placido, who met his fate with a heroic calmness 
 that produced a universal impression of regret. Nothing 
 was positively known of the decision of the council respect- 
 ing him, till it was rumoured a few days since that he would 
 proceed, along with others, to the ' Chapel ' for the con- 
 demned. On the appointed day, amidst a great crowd, he was 
 seen walking along with singular composure under circum- 
 stances so gloomy, saluting with graceful ease his numerous 
 acquaintances. Are you aware what the punishment of 
 the ' Chapel ' means ? It is worse a thousand times than 
 the death of which it is the precursor. The unfortunate 
 criminals are conducted into a chapel hung with black, and 
 dimly lighted. Priests are there to chant in a sepulchral 
 voice the service of the dead ; and the coffins of the trem- 
 bling victims are arrayed in cruel relief before their eyes. 
 Here they are kept for twenty- four hours, and are then led 
 out to execution. Can anything be more awful ? And 
 what a disgusting aggravation of the horror of the coming 
 death ! Placido emerged from the chapel cool and undis- 
 mayed, whilst the others were nearly or entirely overcome 
 with the agonies they had already undergone. He held a 
 crucifix in his hand, and recited in a loud voice a beautiful 
 prayer in verse, which thrilled upon the hearts of the atten- 
 tive masses which lined the road he passed. On arriving 
 at the fatal spot, he sat down on a bench with his back 
 turned, as ordered, to the military, and rapid preparations 
 
% € ritafe fnr % JfBgrn 
 
 were made for his death. And now the dread hour had 
 arrived. At last he arose, and said, ' Adios, raundo ; no 
 hay piedad para mi. Soldados, fuego.' — [Adieu, O world; 
 here there is no pity for me. Soldiers, fire.] Five balls 
 entered his body. Amid the murmurs of the horror-struck 
 spectators, he got up, and turned his head upon the shrink- 
 ing soldiers, his face wearing an expressiou of super-human 
 courage. f Will no one have pity on me ?' he said. ' Here 
 (pointing to his heart) — fire here.' At that instant two 
 balls pierced his breast, and he fell dead whilst his words 
 still echoed in our ears. Thus has perished the great leader 
 of the attempted revolt." 
 
 The following is the poem alluded to in the Heraldo, 
 composed in Spanish by Placido. 
 
 A DIOS PLEGARIA. 
 
 " Ser de immensa bondad, Dios Poderoso, 
 a, vos acudo en mi dolor vehemente ; 
 estendea vuestro brazo omnipotente, 
 rasgad de calumnia el velo odioso, 
 j arrancad esto sello ignominioxo, 
 con que el mundo maucbar quiere mi frente. 
 
 E,ey de los reyes, Dios de mis abuelos, 
 vos solo sois mi defensor, Dios mio ; 
 todo lo puede quien al mar sombrio, 
 olas y peces did, luz a los cielos 
 fuego al sol, giro al aire, al Norte luelos, 
 vida a las plantas, movimiento al rio. 
 
 Todo lo podeis vas, lodo fenece, 
 d se reanima a vuestra voz sagrada ; 
 fuera de vos, Senor, el todo es nada, 
 que en la insondabil eternidad perece. 
 y aun es a misnia nada as obedece, 
 pues de ella fue la bumanidad creada. 
 
 Yo no os puedo eno anar, Dios de clemencia ; 
 y pues vuestra ; eternal sabiduria 
 ve el traves de mi cuerpo el alma mia, 
 cual del aire a la clara transparencia, 
 estorbad que bumillada la innocencia, 
 bata sus palmas la calumnia impia. 
 
% <MMt far tju Jfrgrn. 
 
 Mas si quadra a tu suma omnipotencia 
 que yo pereyca, cual malvado inipio, 
 y que las hombres mi cadaver frio 
 ultrageu con maligna complacencia 
 suene tu voz, y acabe mi existencia, 
 cumplose en mi tu voluntad, Dios mio." 
 
 The following is a translation of these beautiful lines. 
 They were written in prison the night before his execution, 
 and were solemnly recited by him as he proceeded to the 
 place of death, so that the concluding stanza was uttered 
 only a few moments before he expired. 
 
 " Being of infinite goodness ! God Almighty ! 
 I hasten in mine agony to thee ! 
 Rending the hateful veil of calumny, 
 Stretch forth thine arm omnipotent in pity ; 
 Efface this ignominy from my brow, 
 Wherewith the world is fain to brand it now. 
 
 Oh King of kings ! thou God of my forefathers ! 
 
 My God ! thou only my defence shalt be, 
 
 Who gav'st her riches to the shadowed sea ; 
 From whom the North her frosty treasures gathers — 
 
 Of heavenly light and solar flame the giver, 
 
 Life to the leaves, and motion to the river. 
 Thou canst do all tbings. What thy will doth cherish, 
 
 Revives to being at thy sacred voice, 
 
 Without thee all is naught, and at thy choice, 
 In fathomless eternity must perish. 
 
 Yet e'en that nothingness thy will obeyed, 
 
 When of its void humanity was made. 
 Merciful God ; I can deceive thee never ; 
 
 Since, as through ether's bright transparency, 
 
 Eternal wisdom still my soul can see 
 Through every earthly lineament for ever. 
 
 Forbid it, then, that Innocence should stand 
 
 Humbled, while Slander claps her impious hand. 
 But if the lot thy sovereign power shall measure, 
 
 Must be to perish as a wretch accurs'd, 
 
 And men shall trample over my cold dust — 
 The corse outraging with malignant pleasure — 
 
 Speak, and recall my being at thy nod ! 
 
 Accomplish in me all thy will, my God ! " 
 
 Maeia W. Chapman. 
 
*A< 
 
 256 
 
 % €Mz for tjjr- Jiegnr. 
 
 The execution of Placido took place at six o'clock in 
 the morning, a victim to Slavery. It is to be hoped that 
 more may yet be learnt of the history of this unfortunate, 
 but gifted Negro. 
 
 THE HAPPY NEGRO. 
 
 Some years ago, Andrew Searle, an English gentleman 
 had occasion to visit North America, where the following 
 circumstance occurred, as related in his own words : — 
 
 " Every day's observation convinces me that the children 
 of God are made so by his own special grace ; and that all 
 means are equally effectual with Him, whenever He is 
 pleased to employ them for conversion. 
 
 " In one of my excursions, while I was in the State of 
 New York, I was walking by myself over a considerable 
 plantation, amused with its husbandry, and comparing it 
 with that of my own country, till I came within a little 
 distance of a middle aged Negro, who was tilling the 
 ground. I felt a strong inclination, unusual with me, to 
 converse with him. After asking him some little questions 
 about his work, which he answered in a sensible manner, 
 I asked him to tell me whether his state of Slavery was not 
 disagreeable to him, and whether he would not gladly be 
 at liberty. 'Massah,' said he, looking seriously upon me, 
 ' I have a wife and children ; my Massah take care of them, 
 and I have no care to provide any thing ; I have a good 
 Massah, who teaches me to read ; and I read good book 
 that makes me happy.'— 'I am glad,' replied I, c to hear 
 you say so ; and pray what is the good book you read V 
 1 The Bible, Massah, God's own book.' — ' Do you under- 
 stand, friend, as well as read, this book ? For many can 
 read the words well, who cannot get hold of the true and 
 good sense.' 
 
 " 'O Massah,' said he, 'I read the book much, before I 
 understand ; but, at last, I felt pain in my heart ; I found 
 
 ( ff\£ 
 
 % 
 
$ €xMt for % Urgrn. 
 
 257 
 
 ^ 
 
 things in the book that cut me to pieces.' — 'Ah!' said I, 
 'and what things were they V ' Why, Massah, I found that 
 I had a bad heart, a very bad heart indeed ; I felt pain 
 that God would destroy me, because I was wicked, and 
 done nothing as I should do. God was holy, and I was 
 very vile and wicked ; I could have nothing from Him 
 but fire and brimstone in hell.' 
 
 " In short, he entered into a full account of his convic- 
 tions of sin, which were indeed as deep and piercing as 
 almost any I had ever heard of ; and stated what Scriptures 
 came to his mind, which he had read, that both probed to 
 the bottom of his sinful heart, and were made the means of 
 light and comfort to his soul. I then inquired of him what 
 ministry or means he made use of, and found that his 
 master had taught his Slaves to read, but had not conversed 
 with this Negro upon the state of his soul. 
 
 "I asked him likewise, how he got comfort under all this 
 trial ? * O Massah ! ' said he, ' it was Christ gave me com- 
 fort by his dear word. He bade me come unto Him, and 
 He would give me rest ; for I was very weary and heavy 
 laden.' And here he repeated a number of the most pre- 
 cious texts in the Bible, showing, by his artless comment 
 upon them, as he went along, what great things God had 
 done in the course of some years for his soul. Being rather 
 more acquainted with doctrinal truths, and the Bible, than 
 he had been, or in his situation could easily be, I had 
 a mind to ascertain how far a simple experience, gra- 
 ciously given without the usual means, could preserve a 
 man from error ; and I therefore asked him several ques- 
 tions about the merit of works, the justification of a sinner, 
 the power of grace, and the like, and I own I was as much 
 astonished at, as I admired, the sweet spirit and simplicity 
 of his answers, with the heavenly wisdom that God had put 
 into the mind of this Negro. 
 
 " His discourse, flowing merely from the richness of 
 grace, with a tenderness and expression far ' beyond the 
 
 w 
 
 
 2 L 
 
 >i^ 
 
258 
 
 SI €xlhit far tip Jfrgrn. 
 
 reach of art,' perfectly charmed me. On the other hand, 
 my entering into all his feelings, together with an account 
 to him, which he had never heard before, that thus and thus 
 the Lord, in his mercy, dealt with all his children, and had 
 dealt with me, drew streams of joyful tears down his black 
 face ; and we looked upon each other, and talked with that 
 inexpressible glow of Christian affection, that made me 
 more than ever believe, in what I have often too thought- 
 lessly professed to believe — the communion of saints. 
 
 "I shall never forget how the poor creature seemed to 
 hang upon my lips, and to eat my very words, when I en- 
 larged upon the love of Christ to poor sinners — the free 
 bounty and tender mercy of God — the frequent and 
 delightful sense He gives of his presence — the faith He 
 bestows in his promises — the victories this faith is enabled 
 to get over trials and temptations — the joy and peace in 
 believing — the hope in life and death, and the glorious ex- 
 pectation of immortality. To have seen his eager, delighted, 
 animated air and manner, would have cheered and warmed 
 any Christian's heart, and have been a master-piece for any 
 painter. He had never heard such discourse, nor found 
 the opportunity of hearing it, before. He seemed like a 
 man who had been thrown into a new world, and at length 
 had found company. 
 
 "Though my conversation lasted at least two or three 
 hours, I scarcely ever enjoyed the happy swiftness of time 
 so sweetly in all my life. We knew not how to part. He 
 would accompany me as far as he might ; and I felt, on my 
 side, such a delight in the artless, solid, unaffected experi- 
 ence of this pious soul, that I could have been glad to have 
 seen him oftener then, or to see his like at any time now ; 
 but my situation rendered it impossible. I therefore took 
 an affectionate leave, with feelings equal to those of the 
 warmest and most ancient friendship ; telling him that 
 neither the colour of his body, nor the condition of his 
 present life, could prevent him from being my dear brother 
 
in our dear Saviour ; and that, though we must part now, 
 never to see each other again in this world, I had no doubt 
 of our having another joyful meeting in our Father's home, 
 where we should live together, and love one another, 
 throughout a long and happy eternity. ' Amen, Amen, my 
 dear Massah,' said he, — ' God bless you, and poor me, too, 
 for ever and ever.' 
 
 " If I had been an angel from Heaven, he could not 
 have received me with more ardent delight than he did ; 
 nor could I have considered him with a more sympathetic 
 regard, if he had been a long known Christian of the good 
 old sort, grown up into my affections in the course of 
 many years." 
 
 RICHARD COOPER. 
 
 The following testimony was issued by the Society of 
 Friends, at Little Creek, North America, respecting 
 Richard Cooper, a descendant of Africa, who died in 
 1820. 
 
 " Our esteemed friend, Richard Cooper, departed this 
 life about the age of 100. He was a descendant of the 
 greatly oppressed Africans, a native of the island of Bar- 
 badoes, and, by birth, a Slave. At the age of 12 or 14 he 
 was brought to this country and sold. Having frequently 
 changed owners, he at length became the property of a 
 member of the Society of Friends ; and at the time of the 
 total emancipation, by the Society, of its Slaves, he was 
 liberated from an unmerited and unjust bondage. 
 
 " About this time, he became convinced of the religious 
 principles of Friends, which he ascribed to the tender 
 care and frequent admonition of his mistress, in directing 
 his mind to the principle of divine grace and truth in the 
 heart. He was a frequent attendant of Friends' meetings, 
 and, in advanced life, he requested to be admitted a 
 member of the society, and was received. 
 
*n< 
 
 ^i 
 
 260 
 
 % €x\Mt fnr \\t Urgrn. 
 
 "His conduct and conversation, corresponding in a good 
 degree with his profession, he became generally respected 
 and beloved. By the people of Colour in his neighbour- 
 hood, he was consulted in most matters of controversy in 
 which they were interested ; and his good counsel always 
 tended to, and often effected, an amicable adjustment of 
 differences. He appeared generally concerned to promote 
 friendship and brotherly love ; and, in his friendly visits, 
 he mostly had a word of religious exhortation. Having 
 no school learning, and being desirous for advancement in 
 the knowledge of the best things, he would, when oppor- 
 tunities offered, request the Scriptures and other good 
 books to be read to him, esteeming them valuable in 
 directing the mind to that source from whence all true 
 wisdom comes. In his last sickness he expressed thank- 
 fulness that Friends had received him into membership, 
 and that he had been so favoured as not to have been bur- 
 densome, and hoped that his conduct had brought no re- 
 proach on the society. It was truly comfortable to visit 
 him. No murmuring, no complaining; he appeared thank- 
 ful and resigned — numbering the many mercies and bless- 
 ings which had been bestowed upon him — having a word of 
 encouragement or consolation for all. He expressed a 
 desire for the prosperity of the society, and particularly 
 for the rising generation, that they might be willing to 
 take the yoke of Christ upon them, and so become strength- 
 ening to their elder brethren, and fitted to stand firm in 
 the cause of truth ; of which, he said, they never would 
 have cause to repent. 
 
 " Upon taking leave of those who visited him, he gene- 
 rally expressed something to them by way of blessing. 
 His last advice to his children was, that they should not 
 fall out about the little he had to leave behind him. 
 
 " Through the gradual decay of nature, his long and useful 
 life was brought to a close ; and the belief is entertained, 
 that he has entered into the rest prepared for the righteous. 
 
 jjfcpU 
 
31 '(Eriirate far tju $fop-. 
 
 261 
 
 "To record the Christian virtues of the deceased, that we 
 may imitate their example, is sanctioned by that voice 
 which spoke from Heaven, saying, ' Write, blessed are 
 the dead which die in the Lord, from henceforth : yea, 
 saith the Spirit, that they may rest from their labours, and 
 their works do follow them.' " 
 
 TESTIMONIES RESPECTING THE BUSHMEN OF SOUTH 
 AFRICA, WITH INTERESTING EXAMPLES. 
 
 (FROM PHILIP'S "AFRICAN RESEARCHES.") 
 
 The Bushmen are doubtless in a very ignorant and de- 
 graded state ; but what has been adduced in proof of their 
 incapability of being improved, affords a better criterion of 
 their depressed condition, than of the absence of mental 
 capacity. Many of the accounts which have been published 
 respecting the savage, ferocious, and untameable character 
 of the Bushmen, can scarcely be read in Africa without a 
 smile. The civilization of that degraded people is not only 
 practicable, but might be easily attained : while they are 
 by no means deficient in intellect, they are susceptible of 
 kindness ; grateful for favours ; faithful in the execution 
 of a trust committed to them ; disposed to receive instruc- 
 tion ; and, by the use of proper means, could be easily 
 brought to exchange their barbarous maimer of life for one 
 that would afford more comfort. 
 
 In a journey undertaken into the interior of a colony in 
 1819, we had two Bushmen in our train. One of them 
 had only been a few months in the service of our missionary 
 when he joined us ; and we had not in our party any one 
 that was more teachable, faithful, and obliging. During 
 the last four months of our journey, he served at table ; 
 and after a month's apprenticeship, conducted himself with 
 as much propriety as any English servant might have been 
 expected to do with as little training. 
 
 The following extract of a letter, dated 24th Nov., 1825, 
 
 x O 
 
262 
 
 % €x\Mx for \)i Ifrgrn. 
 
 i from Sir J. Brenton, Bart., giving an account of a Bush- 
 man boy brought by him from the Cape of Good Hope, 
 may be adduced as strongly confirmatory of the opinions 
 which have been advanced of the talents and disposition of 
 the Bushmen people : — 
 
 " Hermes is an honour to his race, and a distinguished 
 proof of what these amiable people are capable of. He 
 possesses the sweetest disposition, and the strongest attach- 
 ments possible. With all the fun and merriment you re- 
 member in him, there is a depth of thought and solidity of 
 understanding that is really astonishing. He has been living 
 for the last year with my sisters at Bath, to whom he is 
 invaluable as a servant, and even as a friend. He heard 
 some time since, of an approaching confirmation, and ex- 
 pressed a wish to be confirmed. My sister mentioned it 
 to the Archdeacon, who requested to see him, and, after a 
 long conversation, pronounced him to have attained a most 
 extraordinary degree of knowledge in religion. He was 
 accordingly confirmed, and became the subject of universal 
 conversation. A clergyman, who had heard of the circum- 
 stance, begged to see him, and cross-questioned him in every 
 way. He asked him which of all the characters in the Old 
 Testament he should have wished to have been, haditbeen 
 possible. Hermes reflected for some time, and then said 
 firmly, ' David, sir.' 'What? sooner than Solomon, whose 
 prosperity was so great?' 'Yes, sir; both were sinners ; 
 but David, we know, repented of his sins ; while there is 
 no passage of Scripture which gives us the same opinion of 
 Solomon.' This is the substance of his answer, which 
 greatly surprised his auditors. His memory is wonderful : 
 he brings home every sermon, and comments upon it with 
 extraordinary exactness." 
 
 Col. Collins, in his report to government in 1809, speaks 
 of the Bushmen as being most liberally gifted by nature 
 with talents. To the same effect, the following passage, 
 related to me as a part of an address delivered by a 
 
Bushman to his countrymen, at a missionary station, when 
 some colonists were present, may be adduced as displaying a 
 very considerable knowledge of Scripture, and no mean 
 share of ability. " Why is it," said he, "that we are per- 
 secuted and oppressed by the Christians ? Is it because 
 we live in desert lands, clothe ourselves with skins, and 
 feed on locusts and wild honey ? Is there anything morally 
 better in one kind of raiment, or in one kind of food, than 
 another ? Was not John the Baptist a Bushman ? Did he 
 not dwell in a wilderness ? Was he not clothed with a 
 leathern girdle, such as we wear ? And did he not feed on 
 locusts and wild honey ? Was he not a Bushman ? Yet 
 Christians acknowledge John the Baptist to have been a 
 good man. Jesus Christ (whose forerunner he was) has 
 said that there has not arisen among men a greater than 
 John the Baptist. He preached the doctrine of repentance 
 to the Jews, and multitudes attended his ministry ; he was 
 respected even by the Jews, and preached before a great 
 king. It is true John the Baptist was beheaded, but he 
 was not beheaded because he was a Bushman, but because 
 he was a faithful preacher ; and where, then, do the 
 Christian men find anything in the precepts or example of 
 their religion to justify them in robbing and shooting 
 us, because we are Bushmen ?" 
 
 Sparrmann gives the following description of the manner 
 in which these people were treated when he travelled in 
 the colony of the Cape of Good Hope. " The Slave busi- 
 ness, that violent outrage against the natural rights of man- 
 kind, which is always in itself a crime, and leads to all 
 manner of misdemeanours and wickedness, is exercised by 
 the colonists with a cruelty towards the Bushmen, which 
 merits the abhorrence of every one, though I have been 
 told that they picpie themselves upon it : and not only is 
 the capture of the Hottentots considered by them merely 
 as a party of pleasure, but, in cold blood, they destroy the 
 bands which nature has knit between husband and wife, 
 
% €xihk for tju ftgrn. 
 
 and between parents and their children. Not content, for 
 instance, with having torn an unhappy woman from the 
 embraces of her husband, her only protection and comfort, 
 they endeavour all they can, and that chiefly at night, to 
 deprive her likewise of her infants ; for it has been observed, 
 that the mothers can seldom persuade themselves to flee 
 from their tender offspring." 
 
 In the instructions given to Col. Collins by the Colonial 
 Government, on his visit into the interior, among other 
 subjects on which he was called to collect information, his 
 attention was particularly directed to the Bushmen. Having 
 studied their character, as far as his opportunities allowed 
 him, he asserts, without the slightest qualification, — that 
 there is not upon the face of the globe a people possessed 
 of better natural abilities or more susceptible of mental or 
 moral improvement. 
 
 A Bushman, says Dr. Philip, on one occasion remarked, 
 that before they heard the Gospel, they had several times 
 stolen cattle, but declared they would do so no more ; that 
 they now detested stealing, particularly as means were put 
 into their hands whereby they might support themselves ; 
 and the missionary adds, in a letter in my possession, that 
 had the institution been continued, as far as civilization is 
 concerned, a better race of men could not, perhaps, have 
 been found. 
 
 A. Faure, a respectable colonial clergyman, writes as 
 follows, respecting the Bushmen: — " I visited," says he, 
 " the spot lately occupied by Mr. Smith, (at Toverberg, 
 South Africa). Here I found a beautiful garden, an ex- 
 cellent vineyard, fine wheat, &c, &c. Some of the Bush- 
 men, whom Mr. Smith baptized, had acquired very rational 
 ideas of the principles of the Christian religion ; and ap- 
 peared to feel its constraining influence in their habitual 
 conduct. They were zealous in trying to convey the same 
 inestimable blessings to their unhappy countrymen, who 
 lived without God, and without hope in the world. It 
 
% fiUrafc for tire Jfrgrn. 
 
 265 
 
 was delightful to hear the children sing the praises of 
 Jehovah, and to witness the progress they have made in 
 spelling and reading. These facts, which have come under 
 my own observation, prove that the conversion of this race 
 of immortal beings is not impossible." 
 
 Uithaalder, the Bushman Chief of Toverberg, and a few 
 of his people, were baptized by the missionary Smith, and 
 their good sense and piety, and the improvement which 
 had taken place in their condition, excited the admiration 
 of others as well as the clergyman above quoted. 
 
 Some singular stories had been told us, says Dr. Philip, 
 while travelling in the colony, respecting the chief Uithaal- 
 der and his family. On their being driven from Toverberg, 
 we were told that he and a few who adhered to him had 
 been cruelly treated ; that they were then hiding in the 
 most retired parts of the district ; that they were reduced 
 to live upon roots only, and what game they could catch in 
 the night ; that they were afraid to appear abroad in day- 
 light, for fear of being shot ; that, in this situation, they 
 kept up the worship of God among themselves, and that 
 the chief constantly exhorted them to remain steadfast in 
 their profession, and to continue instant in prayer to God 
 that he would again send them a missionary in the room of 
 those that had been taken from them. 
 
 ANTHONY WILLIAM AMO, 
 
 Born in Guinea, was brought to Europe when very young ; 
 and the Princess of Brunswick took charge of his educa- 
 tion. He pursued his studies at Halle, in Saxony, and at 
 Wittemberg ; and so distinguished himself by his talents 
 and good conduct, that the Rector and Council of the Uni- 
 versity of the last mentioned town, gave a public testimony 
 to them in a letter of congratulation. 
 
 Amo, skilled in the knowledge of the Latin and Greek 
 
 lO< 
 
 2m 
 
 w 
 
 >ys 
 
266 
 
 I €t\Mi for tire jftgrt 
 
 languages, delivered with success, private lectures on philo- 
 sophy, which are highly praised in the same letter. In an 
 abstract, published by the Dean of the Philosophical 
 Faculty, it is said of this learned Negro, that having ex- 
 amined the systems of the ancients and moderns, he selected 
 and taught all that was best of them. Besides his know- 
 ledge of Latin and Greek, he spoke Hebrew, French, 
 Dutch, and German, and was well versed in astronomy. 
 
 In 1774, Amo published dissertations on some subjects 
 which obtained the approbation of the University of Wittem- 
 berg, and the degree of Doctor was conferred upon him. 
 The title of one of these was " Dissertio inauguralis philo- 
 sophica de humanae mentis AI1A8EIA : seu sensionis ac 
 facultates sentiendi in mente humana absentia, et earum in 
 corpore nostro organico ac vivo prassentia, quam praeside, 
 etc., publice defendit autor Ant. Guil. Amo Guinea-afer 
 philosophise, ect. L. C. magister, etc., 1734, in 4°, Witten- 
 bergse." 
 
 Another was entitled " Disputatio philosophica conti- 
 nens ideam distinctam earum quae competunt vel menti vel 
 corpori nostro vivo et organico, quam consentiente amplis- 
 simorum philosophorum ordine praeside M. Ant. Guil. 
 Amo, Guinea-afer, defendit Joa. Theod. Mainer, philos., 
 et J. V. Cultor, in 4°, 1734, Wittenbergae." At the con- 
 clusion of these works are letters of approbation from the 
 Rector of the University of Wittemberg, who, in speaking 
 of one of them, says : — ■" it underwent no change, because 
 it was well executed ; and indicates a mind exercised in 
 reflection." In a letter addressed to him by the president, 
 he styles Amo, " vir nobilissime et clarissime. Thus the 
 University of Wittemberg has not evinced a belief in the 
 absurd prejudice which exists against the Coloured portion 
 of mankind. 
 
 The Court of Berlin conferred upon Amo the title of 
 Counsellor of State, but after the death of his benefactress, 
 the Princess of Brunswick, Amo fell into a profound 
 
% Crilnttr for \\)t ifrgrn. 
 
 melancholy, and resolved to leave Europe, in which he had 
 resided for 30 years, and to return to the place of his birth 
 at Axim, on the Gold Coast. There he received, in 1753, 
 a visit from the intelligent traveller, David Henry Gallan- 
 dat, who mentions him in the Memoirs of the Academy of 
 Flessingue, of which he was a member. Amo, at that 
 time about fifty years of age, led there the life of a recluse. 
 His father and a sister were living with him, and he had a 
 brother who was a Slave in Surinam. Some time after, it 
 appears, he left Axim, and settled at Chama. 
 
 The Abbe Gregoire, from whose work the foregoing 
 particulars are translated, says, that he made unavailing 
 researches to ascertain whether Amo published any other 
 works, or at what period he died. 
 
 TOTTSSAINT L'OUVEBTTJEE. 
 Toussaint L'Ouverture has been justly designated 
 " one of the most extraordinary men of a period in which 
 extraordinary men were numerous." He is a remarkable 
 instance of genius exhibiting itself in the Negro race, 
 although, as in most other cases, having to contend with 
 circumstances very inconducive to the free growth either 
 of the moral qualities, or the intellectual faculties of the 
 mind. Among the individuals of the African race who 
 have distinguished themselves by intellectual achievement, 
 Toussaint L'Ouverture is pre-eminent ; and while society 
 is waiting for evidence of what the Negro race at large can 
 do and become, it seems only rational to build high hopes 
 upon such a character as that of the man, who was, as a 
 Dictator and a General, the model upon which Napoleon 
 formed himself;* who was as inclined to peace as renowned 
 in war ; and who will ever be regarded in history, as one 
 of the most remarkable men of an age teeming with social 
 wonders. 
 
 * Sec "Biographic Uiiiversclle ;" art. " Toussaint." 
 
1 €tihli fnr tire Jfep, 
 
 Toussaint was born on the plantation of the Count de 
 Noe, situated a few miles from Cape Francois, in the 
 Island of St. Domingo, in 1743 or 1745. His parents 
 were African Slaves on the Count's estate. His father, it 
 is said, was the second son of Gaou Guinou, the King of 
 a powerful African tribe, who, being taken prisoner by a 
 hostile people, was sold to some White merchants, who 
 carried him to St. Domingo, where he was purchased by 
 the Count de Noe. Being more kindly treated by his 
 master than is usually the lot of his race, the son of Gaou 
 Guinou was comparatively happy in a state of Slavery. 
 He married a fellow-slave, a girl of his own country, and 
 by her he had eight children, five sons and three daughters. 
 Of the sons Toussaint was the eldest. 
 
 The Negro boy grew up on the plantation, performing 
 such little services as he could, and altogether his life was 
 as cheerful, and his work as easy, as that of any Slave boy 
 in St. Domingo. The first employment of the little Negro 
 was to tend the cattle ; and the earliest recollections of his 
 character, were of his gentleness, thoughtfulness, and strong 
 religious tendencies. He had some of the advantages for 
 thought that the herdsmen of the East enjoy, — long days 
 of solitude, spent under a bright sky, with all the luxuri- 
 ance of nature shed around, and an occupation which 
 required little of either the head or the hands. But all 
 this would be nothing to a mind which had never been 
 roused. Toussaint would have vegetated like the grass he 
 stretched himself upon, if some superior mind had not 
 given him thoughts, or excited him to think for himself : 
 whose mind this was, whether that of parent, master, com- 
 panion, or priest, is not known. 
 
 One thing is certain, that Toussaint's good qualities 
 soon attracted the attention of Bayou de Libertas, the 
 agent of the estate, who treated him kindly, and by some 
 means he learned to read and write, and acquired some 
 knowledge of arithmetic. But whether the agent caused 
 
51 €riki£ for tjji 2ftgrn. 
 
 him to be taught, or whether he owed his knowledge to a 
 Negro named Pierre Baptiste, or whether he learned by 
 noticing others, is disputed. Pierre Baptiste was a Black 
 on the same plantation, a shrewd and intelligent man, who 
 had acquired considerable information, having been edu- 
 cated by some benevolent missionaries. An intimacy 
 sprung up between Pierre and young Toussaint, and it is 
 probable that all that Pierre had learned from the mission- 
 aries, Toussaint learned from him. However this may 
 have been, certain it is, that the acquisitions of Toussaint, 
 which also included a little knowledge of Latin, and some 
 idea of geometry, were considerably more than were pos- 
 sessed by one in ten thousand of his fellow Slaves ; and it 
 would seem a fortunate circumstance, that so great a 
 natural genius should thus be singled out to receive the 
 unusual gift of a little instruction. Yet, what Toussaint 
 became, others of his race might have been also, had similar 
 advantages been administered to them as fell to his lot. 
 
 Toussaint's qualifications, in conjunction with his regular 
 and amiable deportment, gained him the increased love 
 and esteem of his master, and led to his promotion. He 
 was taken from the labours of the field, and made the 
 coachman of M. Bayou, the overseer — a post of consider- 
 able dignity, — a situation, indeed, as high as a Negro 
 could at that time hope to fill. 
 
 The increased leisure his situation afforded was em- 
 ployed in cultivating his talents, and collecting those stores 
 of information which enriched his mind, and prepared him 
 for a more extensive and important sphere of action. In 
 this, and in higher situations to which he was subsequently 
 advanced, his conduct was irreproachable, and while he 
 gained the confidence of his master, every Negro in the 
 plantation held him in respect. Though there is but little 
 recorded of his early life, it appears that he was noted for 
 his benevolence, and for a stability of temper that scarcely 
 anything could discompose. He was also remarkable for 
 
 o#3 
 
% <Mh\t for tire Jfogra; 
 
 sedateness, and an invincible patience. His religion taught 
 him to endure patiently, and to refrain from inflicting 
 upon others anything which he would not have inflicted 
 on himself. Through life, in the lowest humiliation of his 
 servitude, and in the majesty of his virtual sovereignty, he 
 was temperate in all kinds of enjoyments, and remarkable 
 for preferring the pleasures of the mind to those of the 
 body, manifesting singular strength of religious sentiment. 
 
 In person, Toussaint was about the middle size, with a 
 striking countenance, and a robust constitution, capable of 
 enduring great fatigue. At the age of twenty -five he married 
 a Negress, to whom he always manifested the most un- 
 swerving attachment, uniting with her in all the cares of 
 domestic life. They had several children, who became 
 objects of his tender, affectionate, and parental solicitude, 
 and they were brought up with great judgment and ten- 
 derness. 
 
 The subsequent remarkable career of Toussaint, which 
 led to his great renown, by constituting him the ruler 
 of the country in which he had been brought up a Slave, 
 is so intimately connected with the history of St. Domingo 
 that we must glance at the state of affairs which rendered 
 the island for several years a theatre of war and contention 
 between the White population and the Blacks. 
 
 At the period when the French Revolution broke out, 
 St. Domingo belonged partly to the Spaniards and partly 
 to the French. This beautiful island, which lies near to 
 Jamaica, is 390 miles long, and 140 broad, at its widest 
 part. About two-thirds of it belonged to the Spaniards, 
 and the remainder, the western end, to the French. The 
 north and east coasts are barren ; but the interior spreads 
 into fertile plains, where the Spaniards were rich in wild 
 horses and cattle. The part belonging to the French was 
 divided into three provinces, in which were a few flourish- 
 ing towns, and many rich plantations cultivated by Slaves. 
 It contains some high mountains, and many beautiful 
 
valleys, shaded with cacao groves and coffee plantations ; 
 while in the plains were fields of cotton, sugar, and tobacco, 
 separated from each other by hedges of limes, citrons, and 
 beautiful flowering shrubs. 
 
 The inhabitants of the French provinces of the island 
 were of three kinds — Planters, who were Whites, (French 
 men, or their descendants,) Free People of Colour, and 
 Slaves. The numbers of these three classes were sup- 
 posed to be nearly as follows in 1790 : — ■ 
 
 Whites 30,800 
 
 Free People of Colour . . 24,000 
 
 Slaves 480,400 
 
 So that there were nearly sixteen times as many Slaves 
 as Whites ; while, at the same time, the Free People of 
 Colour might, by themselves, have been almost a match 
 for the Whites in case of a war of the races. 
 
 When the French Revolution broke out, news arrived 
 in the colony of St. Domingo, of what was doing in France. 
 It might have been supposed that the Planters, a small 
 body of gentlemen, holding a large number of Slaves, and 
 living in the midst of Mulattoes, to whom, though free, 
 they would not allow the rights of citizenship, would have 
 been anxious to prevent anything being said about the 
 Rights of Men, and upon Social Equality. It strangely 
 happened, however, that when they were speaking of Man 
 and his Rights, they were thinking only of White men ; 
 and it seems never to have occurred to them, that dark- 
 complexioned men would desire or endeavour to obtain 
 their share of social freedom. The Mulattoes, however, 
 considered that they were as much entitled to social liberty 
 of every kind as any other men ; and while the White 
 planters were drinking popular toasts, and displaying the 
 banners sent over to them from France, and hailing a new- 
 age of the world, (forgetting that they were all the time 
 oppressing the Mulattoes, and holding fellow-men as pro- 
 perty,) their dusky neighbours were planning how they 
 
% fritafe fnr \\t Mt$n. 
 
 might best claim from the French government the rights, of 
 citizenship, from which they were shut out by the proud 
 Whites. A dreadful war followed, in consequence of the 
 absolute refusal of the Whites to admit them to an equality. 
 The French government first favoured one party and then 
 the other, and thus exasperated the deadly hatred which 
 the two parties mutually bore. 
 
 The Slaves, for some time, kept very quiet, supposing 
 that they had no concern in the affair. Their masters were 
 so much in the habit of despising Negroes that they do not 
 appear to have dreaded their Slaves hearing anything about 
 the principles of liberty. It is not known whether the 
 Mulattoes stirred up the Slaves to attempt their freedom, 
 or whether they did it of their own accord. The Mulattoes 
 had been put down, for a time, by the Whites, and it is 
 probable they set the Slaves to rebel for them ; but all 
 that is known is, that a fire broke out on a plantation on 
 the northern part of the island, in August, 1791, and it 
 soon appeared that all the Slaves in the province were 
 acting in concert, and rising against their masters. The 
 north-western part of the island blazed with fires ; the 
 household Slaves were locked up by their owners ; and the 
 Whites began fortifying the towns. 
 
 When the insurrection of the Negroes commenced, 
 Toussaint was about forty-eight years of age, and still a 
 Slave on the plantation on which he was born, in the 
 midst of the district in which hostilities first begun. Great 
 exertions were made by the insurgents to induce a Negro 
 of his respectability and reputation to join them ; but he 
 steadily refused taking any part in the early revolutionary 
 movements, being one of the last to stir in the insurrection ; 
 indeed, he was often heard to lament his brethren rising at 
 all. He feared and believed that their objects were revenge 
 and plunder ; he mourned over their excesses, and kept 
 quiet himself, in the conviction that it was better to en- 
 dure personal injuries than to avenge them. The moment, 
 
% '(Mute for tip ffl r-grn. 
 
 273 
 
 however, he perceived that the struggle was of a political 
 nature, and that the rights of a class were in question, he 
 joined his brethren, and stepped ina moment out of Slavery 
 into freedom. He had nothing to do with the fires and mas- 
 sacres of August, 1791 ; but joined the insurgents as soon 
 he was convinced that they had a principle of union, and 
 an end in view. 
 
 Many of the Planters had made their escape from the 
 island, and fled with their families to foreign countries ; 
 but the master of Toussaint was one, who, not having made 
 an early retreat, was on the point of falling into the hands 
 of the infuriated Blacks ; but his humane and beneficent 
 treatment of this worthy Slave was not forgotten. When 
 the plantation on which Toussaint had served was endan- 
 gered by the approach of the Negro forces, with con- 
 siderable care and ingenuity, and at the risk of his own 
 life, he secured the safety of his master and family, by 
 secreting them in the woods for several days, and finally 
 provided for their escape from the island, by putting them 
 on board an American vessel, with a considerable quantity 
 of produce, on which the fugitives might be enabled to 
 support themselves in exile. Nor did his gratitude end 
 here : after their settlement at Baltimore, he availed him- 
 self of every opportunity of making them such remittances, 
 as he could snatch from the wreck of their property, fre- 
 quently sending them some additional proof of his gratitude 
 and friendship. Conduct so noble, in the midst of such 
 barbarities as were then enacting, indicated great origin- 
 ality and moral independence of character. 
 
 Having performed what he considered to be an act of 
 duty, in providing for the safety of his master, Toussaint, 
 who had now no tie to retain him longer in servitude, per- 
 ceiving both reason and justice in the struggle which his 
 oppressed race were making to regain their liberty, attached 
 himself to the body of Negroes. Presenting himself to the 
 Black General, Jean Francois, he was received into the 
 
 2n 
 
274 
 
 % €vh\t for tju Jfegtn. 
 
 army, in which he at once assumed a leading rank. A 
 certain amount of medical knowledge, derived in the course 
 of his reading, enabled him to unite the functions of phy- 
 sician with those of military officer, and he was called 
 physician to the forces. He soon rose from the rank of 
 aide-de-camp to that of colonel. 
 
 The army he had joined was under royalist commanders 
 in the Spanish part of the island, and was opposed to the 
 French republican planters. He knew and cared little for 
 the state of parties in France : he was fighting for his Black 
 brethren against their White oppressors, and for a long 
 time he was not aware that he was affording his favour in 
 testimony of the same despotic principles in France, which 
 he was contending against in St. Domingo. 
 
 Toussaint was posted at Marmalade, with his Negro 
 troops, under the command of a Spanish general, when he 
 heard of the Decree of the French Convention, of Feb- 
 ruary 4th, 1794, which confirmed and proclaimed the 
 liberty of all Slaves, and declared St. Domingo to be an 
 integral part of France. This news opened his eyes to 
 the truth, that in opposing the republicans he was fighting 
 against the freedom of the Blacks. He lost no time in 
 opening a communication with Laveaux, the republican 
 commander ; and in a few days joined him with a considerable 
 Negro force, delivering up several Spanish posts of great 
 importance. The Spanish general, Hermona, had ex- 
 claimed, a few days before, on seeing Toussaint receive the 
 sacrament, that God never visited a purer spirit ; but now, 
 confusion and terror reigned among the Spaniards, and the 
 name of the Negro commander was reviled as it had before 
 been honoured. It is hinted by historians that ambition 
 was one cause of the defection of Toussaint ; that he had 
 little hope of rising to the rank held by Jean Francois in 
 the Spanish forces, while he hoped for a great addition to 
 his honours from the French general. Laveaux made him 
 brigadier-general, but watched all his movements, fearing 
 
(gl 
 
 51 €x\Mi for tjp Urgrn. 
 
 that a man who had once changed sides might be liable to 
 change again. 
 
 The power which Toussaint speedily obtained over the 
 ignorant and barbarous soldiery, (the released Slaves, whom 
 he commanded,) was indeed wonderful enough to fix the 
 attention of all who were around him, — the wisest and most 
 experienced of whom were as much under the spell of his 
 influence as the most degraded. It was by his observation 
 of men's minds, and by his own decision of character, that 
 he obtained this influence. He had not yet had the oppor- 
 tunity of showing valour : he was so far from eloquent that 
 his words were few, and the utterance of them awkward 
 and difficult; he had but just emerged from Slavery. But 
 he knew that the Blacks wanted a leader, and he felt that 
 he was the leader they wanted ; and this conviction gave 
 him a confidence in arrangement and action, which made 
 him the master of all the minds about him. To assist him 
 in his military operations, we are told in some curious notes 
 written by his son, " that, imitating the example of the 
 captains of antiquity, — Lucullus, Pompey, Caesar, and 
 others, he constructed a topographical chart of that part of 
 the island, marking accurately the position of the hills, the 
 course of the streams," &c. So much did he harrass the 
 commissioners, that when the Spanish posts fell, one after 
 another, into the hands of the French, one of them ex- 
 claimed, " Cet homme fait ouverture partout !" " This 
 man makes an opening everywhere." This expression get- 
 ting abroad, was the cause of Toussaint being ever after- 
 wards called by the name of Toussaint L' Ouverture ; which 
 may be translated, Toussaint the Opener, or the Opening. 
 Toussaint, knowing the value of a good name too well 
 to disclaim the flattering addition, willingly adopted it, 
 building upon it an assurance to his dark brethren, 
 that through him they were to obtain a bright and peace- 
 ful future. 
 
 But the distrust with which Laveaux regarded Toussaint, 
 
Vv( 
 
 276 
 
 % €xxhk for tjj? Jfogra. 
 
 seemed to doom him to inaction, and to fix the term of his 
 political career. For some time, the French commander 
 showed little disposition to place confidence in him. We 
 may easily conceive, that it must have been by slow degrees 
 that a man in the position of Laveaux came to appreciate 
 the character of his Negro officer. Laveaux had a difficult 
 task to fulfil ; nothing less, in fact, than the task of being 
 the first European to do justice in practice to the Negro 
 character, and to treat a Negro chief exactly as he would 
 treat a European gentleman. Philosophers, such as the 
 Abbe Gregoire and the Abbe Raynal, had indeed written 
 books to prove that ability and worth were to be found 
 among the Negroes, and had laid it down as a maxim that 
 a Negro was to be treated like any other man whose cir- 
 cumstances were the same ; but probably Laveaux was the 
 first European who felt himself called upon to put the 
 maxim in practice, at least in affairs of any importance. It 
 is highly creditable, therefore, to this French officer, that 
 when he came to have more experience of Toussaint 
 L'Ouverture, and discerned his extraordinary abilities, he 
 esteemed him as much as if he had been a French gentle- 
 man educated in the schools of Paris. 
 
 The immediate occasion of the change in the sentiments 
 of Laveaux towards Toussaint, was as follows. In March, 
 1795, an insurrection of Mulattoes occurred at the town of 
 the Cape, and Laveaux was seized and placed in confine- 
 ment. On hearing this, Toussaint marched at the head of 
 10,000 Blacks to the town, obliged the inhabitants to open 
 the gates by the threat of a siege, entered in triumph, re- 
 leased the French commander from prison, and reinstated 
 him in office. In gratitude for this act of loyalty, Laveaux 
 appointed Toussaint lieutenant-governor of the island, de- 
 claring his resolution at the same time to act according to 
 his advice in all matters, whether military or civil. A say- 
 ing of Laveaux's is recorded, which shows the decided 
 opinion he had formed of Toussaint's abilities. " It is this 
 
% $riiinte for tju Jfogrn. 
 
 Black," said he, " this Spartacus, spoken of by Raynal, 
 who is destined to avenge the wrongs done to his race." 
 
 A wonderful improvement soon followed the appoint- 
 ment of L'Ouverture as lieutenant-governor of the island. 
 The first use he made of his power, was to establish order 
 and discipline among the Black population. Obedient to 
 their champion, they were speedily reduced under strict 
 military discipline, and submitted to all the regulations of 
 orderly civil government. The success of Toussaint's en- 
 deavours is equally honourable to the people he governed 
 and to himself. France owed him an immense debt of 
 gratitude. Lacroix, a historian unfriendly to the Blacks, 
 wrote, that " if St. Domingo still carried the colours of 
 France, it was solely owing to an old Negro, who seemed 
 to be appointed by heaven to unite its severed members." 
 The war with the Spanish part of the island was soon 
 brought to a close, and Toussaint was left alone to support 
 the pride and the hopes of his Colour. 
 
 General Laveaux being nominated a member of the 
 French legislature, was obliged to return to Europe. Gen. 
 Rochambeau now arrived in the island from France, to 
 assume the dignity of Commander-in-chief, but he found 
 himself a mere cipher. Toussaint ordered him on board a 
 vessel, and sent him home again. Soon after, he got rid 
 of Santhonax, another French official, by sending him with 
 dispatches to the French govermnent. All this appears 
 excessively arbitrary ; but it remains doubtful how much 
 Toussaint's proceedings were owing to his personal ambi- 
 tion, or to his conviction that men fresh from France were 
 not qualified to govern Negroes. He was aware that the 
 peace and prosperity of the island depended on his keeping 
 all the power in his own hands ; and it is certain that he 
 did restore St. Domingo to a state of high prosperity ; that 
 the people were devoted to him ; and that no act of guilt 
 is known ever to have been perpetrated by him for the gra- 
 tification of his own ambition. 
 
278 
 
 % €x\Mt for tip Jftgru. 
 
 In April, 1796, Toussaint L'Ouverture was appointed 
 Commander-in-chief of the French forces in St. Domingo. 
 Thus, by a remarkable succession of circumstances, was 
 this Negro, at the age of fifty-three years, nearly fifty of 
 which had been passed in a state of Slavery, placed in the 
 most important position in the island. 
 
 Toussaint made order take the place of licentiousness, 
 and diligence give way to recklessness. The waste country 
 began to teem with fertility wherever he turned his steps ; 
 and all the sad symptoms of devastation disappeared where 
 he stretched out his arm in command. The proprietors 
 naturally came in under his protection, and were eager to 
 sanction his authority ; and never, perhaps, was a monarch 
 more powerful, or more conscious of his power, than 
 Touissaint in his beautiful island at this time. With what 
 a full heart, with what strange emotions, must he have 
 looked upon the Breda estate, where fifty years had 
 passed over him as a Slave ! How his eye must have dwelt 
 on the cattle in the field where he had formerly been herds- 
 man ! on the bananas under whose shade he had rested at 
 noon ! and on the hut where he had slept, in preparation 
 for the toils of the morrow ! But no unnecessary word is 
 known to have escaped him respecting his astonishing 
 change of condition. He seems to have considered himself 
 born to a great lot ; for he was as little dazzled by his ele- 
 vation as he had been patient under oppression. 
 
 Toussaint now began to see his way more clearly, and to 
 become conscious of the duty which Providence had as- 
 signed him. Taking all things into consideration, he re- 
 sovled on being no longer a tool of foreign governments, 
 but to strike a grand blow for the permanent independence 
 of his race. Perceiving how his arbitrary measures towards 
 the two French officials, would tell against him in the 
 mother-country, — being sensible also of the value of a good 
 education, he sent his two eldest sons, Placide and Isaac, to 
 be educated in Paris, escorted by an officer, who was 
 

v^^A^^M^ 
 
 r R C'Vi 
 
 iconocraphie oes contemporains 
 
 depuis 1789 jusou'a 1820." 
 
 JrM»SStR LITHO LEEDS 
 
% €xifok far tjjr JfcpL 
 
 279 
 
 m 
 
 commissioned to intimate to the French government the un- 
 easiness and trouble which would have been caused in the 
 island by the continued residence of Commissioner San- 
 thonax. In his letter to the Directory on this occasion, 
 he declared how great must be his confidence in the 
 Directory, when he delivered his children into their power, 
 at a time when the complaints which were alleged against 
 him might well cause a doubt of his good faith. " At pre- 
 sent," he added, " there is no inducement to interior agita- 
 tion. I guarantee, under my personal responsibility, the 
 submission of my Black brethren to order, and their felicity 
 to France. Citizen Directors, you may rely upon speedy 
 good results ; and you shall soon see whether I involve in 
 vain my own responsibility and your hopes." 
 
 The people of Paris received with a generous astonish- 
 ment the intelligence of the doings of the Negro prodigy, 
 and the interest they took in the novelty of the case, pre- 
 vented them from being angry. Indeed his conduct was 
 publicly praised at Paris. He was once more entitled the 
 deliverer of St. Domingo, and the Directory presented him 
 with a richly embroidered dress, and a suit of superb armour. 
 
 The French government, however, could not but be jea- 
 lous of him ; and General Hedouville was sent out to be 
 Commander-in-chief, and to attempt to restrain the Negro 
 Dictator. But Hedouville could compete with him no 
 better than his predecessors. When he arrived, Toussaint 
 went on board the ship to bid him welcome. The captain 
 of the ship, hearing Toussaint speak of the fatigues of go- 
 vernment, said, he should be proud, after having brought 
 out Hedouville, to carry back Toussaint. Toussaint replied 
 hastily, " Your ship, sir, is not large enough for a man like 
 me." Hedouville found himself a mere shadow, and soon 
 turned his face home again. Toussaint, though strictly 
 polite to him, paid no attention to his wishes or represen- 
 tations, except when they agreed with his own intentions. 
 
 The English still retained a footing in the island, but 
 
 
Wk\ 280 
 
 % €x\Mt far tju MtpL 
 
 itp 
 
 when it became clear that they could not long retain pos- 
 session of their posts, General Maitland, seeing the hope- 
 lessness of continuing an enterprise which had already cost 
 so many British lives, opened a negotiation with Toussaint, 
 which ended in a treaty for the evacuation of the island. 
 It is said that in the archives of the capital of Hayti, there 
 is a copy of a proposition that Toussaint should be acknow- 
 ledged by England, on condition of his agreeing to a treaty 
 of exclusive commerce with Great Britain. Toussaint was 
 too wary to agree prematurely to these proposals ; but he 
 accepted the evacuation of the British posts, and the rich 
 presents of plate, and two brass cannons offered by the 
 English general. He took possession of the principal posts 
 amidst great pomp. The British troops lined the road : a 
 Catholic priest met him in procession with the host ; and 
 he was received and entertained in a magnificent tent, 
 with all the pomp of military ceremonial. After the feast, 
 he reviewed the British troops. He seems to have borne in 
 mind the intention of being made king of Hayti ; for he 
 proclaimed a general amnesty, secured the old proprietors 
 in their estates, decreed and superintended the intelligent 
 prosecution of rural labour, and attached all the Creoles 
 by using his power to reinstate them in their rights. He 
 decreed that the former Negro cultivators, though now 
 free, should work for five years for their former masters, 
 provided they were well used, and allowed a fourth part of 
 the produce : and upon his thus pronouncing, the Blacks 
 flocked to the fields, with arms by their sides, and the hoe 
 in their hands ; so that all traces of the devastation of war 
 soon disappeared. 
 
 A characteristic anecdote is related of Toussaint's con- 
 duct about this time. While General Maitland was 
 making preparations for quitting the island, believing that 
 another personal interview between himself and Toussaint 
 was desirable, he returned the visit at the Negro camp. 
 With perfect confidence in Toussaint's integrity, the General 
 
 fllNS 
 
did not hesitate to travel to him with only two or three 
 attendants, though his camp was at a considerable distance 
 from his own army, and he had to pass through a country 
 full of Negroes, who had lately been his mortal enemies. 
 The French Commissioner, Roume, thinking this afforded 
 a most favourable opportunity for serving the cause of the 
 French Government, wrote to Toussaint, urging him to 
 detain the British General as a prisoner. While General 
 Maitland was on the road towards the camp, he received a 
 letter, informing him of Roume's plot, and warning him 
 not to trust himself in the power of the Negro chief; but, 
 consulting the good of the service in which he was engaged, 
 and still relying on Toussaint's honour, he determined to 
 proceed. When he arrived at the head quarters, Toussaint 
 was not to be seen, and the general was kept in waiting a 
 considerable time. At length Toussaint entered the room, 
 with two letters in his hand. " There, general," said he, 
 " before we talk together, read these : one is a letter just 
 received from Roume, the French Commissioner ; and the 
 other is the answer I am just going to despatch : — I would 
 not come to you until I had written my answer to him, 
 that you might be satisfied how safe you are with me, and 
 how incapable I am of baseness." General Maitland, on 
 reading the letters, found one of them to be from the 
 French commissioner, Roume, being an artful attempt to 
 persuade Toussaint to seize his guest, as an act of duty to 
 the republic ; the other was a noble and indignant refusal. 
 "What!" said Toussaint, in his letter to the perfidious 
 Frenchman, " have I not passed my word to the British 
 general ? How then can you suppose that I will cover 
 myself with dishonour by breaking it ? His reliance on 
 my good faith leads him to put himself in my power ; and 
 I should be for ever infamous, if I were to act as you 
 advise. I am faithfully devoted to the republic ; but 
 will not serve it at the expense of my conscience, and my 
 honour." 
 
 (Ly 
 
 2o 
 
282 
 
 % €vMt fnr \\t lltgra. 
 
 np 
 
 
 M\8 
 
 The Mulattoes began to raise a cry that the island was 
 sold to Great Britain, and that Slavery was to be re- 
 established; and a cruel war ensued between them and the 
 Negroes ; the Whites taking part with the one or the 
 other, according to the position of their estates. On re- 
 ceiving tidings of the success and massacre on the part of 
 Rigaud, a Mulatto chief, Toussaint collected his forces at 
 Port-au-Prince, the south-western capital, and commanded 
 the attendance at church of all the Mulattoes of the place. 
 He mounted the pulpit, and addressed them, predicting 
 his own success, and the ruin of their Colour, if they 
 opposed him. 
 
 For a time, however, the Mulattoes were successful, and 
 by means of treachery were enabled to defy him, and lift 
 up their heads in the north. But while they supposed 
 Toussaint to be shut up in Port-au-Prince, he was upon 
 them, having escaped a hundred dangers, and acted and 
 marched with incredible speed. He delivered the Whites 
 who were imprisoned, and sacrificed the traitors to whom 
 he owed his temporary defeat. The Mulattoes, in utter 
 despair, crowded into Cape Francois. Toussaint was in- 
 stantly upon them again. He convoked the authorities of 
 the place in the church, mounted the pulpit, and declared, 
 " The Men of Colour have been punished enough. Let 
 them be forgiven by all, as they are by me. They may 
 return to their dwellings, where they shall be protected and 
 treated like brethren." 
 
 The enthusiasm excited by this unexpected clemency, 
 however great among those who had been trembling before 
 the conqueror, did not extend to their companions who 
 were in arms. The war was not over ; but Toussaint was 
 finally victorious. Towards the end of 1799, Napoleon, 
 then First Consul, sent out commissioners to St. Domingo, 
 to confirm Toussaint in his office of Commander-in-chief. 
 Rigaud, the Mulatto general, saw that his party was aban- 
 doning him, and set sail for France, and again it appeared 
 
 All© 
 
s> 
 
 51 ®Mt fnr t|i Ifrgrn. 
 
 283 
 
 (SNifr 
 
 m 
 
 as if all promised peace and prosperity. Toussaint per- 
 ceived that there could be no permanent peace in the 
 Island, while any portion of it remained under Spanish 
 control ; and his first great error of policy seems to have 
 been in regarding exclusively the state of affairs at home, 
 and overlooking or despising the force which might be 
 brought against him from Europe. He found little diffi- 
 culty in uniting the Spanish to the French portion of the 
 island under his sway. The city of St. Domingo delivered 
 its keys to him upon summons ; and the clergy, who were 
 very influential among the Spanish population, were in 
 favour of a devout ruler, who flattered their ambition with 
 the homage he rendered to themselves and their office. 
 They prepared the people to receive him in his progress 
 through the Island, with acclamations, and the uproar of 
 cannon and bells. 
 
 As the Islanders had now thrown off the shackles of 
 Slavery, it was necessary for the well ordering of govern- 
 ment, that a new Constitution should be formed. Tous- 
 saint, assisted by a council of his adherents, prepared a 
 Colonial Constitution, uniting the different inhabitants of 
 the Island under an impartial and uniform government ; 
 and the whole, after being submitted toa general assembly 
 convened from every district, was approved and adopted, 
 and a proclamation thereof made in due form, in July, 1801. 
 By this constitution, all executive power was put into his 
 hands, under the title of President for life, with power to 
 choose his successor, and to nominate to all offices. Every 
 part of St. Domingo, was now in quiet submission to the 
 Negro chief. In all that regarded commerce and finance, 
 the constitution worked admirably, during the short period 
 of its continuance. The commerce of all nations visited 
 the shores of the Island under the American flag ; the 
 treasury filled ; the estates flourished ; and Toussaint was 
 adored. St. Domingo was rapidly improving in wealth and 
 happiness, under a wise administration ; which, for its 
 
 ib© 
 
% €xihk fnr tin? Jfcp. 
 
 ability, mildness, and integrity, was acknowledged to be 
 beyond all praise. Considering the interests of France 
 alone, the colony had never been in a more prosperous con- 
 dition. The Negroes gave every proof of industry, sub- 
 ordination, and content. They diligently cultivated the 
 plantations, and received the wages of their labour. They 
 submitted cheerfully to all those regulations which it was 
 thought necessary to establish ; and living in possession of 
 their freedom, were satisfied and happy. Those whose 
 merits had raised them to stations of honour and responsi- 
 bility, were as solicitous for the French interests as for the 
 preservation of their own freedom. In short, the colony 
 had seldom been more productive, the revenue which it 
 afforded to the mother country more abundant, the persons 
 and property of the Planter more secure, nor the Negroes 
 themselves more industrious and peaceful. In this manner 
 things would no doubt have proceeded — the natives im- 
 proving in the arts of peace and civilization — the produce of 
 the island yielding increased wealth both to the proprietors 
 and to the cultivators — till the distinctions of Colour and 
 the prejudices founded on them would have been forgotten — 
 and the whole state of things have presented a proof that 
 Whites and Blacks may, in all respects, become equals, 
 and regard each other as brethren — had not the restless 
 ambition of the usurper of France, disturbed the tran- 
 quility of the island, and suddenly renewed those contests, 
 which, it was hoped, had for ever ceased. 
 
 Toussaint having now become placed in a conspicuous 
 station, the excellencies of his character unfolded them- 
 selves more and more, as opportunities offered for their 
 devolopment ; and the same amiable disposition which 
 adorned his humble life, continued to distinguish him in 
 his elevated position. He caused the duties of religion 
 and morality to be strictly enforced, and gave the whole 
 weight of his example and influence in favour of decency 
 and sobriety of life. He frowned upon every indication 
 
% €nbsk far fyt firgrn. 
 
 285 
 
 %> 
 
 of licentiousness of manners, and avoided all favourable 
 notice of persons, however otherwise graced, who were 
 not modest, quiet, and diligent in their vocation. His 
 public levees were conducted with the strictest decorum, 
 and the best private societies of Europe were not superior 
 in manners to his evening parties. Every thing was mag- 
 nificent around him, and his retinue as splendid as that 
 of an Oriental monarch ; but he was plain in his food, his 
 dress, and all his habits. He would make a meal of cakes 
 and fruit, with a glass of water. His bodily strength was 
 prodigious, and he maintained it by constant and vigorous 
 exercise. It was his custom to make sudden excursions 
 to various parts of the island, always choosing the points 
 where he was least expected. He sometimes rode 150 
 miles without rest, perpetually outstripping all his attend- 
 ants, except two trumpeters, who were as well mounted as 
 himself. After such fatigue, he would sleep for two hours, 
 and start up again, refreshed for new toils. 
 
 The following description of Toussaint was given by one 
 of his enemies : — " He has a fine eye ; and his glances are 
 rapid and penetrating. Extremely sober by habit, his 
 activity in the prosecution of his enterprises is incessant. 
 He is an excellent horseman, and travels, on occasions, 
 with inconceivable rapidity, arriving frequently at the end 
 of his journeys alone, or almost unattended ; his aides-de- 
 camp and domestics being unable to follow him, in jour- 
 neys often extending to fifty or sixty leagues. He 
 allows very little time for his repose or his meals." 
 
 Toussaint was accessible to all who wished to see him ; 
 and it is said that no one ever left his presence dissatisfied : 
 if he could not grant a request, he contrived to please 
 the applicant. His generals were obedient as children 
 before him ; his soldiers regarded him as a superior being, 
 and the people at large worshipped him as their deliverer. 
 It is no wonder that the conviction existing in his mind 
 escaped his lips, that he was the Bonaparte of St. Domingo, 
 
 w 
 
286 
 
 51 €xiMt for tjp Jfogm 
 
 feUJA 
 
 and that the colony could not exist without him. This 
 was no more than a moderate expression of the truth. 
 
 That Toussaint was a great man is unquestionable. 
 Captain Rainsford, an officer in the British army, who 
 visited St. Domingo during the time of the revolutionary 
 movements, speaks in the following terms of the Negro 
 General. " Toussaint L'Ouverture, the present Com- 
 mandant of St. Domingo," says he, "is one of those char- 
 acters, which contentions for power and the extension of 
 territory, as well as the jars of individual interest, have not 
 unfrequently introduced to astonish the world. He is 
 worthy of imitation as a man — he excites admiration as a 
 governor — and as a general, he is yet unsubdued, without 
 the probability of subjection ! His regard for the unfortu- 
 nate appears the love of human kind ; and, dreaded by dif- 
 ferent nations, he is the foe of none. To the English he 
 is by no means inimical, and, in possession of many of the 
 blessings of humanity, he courts the acceptance of the 
 world. He is a perfect Black (born a Slave), at present 
 about 45 years of age, of a venerable appearance, and pos- 
 sessed of uncommon perseverance. Of great suavity of 
 manners, he was not at all concerned in the perpetration 
 of the massacre, or in the conflagration. He is styled the 
 General-en-chef, and is always attended by four aides-de- 
 camp. He receives a voluntary respect from every descrip- 
 tion of his countrymen, which is more than returned by 
 the affability of his behaviour, and the goodness of his 
 heart. Of his civilities to myself, I have sufficient reason 
 to be proud. I met him frequently during my stay in his 
 dominions, and had no occasion of complaint, even from 
 his errors." 
 
 If there was one trait in Toussaint's character more con- 
 spicuous than the rest, it was his unsullied integrity. That 
 he never broke his word, was a proverbial expression common 
 in the mouths of the White inhabitants of the island, and of 
 the English officers who were employed in hostilities against 
 
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 * 1 1 I ^ * 
 
 • 1 1 9 * 
 
 1 1 r 
 
 II i s ^ ^ 
 
 ^ * <! "b ts 
 

 51 €rilntfr for Wjt Jfcgrn. 
 
 287 
 
 him. His spirit of forgiveness was remarkable. Though 
 for a considerable time he possessed unlimited power, he 
 never abused it : and in cases of injury, he displayed a 
 generosity of forgiveness, which would do honour to the 
 heart of the most enlightened potentate of Europe. Of this, 
 the following incident affords a memorable specimen. Four 
 Frenchmen, who had deserted from him with aggravated 
 treachery, were retaken ; and every one expected they 
 would be put to a cruel death. Leaving them, however, 
 in suspense as to their fate, Toussaint ordered them to 
 be brought into the church the following Sunday ; and 
 while that part of the service was pronouncing which relates 
 to mutual forgiveness, he went with them to the front of 
 the altar, where, after endeavouring to impress upon their 
 minds the heinousness of their conduct, he ordered them 
 to be discharged without further punishment. 
 
 Toussaint had now reached the highest point of his pros- 
 perity. Fifty years of his life had been spent in an insen- 
 sible preparation for the prodigious work which the last ten 
 had achieved. His meditations in the groves, his specula- 
 tions under the starry heavens of the tropics, his study of 
 human powers and human destinies during the nights of 
 nearly half a century of Slavery, had now come into the use 
 for which he had little dreamed that they were designed. 
 He had been the means of forming a nation of Free Men 
 out of a herd of Negro Slaves, and had taught them that 
 personal self-restraint is the only guarantee of social liberty : 
 he had fairly established the first civilized Negro commu- 
 nity ; and now it remained to show how the other species 
 of education which he had undergone had prepared him for 
 another fate ; how far his principles of religion and his 
 habits of patience could support him through the third, the 
 dreariest portion of his course. Two years of his life re- 
 mained to be passed in decline, in humiliation, struggle, 
 grief, and sickness, and it was in these two last years that 
 his greatest moral triumphs were achieved. 
 
 n£S>' 
 
 n~ 
 
 3) 
 
 m 
 
 ill© 
 
 (IT"* 
 
sfo 
 
 Successful in all his schemes of improvement, Toussaint 
 had now only one serious cause for dread. While he ad- 
 mired Bonaparte, he entertained a secret fear of the projects 
 of that great general. Although Bonaparte had confirmed 
 him in his command, several circumstances had occurred to 
 excite alarm. He had sent two letters to Bonaparte, both 
 headed, " The First of the Blacks to the First of the 
 Whites," one of which announced the complete pacification 
 of the island, and requested the ratification of certain ap- 
 pointments which he had made, and the other explained 
 his reasons for cashiering a French official ; hut to these 
 letters Bonaparte had not deigned to return an answer. 
 Not disheartened by this taciturnity, Toussaint again ad- 
 dressed him in respectful terms, and intreated his ratifica- 
 tion of the new constitution. Bonaparte, however, had 
 already formed the resolution of extinguishing Toussaint, 
 and taking possession of St. Domingo ; and the conclusion 
 of a treaty of peace with England in 1801 increased his 
 haste to effect the execution of his deceitful purpose. In 
 vain did persons acquainted with the state of the island 
 endeavour to dissuade him from this movement, by repre- 
 senting the evils which would arise. " I want," he said to 
 the minister Forfait, who was one of those who reasoned 
 with him on the subject — " I want, I tell you," said Bona- 
 parte, "to get rid of 60,000 men." This was probably the 
 secret of his determination to invade St. Domingo. Now 
 that the treaty with England was concluded, Bonaparte 
 felt the presence of so many of his old companions in arms 
 to be an incumbrance. There were men among them very 
 likely to criticise his government and thwart his designs, 
 and these it would be very convenient to send on a distant 
 expedition. Nay more, it would not be misrepresenting 
 Napoleon's character, if we were to suppose that some 
 jealousy of his Negro admirer mingled with his other views. 
 Be this as it may, the expedition was equipped. It con- 
 sisted of 26 ships of war and a number of transports, 
 
 >V* 
 
& €x\Mi for % Urgrn. 
 
 289 
 
 % 
 
 carrying an army of 25,000 men, the flower of the French 
 troops, whose valour had been previously tried in Europe, 
 who embarked reluctantly. The command of the army 
 was given to General Le Clerc, Bonaparte's brother-in-law. 
 
 The French squadron reached St. Domingo early in 
 1802. In all quarters the French were successful in effect- 
 ing a landing. Rochambeau, in landing with his division, 
 came to an engagement with the Blacks who had gathered 
 on the beach, and slaughtered a great number of them. At 
 Cape Francois, Le Clerc sent an intimidating message to 
 Cliristophe, the Negro whom Toussaint had stationed there 
 as commander ; but the Negro replied that he was responsible 
 only to Toussaint, his commander-in-chief. Perceiving, 
 however, that his post was untenable, owing to the inclina- 
 tion of the "White inhabitants of the town to admit Le 
 Clerc, Christophe set fire to the houses at night, and re- 
 treated to the hills by the light of the conflagration, carry- 
 ing 2000 Whites with him as hostages, not one of whom 
 was injured during the warfare which followed. 
 
 Toussaint was not idle all this while. He knew he might 
 trust to Christophe to deal with the city ; and he was busy 
 in the interior making preparations for a protracted war. 
 Le Clerc seems to have entertained a due dread of the 
 mighty Negro ; for he tried all devices to ensnare him be- 
 fore he drove him to bay. Among other seductions to 
 yield, he employed the two sons of Toussaint, who had been 
 educated at Paris, and who had been brought over in the 
 squadron. On their arrival at Cape Francois, they were sent 
 with Coisnon their tutor, to Ennery, one of Toussaint's 
 country residences. The interview was a most affecting one. 
 Toussaint was absent at the time, but his faithful wife re- 
 ceived her sons as an affectionate mother might be expected 
 to welcome her children, after an absence of several years. 
 Improved both in stature and accomplishments, they now 
 appeared in the vigour and loveliness of youth. 
 
 The crafty Frenchman accepting an invitation to stay 
 
 w 
 
21 
 
 ^@>fe 
 
 290 
 
 1 €xihit for f jib Jfrgrn. 
 
 until Toussaint should arrive, made use of this interval to 
 persuade his hostess, as he had done many others, that the 
 French government had no design against their freedom, 
 but only wished that by submitting they might be again 
 united. This tale was so artfully told, that the unsuspect- 
 ing wife, having a desire for tranquillity and its attendant 
 enjoyments, sent a messenger immediately for her husband, 
 who was at such a distance, that although he travelled with 
 all possible speed, he did not reach home until after the 
 middle of the second night. 
 
 The two sons ran to meet their father ; and he, with 
 emotions too great for utterance, clasped them silently in 
 his arms. Few who have any feelings of humanity could 
 have beheld such a scene without emotion. But the cold- 
 blooded emissary Coisnon beheld it with a barbarous 
 apathy. When the first burst of parental feeling had a 
 little subsided, Toussaint stretched out his arms to enclose 
 him whom he regarded with respect as the tutor of his 
 children, and their conductor to the embraces of their pa- 
 rents. " The father and two sons," says Coisnon, " threw 
 themselves into each others arms. I saw them shed tears ; 
 and wishing to take advantage of a period I conceived to 
 be favourable, I stopped him at the moment when he 
 stretched out his arms to me." Retiring from the embrace 
 of Toussaint, Coisnon endeavoured to persuade him to ac- 
 cede to the proposals of Bonaparte : describing, in glowing 
 colours, the advantage to be gained by joining the French 
 government ; declaring that no design was entertained of 
 infringing on the liberties of the Blacks ; and desiring him 
 to reflect on the situation of his children, who, unless he 
 would submit, were to be immediately taken back, never 
 more, perhaps, to gladden the hearts of their parents. He 
 concluded his perfidious speech, by putting into Toussaint's 
 hand a letter from the French general at the Cape, accom- 
 panied by one from Bonaparte. 
 
 These letters were couched in all the arts of intrigue, 
 
 M 
 
$ €fiMt for tju Jftgra. 
 
 291 
 
 combined with that of persuasive eloquence. In the letter 
 from Bonaparte were the following expressions : — " We 
 have made known to your children, and their preceptor, 
 the sentiments by which we are animated — we send them 
 back to you — what can you desire ? the freedom of the 
 Blacks ? You know that in all the countries we have been 
 in, we have given it to the people who had it not." Tell 
 the people of St. Domingo, that " if liberty be to them the 
 first of wants, they cannot enjoy it but with the title of 
 French citizens." — " Rely without reserve on our esteem ; 
 and conduct yourself as one of the principal citizens of the 
 greatest nation in the world ought to do." 
 
 Isaac, the eldest son, next addressed his father, repre- 
 senting the great kindness his brother and himself had 
 received from Bonaparte, and the high esteem he had pro- 
 fessed for Toussaint and his family. The youngest son 
 added something that he had been taught to the same 
 effect ; and both, with artless eloquence, endeavoured to 
 win their father to a purpose, of the true nature of which 
 they had no suspicion. To their persuasions, were also 
 added the tears and entreaties of their distressed mother. 
 
 Toussaint appeared to hesitate amidst these tender soli- 
 citations. Coisnon, the tutor, observing these appearances 
 with savage pleasure, got a little off his guard, and disco- 
 vered his base design. Toussaint now plainly perceived, 
 as he had suspected, that the subjugation of his race was 
 the aim of this invasion ; and he was neither to be threat- 
 ened nor tempted into any concession whatever. He with- 
 drew from the estate, where the youths remained for some 
 days, at the end of which Toussaint sent orders to them to 
 return to the fleet, with a letter to Le Clerc, which con- 
 tained the following : — " You have come to supplant me 
 by force of arms. You have detained the letter of the First 
 Consul to me till three months after its date ; and have 
 meanwhile put in jeopardy the order and liberties of the 
 Blacks by acts of hostility. The rights of my Colour 
 
 W 
 
1 €xiMt far tire Jftgrn. 
 
 impose upon me duties above those of nature ; to them I 
 am ready to sacrifice my children, whom I send back to you, 
 that I may not be enfeebled and shackled by their presence. 
 I am more distrustful of France than ever, and must have 
 time to decide on the course I am to pursue. 
 
 Finding all his endeavours fruitless, Le Clere hastened 
 to send back the sons, with a declaration that he agreed to 
 a truce of four days ; at the end of which time he would 
 outlaw the Negro Generals, if they did not come into the 
 service of France. 
 
 Toussaint had no idea of yielding. His first thought 
 was for the liberty of conscience of his sons. He left 
 them free to choose between him and France. "My 
 children," said he, " choose your duty. Whatever it be, 
 I shall always love and bless you." Placide declared that 
 he had done with France; and he fought by his father's 
 side. Isaac returned to the fleet. 
 
 A declaration of outlawry was issued, as threatened, 
 against Toussaint and Christophe. Le Clerc used every 
 means to secure the defection of the Negro troops, in 
 which he succeeded but too well; a matter more of sorrow 
 than surprise, under the circumstances. The greatest 
 marvel of all Toussaint's achievements is that he was able 
 to do what he did with such social materials as he had at 
 command. When it is considered that the elements of the 
 society he ruled were Whites, first made arbitrary and 
 selfish by being Slave-owners, and then vindictive by being 
 deprived of their human property — Mulattoes made jealous 
 by social oppression — and Negroes debased by Slavery, it 
 is truly astonishing that, while left unmolested from with- 
 out, Toussaint was able to establish anything like order, 
 diligence, peace, and prosperity in the island. The pre- 
 sence of a foreign foe, who appealed to the jealousy, avarice, 
 and fears of the different parties in society, was sure to 
 disorganize his work for the time, and leave him a sacrifice 
 to the defection of his people. After much fighting and 
 
some vicissitude, Toussaint, with his generals, and a small 
 body of troops, fortified themselves in a mountainous re- 
 treat. There Le Clerc pursued him, and lost 1500 men 
 in repeated vain attempts to dislodge him. 
 
 The Blacks issued forth at intervals, cut off the commu- 
 nication between different bodies of the invaders, and 
 assaulted the French when they were least expected. But 
 all was in vain. The discipline of the French troops 
 (amounting, with reinforcements, to 25,000 men) was too 
 much for him. He was sustained occasionally by bands of 
 labourers from the estates ; but the French were reinforced 
 to much better purpose by the arrival of 4000 fresh and 
 hardy soldiers from France. Christophe and Dessalines, his 
 two chief supporters, were compelled to submission : and 
 the time was come for Toussaint to make terms. 
 
 Toussaint called before him two of his prisoners, one a 
 military, the other a naval officer, and sent them as bearers 
 of a letter from him to Le Clerc, in which he intimated 
 that there might yet be room for negotiation. He exhi- 
 bited the war as having now become aimless and merely 
 cruel ; but declared, finally, that he should always be 
 strong enough to burn, ravage, and destroy, and to sell 
 dearly a life which had been somewhat useful to the 
 mother-country as well as to his own race. Le Clerc was 
 only too happy to negotiate. 5000 of his men were slain ; 
 5000 more were in the hospitals ; and only 12,000 remained 
 in fighting condition. 
 
 The declaration of Toussaint's outlawry was rescinded, 
 and, a few days after, the fallen hero came boldly to greet 
 the French general. His appearance excited a strong sen- 
 sation, and the mountains reverberated with the salutes 
 fired in his honour from the forts and the squadron. All 
 heads were bowed as he passed, and the French were awed 
 by the homage paid to the Deliverer in his adversity. 
 
 Toussaint was followed by between 300 and 400 horse- 
 men, who remained in a defensive position, their sabres 
 
 'W 
 
51 €xMh for l\)i &p. 
 
 drawn, during the conference between the two com- 
 manders. 
 
 Negotiations were now entered into, and a treaty was at 
 length concluded between Le Clerc and Toussaint L'Ouver- 
 ture, the conditions of which were, that Toussaint should 
 continue to govern St. Domingo as hitherto, Le Clerc act- 
 ing only in the capacity of French deputy, and that all the 
 officers in Toussaint's army should be allowed to sustain 
 their respective ranks, himself and his brother Christophe 
 being honoured with a dignified retirement from public life. 
 A letter to Toussaint from the French general, about this 
 time, contained the following passage : " With regard to 
 yourself, you desire repose, and you deserve it. I leave 
 you at liberty to retire to which of your estates you please." 
 
 The War now appeared to have reached a happy close ; 
 the Whites and Blacks mingled with each other once more 
 as friends ; and Toussaint retired to one of his estates, 
 called by his own name, situated on the south-west part of 
 the island, to lead a life of quiet and domestic enjoyment. 
 There, in the bosom of his remaining family, (for his two 
 sons who had been under the care of Coisnon, were lost 
 sight of after their return to the Cape with their perfidious 
 tutor,) he entered on that repose, of which he had long 
 been deprived, laying plans for the comfortable enjoyment 
 of the domestic circle, in his declining age, confidently re- 
 lying upon the solemn assurances that his person and pro- 
 perty should be held sacred. 
 
 But the instructions of Bonaparte had been precise, that 
 the Negro chief should be sent as a prisoner to France. 
 Many reasons recommended such a step as more likely than 
 any other to break the spirit of independence among the 
 Blacks, and rivet the French power in the Island. Although 
 Le Clerc had been put into nominal possession of the 
 colony and of the colonial army, Toussaint was the virtual 
 monarch of the island. His moral influence was incalcu- 
 lable ; and while he lived and moved in sight, the French 
 
 t^ 
 
 ^ 
 
% €:lkk far tjp? Ifrgra. 
 
 295 
 
 held but a deceptive sovereignty. A glance of the great 
 man's eye, the lifting up of his finger, his lightest whisper, 
 were more than a match for all the drilled troops, all the 
 ships and ammuniton in France, and for all the wealth of 
 her treasury. Napoleon knew this : and accordingly Le 
 Clerc was now furnished with secret orders which em- 
 powered him to remove that influence by treachery which 
 he had been unable to overthrow by force. 
 
 Time pressed : it was difficult to take Toussaint, on ac- 
 count of his wariness, and of the love borne to him by the 
 whole people. A deep stratagem served the purpose at 
 last, for the French general no sooner perceived the con- 
 fidence Toussaint had placed in him, than he committed 
 one of the basest and most infamous acts of treachery. The 
 district in which Toussaint resided was purposely over- 
 charged with French troops. The residents were discon- 
 tented, and made Toussaint the medium of their complaints. 
 General Brunet, to whom he applied, answered that he was 
 but imperfectly informed about the localities, and needed 
 the assistance of the former ruler of St. Domingo to deter- 
 mine the situation of the troops. " See these Whites ! " 
 exclaimed Toussaint, as he read General Brunet's letter. 
 They know everything, and yet they are obliged to come 
 to the old Negro Chief for advice." He now fell into the 
 trap artfully laid for him. He sent word to General Bru- 
 net that he would come, attended by twenty men, and con- 
 fer with him, on the Georges estate, on the 10th of June. 
 General Brunet appeared at the appointed place and time, 
 escorted also by 20 men. He asked Toussaint in, and they 
 shut themselves up for business. Meanwhile the French 
 soldiers mixed in with the escort of Toussaint, engaged each 
 his man in light conversation, and, at an appointed signal, 
 sprang each upon his Negro neighbour, and disarmed him. 
 At the same moment, the French admiral, Ferrari, ap- 
 peared before Toussaint, and said, " I have orders from 
 General Le Clerc to arrest you. Your guards are captured : 
 
 >yr 
 
% €xihk for tjiB Jftgrri 
 
 our troops are everywhere : you are a dead man if you 
 resist. Deliver up your sword." Toussaint yielded his 
 sword in silence. 
 
 He was now conducted to his estate again — not, as his 
 adorers had trusted, to spend a vigorous and peaceful old 
 age in repose, surrounded by his family, and cherished by 
 the love of the people he had redeemed, but merely in 
 preparation for further insult and injury, and it now be- 
 comes our melancholy duty to record one of the blackest 
 acts committed by Napoleon. Agreeably to his orders, 
 the person of Toussaint was treacherously arrested, while 
 in his own house near Gonaives. Under cover of the night, 
 and while himself, and the faithful companion of all his 
 cares, were, with their family wrapped in silent sleep, un- 
 conscious of their danger, a band of soldiers surrounded the 
 house ; and some of them entering his chamber, com- 
 manded him, with all his family, to go immediately on 
 board a vessel then in the harbour. Two Black chiefs, 
 who attempted the great man's rescue were killed on the 
 spot ; and about a hundred of Toussaint's most devoted 
 companions were arrested at the same time, and made pri- 
 soners, being sent on board different ships. Not one of 
 them was ever heard of more ; their fate is not known ; it 
 is supposed that they were thrown overboard. 
 
 Resistance being useless, he quietly submitted to his own 
 fate ; but for his feeble wife and innocent children, he asked 
 the privilege of their remaining at home. This request, 
 however just, was not granted ; and before their friends 
 and neighbours had any knowledge of it, the family, in- 
 cluding the daughter of a deceased brother, were on board 
 the " Hero " man-of-war, which immediately set sail for 
 France. To justify this base act, the French General cir- 
 culated a report, that Toussaint had engaged in a conspi- 
 racy ; but the time was so short, there could be no grounds 
 for even a suspicion of such a crime. 
 
 On meeting the commander of the " Hero," Toussaint 
 
% CttimtE for tju Jfrgrn. 
 
 observed to him, " In overthrowing me, you have over- 
 thrown only the trunk of the tree of Negro liberty in St. 
 Domingo. It will arise again from the roots, because they 
 are many, and have struck deep." He spoke truly. 
 Slavery has never been re-established in Hayti. The 
 outrage upon Toussaint roused the whole Island. Chris- 
 tophe and Dessalines rose with their forces : the French 
 were pressed on every side ; and all the reinforcements 
 which were sent from France seemed to do them no good. 
 Even while Toussaint yet lived, 40,000 Frenchmen are 
 supposed to have perished in the Island. Although tor- 
 tures were established and inflicted on the Blacks ; although 
 blood-hounds from Cuba were introduced to hunt them 
 down ; for every Black whom they destroyed, two seemed 
 to rise up ; and before the invaders relinquished the strug- 
 gle, they were reduced to feed on the carcases of the very 
 dogs they had brought in to destroy their Negro foes. On 
 the first of January, 1804, the independence of Hayti was 
 formally declared, and its inhabitants took their place 
 among the nations. 
 
 On their passage to France, Toussaint was kept a close 
 prisoner, and refused all intercourse with his family. He 
 was constantly confined to his cabin, and the door was 
 guarded by soldiers. When they arrived at Brest, no time 
 was lost in hurrying him on shore ; — on the deck only, was 
 he permitted to have an interview with his wife and chil- 
 dren, whom he was to meet no more in this life. The 
 separation of this faithful pair, and their beloved offspring, 
 was such as might be expected ; and excited in those who 
 beheld it, compassion for their fate. 
 
 The unfortunate Negro General was now escorted by a 
 detachment of dragoons to Paris, and committed to the 
 prison of the Temple. Napoleon frequently sent his aide- 
 de-camp, Caffarelli, to him there, to question him about a 
 large amount of treasure he was said to have buried. The 
 only answer that could ever be obtained from him was, " I 
 
 2q 
 
 fg 
 
298 
 
 % €vMt fur i\t Jfrgrn. 
 
 have lost something very different from such treasures as 
 you seek." When this disgraceful importunity was found 
 to be in vain, he was conveyed, by the orders of Bonaparte, 
 to the castle of Joux, in the east of France, among the Jura 
 mountains. For the first few months of his captivity, 
 Toussaint was allowed to be attended by a faithful Negro 
 servant, Mars Plaisir, but at length he was deprived of the 
 service of this single attendant, and winter approaching, he 
 was plunged into a cold, damp, and gloomy subterraneous 
 dungeon like one of the worst of criminals. It has been 
 confidently asserted by respectable authority, that the floor 
 of this dungeon was covered with water. Let the reader 
 imagine the dreadful situation of such a prison, to one who 
 had lived near three score years, enjoying the necessaries, 
 and, the latter part of his time, even the luxuries of life, 
 in a West Indian climate — and he must feel a tender com- 
 passion for the poor — the afflicted — -the suffering Toussaint ! 
 It was while he, who had spent a long life under the 
 warm skies, and in the sunshine of the tropics, and in un- 
 ceasing activity of body and mind, was striving for patience 
 under the long torture of such an imprisonment as this, 
 that our poet Wordsworth wrote — ■ 
 
 " Toussaint, the most unhappy man of men ! 
 Whether the whistling rustic tend his plough 
 Within thy hearing, or thou liest now 
 Buried in some deep dungeon's earless den; — ■ 
 O miserable chieftain ! where and when 
 Wilt thou find patience ? Yet die not ; do thou 
 Wear rather in thy bonds a cheerful brow : 
 Though fallen thyself, never to rise again, 
 Lire, and take comfort. Thou hast left behind 
 Powers that will work for thee — air, earth, and skies ; 
 There's not a breathing of the common wind 
 That will forget thee — thou hast great allies ; 
 Thy friends are exultations, agonies, 
 And love, and man's unconquerable mind." 
 
 In the deplorable situation in which Toussaint was placed, 
 without any alleviation, he lingered through the winter. 
 
 ->>V 
 
% €xiMt fnr tl;? jSrgrn. 
 
 299 & 
 
 After an imprisonment of ten months, during which nothing 
 is known either of his thoughts or sayings, the Negro Chief 
 was found dead in his dungeon. The severities of confine- 
 ment in this inhospitable prison had killed him, as his foes 
 doubtless intended it should, although no formal or reason- 
 able charge had ever been brought against him. This melan- 
 choly termination to his sufferings took place on the 27th 
 of April, 1803, when he was about 60 years of age. His 
 death, which was announced in the French papers, raised a 
 cry against the government which had chosen this dastardly 
 method of destroying one of the best and bravest men of 
 the Negro race. 
 
 We have now completed a brief history of this remark- 
 able Negro. Reader, was not this a man in all respects 
 worthy of the name ? He was altogether African, — a per- 
 fect Negro in his organization, of a jet complexion, yet 
 a fully endowed and well accomplished man. In no respect 
 does his nature appear to have been unequal ; there was 
 no feebleness in one direction, as a consequence of unusual 
 vigour in another. He had strength of body, strength of 
 understanding, strength of belief, and, consequently, of 
 purpose; — strength of affection, of imagination, and of will. 
 He was, emphatically, a Great Man ; and what he was, 
 others of his race may equally attain to. 
 
 A GLANCE AT THE SUBSEQUENT HISTORY OF 
 ST. DOMINGO, ORHAYTI. 
 
 That Toussaint L'Ouverture, whose life we have just 
 sketched, " was not a mere exceptional Negro, cast up as 
 it were once for all, but that he was only the first of a series 
 of able Negroes, and that his greatness may be fairly taken 
 as a proof of certain capabilities in the Negro character, 
 will appear from the history of St. Domingo subsequent 
 to his imprisonment and death." 
 
 The forcible suppression of Toussaint's government, and 
 
 >v*r 
 
300 
 
 % €rihtfe for i\i lugrn. 
 
 dUU 
 
 his treacherous removal from the island, did not prove a 
 happy stroke of policy. Le Clerc, with all the force com- 
 mitted to his care by Bonaparte, signally failed in his de- 
 signs. The contemptuous and cruel manner in which he 
 treated the Blacks, and the attempts made to restore them 
 to Slavery, provoked a wide spread insurrection. Inde- 
 pendent of the natural right of the Negroes to liberty, 
 their freedom had been declared by the French govern- 
 ment, who now attempted to enslave them again. Coiild 
 it be for a moment expected that they would allow this 
 without making any resistance ? They had felt the rigours 
 of Slavery, and endured them too long to be forgotten. 
 They were now in possession of their freedom, and were 
 not to be suddenly deprived of it without making one effort 
 in its defence. 
 
 Toussaint's old friends and generals, Dessalines, Chris- 
 tophe, Clervaux, and others, rose in arms, and all the re- 
 sources of European military skill opposed to them were 
 in vain. The French were soon driven out of several 
 important positions. In 1802 Le Clerc died, and was suc- 
 ceeded in the command by Rochambeau, a determined 
 enemy of the Blacks. Cruelties such as Le Clerc shrunk 
 from, were now employed to assist the French arms. The 
 Whites, regarding the Blacks as a species of brutes, had 
 recourse to such methods of cruelty and death, as would 
 be selected only for the purpose of exterminating a dan- 
 gerous and destructive race of animals ; to barbarities worse 
 than had ever before stained the annals of any people pre- 
 tending to the character of civilization. All the male 
 Negroes and Mulattoes they could lay their hands on were 
 murdered in the most shocking manner. Five hundred of 
 these unfortunate beings were at one time shot near Cape 
 Francois ; and an equal number were, on another occasion, 
 coolly massacred in view of the Negro army. Thousands 
 were carried on board the vessels in the harbour, and were 
 either suffocated in the holds, or thrown overboard in chains 
 
tJto. 
 
 dk 
 
 .->J> 
 
 51 iTritt for tjjl I r rgrn. 
 
 301 
 
 and drowned. Even these methods failed to accomplish 
 the horrid purposes of blood-thirsty tyrants — till at length 
 they had recourse to the dreadful expedient of hunting and 
 destroying the unhappy victims of their rage by blood- 
 hounds. These animals, pursuing the Negroes to the parts 
 of the mountains inaccessible to their no less bloody em- 
 ployers, easily gained their retreats, and devoured all who 
 were so unfortunate as to be discovered. Such of the 
 Black prisoners as had evinced the greatest zeal and activity 
 in defence of liberty, were selected from the rest, and on 
 the Sabbath were dragged to a spot chosen for the purpose, 
 and in sight of thousands of spectators, were thrown to 
 these terrible animals and torn to pieces. In short, the 
 attempt was founded in injustice, commenced by treachery, 
 and conducted in a manner the most inhuman and barbarous. 
 To the arms, the treachery, and the cruelty of the French, 
 what had the Negroes to oppose ? By what means were a 
 body of men, in a great measure ignorant of all that was 
 necessary to a successful enterprise, trained in the school 
 of Slavery, and knowing little except its rigors, frequently 
 destitute of a sufficient number of leaders, and but ill-fur- 
 nished with arms, to contend successfully with troops 
 trained to every mode of warfare, and stimulated by a re- 
 solution to subdue, or to exterminate. However hopeless 
 their case for some time appeared, they determined on re- 
 sistance as long as there should be any left capable of op- 
 posing their enemies. They first united in one body and 
 entered into a common vow, either to expel their oppres- 
 sors, or to die in the attempt. " La Liberte ou la mort!" 
 was their rallying cry ; and though there appeared little or 
 no prospect of success, they ever felt animated by the con- 
 viction, that they fought in the best of causes — the cause 
 of freedom and independence. Right and justice were on 
 their side ; they felt it so, and it rendered them uncon- 
 querable. In the early part of the contest, they were de- 
 prived by treachery of their ablest leader ; but his loss 
 
 
 vhJLM 
 
 m 
 
 : v^-- 
 
 V^ .'- 
 
302 
 
 % €vMi fnt \\t Jfogra. 
 
 served only to increase their rage, and consequently to 
 render them more formidable. During this severe struggle, 
 they displayed a degree of courage and firmness, with a 
 patient endurance of privations and sufferings, far above 
 their condition and character. At the same time they 
 sought and found opportunities of revenge ; and the cruel- 
 ties which they perpetrated were perhaps equal in number 
 and atrocity to those committed by their oppressors. But 
 it will be remembered that they were, in the first instance, 
 compelled to take up arms in their defence, by the unjust 
 designs of the French ; and were then urged by their sub- 
 sequent barbarities, to avail themselves of every occasion and 
 mode of retaliation. They fought for liberty ; and if they 
 found that the only way to secure it was through blood, it 
 was an alternative to which their enemies had reduced them. 
 Nor will those who have paid attention to the circumstances 
 of the war, hesitate to consider the French as chiefly charge- 
 able with the horrors, cruelties, and massacres of this san- 
 guinary contest. 
 
 After a doubtful and desperate struggle, success crowned 
 the exertions of the Negroes. They expelled their foes, 
 secured their rights, and took possession of the island, 
 which their toils and sufferings had purchased ; and in 
 1804, at an assembly of generals and chiefs, its indepen- 
 dence was declared, and all present bound themselves by 
 an oath to defend it. At the same time, to mark their 
 formal renunciation of all connection with France, it was 
 resolved that the name of the island should be changed 
 from St. Domingo to Hayti, the name given to it by its 
 original Indian inhabitants. 
 
 Dessalines was appointed Governor-General of the Island 
 for life, but subsequently changed his title to that of Em- 
 peror. He was solemnly inaugurated under the name of 
 James I., Emperor of Hayti ; and «the ceremony of his 
 coronation was accompanied by the proclamation of a new 
 constitution, the main provisions of which were exceedingly 
 
(SKlJi 
 
 51 €:\Mi far tip 3fegra. 
 
 judicious. Entire religious toleration was decreed, schools 
 were established, public worship encouraged, and measures 
 adopted, similar to those which Toussaint had employed for 
 creating and fostering an industrial spirit among the Ne- 
 groes. As a preparation for any future war, the interior of 
 the Island was extensively planted with yams, bananas, and 
 other articles of food, and many forts were built in advan- 
 tageous situations. Under these regulations the Island 
 again began to show symptoms of prosperity. Dessalines 
 was a man in many respects fitted to be the first sovereign 
 of a people rising out of barbarism. Bom a Slave, he 
 was quite illiterate, but had great natural abilities, united 
 to a very ferocious temper. His wife was one of the 
 most beautiful and best educated Negro women in Hayti. 
 For two years Dessalines continued to govern the Island ; 
 but at length his ferocity provoked his Mulatto subjects 
 to form a conspiracy against him, and in 1806 he was as- 
 sassinated by the soldiers of Petion. 
 
 A schism now took place in the Island. Christophe, 
 who had been second in command, assumed the governnent 
 of the northern division, and Petion, the Mulatto general, 
 assumed the government of the southern division. For 
 several years a war was carried on between the two rivals, 
 but at length, by a tacit agreement, Petion came to be 
 regarded as a legitimate governor in the south and west, 
 and Christophe in the north. Christophe, trained like Des- 
 salines in the school of Toussaint L'Ouverture, was bom a 
 Slave, but was an able as well as a benevolent man ; though, 
 like most of the Negroes who had arrived at his period of 
 life, he had not had the benefit of any systematic education. 
 Petion, on the other hand, had been educated in the Mili- 
 tary Academy of Paris, and was accordingly as accomplished 
 and well-instructed as any European officer. The title with 
 which Petion was invested, was that of President of the Re- 
 public of Hayti, in other words, President of the republican 
 part of Hayti ; the southern and western districts preferring 
 
% €rihte for tjre Jfogra. 
 
 the republican form of government. For some time Chris- 
 tophe bore the simple title of chief magistrate, but was, in 
 all respects the president of a republic like Petion. In 
 1811, by the desire of his subjects, he assumed the title 
 of Henry I., king of Hayti. The coronation was cele- 
 brated in the most gorgeous manner ; and the creation of 
 an aristocracy took place, the first act of the new sovereign 
 being to name four princes, seven dukes, twenty-two counts, 
 thirty barons, and ten knights. 
 
 Both parts of the Island were well governed, and rapidly 
 advanced in prosperity and civilization. On the restora- 
 tion of the Bourbons to the French throne, some hope 
 seems to have been entertained in France, that it might be 
 possible yet to obtain a footing in the Island, and commis- 
 sioners were sent out to collect information respecting its 
 condition ; but the conduct both of Christophe and Petion 
 was so firm, that the impossibility of subverting the inde- 
 pendence of Hayti became manifest. It was therefore left 
 in the undisturbed possession of the Blacks and Mulattoes. 
 
 In 1818 Petion died, and was succeeded by General 
 Boyer, a Mulatto who had been in France, and had accom- 
 panied Le Clerc in his expedition. In 1820, Christophe 
 having become involved in differences with his subjects, 
 shot himself ; and the two parts of the Island were then 
 reunited under the general name of the Republic of Hayti, 
 General Boyer being President. In 1825, a treaty was 
 concluded between him and Charles X. of France, by 
 which the latter acknowledged the independence of Hayti, 
 in consideration of a payment of 150 millions of francs 
 (six millions sterling), which was afterwards reduced to 60 
 million francs (£2,400,000). In the political constitution 
 of the island, no change of any importance has taken place 
 till the present time ; and the republic of Hayti continues 
 to be governed by a president elected for life, and two 
 legislative houses ; one, a senate, the other, a chamber of 
 representatives. 
 
ON STONE BY 3 ' 
 
 W)mwm ATPBHEPE.IB, 
 
 erecited ] ' 51a oks of & Domj go, 
 
 T D COMMEMORATE THEIR EMANCIPATION . 
 
 J FMasse-r LiUio Leeds. 
 

% €nhit far \\t Jdrgrn. 
 
 According to recent accounts of this interesting island, 
 the annual exports amounted to upwards of thirty millions 
 of pounds of coffee, six millions of pounds of logwood, one 
 million of pounds of cotton, five millions of feet of maho- 
 gany, besides considerable quantities of tobacco, cigars, 
 sugar, hides, wax, and ginger. 
 
 The Roman Catholic religion predominates, but all other 
 sects are tolerated. In the principal towns there are go- 
 vernment schools, some of them on the Lancasterian plan. 
 In the capital there is a military school ; and there are a 
 number of private academies in the Island. In 1837 the 
 revenue of Hayti was 3,852,576 dollars, and its public ex- 
 penditure 2,713,102 dollars. The social condition of the 
 island is one of advancement, and though many traces of 
 barbarism remain, it contains a population of Blacks, who 
 in the short space of fifty years, have raised themselves 
 from the depths and the degradation of Slavery to the con- 
 dition of a flourishing and respectable state. 
 
 Not many years ago, the master of an American vessel, 
 who had visited different ports in Europe and America, 
 stated to the writer, that the customhouse at Cape Haytian 
 was under as good regulation, if not better, than the cus- 
 tom houses of London and New York. " The officers of 
 the custom were all Black men," said he, " and yet the or- 
 der, correctness, and despatch of business, were remarkable, 
 equalling any thing of the kind I ever saw." 
 
 " This interesting people have shown to the world," says 
 a foreign writer, " for 50 years, that Black men can govern 
 themselves, creditably maintain all the relations of civil 
 society among themselves and with other states, and be- 
 sides paying a large indemnity to France for their indepen- 
 dence — which they never should have submitted to — place 
 themselves in the enviable situation of having ' a happy 
 peasantry, a country's pride,' and having an exchequer clear 
 of debt, which many older states cannot boast." 
 
 The state papers of the Republic of Hayti, have ever 
 
 2r 
 
 JiLS 
 
 W 3 ) 
 
 ^f= 
 
306 
 
 % €xlhk fur \\i Mt$n. 
 
 been distinguished for the ability with which they are writ- 
 ten ; and the gentlemen from that Island who have visited 
 the United States on business, or for other purposes, have 
 well supported the character which the people of Hayti 
 have established among civilized nations, many of whom 
 are men of refinement, education, and wealth. 
 
 m 
 
 NOTICE OF A SON OF TOUSSAINT L' OUVERTURE. 
 
 The following notice of a son of Toussaint L'Ouverture, 
 is from a letter written by a member of the Society of 
 Friends at Exeter, about the commencement of the present 
 century. 
 
 A Bible Meeting being convened in that city, the 
 audience were unexpectedly impressed by the powerful 
 speech of " a young Black from St. Domingo, son of the 
 late General Toussaint, a most interesting youth, who, 
 having escaped from Napoleon, the murderer of his father, 
 had, by a variety of providences, been brought to England, 
 and to the knowledge of God. This knowledge he ob- 
 tained through reading the Scriptures, and fervent prayer 
 that they might be opened to his understanding. He 
 seemed to be swallowed up in love to his Divine Protector, 
 and to his creature man ; desirous that all the inhabitants 
 of the world might be brought to the same source of never 
 failing consolation he himself experiences. 
 
 " The amiable Toussaint left Exeter next morning. As 
 he returned from Honiton, after the meeting, when he had 
 passed the door, we felt as we formerly did when we had 
 parted with some of our dearest friends in the ministry ; 
 nor do I ever remember the presence of the Most High more 
 evidently felt than when he was in our house for a short 
 time, when he addressed the language of consolation to our 
 aged parent, and afterwards poured forth his fervent sup- 
 plications on her behalf. I was almost lost in amazement 
 at this unexpected occurrence, for although we had been 
 
Wb 
 
 % €x\kk far tjp lirgrn. 
 
 given to understand that he was a serious youth, we had no 
 idea that he was so eminently favoured. Our joy at thus 
 meeting with one whom we can call a brother beloved, was, 
 and is, mixed with a fear for him, lest by any means his 
 mind should be diverted from its religious exercise. May 
 he be preserved in the hollow of the Almighty's hand, that 
 nothing may separate him from the love of his Creator. 
 His manners are graceful and elegant ; his disposition 
 affectionate, and his person handsome for a Black ; before 
 religion exerted its influence, he was proud and obstinate." 
 
 GEOFFREY L'ISLET. 
 
 Geoffrey L'Islet, a Mulatto, was an officer of artillery, 
 and guardian of the depot of maps and plans of the Isle of 
 France. In 1786, he was named a correspondent of the 
 French Academy of Sciences, and is acknowledged as such 
 in the " Connoisance des temps" for 1797, to which learned 
 society L'Islet regularly transmitted meteorological obser- 
 vations, and sometimes hydrographical journals. His maps 
 of the Isles of France, delineated according to astronomical 
 observations, were published with other plans, in 1791, by 
 order of the minister of marine. A new edition appeared 
 in 1802, corrected from drawings transmitted by the author. 
 Gregoire speaks of them as the best maps of those isles 
 that had appeared. 
 
 In the almanac of the Isle of France, several contribu- 
 tions of L'Islet's were inserted, among others a description 
 of Pitrebot, one of the highest mountains of the Islands. 
 
 A collection of his manuscript memoirs are deposited in 
 the archives of the Academy of Sciences. Amongst these 
 is the account of a voyage of L'Islet to the Bay of St. 
 Luce, an island of Madagascar ; it is accompanied with a 
 map of the Bay, and of the coast. He points out the ex- 
 changeable commodities, the resources which it presents, 
 and which would increase, says he, if instead of exciting 
 
 W 
 
 iSfi 
 
308 
 
 % €x\hh for \\i Jlrgrn. 
 
 )/TR) 
 
 the natives to war, in order to obtain Slaves, industry were 
 encouraged by the prospects of advantageous commerce. 
 The description he gives of the manners and customs of 
 the natives of Madagascar is very curious. 
 
 L'Islet was well versed in botany, natural philosophy, 
 geology, and astronomy. He struggled more succesfully 
 than many against the prejudices attached to his race. He 
 never visited Europe to improve his taste or acquire know- 
 ledge ; had he been able to do this in his youth, to breathe 
 the atmosphere of the learned, it would have probably 
 tended to the expansion of his genius and talents. 
 
 L'Islet established a scientific society in the Isle of 
 France, of which some Whites refused to become members, 
 merely because its founder was a Black. " Did they not 
 prove, by their conduct," asks the Abbe Gregoire, " that 
 they were unworthy of such an honour ? " 
 
 KAFIR GENEROSITY. 
 
 Captain Stockenstrom, at the time of the commando 
 of the expedition against Makanna, had once the misfor- 
 tune, while walking in the rear, to be taken suddenly ill. 
 He was thus, unobserved by his men, left behind, unable 
 to move and ignorant of the way. He expected that as 
 soon as he was discovered by the enemy he would be in- 
 stantly put to death. While in this anxious predicament, 
 he observed a solitary Kafir approaching him, armed with 
 a bundle of arrows. As soon as the Kafir, who was one of 
 the enemy's warriors, ascertained his case, without saying 
 a word, he laid down his mantle and arms at his feet, and 
 darted off at full speed. Captain Stockenstrom could form 
 no idea what was his intention, until in about an hour, to 
 his agreeable surprise, he saw him return, accompanied by 
 a Boor on horseback, leading another horse. The Kafir 
 having resumed his mantle and arrows, suddenly disappeared 
 in the jungle, and captain S. rode to rejoin his party. 
 
After peace was concluded, captain S. made every exer- 
 tion in his power to ascertain the name of his deliverer, 
 but without effect, nor did he ever come forward to claim 
 the reward that captain S. publicly announced his desire 
 to bestow for such noble conduct in an enemy. 
 
 CAPITEIN. 
 
 James E. J. Capitein was born in Africa. He was pur- 
 chased when seven or eight years of age, on the borders of 
 the river St. Andre, by a Negro trader, who made a pre- 
 sent of him to one of his friends. 
 
 By his new master, who proved to be his friend, he was 
 first named Capitein ; and he instructed him, baptized him, 
 and brought him to Holland, where he acquired the lan- 
 guage of the country. He devoted his time to painting, 
 for which he had a great inclination. He commenced his 
 studies at the Hague, where a pious and learned lady, who 
 was much occupied in the study of languages, is said first 
 to have taught him Latin, and the elements of the Greek, 
 Hebrew, and Chaldean tongues. From the Hague he 
 went to the University of Leyden, meeting everywhere 
 with zealous protectors. He devoted himself to theology, 
 under able professors, with the intention of returning to 
 Africa, to preach the Gospel to his countrymen. 
 
 Having studied four years, Capitein took his degrees, 
 and in 1742, was sent as a Christian minister to Elmina, 
 on the Gold Coast. In 1802, a vague report was spread, 
 that he had abjured Christianity, and embraced idolatry 
 again. Blumenbach, however, who inserted a portrait of 
 Capitein in his work on the varieties of the human race, 
 could detect no authentic information against him. 
 
 The first work of Capitein is an elegy in Latin, on the 
 death of Manger, minister at the Hague, his preceptor and 
 his friend. It is as follows : — 
 
 Hac autem in Batavoruni gratissima sede 
 Non prinium tantum elementa lingme Belgicoe 
 
 >yr 
 
M( 
 
 310 
 
 $ €xiMt fnr i\)t jfjgnr. 
 
 Addidici, sed arti etiam pictorica, in quam 
 Eram pro pensissimus, dedi operam Virum 
 Interea tempore labente, institutioni sua 
 Domestica catechesios mihi interesse permisit 
 Vir bumanissiinus, Joannes Pbillipus Manger, 
 Cujus in obitum (cum tanti viri, turn 
 Solidor eruditiouis, turn erga deum singularis 
 Pictatis, admirator semper extitissim) flebilibus 
 Fatis. Cum Ecclesior Hagienis protento anno 
 Esset ademptus, lugubrem banc compersui 
 Elegiam ! 
 
 ELEGIA. 
 
 Invida mors totum vibrat sua tela per orbem : 
 
 Et gestit quemvis succubuisse sibi. 
 
 Ilia, metus expers, penetrat conclavia regum : 
 
 Imperiique manu ponere sceptra jubet. 
 
 Non sinit ilia diii partos spectare triumphos : 
 
 Linquere sed cogit, clara tropcea duces. 
 
 Divitis et gazas, aliis ut dividat, omnes, 
 
 Mendicique casam vindicat ilia sibi. 
 
 Falce senes, juvenes, nullo discrimine, dura, 
 
 Instar aristarum, demittit ilia simul. 
 
 Hie fuit ilia audax, nigro velamine tecta. 
 
 Limina Mangeri sollicitare domus. 
 
 Hujus ut ante domum steterat funesta cypressus, 
 
 Luctisonos gemitus nobilis Haga dedit. 
 
 Hunc lacrymis tinxit gravibus carissima conjux, 
 
 Dum sua tundebat pectora sape manu 
 
 Non abter Naomi, cum te vinduata marito, 
 
 Profudit lacrymas, Ebmelecbe, tua. 
 
 Ssepe sui manes civit gemebunda mariti, 
 
 Edidit et tales ore tremente sonos ; 
 
 Condit ut obscuro vultum velamine Pbcebus, 
 
 Tractibus ut terra? lumina grata neget ; 
 
 O decus immortale meum, mea sola voluptas ! 
 
 Sic fugis ex oculis in mea damna meis. 
 
 Non equidem inyideo, consors, quod te ocyor aura 
 
 Transtulit ad loetas setbereas que domos. 
 
 Sed quoties mando placida? mea membra quieti, 
 
 Sive dies veniat, sum memor usque tui. 
 
 Te tbalamus noster raptum mibi funere poscit, 
 
 Quis renovet nobis foedera rupta dies ? 
 
 En tua sacra deo sedes studiisque dicata, 
 
% €riinrte for tire- Jfogm. 3ii 
 
 Te propter, msesti signa doloris babet. 
 Quod magis, effusas, veluti de flumine pleno, 
 Dant lacrynias nostri pignora cara tori. 
 Dentibus ut misere fido pastore lupinis 
 Conscisso tenerse disjiciunter oves, 
 Aeraque borrendis, feriunt balatibus altum, 
 Dum scissuin adspiciunt voce cientque ducem : 
 Sic querulis nostras implent ululatibus cedes 
 Dum jacet in lecto corpus inane tuum. 
 Succinit buic vatum viduee pia turba querenti, 
 Funera qutc celebrat conveniente modo 
 Grande sacerdotum decus, et mea gloria cessat, 
 Delicium domini, gentis amorque pise ! 
 Clauditor os blandum sacro de fonte rigatum ; 
 Fonte meam possum quo relevare sitim ! 
 Hei mibi ? quam subito fugit facundia linguae, 
 Caelesti dederat quae mibi nielle frui. 
 Nestoris eloqium veteres jactate poetce, 
 Ipso Mangerius Nestore major erat, &c. 
 
 On his admission to the University of Leyden, Capitein 
 published a Latin dissertation on the calling of the Gen- 
 tiles, "De Vocatione Ethnicorum," which he divided into 
 three parts. From the authority of the sacred writings he 
 establishes the certainty of the promise of the gospel, 
 which embraces all nations, although its manifestation is 
 only gradual. For the purpose of co-operating in this 
 respect with the design of the Almighty, he proposes that 
 the lansruao-es of those nations should be cultivated to 
 whom the blessings of Christianity are yet unknown ; and 
 also that Missionaries be sent among them, who, by the 
 mild voice of persuasion might gain their affections, and 
 dispose them to receive the truths of the gospel. 
 
 The Spaniards and the Portuguese, he observes, exercise 
 a mild and gentle treatment of their Slaves, establishing no 
 superiority of colour, &c. In other countries, Planters 
 have prevented their Negroes from being instructed in a 
 religion which proclaims the equality of men, all proceed- 
 ing from a common stock, and equally entitled to the bene- 
 fits of a kind Providence, who is no respecter of persons. 
 
 )>^ 
 
The Dutch Planters, persuaded that Slavery is incon- 
 sistent with Christianity, but stifling the voice of con- 
 science, probably instigated Capitein to become the apolo- 
 gist of a bad cause, for he subsequently composed a 
 politico-theological dissertation in Latin, to prove that 
 Slavery is not opposed to Christian freedom. His con- 
 clusions are forced. Though poor in argument, it is rich 
 in erudition, and translated into Dutch, by Wilheur, and 
 published with a portrait of the author in preacher's attire. 
 This work went through four editions. 
 
 Capitein also published a small quarto volume of Ser- 
 mons, in Dutch, preached in different towns, and printed 
 at Amsterdam in 1742. 
 
 CHRISTIAN KINDNESS IN AN AFRICAN. 
 
 " In one of my early journeys," says Moffat, " with 
 some of my companions, we came to a heathen village on 
 the banks of the Orange River. We had travelled far, and 
 were hungry, thirsty, and fatigued. From the fear of 
 being exposed to lions, we preferred remaining at the 
 village to proceeding during the night. The people at the 
 village, rather roughly, directed us to halt at a distance. 
 We asked water, but they would not supply it. I offered 
 the three or four buttons which still remained on my 
 jacket for a little milk ; this also was refused. We had 
 the prospect of another hungry night at a distance from 
 water, though within sight of the river. We found it diffi- 
 cult to reconcile ourselves to our lot ; for, in addition to 
 repeated rebuffs, the manner of the villagers excited sus- 
 picion. 
 
 " When twilight drew on, a woman approached from 
 the height, beyond which the village lay. She bore on her 
 head a bundle of wood, and had a vessel of milk in her 
 hand. The latter, without opening her lips, she handed 
 to us, laid down the wood, and returned to the village. A 
 
 >vr 
 
% €tifotfe for \\t Jfignr. 
 
 313 
 
 second time slie approaclied with a cooking vessel on her 
 head, and a leg of mutton in one hand, and water in the 
 other. She sat down without saying a word, prepared the 
 fire, and put on the meat. We asked her again and again 
 who she was. She remained silent, till affectionately en- 
 treated to give us a reason for such unlooked for kindness 
 to strangers. The solitary tear stole down her sable cheek 
 when she replied, ' I love Him whose servant you are ; and 
 surely it is my duty to give you a cup of cold water in his 
 name. My heart is full ; therefore I cannot speak the joy 
 I feel to see you in this out-of-the-world place.' On learn- 
 ing a little of her history, and that she was a solitary light, 
 burning in a dark place, I asked her how she kept up the 
 life of God in her soul, in the entire absence of the com- 
 munion of saints. She drew from her bosom a copy of the 
 Dutch New Testament, which she had received from Mr. 
 Helme, when in his school some years previous, before she 
 had been compelled by her connexions to retire to her 
 present seclusion. ' This,' she said, ' is the fountain whence 
 I drink ; this is the oil which makes my lamp burn.'* 
 
 I looked on the precious relic, printed by the British and 
 Foreign Bible Society ; and the reader may conceive how 
 I felt, and my believing companions with me, when we met 
 with this disciple, and mingled our sympathies and prayers 
 together at the throne of our Heavenly Father." 
 
 OTHELLO. 
 
 All the information I can glean respecting the Negro 
 Othello, is, that he published at Baltimore, in 1788, an 
 essay against the Slavery of his race. 
 
 " The European powers," says he, " ought to unite in 
 
 * Christ alone is the well of living -water, and from Him flows alone the 
 oil whereby the lamp is fed. The inspired words of Scripture, applied to 
 her sold by the Holy Spirit, continually brought comfort and peace to this 
 solitary Christian. 
 
 2s 
 
314 
 
 51 Critafr far fyt 3fop, 
 
 abolishing the infernal commerce in Slaves : it is they who 
 have covered Africa with desolation. They declaim against 
 the people of Algiers, and they vilify, as barbarians, those 
 who inhabit a corner of that portion of the globe, where 
 ferocious Europeans travel to purchase men, and carry 
 them away for the purpose of torture. These are the peo- 
 ple who pretend they are Christians, whilst they degrade 
 themselves by acting the part of an executioner." " Is not 
 your conduct," adds Othello, " when compared with your 
 principles, a sacrilegious irony ? When you dare to talk 
 of civilization and the Gospel, you pronounce your anathe- 
 ma. In you, the superiority of power produces nothing 
 but a superiority of brutality and barbarism. Weakness, 
 which calls for protection, appears to provoke your inhu- 
 manity. Your fine political systems are sullied by the 
 outrages committed against human nature and the Divine 
 Majesty. When America opposed the pretensions of Eng- 
 land, she declared that all men have the same rights of 
 freedom and equality. After having manifested her hatred 
 against tyrants, ought she to have abandoned her principles ? 
 Whilst we should bless the measures pursued in Penn- 
 sylvania in favour of the Negroes, we must execrate those 
 of South Carolina, which even prevent the Slaves from 
 learning to read. To whom can these unfortunates then 
 address themselves ? The law either neglects or chastises 
 them." 
 
 Othello paints in strong colours the griefs and sighs of 
 families suddenly torn asunder and forcibly dragged from 
 the country which gave them birth, — a country always dear 
 to their heart, from the remembrance of kindred ties and 
 local impressions. So dear to them, indeed, does it remain, 
 that one of the articles of their superstitious credulity, is 
 to imagine, that after death they will return to Africa." 
 With the happiness which they enjoyed in their native soil, 
 Othello contrasts their horrible state in America ; where, 
 naked, hungry, and without instruction, they see all the 
 
 <tu/< 
 
% €xlkk for tljB $frgrn. 
 
 315 
 
 & 
 
 mj<i> 
 
 evils of life accumulate ou their heads. He desires that 
 their cries may reach to heaven, and that heaven may an- 
 swer their prayers. Few works can be compared to this of 
 Othello's, for force of reasoning, and fire of eloquence ; 
 but, alas ! how little can reason and eloquence perform, 
 when opposed by avarice and crime ? 
 
 alKi/ 
 
 JAMES DEBHAM. 
 
 This intelligent descendant of Africa, originally a Slave 
 in Philadelphia, was sold to a medical man, who employed 
 him as an assistant in the preparation of drugs. During the 
 American war he was sold to a surgeon, and by him to Dr. 
 Dove, of New Orleans. He learned the English, French, 
 and Spanish languages, so as to speak them with ease. 
 
 He was received a member of the English church ; and 
 in 1788, when about 21 years of age, he became one of the 
 most distinguished physicians at New Orleans. " I con- 
 versed with him on medicine," says Dr. Rush, " and found 
 him very learned. I thought I could give him information 
 concerning the treatment of diseases ; but I learned more 
 from him than he could expect from we." 
 
 The Pennsylvania Society, established in favour of the 
 people of Colour, thought it their duty, in 1789, to publish 
 these facts ; which are also related by Dickson. In the 
 Domestic Medicine of Buchan, and in a work of Duplaint, 
 we find an account of a cure for the bite of a rattlesnake. 
 It is not clear whether Derham was the discoverer ; but it 
 is a well known fact, that, for this important discovery, we 
 are indebted to one of his Colour, who received his freedom 
 from the general assembly of Carolina, and also an annuity 
 of £100. 
 
 ANECDOTE OF TWO NEGEOES IN FRANCE. 
 Iii the most flourishing period of the reign of Louis 
 XIV., two Negro youths, the sons of a prince, being 
 
 >'/* 
 
brought to the court of France, the king appointed a Jesuit 
 to instruct them in letters, and in the Christian religion ; 
 and gave to each of them a commission in his guards. — The 
 elder, who was remarkable for candour and ingenuity, made 
 great advances, more especially in the doctrines of religion. 
 
 A brutal officer, in a dispute, insulted him with a blow. 
 The gallant youth did not so much as offer to resent it. 
 One of his friends spoke to him that evening alone upon 
 his behaviour, which he told him was too tame, especially 
 in a soldier. " Is there then," said the young African, 
 " one revelation for soldiers, and another for merchants and 
 gownsmen ? The good father to whom I owe all my know- 
 ledge, has earnestly inculcated in me the forgiveness of in- 
 juries ; assuring me that a Christian was by no means to 
 retaliate abuses of any kind." " The good father," replied 
 his friend, " may fit you for a monastery by his lessons, 
 but never for the army, and the rules of a court. In a 
 word," continued he, " if you do not call the officer to an 
 account, you will be branded with the infamy of cowardice, 
 and have your commission taken from you." " I would 
 fain," said the young man, " act consistently in everything: 
 but since you press me with that regard to my honour 
 which you have always shown, I will wipe off so foul a 
 stain ; though I must own I gloried in it before." 
 
 He desired his friend to appoint the aggressor to meet 
 him early in the morning. They met and fought ; and the 
 brave African youth disarmed his adversary, and forced him 
 to ask his pardon publicly. This done, he threw up his 
 commission, and desired the king's leave to return to his 
 father. At parting, he embraced his brother and his friends, 
 with tears in his eyes, saying, " he did not imagine the 
 Christians had been such an unaccountable people ; and 
 that he could not apprehend their faith was of any use to 
 them, if it did not influence their practice. In my coun- 
 try, we think it no dishonour to act according to the prin- 
 ciples of our religion." 
 
1 €xifok far fjj? llrgrn. 
 
 KINDNESS OF A COLOURED FEMALE TO 
 CAPTAIN RAINSFORD. 
 
 When Captain Rainsford, a British officer, was in St. 
 Domingo in 1799, he was arrested from suspicions as to his 
 being a spy. During fourteen days' imprisonment, he was 
 touched with the sympathy of a Coloured female, who 
 brought him refreshment to the window of his cell. He 
 records this circumstance in the following words : " I can- 
 not omit to pay the tribute of gratitude to an unknown 
 female of Colour, whose pity, more than her power, would 
 have alleviated the horrors of my situation. She came 
 occasionally in the night to the window of my cell, which 
 looked into a court, to which she found access by an avenue 
 that was unguarded. She brought me food, wine, and 
 spirits, the remains of which, to prevent enquiry, she was 
 anxious should be destroyed. The humane sympathy ex- 
 pressed by her in these nocturnal offerings to misery, have 
 repeatedly brought to my remembrance the eulogium of 
 Ledyard, on a sex ever prone to tender offices." 
 
 THOMAS JENKINS. 
 
 Thomas Jenkins was the son of an African king, and 
 bore externally all the features of the Negro. His father 
 reigned over a country on the coast of Guinea, resorted to 
 by British vessels for the purchase of Slaves. The Negro 
 sovereign having observed the superiority civilization and 
 learning gave to the Europeans, resolved to send his eldest 
 son to Britain, that he might acquire the advantages of 
 knowledge. He bargained with Captain Swanstone, a 
 native of Hawick, who traded to the coast for ivory, gold 
 dust, &c, that the boy should be taken by him to his own 
 country, and returned in a few years fully educated, for 
 which he was to receive a certain consideration in the pro- 
 ductions of Africa. The boy recollected a little of the scene 
 which took place on his being handed over to Swanstone. 
 
 W 
 
 >y± 
 
XJi 
 
 1 €xiMt fur tire Jfrgm 
 
 His father came with his mother, and a number of Sable 
 courtiers, to a green eminence near the coast, where, 
 amidst tears, he was formally consigned to the care of the 
 British trader, who pledged himself to return his tender 
 charge, some years afterwards, endowed with as much learn- 
 ing as he might be found capable of receiving. He was 
 then conveyed on ship-board, where the fancy of the master 
 conferred upon him the name of Thomas Jenkins. 
 
 Swanstone brought his protege to Hawick, and was about 
 to take the proper means for fulfilling his bargain, when he 
 died. No provision having been made for such a contin- 
 gency, the young Negro was thrown upon the wide world, 
 not only without the means of obtaining an education, but 
 destitute of everything necessary to supply more pressing 
 wants. Swanstone died at the Tower Inn at Hawick, 
 where Tom very faithfully attended him, though almost 
 starved by the cold of a Scottish winter. After his guar- 
 dian had expired, he was in a state of the greatest distress 
 from cold, till the landlady brought him to her kitchen 
 fire, where he found a climate agreeable to his nerves, and 
 he was ever after very grateful for her kindness. After 
 remaining some time at the inn, a farmer in Teviot-head, 
 the nearest surviving relation of his guardian, took charge 
 of him, and he was removed to his house, where he soon 
 made himself useful in humble duties. When he left the 
 inn, he understood hardly a word of English ; but here he 
 speedily acquired the dialect of the district, with all its 
 peculiarities of accent and intonation. He lived in this 
 family several years, in the course of which he was succes- 
 sively advanced to the offices of cow-herd and driver of 
 peats to Hawick for sale on his master's account, which he 
 discharged very satisfactorily. After he had become a 
 stout boy, Mr. Laidlaw of Falnash, a gentleman of great 
 respectability and intelligence, took a fancy for him, and 
 prevailed upon his former protector to yield him into his 
 charge. Black Tom, as he was called, became at Falnash 
 
% €x\Mi for ifpe ffltyn. 
 
 319 
 
 i 
 
 a sort of Jack-of-all-trades. He acted as cow-herd at 
 one time, and stable-boy at another : in short, he could 
 turn his hand to anything. It was his especial duty to go 
 errands to Hawick, for which a retentive memory well qua- 
 lified him. He afterwards became a regular farm-servant 
 to Mr. Laidlaw, and while in this capacity, he first disco- 
 vered a taste for learning. How he acquired his first in- 
 structions is not known. The boy probably cherished a 
 notion of duty on this subject, and was anxious to fulfil, 
 as far as his unfortunate circumstances would permit, the 
 designs of his parent. He picked up a few crumbs of ele- 
 mentary literature at the table of Mr. Laidlaw's children, 
 or interested the servants to give him what knowledge 
 they could. 
 
 In a short time, Mrs. Laidlaw was surprised to find that 
 Tom began to have a strange liking for candle-ends. Not 
 one about the farm-house could escape him. Every scrap 
 of wick and tallow he fell in with was secreted and taken 
 to his loft above the stable, and suspicions were entertained 
 respecting the use he made of them. Curiosity incited the 
 people about the farm to watch his proceedings after he 
 had retired to his den ; and it was then discovered, to the 
 astonishment of all, that the poor lad was engaged, with a 
 book and a slate, in drawing rude imitations of the letters 
 of the alphabet. On the discovery of his literary taste, 
 Mr. Laidlaw put him to an evening school, kept by a neigh- 
 bouring rustic, at which he made such rapid progress as to 
 excite astonishment all over the country, for no one had 
 ever dreamt of his becoming a scholar. 
 
 Though daily occupied with his drudgery as a farm-ser- 
 vant, he began to instruct himself in Latin and Greek. A 
 boy friend lent him several books necessary in these stu- 
 dies ; and Mr. and Mrs. Laidlaw did all in their power to 
 favour his wishes, though the distance of a classical academy 
 was a sufficient bar, had there been no other, to prevent 
 their giving him the opportunity of regular instruction. In 
 
 £v><D 
 
 )'i± 
 
% potato far tjre &gtx 
 
 speaking of the kind treatment he received from these wor- 
 thy individuals, his heart was often observed to swell, and 
 the tear to start into his honest dark eye. Besides ac- 
 quainting himself with Latin and Greek, he initiated him- 
 self in the study of mathematics. 
 
 A great era in Tom's life was his possessing himself of a 
 Greek dictionary. Having learned that there was to be a 
 sale of books at Hawick, he proceeded thither, in com- 
 pany with his boy friend. Tom possessed twelve shillings, 
 saved out of his wages, and his companion vowed that 
 if more should be required for the purchase of any parti- 
 cular book, he should not fail to back him in the compe- 
 tition — so far as eighteen-pence would warrant, that being 
 the amount of his own little stock. Tom at once pitched 
 upon a lexicon as the grand necessary of his education, and 
 began to bid for it. All present stared with wonder when 
 they saw a Negro competing for a book which could only 
 be useful to a student at a considerably advanced stage. A 
 gentleman named Moncrieff, who knew Tom's companion, 
 inquired with great curiosity into the seeming mystery. 
 When it was explained, and Mr. Moncrieff learned that 
 thirteen shillings and sixpence was the utmost extent of their 
 joint stocks, he told his young friend to bid as far beyond 
 that sum as he chose, and he would be answerable for the 
 deficiency. Tom had now bidden as far as he could go, and 
 he was turning away in despair, when his young friend 
 threw himself into the competition, and soon had the satis- 
 faction of placing the precious volume in the hands which 
 were so eager to possess it. Tom carried off his prize in 
 triumph, and, it is needless to say, made the best use of it. 
 
 It may now be asked — what was the personal character 
 of this interesting African ? We answer at once — the best 
 possible. He was mild and unassuming, free from every 
 kind of vice, and possessing a kindliness of manner which 
 made him the favourite of all who knew him. In fact, he 
 was one of the most popular characters in the whole district 
 
VlV 
 
 & €MU for tjp Ifrgrn. 
 
 of Upper Teviotdale. His employers respected him for 
 the faithful and zealous manner in which he discharged his 
 duties, and all were interested in his efforts to obtain know- 
 ledge. Having retained no trace of his native language, 
 he resembled, in every respect except his colour, a Scotch 
 peasant : only he was much more learned than most of 
 them, and spent his time more abstractedly. He was 
 deeply impressed with the truths of Christianity, and was 
 a regular attender on religious ordinances. Altogether, he 
 was a person of the most worthy and respectable properties, 
 and, even without considering his meritorious struggles for 
 knowledge, would have been beloved and esteemed wherever 
 he was known. 
 
 When he was about twenty years of age, a vacancy oc- 
 curred in the school of Teviot-head. A committee was 
 appointed to examine the candidates : among three or four 
 competitors appeared the Black farm-servant of Falnash, 
 with a heap of books under his arm. The* committee was 
 surprised ; but they read his testimonials of character, and 
 put him through the usual forms of examination. His 
 exhibition was so decidedly superior to the rest, that they 
 reported him as the best fitted for the situation. 
 
 For a time this prospect was dashed. On the report 
 coming before the presbytery, a majority of the members 
 were alarmed at the idea of placing a Negro in such a 
 situation, and poor Tom was voted out of all the benefits 
 of the competition. He suffered dreadfully from this sen- 
 tence, which made him feel keenly the misfortune of his 
 colour, and the awkwardness of his situation in the world. 
 But the people most interested in the matter felt as indig- 
 nant at the treatment which he had received, as he could 
 possibly feel depressed. The heritors, among whom the 
 late Duke of Buccleuch was the chief, took up the case so 
 warmly, that it was resolved to set up Tom in opposition 
 to the teacher appointed by the presbytery, and to give 
 him an exact duplicate of the salary which they already 
 
 fflNS) 
 
 2 T 
 
% €:ikk far \)t Jfrp. 
 
 paid to that person. A place was hastily fitted up for his 
 reception, and he was immediately installed in office, with 
 the universal approbation of both parents and children. 
 The other school was completely deserted ; and the Negro, 
 who had come to this country to learn, soon found himself 
 fully engaged in teaching, and in the receipt of an income 
 more than adequate to his wants. 
 
 To the gratification of his friends, and confusion of face 
 to the presbytery, he proved an excellent teacher. He 
 had a way of communicating knowledge eminently success- 
 ful, and was as much beloved by his pupils as he was re- 
 spected by those who employed him. On the Saturdays, 
 he walked to Hawick (eight miles distant), to make an 
 exhibition of what he had himself acquired during the 
 week, to the master of an academy there ; thus keeping up 
 his own gradual advance in knowledge. His untiring zeal 
 for religious instruction shewed itself in his always return- 
 ing to Hawick next day — (of course an equal extent of 
 travel) — to attend the church. 
 
 After he had conducted the school a year or two, finding 
 himself in possession of about £20., he determined to spend a 
 winter at college. He waited upon Mr. Moncrieff(the gen- 
 tleman who had enabled him to get the lexicon, and who had 
 since done him many other good offices), to consult him 
 concerning the step he was about to take. Mr. Moncrieff, 
 though accustomed to regard him as a wonder, was surprised 
 at this new project. He asked the amount of his cash. 
 On being told that £20. was all, and that he contemplated 
 attending the Latin, Greek, and mathematical classes, he 
 informed him this would never do : the money would 
 hardly pay his fees. Tom was much disconcerted at this ; 
 but his generous friend soon relieved him, by placing in 
 his hands an order upon a merchant in Edinburgh for what- 
 ever might be required to support him for a winter at 
 college. 
 
 He pursued his way to Edinburgh with his £20. On 
 
Wk 
 
 $ 
 
 51 '(T'rilinft far tjjt jfegrti 
 
 applying to the Professor of Latin for a ticket to his class, 
 he looked upon him with wonder, and asked if he had 
 acquired any rudimental knowledge of the language. Mr. 
 Jenkins, as he may now be called, said modestly that 
 he had studied Latin for a considerable time, and was 
 
 anxious to complete his acquaintance with it. Mr. P 
 
 presented him with a ticket, for which he generously re- 
 fused to take the usual fee. Of the other two professors 
 to whom he applied, both stared as much as the former, 
 and only one took the fee. He was thus enabled to spend 
 the winter in a most valuable course of instruction ; and 
 next spring returned to Teviot-head, and resumed his pro- 
 fessional duties. 
 
 A gentleman, animated by the best intentions, subse- 
 quently recommended Thomas Jenkins to the Christian 
 Knowledge Society, for a missionary among the colonial 
 Slaves ; and he was induced to go out to the Mauritius, 
 where he attained eminence as a teacher, and is probably 
 still living there. 
 
 QL, 
 
 NOTICE OF AN INTELLIGENT NEGRO. 
 
 COMMUNICATED BT CAPTAIN WAUCHOPE, R.N., IN A LETTER TO THE AUTHOR, 
 DATED FEB. 27, 1813. 
 
 Dear Sir, 
 
 I think the following statement may be worthy of a place 
 in the volume you are now publishing. 
 
 In 1837, I commanded her Majesty's frigate "Thalia," 
 on the west coast of Africa ; and when in Clarence Cove, 
 in the island of Fernando Po, I spent the day on shore 
 with that very worthy and excellent man, Mr. Becroft, 
 who at that time was in charge of the establishment there. 
 My purser had occasion that forenoon to draw a bill on 
 government for £250., which was cashed by Mr. Scott, a 
 Negro. I dined with Mr. Becroft the same clay, and Mr. 
 Scott, who was chief clerk of the establishment, was one 
 of the quests. I was struck with his intelligence and 
 
 fir© 
 
gentlemanly behaviour, and when alone with Mr. Becroft 
 afterwards, I mentioned how much surprised I had been 
 with the whole of Mr. Scott's conduct and conversation : 
 his reply was — " You will be more surprised when I tell 
 you that ten years ago Mr. Scott was in the hold of a 
 Slaver." 
 
 He had been educated at Sierra Leone, and found his 
 way afterwards to Fernando Po. I believe that few Euro- 
 pean intellects would have made such a stride in so short 
 a space of time. 
 
 I have the honour to remain, sir, 
 
 Your obedient servant, 
 
 R. WAUCHOPE, 
 Captain R.N. 
 
 FURTHER OBSERVATIONS RESPECTING 
 
 NEGRO CHARACTER AND ABILITY; 
 
 COMMUNICATED BY CAPT. WAUCHOPE, R.N. 
 
 Dacre, near Penrith, April 8, 1848. 
 
 Dear Sir, — Although I am not able to give you any 
 further account of the history of Mr. Scott, whom I men- 
 tioned to you in my last letter, yet I cannot refrain from 
 giving you my notes of the state of the liberated Africans 
 at Sierra Leone during the years 1 834-5-6-7, when cruizing 
 upon the west coast of Africa in command of H.M. Ship 
 Thalia, being then flag-captain to Sir Patrick Campbell. 
 
 We were invited to an official dinner at the Chief Jus- 
 tice's, at which were present most of the official people of 
 rank, and many of the principal merchants of Free Town. 
 After dinner, the conversation turned upon the state of the 
 liberated Africans, of whom all spoke very highly. The 
 Chief Justice appealed to the gentlemen of authority pre- 
 sent, as well as to the merchants, whether, upon a trial 
 where life or property were concerned, a liberated African 
 jury was not as much to be trusted as any jury in Great 
 
 TIT) 
 
% €xlMt far fjp Jfjgrn, 
 
 Britain, and all agreed that they would as soon trust to the 
 verdict of a jury of liberated African householders as to 
 any jury of the same description in England. This, I think, 
 requires no comment, as I consider it a decided proof of 
 the equality of intellect between the White and Coloured 
 man when cultivated. 
 
 There have been many opinions respecting the character 
 of the Coloured people brought over to Sierra Leone and 
 other places. We hear one opinion given — that they are 
 generally a hard working, intelligent, and honest people ; 
 another asserts that they are dishonest and treacherous ; 
 and a third, that such is the indolence of their character, 
 that nothing will induce them to work beyond what is ab- 
 solutely necessary to supply the wants of nature, in fact, 
 that their indolence appears to be incurable ; but, however 
 difficult it may be to reconcile these different opinions, 
 there is truth in them all. When at Sierra Leone, I took 
 much pains to inquire about the different descriptions of 
 Africans who were brought there from the coast, and I 
 found that in every cargo of Slaves there probably were 
 three descriptions of people. First, the man who had been 
 a Slave from infancy in his own country, when brought 
 to Sierra Leone would be found to be incurably idle and 
 inferior in intellect : his beau ideal of happiness, and 
 after which he ardently longed, was repose from labour 
 and freedom from Slavery, both of which were connected 
 together in his mind ; and, when restored to freedom, in- 
 dolence and sleep appeared his greatest enjoyments. Se- 
 condly, criminals who had been sold into Slavery in their 
 own land as malefactors ; such as are constantly found pil- 
 fering, and prowling about the native villages, picking up 
 chickens or whatever they can lay their hands upon. The 
 third class, are those who, in their own country, were free 
 men and independent characters ; these are noted for being 
 both honest, industrious, and of superior intellect. 
 
 I quote these remarks from my notes made at the time, 
 
 W 
 
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 326 
 
 % €tihk fur tip Jfrgra. 
 
 from information obtained from those who were well ac- 
 quainted with the Negro character ; that these last were a 
 hard working, money making people, and that it not unfre- 
 quently happens that a man, who had only been landed a 
 month or six weeks from a Slave vessel, will return to the 
 barracks, where the new people are placed on first landing, 
 and deposit ten shillings, which entitles him to a boy for an 
 apprentice, having obtained this money by cutting wood, 
 &c, and selling it at Free Town. With this help he culti- 
 vates his little plantation, and makes the most he can of all 
 its produce : his great ambition is to build a stone house at 
 Free Town, and I have seen houses in all states of forward- 
 ness, from the first purchase of the ground for a site in one 
 place ; in another, a site railed off and a hole dug for a foun- 
 dation, waiting for more money to get stone and commence 
 building : again, houses may be found half built and in a 
 state of forwardness, and last of all, finished and completely 
 furnished, and most comfortably so. I have visited these 
 houses, and can remember the inventory I took of one of 
 the dining rooms ; there was a handsome mahogany table, 
 a mahogany black hair sofa, mahogany chairs, a mahogany 
 sideboard containing cut glass and decanters, a German 
 mirror on one side of the room and a map of Palestine on 
 the other. I was informed that there were many liberated 
 Africans at Sierra Leone possessed of very considerable 
 wealth. 
 
 It is not fair to draw the Coloured man's character from 
 the Negro found in a state of Slavery, (or even from the 
 next generation to this), a state which reduces both the 
 Black and the White to the same level. 
 
 When Lord Exmouth bombarded Algiers, he sent a 
 person who understood the language of the Coast to nego- 
 tiate for the liberation of European Slaves, and that person 
 informed a friend of mine that he found the White Slaves 
 in a more degraded condition, both as to intellect and ap- 
 pearance, than he had ever found the Negro when in the 
 
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% €xihh far tire lirgrn. 
 
 327 
 
 W 
 
 
 same state of Slavery. I may also here mention, that in 
 1835, the lawyer generally employed by the captains of 
 Slavers as their counsel was a Black man; I cannot at pre- 
 sent recollect his name, but I have spoken to him : he was 
 esteemed a good lawyer, and a very clever man. 
 I remain, dear Sir, 
 
 Your very obedient servant, 
 
 R. WAUCHOPE, (R.N.) 
 To Wilson Armistead, Esq., Leeds. 
 
 THE HOSPITABLE NEGRO WOMAN. 
 
 The enterprising traveller, Mungo Park, was employed 
 by the African Association, to explore the interior regions 
 of Africa, in which he encountered many dangers and diffi- 
 culties. His wants were often supplied, and his distresses 
 alleviated, by the kindness and compassion of the Negroes. 
 He gives the following interesting account of the hospitable 
 treatment he received from a poor Negro woman. 
 
 " Being arrived at Sego, the capital of the kingdom of 
 Bambarra, on the Niger, I wished to pass over to that part 
 of the town in which the king resides. The people who 
 crossed the river, carried information to Mansong the 
 king, that a White man was coining to see him. He im- 
 mediately sent one of his chief men, who informed me 
 that the king could not possibly see me, until he knew what 
 had brought me into his country. He advised me to lodge 
 for the night in a village to which he pointed. As there 
 was no remedy, I set off for the village ; where I found, to 
 my great mortification, no person would admit me into 
 his house. From prejudices infused into their minds, 
 I was regarded with astonishment and fear ; and was 
 obliged to sit the whole day without victuals, in the shade 
 of a tree. 
 
 " The night threatened to be very uncomfortable ; the 
 wind rose, and there was great appearance of a heavy rain. 
 
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328 
 
 51 #ritafo for % Jfegnr. 
 
 The wild beasts, too, were so numerous in the neighbour- 
 hood, that I should have been under the necessity of 
 climbing up the tree, and resting among the branches. 
 About sun-set, however, as I was preparing to pass the 
 night in this manner, and had turned my horse loose, that 
 he might graze at liberty, a Negro woman, returning from 
 the labours of the field, stopped to observe me ; and per- 
 ceiving that I was weary and dejected, inquired into my 
 situation. I briefly explained it to her ; after which, with 
 looks of great compassion, she took up my saddle and bridle, 
 and told me to follow her. Having conducted me into her 
 hut, she lighted a lamp, spread a mat on the floor, and told 
 me I might remain there for the night. Finding I was 
 very hungry, she went out to procure me something to 
 eat ; and returned in a short time with a very fine fish, 
 which, having caused to be half broiled upon some embers, 
 she gave me for supper. The rights of hospitality being 
 thus performed towards a stranger in distress, my worthy 
 benefactress (pointing to the mat, and telling me I might 
 sleep there without apprehension) called to the female part 
 of her family, who had stood gazing on me all the while in 
 astonishment, to resume their task of spinning cotton ; in 
 which they continued to employ themselves great part of 
 the night. 
 
 " They lightened their labour by songs, one of which 
 was composed extempore : for I was myself the subject of 
 it. It was sung by one of the young women, the rest join- 
 ing in a chorus. The air was sweet and plaintive, and the 
 words literally translated, were these : — ' The winds roared 
 and the rain fell. The poor White Man, faint and weary, 
 came and sat under our tree. He has no mother to bring 
 him milk — no wife to grind his corn.' Chorus. ' Let us 
 pity the White man ; no mother has he to bring him milk 
 — no wife to grind his corn.' " 
 
 These simple and affecting sentiments have been very 
 beautifully versified in the following lines : — 
 
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 The loud wind roared, the rain fell fast ; 
 The White man yielded to the blast. 
 He sat him down beneath the tree, 
 For weary, sad, and faint was he : 
 And ah ! no wife or mother's care, 
 For him the milk or corn prepare. 
 
 CHOETJS. 
 
 The White man shall our pity share ; 
 Alas ! no wife or mother's care, 
 For him the milk or corn prepare. 
 
 The storm is o'er, the tempest past, 
 And mercy's voice has hush'd the blast ; 
 The wind is heard in whispers low, 
 The White man far away must go ; 
 But ever in his heart will bear, 
 Remembrance of the Negro's care. 
 
 OHOEUS. 
 
 Go, White man, go ; but with thee bear 
 The Negro's wish, the Negro's prayer, 
 Remembrance of the Negro's care. 
 
 " I could never read these lines," says Dr. Madden, 
 " without feeling the lump in the throat that troubles a 
 man's deglutition when he stumbles unexpectedly on a 
 generous act that is the genuine impulse of nature." 
 
 " Trifling as these events may appear to the reader," 
 concludes Mungo Park, " they were to me affecting in the 
 highest degree. I was oppressed by such unexpected kind- 
 ness ; and sleep fled from my eyes. In the morning, I 
 presented to my compassionate landlady two of the four 
 brass buttons which remained on my waistcoat ; the only 
 recompence it was in my power to make her." 
 
 ATTOBAH CTJGOANO 
 Was born in the town of Agimaque, on the coast of 
 Fan tin, in Africa ; and was dragged from his country, with 
 twenty other children of both sexes, by European robbers, 
 who, brandishing their pistols and sabres, threatened to 
 kill them if they attempted to escape. " They confined 
 
330 
 
 ft <Eriimte for % Urgrn. 
 
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 us," he says, " and soon I heard nothing but the clanging 
 of chains, the sound of the whip, and the cries of nry fel- 
 low prisoners." In this dreadful situation he was carried 
 to Grenada, and sold into Slavery. 
 
 Cugoano was indebted to the generosity of Lord Hoth, 
 who liberated him and carried him to England, where, in 
 1788, he was in the service of Cosway, the first painter to 
 the Prince of Wales. Piatoli, an Italian author, who, 
 during a long residence in London, was particularly ac- 
 quainted with Cugoano, then about forty years of age, and 
 whose wife was an English woman, praises this African 
 highly ; he speaks in strong terms of his piety, his mild- 
 ness of character, modesty, integrity, and talents. 
 
 Like Othello, Cugoano has described in an affecting 
 manner, the heart-rending spectacle of those unfortunate 
 Africans, who are forced to bid an eternal adieu to their 
 native country — to fathers and mothers, husbands, brothers 
 and children, invoking heaven and earth, throwing them- 
 selves, bathed in tears, into each other's arms asunder! 
 " This spectacle," says he, " calculated to move the hearts 
 of monsters, does not that of the Slave dealer." At Gre- 
 nada, he saw Negroes lacerated by the whip, because, in- 
 stead of working, they went to church on the Sabbath. 
 He saw others have their teeth broken, because they dared 
 to suck the sugar cane. 
 
 Cugoano published his reflections on the Slave Trade, 
 and the Slavery of Negroes, in English ; and it was also 
 translated into French. He raised his voice to spread abroad 
 the spirit of religion, and prove from the Scriptures, that 
 the stealing, sale, and purchase of men, and their detention 
 in a state of Slavery, are crimes of the deepest die. His 
 writings are not very methodical, but they speak the lan- 
 guage of a feeling heart. There are repetitions, because 
 grief is verbose. An individual deeply affected, is always 
 afraid of not having said enough — of not being sufficiently 
 understood. 
 
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 After some observations on the cause of difference of 
 colour in the human species, as climate, soil, regimen, &c, 
 he asks, whether colour or bodily form give a right to en- 
 slave men. " The Negroes," he observes, " have never 
 crossed the seas to steal White Men." " Europeans," he 
 says, "complain of the barbarism of the Negroes, while 
 their conduct towards Negroes is horribly barbarous. To 
 steal men, to rob them of their liberty, is worse than to 
 plunder them of their goods. On national crimes," he 
 adds, " heaven sometimes inflicts national punishments. 
 Besides, injustice is sooner or later fatal to its author." 
 This idea is conformable to the gre*at plan of religion ; and 
 ought to be indelibly impressed on every human heart. 
 
 Cugoano makes a striking comparison between ancient 
 and modern Slavery ; and proves that the last, which pre- 
 vails among professing Christians, is worse than that among 
 Pagans, and also worse than that among the Hebrews, who 
 did not steal men to enslave them, nor sell them without 
 their consent ; and who put no fine on the head of a fugi- 
 tive. In Deuteronomy, it is formally said : " Thou shalt 
 not deliver up to his master a fugitive Slave, who in thy 
 house has sought an asylum." He passes from the Old to 
 the New Testament, and states the inconsistency of Slavery 
 with Christ's command, to "do to others as we would they 
 shoidd do to us." 
 
 In Cugoano, we may behold talents without much literary 
 cultivation, to which a good education would have given 
 great advantage. 
 
 WILLIAM HAMILTON 
 
 "Was originally a Slave on the Bog Estate, near Hope- 
 ton, 'in Jamaica. His sufferings during the last years of 
 Slavery in that Island, were given in evidence before the 
 Apprenticeship Committee of the House of Commons. 
 
 Hamilton was the only Slave on the estate who dared 
 
332 
 
 % €vU& for tju Jfrgrn. 
 
 to attend a place of worship ; the only one of upwards of 
 400 Negroes who dared to live with his partner in mar- 
 riage. For these offences he was degraded from being a 
 first-rate mechanic and copper-smith, to the rank of a com- 
 mon field labourer, and sent to a swampy estate, 30 miles 
 distant from his wife and family, where he narrowly escaped 
 with his life. He had learned to read and write when a 
 boy, by stealth, and during his banishment he kept a jour- 
 nal, which, though it is chiefly the record of his spiritual 
 conflicts and his religious labours among the neglected 
 heathen Negroes with whom his lot was cast, yet contains 
 many incidental allusions to the sufferings of himself and 
 his fellow Slaves. It affords an interior picture of Slavery, 
 which exceeds perhaps, any that the world has yet seen ; it 
 lifts a veil that conceals the true lineaments of Slavery, 
 which forcibly impress the mind with the conviction, that 
 the worst features of that horrible state of society, neither 
 have been, nor can be, laid open to public view. 
 
 William Hamilton, soon after the introduction of the 
 Apprenticeship system, purchased his freedom by valuation, 
 for £209 ; and has since been employed as the overseer of 
 the Lenox estate. He has also purchased 70 acres of land 
 for himself. " Though self educated," say Sturge and 
 Harvey, " he is evidently a person of an intelligent and re- 
 flecting mind, which has been improved by reading and 
 disciplined by a life of adversity, such as rarely falls to the 
 lot of a Slave." 
 
 PHILIIS WHEATLEY. 
 
 Although the state of Massachusetts was never so deeply 
 involved in the African Slave Trade as most of the other 
 states of America, previous to their separation from Great 
 Britain, many Negroes were brought into its ports, and 
 sold for Slaves. 
 
 In 1761, Mrs. John Wheatley, of Boston, went to the 
 
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 % 4x\Mi fnr tin Jfogti. 
 
 333 
 
 V'TFP 
 
 Slave-market, to select, from the crowd of unfortunates 
 there offered for sale, a Negro girl, whom she might train, 
 by gentle usage, to serve as an attendant during her old 
 age. Amongst a group of more robust and healthy children 
 just imported from Africa, the lady observed one, slenderly 
 formed, and suffering apparently from change of climate 
 and the miseries of the voyage. The interesting counte- 
 nance and humble modesty of the poor little stranger, in- 
 duced Mrs. Wheatley to overlook the disadvantage of a 
 weak state of health, and Phillis, as the young Slave was 
 subsequently named, was purchased in preference to her 
 healthier companions, and taken home to the abode of her 
 mistress. The child was almost in a state of perfect naked- 
 ness, her only covering being a strip of dirty carpet. These 
 things were soon remedied by the attention of the lady 
 into whose hands the young African had been thrown, and 
 in a short time the effects of comfortable clothing and food 
 were visible in her returning health. 
 
 Phillis, at the time of her purchase, was between seven 
 and eight years old, and the intention of Mrs. "Wheatley 
 was to train her up to the common occupations of a menial 
 servant. But the marks of extraordinary intelligence which 
 the young Negress soon evinced, induced her mistress's 
 daughter to teach her to read ; and such was the rapidity 
 with which this was effected, that in sixteen months from 
 the time of her arrival in the family, the African child had 
 so mastered the English language, to which she was an 
 utter stranger before, as to read with ease the most difficult 
 parts of Scripture. This uncommon docility altered the 
 intentions of the family regarding Phillis, and in future she 
 was kept constantly about the person of her mistress, whose 
 affections she entirely won by her amiable disposition and 
 propriety of demeanour. All her knowledge was obtained 
 without any instruction, except what was given her in 
 the family ; and the art of writing she acquired entirely 
 from her own exertion and industry. In the short period 
 
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334 
 
 % €xlMi far tto Jfogrn, 
 
 of four years from the time of her being stolen from Africa, 
 and when only 1 2 years of age, she was capable of writing 
 letters to her friends on various subjects. In 1765, she 
 wrote to Samson Occum, the Indian minister, while he was 
 in London. 
 
 The young Negress soon became an object of very gene- 
 ral attention and astonishment, and in a few years she 
 corresponded with several persons in high stations. At this 
 period neither in the mother country nor in the colonies 
 was much attention bestowed on the education of the la- 
 bouring classes of the Whites themselves, and much less, 
 it may be supposed, was expended on the mental cultiva- 
 tion of the Slave population. It is scarcely possible to 
 suppose that any care should have been expended on the 
 mind of the young Negress before her abduction from her 
 native land ; and indeed her tender years almost precluded 
 the possibility even of such culture as Africa could afford. 
 Of her infancy, spent in that unhappy land, Phillis had but 
 one solitary recollection, but that is an interesting one. 
 She remembered that every morning her mother poured 
 out water before the rising sun — a religious rite, doubtless, of 
 the district from which the child was carried away. Thus, 
 every morning, when the day broke over the land and the 
 home which fate had bestowed on her, was Phillis reminded 
 of the tender mother who had watched over her infancy, 
 but had been unable to protect her from the hand of the 
 merciless breakers-up of all domestic and social ties. The 
 young Negro girl, however, regarded her abduction with no 
 feelings of regret, but with thankfulness, as having been 
 the means of bringing her to a land where a light, unknown 
 in her far-off home, shone as a guide to the feet and a lamp 
 to the path. 
 
 As Phillis grew up to womanhood, her progress and 
 attainments kept pace with the promise of her earlier years. 
 She attracted the notice of the literary characters of the 
 place, who supplied her with books, and encouraged the 
 
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 % (Triliutt far tip? l T rgrn 
 
 ripening of her intellectual powers. This was greatly as- 
 sisted by her mistress, who treated her like a child of the 
 family — admitted her to her own table — and introduced 
 her, as an equal, into the best society of Boston. Notwith- 
 standing these honours, Phillis never departed from the 
 humble and unassuming deportment which distinguished 
 her when she stood, a little trembling alien, to be sold, like 
 a beast of the field, in the Slave-market. Never did she 
 presume upon the indulgence of those benevolent friends 
 who regarded only her worth and her genius, and over- 
 looked in her favour all the disadvantages of caste and of 
 colour. So far was Phillis from repining at, or resenting 
 the prejudices which the long usages of society had im- 
 planted, too deeply to be easily eradicated, in the minds 
 even of the most humane of a more favoured race, that she 
 uniformly respected them, and, on being invited to the 
 tables of the great and the wealthy, chose always a place 
 apart for herself, that none might be offended at a thing so 
 unusual as sitting at the same board with a Woman of 
 Colour — a child of a long-degraded race. 
 
 Such was the modest and amiable disposition of Phillis 
 Wheatley : her literary talents and acquirements accorded 
 Willi the intrinsic worth of her character. She studied the 
 Latin tongue, and if we may judge from a translation of one 
 of Ovid's tales, appears to have made no inconsiderable 
 progress in it. In her leisure moments she often indulged 
 herself in writing poetry. At the early age of fourteen, 
 she appears first to have attempted literary composition ; be- 
 tween this period and the age of nineteen, the whole of her 
 poems which were given to the world seem to have been 
 written. They were published in London in 1773, in a 
 small octavo volume of above 120 pages, containing 39 
 pieces, which she dedicated to the Countess of Hunting- 
 don. This work has gone through several editions in Eng- 
 land and the United States, the genuineness of which was 
 established in the first page of the volume, by a declaration 
 
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% €xlhk for tju Urgrn. 
 
 of the Governor of Massachusetts, the Lieutenant-Gover- 
 nor, her master, and fifteen of the most respectable inha- 
 bitants of Boston, who were acquainted with her talents, 
 and the circumstances of her life. 
 
 Most of her productions have a religious or moral bear- 
 ing ; all breathe a soft and sentimental feeling. Many of 
 them were written to commemorate the decease of friends. 
 The following lines she composed on the death of a young 
 gentleman of great promise : — 
 
 Who taught thee conflict with the powers of night, 
 To vanquish Satan in the fields of fight ? 
 Who strung thy feeble arms with might unknown ? 
 How great thy conquest, and how bright thy crown ! 
 War with each princedom, throne, and power is o'er ; 
 The scene is ended, to return no more. 
 Oh, could my muse thy seat on high behold, 
 How decked with laurel, and enriched with gold ! 
 Oh, could she hear what praise thy harp employs, 
 How sweet thine anthems, how divine thy joys, 
 What heavenly grandeur should exalt her strain ! 
 What holy raptures in her numbers reign ! 
 To soothe the troubles of the mind to peace, 
 To still the tumult of life's tossing seas, 
 To ease the anguish of the parent's heart, 
 What shall my sympathising verse impart ? 
 Where is the balm to heal so deep a wound ? 
 Where shall a sovereign remedy be found ? 
 Look, gracious spirit ! from thy heavenly bower, 
 And thy full joys into their bosoms pour : 
 The raging tempest of their griefs control, 
 And spread the dawn of glory through the soul, 
 To eye the path the saint departed trod, 
 And trace him to the bosom of his God. 
 
 ON THE DEATH OE AN INEANT. 
 No more the flowery scenes of pleasure rise, 
 Nor charming prospects greet the mental eyes ; 
 No more with joy we view that lovely face, 
 Smiling, disportive, flush'd with every grace. 
 
 The tear of sorrow flows from every eye, 
 Groans answer groans, and sighs to sighs reply : 
 
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 51 fritmtt for tjjt JJrgrn. 
 
 Wliat sudden pangs shot through each aching heart, 
 When Death, thy messenger, despatched his dart, 
 Thy dread attendants, all-destroying power, 
 Hurried the infant to his mortal hour. 
 Couldst thou unpitying close those radiant eyes ? 
 Or faded his artless beauties to surprise ? 
 Could not his innocence thy stroke control, 
 Thy purpose shake, and 3ofteu all thy soul ? 
 
 The blooming babe, with shade of Death o'erspread, 
 No more shall smile, no more shall raise his head, 
 But, like a brauch that from the tree is torn, 
 Falls prostrate, wither'd, languid, and forlorn. 
 " Where flies my child ?" 'tis thus I seem to hear 
 The parent ask : — " Some angel tell me where 
 He wings his passage through the yielding air ?" 
 Methinks a cherub bending from the skies 
 Observes the question ; and serene replies, 
 "In heaven's high palaces your babe appears ; 
 Prepare to meet him, and dismiss your tears." 
 
 Shall not the intelligence your grief restrain, 
 And turn the mournful to the cheerful strain ? 
 Cease your complaints, suspend each rising sigh, 
 Cease to accuse the Ruler of the sky. 
 Parents, no more indulge the falling tear ; 
 Let Faith to heaven's refulgent domes repair ; 
 There see your infant, like a seraph glow, 
 What charms celestial in his numbers flow, 
 Melodious, whfle the soul enchanting strain 
 Dwells on his tongue, and fills the ethereal plain ! 
 Enough ! for ever cease your murmuring breath, 
 Not as a foe, but frieud, converse with Death, 
 Since to the port of happiness unknown 
 He brought that treasure which you call your own ; 
 The gift of heaven entrusted to your hand, 
 Cheerful resign at the divine command : 
 Not at your bar must sovereign Wisdom stand. 
 
 ON THE DEATH OF AN INFANT. 
 
 Through airy fields he wings his instant flight 
 To purer regions of celestial light ; 
 Enlarged he sees unnumbered systems roll, 
 Beneath him sees the universal whole, 
 Planets on planets run their destined round, 
 And circling wonders fill the vast profound. 
 
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 338 % $ tthtfj for tju Jfegrn. 
 
 Th' ethereal now, now the empyreal skies 
 
 With glowing splendours strike his wondering eyes : 
 
 The angels view him with delight unknown, 
 
 Press his soft hand, and seat him on his throne ; 
 
 Then smiling thus : — " To this divine abode, 
 
 The seat of saints, of seraphs, and of God, 
 
 Thrice welcome thou." The raptured babe replies, 
 
 " Thanks to my God, who snatched me to the skies, 
 
 Ere vice triumphant had possessed my heart, 
 
 Ere yet the tempter had beguiled my heart, 
 
 Ere yet on sin's base actions I was bent, 
 
 Ere yet I knew temptation's dire intent ; 
 
 Ere yet the lash for wicked actions felt, 
 
 Ere vanity had led my way to guilt, 
 
 Early arrived at my celestial goal, 
 
 Full glories rush on my expanding soul." 
 
 Joyful he spoke : exulting cherubs round, 
 
 Clapped their glad wings, the heavenly vaults resound 
 
 Say parents, why this unavailing moan ? 
 
 Why heave your pensive bosoms with the groan ? 
 
 To Charles, the happy subject of my song, 
 
 A brighter world, a nobler strain belongs. 
 
 Say would you tear him from the realms above, 
 
 By thoughtless wishes, and mistaken love ? 
 
 Doth his felicity increase your pain ? 
 
 Or could you welcome to this world again 
 
 The heir of bliss ? with a superior air 
 
 Methiuks he answers with a smile severe, 
 
 " Thrones and dominions cannot tempt me there." 
 
 But still you cry, " Can we the sigh forbear, 
 And still, and still, must we not pour the tear ? 
 Our only hope, more dear than vital breath, 
 Twelve moons revolved, becomes the prey of death ; 
 Delightful infant, nightly visions give 
 Thee to our arms, and we with joy receive, 
 We fain would clasp the phantom to our breast 
 The phantom flies, and leaves the soul unblest." 
 
 To yon bright regions let your faith ascend, 
 Prepare to join your dearest infant friend 
 In pleasures without measure, without end. 
 
 (7^ 
 
 /M 
 
% €f\Mt far tip Urgra. 
 
 339 
 
 dQJA 
 
 ON THE DEATH OF A LOYELY GIEL, 
 
 EIVE YEAES OF AGE. 
 
 From dark abodes to fair ethereal light, 
 
 The enraptured innocent has winged her flight ; 
 
 On the kind bosom of eternal love 
 
 She finds unknown beatitude above. 
 
 This know, ye parents, nor her loss deplore, 
 
 She feels the iron hand of pain no more ; 
 
 The dispensations of unerring grace, 
 
 Should turn your sorrows into grateful praise ; 
 
 Let then no tears for her henceforward flow, 
 
 Nor suffer distress in this dark vale below. 
 
 Her morning sun, which rose divinely bright, 
 
 Was quickly mantled with the gloom of night ; 
 
 But hear in heaven's blest bowers your child so fair, 
 
 And learn to imitate her language there. 
 
 " Thou, Lord, whom I behold with glory crowned, 
 
 By what sweet name, and in what tuneful sound 
 
 Wilt thou be praised ? Seraphic powers are faint 
 
 Infinite love and majesty to paint. 
 
 To thee let all their graceful voices raise, 
 
 And saints and angels join their songs of praise." 
 
 Perfect in bliss, now from her heavenly home 
 She looks, and smiling beckons you to come ; 
 Why then, fond parents, why these fruitless groans ? 
 Restrain your tears, and cease your plaintive moans. 
 Freed from a world of sin, and snares, and pain, 
 Why would ye wish your fair one back again ? 
 Nay — bow resigned : let hope your grief control, 
 And check the rising tumult of the soul. 
 Calm in the prosperous and the adverse day, 
 Adore the God who gives and takes away ; 
 Behold him in all, his holy name revere, 
 Upright your actions, and your hearts sincere, 
 Tdl having sailed through life's tempestuous sea, 
 And from its rocks, and boisterous billows free, 
 Yourselves, safe landed on the blissful shore, 
 Shall join your happy child to part no more. 
 
 In a poem addressed by Phillis Wheatley to a clergyman 
 on the death of his wife some beautiful lines occur. After 
 describing the deceased as in a state of perfect bliss, " with 
 
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 v$&' 
 
 
% €xlMt fur tjjB Jfrgra. 
 
 peerless glory crowned," she conveys encouragement to the 
 bereaved one by representing him as addressed by her thus 
 from the " empyreal sky" — 
 
 " O come away," her longing spirit cries, 
 " And share with me the raptures of the skies. 
 Our bliss divine to mortals is unknown, 
 Immortal life and glory are our own. 
 Here too may the dear pledges of our love 
 Arrive, and taste with us the joys above ; 
 Attune the harp to more than mortal lays, 
 And join with us the tribute of their praise, 
 To him who died stern justice to atone, 
 And make eternal glory all our own." 
 
 The following is a portion of an epitaph Phillis composed 
 for a Minister of the Gospel, who died much esteemed : — 
 
 Lo, here a man, redeemed by Jesus' blood, 
 A sinner once, but now a saint with God ; 
 Behold ye rich, ye poor, ye fools, ye wise, 
 Nor let his monument your heart surprise. 
 He sought the paths of piety and truth, 
 By these made happy from his early youth ! 
 In blooming years that grace divine he felt, 
 Which rescues sinners from the chains of guilt. 
 Mourn him, ye indigent, whom he has fed, 
 And henceforth seek, like him, for living bread ; 
 E'en Christ, the bread descending from above, 
 And ask an interest in his saving love. 
 Mourn him, ye youth, to whom he oft has told 
 God's gracious wonders from the times of old. 
 I too, have cause this mighty loss to mourn, 
 For he my monitor will not return. 
 O when shall we to his blest state arrive ? 
 When the same graces in our bosoms thrive. 
 
 Many passages in the following poem " On the Provi- 
 dence of God," evince a very considerable reach of thought, 
 and no mean power of expression : — 
 
 Arise, my soul, on wings enraptured rise, 
 To praise the monarch of the earth and skies. 
 Whose goodness and beneficence appear 
 As round its centre moves the rolling year, 
 
% Ctifote for tip llnjrn. 
 
 341 
 
 Or when the morning glows with rosy charms, 
 Or the sun slumbers in the ocean's arms : 
 Of light divine be a rich portion lent 
 To guide my soul, and favour my intent. 
 Celestial muse, my arduous flight sustain, 
 And raise my mind to a seraphic strain ! 
 
 Adored for ever be the God unseen, 
 Which round the sun revolves this vast machine, 
 Though to his eye its mass a point appears : 
 Adored the God that whirls surrounding spheres, 
 Who first ordained that mighty Sol should reign 
 The peerless monarch of the ethereal train : 
 * * * From him the extended earth 
 Vigour derives and every flowery birth ; 
 Vast through her orb she moves with easy grace, 
 Afound her Phcebus in unbounded space ; 
 True to her course the impetuous storm derides, 
 Triumphant o'er the winds, and surging tides. 
 
 Almighty, in these wondrous works of thine, 
 What Power, what Wisdom, and what Goodness shine ! 
 And are thy wonders, Lord, by men explored, 
 And yet creating glory unadored ? 
 Creation smiles in various beauty gay, 
 While day to night, and night succeeds to day : 
 The wisdom which attends Jehovah's ways, 
 Shines most conspicuous in the solar rays ; 
 Without them, destitute of heat and light, 
 This world would be the reign of endless night. 
 ###### 
 
 Had ! smiling morn, that from the orient main 
 Ascending dost adorn the heavenly plain. 
 So rich, so various are thy beauteous dyes, 
 That spread through all the circuit of the skies, 
 That full of thee, my soul in rapture soars, 
 And thy great God, the cause of all adores. 
 O'er beings infinite his love extends, 
 His wisdom rules them, and bis power defends : 
 When tasks diurnal tire the human frame, 
 The spirits faint, and dim the vital flame, 
 Then too that ever active bounty shiues 
 Which not infinity of space confines. 
 The sable veil, that IS"ight in sdence draws, 
 Conceals effects, but shows the Almighty Cause, 
 
342 % €tihk fax i\)t Jfrgrn, 
 
 Night seals in sleep the wide creation fair, 
 And all is peaceful but the brow of care. 
 Again, gay Phoebus, as the day before, 
 Wakes every eye, save what shall wake no more 
 Again the face of nature is renewed, 
 Which still appears harmonious, fair, and good. 
 May grateful strains salute the smiling morn, 
 Before its beams the eastern hdls adorn ! 
 Shall day to day and night to night conspire 
 To show the goodness of the Almighty Sire ? 
 This mental voice shall man regardless hear, 
 And never, never raise the filial prayer ? 
 
 oLA 
 
 But see the sons of vegetation rise, 
 
 And spread their leafy banners to the skies ; 
 
 All-wise, Almighty Providence we trace 
 
 In trees, and plants, and all the flowery race, 
 
 As clear as in the nobler frame of man, 
 
 All lovely ensigns of the Maker's plan. 
 
 The power the same that forms a ray of light, 
 
 That called creation from eternal night. 
 
 " Let there be light !" he said ; from his profound 
 
 Old Chaos heard, and trembled at the sound : 
 
 Swift as the word, inspired by power divine, 
 
 Behold the light around its Maker shine, 
 
 The first fair product of the omnific God, 
 
 And now through all his works diffused abroad. 
 
 As reason's powers by day our Grod disclose, 
 
 So may we trace him in the night's repose. 
 
 Say, what is sleep ? and dreams, how passing strange 
 
 When action ceases and ideas range 
 
 Licentious and unbounded o'er the plains, 
 
 Where fancy's queen in giddy triumph reigns. 
 
 Hear in soft strains the dreaming lover sigh 
 
 To a kind fair, and rave in jealousy ; 
 
 On pleasure now, and now on vengeance bent, 
 
 The labouring passions struggle for a vent. 
 
 What power, oh man ! thy reason then restores, 
 
 So long suspended in nocturnal hours ? 
 
 What secret hand restores the mental train, 
 
 And gives improved thine active powers again ? 
 
 From thee, oh man ! what gratitude should rise ! 
 
 And when from balmy sleep thou op'st thine eyes, 
 
 Let thy first thoughts be praises to the skies. 
 
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 How merciful our G-od, who thus imparts 
 O'erflowing tides of joy to human hearts, 
 When wants and woes might he our righteous lot, 
 Our God forgetting, by our God forgot ! 
 
 Among the mental powers a question rose, 
 ""What most the image of the Eternal shows ?" 
 When thus to Reason (so let fancy rove) 
 Her great companion spoke, immortal Love : — 
 
 " Say, mighty power, how long shall strife prevail, 
 And with its murmurs load the whispering gale ? 
 Eefer the cause to Recollection's shrine, 
 Who loud proclaims my origin divine, 
 The cause whence heaven and earth began to be ; 
 And is not man immortalized by me ? 
 Reason let this most causeless strife subside," 
 Thus Love pronounced, and Reason thus replied, 
 " Thy birth, celestial queen ! 'tis mine to own, 
 In thee resplendent is the Godhead shown ; 
 Thy words persuade, my soul enraptured feels, 
 Resistless beauty which thy smile reveals." 
 Ardent she spoke, and kindling at her charms, 
 She clasped the blooming goddess in her arms. 
 
 Infinite love, where'er we turn our eyes, 
 Appears : this every creature's wants supplies, 
 This most is heard in Nature's constant voice, 
 This makes the morn, and this the eve rejoice ; 
 This bids the fosteriug rains and dews descend 
 To nourish all, to serve one general end, 
 The good of man ; yet man ungrateful pays 
 But little homage, and but little praise. 
 To him whose works arrayed with mercy shine, 
 What songs should rise, how constant, how divine ! 
 
 These lines, written by an African Slave girl, at the age 
 of sixteen or eighteen, are equal to many that appear in 
 standard collections of English poetry. They are, if any- 
 thing, superior in harmony, and are not inferior in depth of 
 thought. 
 
 Phillis Wheatley felt a deep interest in everything affect- 
 ing the liberty of her fellow-creatures, of whatever condi- 
 tion, race, or colour. She expressed herself with much 
 
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 feeling in an address to the Earl of Dartmouth, secretary 
 of state for North America, on the occasion of some re- 
 laxation of the system of haughty severity which the home 
 government then pursued towards the colonies, and which 
 ultimately caused their separation and independence. 
 
 Hail, happy day, when smiling like the morn, 
 
 Fair freedom rose New England to adorn : 
 * # * * * 
 
 Long lost to realms beneath, the northern skies, 
 She shines supreme, while hated faction dies : 
 Soon as appeared the goddess long desired, 
 Sick at the view, she languished and expired ; 
 Thus from the splendours of the morning light 
 The owl in sadness seeks the caves of night. 
 
 No more, America, in mournful strain 
 Of wrongs and grievance unredressed complaiu, 
 No longer shalt thou dread the iron chain, 
 Which wanton tyranny with lawless hand 
 Made, and with it meant to enslave the land. 
 
 Should you, my lord, while you peruse my song, 
 Wonder from whence my love of freedom sprung ; 
 Whence flow those wishes for the common good, 
 By feeling hearts alone best understood — 
 I, young in life, by seeming cruel fate, 
 Was snatched from Afric's fancied happy seat. 
 What pangs excruciating must molest, 
 What sorrows labour in my parents' breast ! 
 Steeled was that sou!, and by no misery moved, 
 That from a father seized his babe beloved : 
 Such, such my case. And can I then but pray 
 Others may never feel tyrannic sway ! 
 
 The other compositions of this African poetess are on 
 Virtue, Humanity, Freedom, Imagination, &c. The follow- 
 ing lines contain a beautiful address and prayer to the Deity. 
 
 Grreat God, incomprehensible, unknown 
 
 To sense, we bow at thine exalted throne. 
 
 O, while we crave thine excellence to feel, 
 
 Thy sacred spirit to our hearts reveal, 
 
 And give us of that mercy to partake, 
 
 Which thou hast promised for the Saviour's sake i 
 
% €riimfo for \\t Jfrgra. 
 
 One of her pieces is an address to a young painter of 
 her own colour. On seeing his works, she vented her grief 
 for the sorrows of her countrymen, in a pathetic strain. 
 
 After the publication of her volume, and about the 
 twenty-first year of her age, Phillis was liberated ; but she 
 continued in her master's family, where she was much re- 
 spected for her good conduct. Many of the most respect- 
 able inhabitants of Boston and its vicinity, visiting at the 
 house, were pleased with an opportunity of conversing 
 with her, and of observing her modest deportment, and the 
 cultivation of her mind. 
 
 The constitution of Phillis being naturally delicate, her 
 health became such as to alarm her friends. A sea voyage 
 was recommended by her physicians, and it was arranged 
 that she should take a voyage to England in company with a 
 son of Mrs. Wheatley, who was proceeding thither on com- 
 mercial business. The amiable Negro girl had hitherto 
 never been parted from the side of her benefactress since 
 the hour of her adoption into the family ; and though the 
 necessity of the separation was acknowledged, it was 
 equally painful to both. She recorded her feelings upon 
 this occasion in the following lines : — 
 
 A FAREWELL TO AMERICA; 
 
 ADDRESSED TO MRS. WHEAT1ET. 
 
 Adieu, New England's smiling meads, 
 
 Adieu, the flowery plain : 
 I leave thine opening charms, O spring, 
 
 And tempt the roaring main. 
 
 In vain for me the flowerets rise, 
 
 And boast their gaudy pride, 
 While here beneath the northern skies 
 
 I mourn for health denied. 
 
 Celestial maid of rosy hue, 
 
 O let me feel thy reign ; 
 I languish till thy face I view, 
 
 Thy vanished joys regain. 
 
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 Susannah mourns, nor can I bear 
 
 To see the chrystal shower, 
 Or mark the tender falling tear 
 
 At sad departure's hour ; 
 
 Not unregarding can I see 
 
 Her soul with grief opprest, 
 But let no sighs, no groans for me 
 
 Steal from her pensive breast. 
 
 In vain the feathered warblers sing. 
 
 In vain the garden blooms, 
 And on the bosom of the spring 
 
 Breathes out her soft perfumes. 
 
 While for Britannia's distant shore 
 
 "We sweep the liquid plain, 
 And with astonished eyes explore 
 
 The wide extended main. 
 
 Lo ! Health appears, celestial dame, 
 
 Complacent and serene, 
 "With Hebe's mantle o'er her frame, 
 
 "With soul-delighting mien. 
 
 For thee, Britannia, I resign 
 
 New England's smiling fields ; 
 To view again her charms divine, 
 
 What joy the prospect yields. 
 
 Phillis was received and admired in the first circles of 
 English society ; and it was here that her poems were first 
 given to the world, with a portrait of the authoress attached 
 to them. From this portrait, her countenance appears to 
 have been pleasing, and the form of her head highly in- 
 tellectual. On the engraving being transmitted to Mrs. 
 Wheatley in America, that lady placed it in a conspicuous 
 part of her room, and called the attention of her visitors 
 to it. But the health of this good and humane lady de- 
 clined rapidly, and she soon found that the beloved original 
 of the portrait was necessary to her comfort and happiness. 
 On the first notice of her benefactress's desire to see her 
 once more, Phillis, whose modest humility was unshaken 
 by the severe trial of flattery and attention from the great, 
 re-embarked immediately for the land of her true home. 
 
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 Within a short time after her arrival, she discharged the 
 melancholy duty of closing the eyes of her mistress, mother, 
 and friend, whose husband and daughter soon sunk also into 
 the grave. The son had married and settled in England, 
 and Phillis Wheatley found herself alone in the world. 
 
 The happiness of the African poetess now became clouded. 
 Little is known of the latter years of her life, except what 
 is of a melancholy character. Shortly after the death of 
 her friends, she received an offer of marriage from a re- 
 spectable Coloured man of the name of Peters. In her 
 desolate condition, it would have been hard to have blamed 
 Phillis for accepting any offer of protection of an honour- 
 able kind. At the time it took place, Peters not only 
 bore a good character, but was every way a remarkable 
 specimen of his race ; being a fluent writer, a ready speaker, 
 and altogether an intelligent and well-educated man. He 
 was a grocer by trade, but having obtained considerable 
 learning, also officiated as a lawyer, under the title of Doc- 
 tor Peters ; pleading the cause of his brethren the Africans, 
 before the tribunals of the state. Phillis was, at the time 
 of her marriage with Peters, about twenty-three years 
 of age. 
 
 The reputation he enjoyed, with his industry, procured 
 him a fortune, though it appears he was subsequently un- 
 successful in business. The connexion did not prove a 
 happy one, and Phillis, being possessed of a susceptible 
 mind and delicate constitution, fell into a decline, and died 
 in 1780, about the twenty-sixth year of her age, much 
 lamented by those who knew her worth. 
 
 Thus perished a woman who, by a fortunate accident, 
 was rescued from the degraded condition to which those of 
 her race who are brought to the Slave-market are too often 
 condemned, as if for the purpose of showing to the world 
 what care and education could effect in elevating the cha- 
 racter of the benighted African. Such an example ought 
 to impress us with the conviction, that, out of the 
 
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 348 
 
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 countless millions to whom no similar opportunities have ever 
 been presented, many might be found fitted by the endow- 
 ments of nature, and wanting only the blessings of educa- 
 tion, to be made ornaments, like Phillis Wheatley, not 
 only to their race, but to humanity. 
 
 JOHN KIZELL 
 
 Was a native of a country some leagues inland from the 
 Sherbro river. His father was a Chief of some consequence, 
 and so was his uncle. They resided at different towns, and 
 when Kizell was a boy, he was sent by his father on a visit 
 to his uncle. On the very night of his arrival the town 
 was attacked : a bloody battle ensued, in which his uncle 
 and many of his people were killed. Some escaped : the 
 rest were taken prisoners, amongst whom was Kizell. His 
 father, as soon as he heard of his son's disaster, made every 
 effort to release him, but in vain. He was taken to the 
 Gallinas, put on board a ship, and carried, as one of a cargo 
 of Slaves, to Charlestown. 
 
 On the passage, one of the women pining away with grief 
 on account of her situation, was tied up to the mast and 
 flogged to death, as a warning to others not to indulge their 
 melancholy to the detriment of their health, and thereby 
 injure their value to their Christian owners. 
 
 John Kizell arrived in Charlestown a few years before it 
 was taken by Sir H. Clinton ; and in consequence of that 
 general's proclamation, with many others, he joined the 
 royal standard. After the war he was removed to Nova 
 Scotia, and from thence to Sierra Leone. He was an in- 
 telligent man, always preserved an excellent character, and 
 had the welfare of his native country sincerely at heart. 
 The government of Sierra Leone often employed him in 
 their negociations with the native chiefs ; and he always 
 discharged his duty with integrity and address. 
 
 In 1810, John Kizell was sent by governor Columbine, 
 with a letter to some of the chiefs on the Sherbro river, 
 
recommending them to discontinue the Slave Trade, and 
 to turn their attention to the cultivation of the earth. 
 While on this mission, he wrote many letters to the gover- 
 nor, from which the following are extracts : — ■ 
 
 " I went to Sumarro with the head-man, and gave him 
 the things you sent for him : he was glad, and all his peo- 
 ple. I then showed them your letter. The young people 
 were thankful for the word they heard, but there were 
 some that did not like it. I then asked them : ' From the 
 time that your fathers began to sell Slaves, to this day, 
 what have you got by it ? Can any of you show me how 
 much money you have — how much gold — how many Slaves, 
 and vessels, and cattle — how many people you have ? ' They 
 said, ' None ! ' 
 
 " I went to take a walk with one of my boys, and was 
 surprised to see so many coffee-trees : some places being 
 entirely covered with them. I was concerned to think that 
 there was no man to be found who had the welfare of this 
 country and people at heart, to observe what is in it, and 
 what it will produce, instead of taking the natives, and car- 
 rying them to European islands to raise coffee, which is 
 the natural plant of Africa. But I thank Almighty God 
 for his over-ruling power : He does all things in their sea- 
 son ; and this is the time he has appointed, in which to 
 rouse the great men of England, and to put it in their 
 hearts to consider the human race. May Almighty God 
 incline them to persevere ! for these men of sin desire to 
 keep the Black people in Slavery, and their minds in dark- 
 ness ; so that they may enjoy neither the good of this 
 world, nor the happiness of the world to come. 
 
 " This country wants nothing but people to bring them 
 to order ; to let them see that by working they will get 
 money, and not by the Slave Trade ; for that destroys their 
 happiness. Of all people I have ever seen, they are the 
 kindest. They will let none want food ; they will lend and 
 not look for it again. If strangers come to them, they will 
 
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350 
 
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 give them water to wash, and food for nothing. If they 
 had the same learning as Europeans, the best lawyer could 
 not excel them in words and speeches. They are a sensible 
 people to talk to in their palavers. The land is rich and 
 good ; and if it was not for the cursed Slave Trade, I think 
 they would be the happiest people in the world." 
 
 BENJAMIN BANNEKER 
 
 Was born in Baltimore County, his father being an 
 African, and his mother of pure African descent. His pa- 
 rents having obtained their freedom, were enabled to send 
 him to an obscure school, where he learned, when a boy, 
 reading, writing, and arithmetic ; and they left him at their 
 decease, a few acres of land, upon which he subsequently 
 supported himself with economy and exertion, so as always 
 to preserve reputation. 
 
 To struggle incessantly against want, is by no means fa- 
 vourable to improvement. What he had learned he did not 
 forget, and as some hours of leisure will occur in the most 
 toilsome life, he availed himself of these, not to read and 
 acquire knowledge from writings of genius and discovery, 
 (for of such he had none), but to digest and apply, as occa- 
 sions presented, the few principles of the few rules of arith- 
 metic he had been taught at school. This kind of mental 
 exercise formed his chief amusement, and soon gave him a 
 facility in calculation that was often serviceable to his 
 neighbours, and at length attracted the attention of the 
 Messrs. Ellicott, a family remarkable for their ingenuity. 
 It was about the year 1788, that George Ellicott lent him 
 three astronomical works, and some instruments, accompany- 
 ing them with neither hint or instruction that might further 
 his studies, or lead him to apply them to any useful result. 
 These books and instruments, the first of the kind Ban- 
 neker had ever seen, opened a new world to him, and he 
 began to employ his leisure in astronomical researches. 
 
1 (Trite for tljr jfrgrn. 
 
 Having taken up the idea of making calculations for an 
 Almanac, he completed a set for a whole year. Encou- 
 raged by this first attempt, he entered upon calculations 
 for subsequent years, which, as well as the former, he began 
 and finished without the least assistance from any person or 
 books than the three volumes mentioned ; so that whatever 
 merit is attached to his performance, is exclusively and pe- 
 culiarly his own. He published almanacs in Philadelphia 
 for 1792-3-4 and 5, which contain his calculations, exhi- 
 biting the different aspects of the planets, a table of the 
 motions of the sun and moon, their risings and settings, 
 and the courses of the bodies of the planetary system. 
 These calculations were so thorough and exact, as to excite 
 the approbation of Pitt, Fox, Wilberforce, and other emi- 
 nent men ; and one of his almanacs was produced in the 
 British House of Commons, as an argument in favour of 
 the mental cultivation of the Coloured people, and of their 
 liberation from their wretched thraldom. 
 
 Imlay says, that in New England, he knew a Negro, who 
 kept an astronomical journal, and who had composed ephe- 
 merides. He does not mention his name : if it was Ban- 
 neker, it is a testimony to his talents ; if some other Negro, 
 it affords further evidence of the ability of the race. 
 
 "When Banneker had prepared his first almanac for pub- 
 lication, he sent a copy of the M.S. to Jefferson, then Pre- 
 sident of the United States, with the following letter, the 
 composition of which bespeaks considerable ability. 
 
 Maryland, Baltimore County, 
 August 19, 1791. 
 
 Sir, 
 
 I am fully sensible of the greatness of the freedom I 
 take with you on the present occasion ; a liberty which 
 seemed scarcely allowable, when I reflected on that distin- 
 guished and dignified station in which you stand, and the 
 
 
352 
 
 % €tlMi far tire flrgrn. 
 
 almost general prejudice which is so prevalent in the world 
 against those of my complexion. 
 
 It is a truth too well attested, to need a proof here, that 
 we are a race of beings, who have long laboured under the 
 abuse and censure of the world ; that we have long been 
 looked upon with an eye of contempt ; and considered ra- 
 ther as brutish than human, and scarcely capable of mental 
 endowments. 
 
 I hope I may safely admit, in consequence of the report 
 which has reached me, that you are a man far less in- 
 flexible in sentiments of this nature, than many others ; 
 that you are measurably friendly, and well disposed towards 
 us ; and that you are willing to lend your aid and assistance 
 for our relief from those many distresses, and numerous 
 calamities, to which we are reduced. 
 
 If this is founded in truth, I apprehend you will embrace 
 every opportunity to eradicate that train of absurd and 
 false ideas and opinions, which so generally prevail with 
 respect to us : and that your sentiments are concurrent 
 with mine, which are, that one universal Father hath given 
 being to us all ; that He hath not only made us all of one 
 flesh, but that He hath also, without partiality, afforded 
 us all the same sensations, and endowed us all with the 
 same faculties ; and that however variable we may be in 
 society or religion, however diversified in situation or in 
 colour, we are all of the same family, and stand in the 
 same relation to Him. 
 
 If these are sentiments of which you are fully persuaded, 
 you cannot but acknowledge, that it is the indispensable 
 duty of those, who maintain for themselves the rights of 
 human nature, and who profess the obligations of Chris- 
 tianity, to extend their power and influence to the relief 
 of every part of the human race, from whatever burden or 
 oppression they may unjustly labour under ; and this, I 
 apprehend, a full conviction of the truth and obligation of 
 these principles should lead all to. 
 
1 €x\Mt far tip Jtfrgro. 
 
 I have long been convinced, that if your love for your- 
 selves, and for those inestimable laws which preserved to 
 you the rights of human nature, was founded on sincerity 
 you could not but be solicitous, that every individual, 
 of whatever rank or distinction, might with you equally 
 enjoy the blessings thereof; neither could you rest satisfied 
 short of the most active effusion of your exertions, in order 
 to their promotion from any state of degradation, to which 
 the unjustifiable cruelty and barbarism of men may have 
 reduced them. 
 
 I freely and cheerfully acknowledge, that I am of 
 the African race, and in that colour which is natural to 
 them, of the deepest dye ; and it is under a sense of the 
 most profound gratitude to the Supreme Ruler of the 
 Universe, that I now confess to you, that I am not under 
 that state of tyrannical thraldom, and inhuman captivity, 
 to which too many of my brethren are doomed, but that I 
 have abundantly tasted of the fruition of those blessings, 
 which proceed from that free and unequalled liberty with 
 which you are favoured ; and which I hope you "will wil- 
 lingly allow you have mercifully received, from the imme- 
 diate hand of that being from whom proceedeth every goed 
 and perfect gift. 
 
 Suffer me to recall to your mind that time, in which the 
 arms of the British crown were exerted, with every power- 
 ful effort, in order to reduce you to a state of servitude : 
 look back, I entreat you, on the variety of dangers to which 
 you were exposed ; reflect on that period in which every 
 human aid appeared unavailable, and in which even hope 
 and fortitude wore the aspect of inability to the conflict, 
 and you cannot but be led to a serious and grateful sense 
 of your miraculous and providential preservation ; you can- 
 not but acknowledge, that the present freedom and tran- 
 quility which you enjoy, you have mercifully received, and 
 that it is the peculiar blessing of heaven. 
 
 This, Sir, was a time when you clearly saw into the 
 
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 354 
 
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 injustice of a state of Slavery, and in which you had just 
 apprehensions of the horrors of its condition. It was then 
 that your abhorrence thereof was so excited, that you pub- 
 licly held forth this true and invaluable doctrine, which is 
 worthy to be recorded and remembered in all succeeding 
 acres : ' We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all 
 men are created equal; that they are endowed by their 
 Creator with certain inalienable rights, and that among 
 these are, life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.' 
 
 Here, was a time in which your tender feelings for your- 
 selves had engaged you thus to declare ; you were then 
 impressed with proper ideas of the great violation of liberty, 
 and the free possession of those blessings, to which you 
 were entitled by nature ; but, sir, how pitiable is it to 
 reflect, that although you were so fully convinced of 
 the benevolence of the Father of Mankind, and of his 
 equal and impartial distribution of these rights and privi- 
 leges which he hath conferred upon them, that you should 
 at the same time counteract his mercies, in detaining by 
 fraud and violence, so numerous a part of my brethren 
 under groaning captivity and cruel oppression, that you 
 should at the same time be found guilty of that most cri- 
 minal act, which you professedly detested in others, with 
 respect to yourselves. 
 
 Your knowledge of the situation of my brethren is too 
 extensive to need a recital here ; neither shall I presume 
 to prescribe methods by which they may be relieved, other- 
 wise than by recommending to you and all others, to wean 
 yourselves from those narrow prejudices which you have 
 imbibed with respect to them, and as Job proposed to his 
 friends, ' put your soul in their souls' stead ;' thus shall 
 your hearts be enlarged with kindness and benevolence 
 towards them ; and thus shall you need neither the direc- 
 tion of myself or others, in what manner to proceed herein. 
 
 And now, sir, although my sympathy and affection for my 
 brethren hath caused my enlargement thus far, I ardently 
 
1 €xlMt for tl;B Jfegra. 
 
 355 
 
 hope, that your candour and generosity will plead with 
 you in my behalf, when I state that it was not originally 
 my design ; but having taken up my pen in order to present 
 a copy of an almanac which I have calculated for the suc- 
 ceeding year, I was unexpectedly led thereto. 
 
 This calculation is the production of my arduous study, 
 in my advanced stage of life; for having long had un- 
 bounded desires to become acquainted with the secrets of 
 nature, I have had to gratify my curiosity herein through 
 my own assiduous application to astronomical study, in 
 which I need not recount to you the many difficulties and 
 disadvantages which I have had to encounter. 
 
 And although I had almost declined to make my calcu- 
 lation for the ensuing year, in consequence of the time 
 which I had allotted for it being taken up at the federal 
 territory, by the request of Mr. Andrew Ellicott, yet I 
 industriously applied myself thereto, and hope I have ac- 
 complished it with correctness and accuracy. I have taken 
 the liberty to direct a copy to you, which I humbly request 
 you will favourably receive ; and although you may have 
 the opportunity of perusing it after its publication, yet I 
 desire to send it to you in manuscript previous thereto, 
 that thereby you might not only have an earlier inspec- 
 tion, but that you might also view it in my own hand- 
 writing. 
 
 And now, sir, I shall conclude, and subscribe myself, 
 with the most profound respect, 
 
 Your most obedient humble servant, 
 
 BENJAMIN BANNEKER. 
 
 To the foreffoinsr letter the President returned the fol- 
 lowing answer: — 
 
 Philadelphia, August 30, 1791. 
 Sir, 
 I thank you, sincerely, for your letter, and the almanac 
 it contained. No body wishes more than I do, to see such 
 
% Crtte for tire H?grn. 
 
 proofs as you exhibit, that nature has given to our Black 
 brethren talents equal to those of the other colours of men ; 
 and that the appearance of the want of them, is owing 
 merely to the degraded condition of their existence, both 
 in Africa and America. I can add with truth, that no 
 body wishes more ardently to see a good system com- 
 menced for raising their condition, both of their body and 
 mind, to what it ought to be, as far as the imbecility of 
 their present existence, and other circumstances, which 
 cannot be neglected, will admit. 
 
 I have taken the liberty of sending your almanac to 
 Monsieur de Condozett, Secretary of the Academy of 
 Sciences at Paris, and member of the Philanthropic Society, 
 because I considered it as a document to which your whole 
 colour had a right for their justification, against the doubts 
 which have been entertained of them. 
 
 I am with great esteem, sir, 
 
 Your most obedient, &c, 
 THOMAS JEFFERSON. 
 
 FAITH OF A POOR BLIND NEGRO. 
 
 A person going to see a very aged woman of Colour, 
 found a respectable looking White girl sitting by her, read- 
 ing the Bible for her. On inquiring of the old woman 
 whether she could ever read, she answered " O yes ! and 
 I used to read a great deal in that book," (pointing to a 
 Bible very much worn, that lay on the table,) but now I 
 am almost blind, and the good girls read for me ; but by 
 and by, when I get on Zion's hill, I shall see as well as 
 any body." 
 
 A PIOUS AND ENLIGHTENED KAFIR. 
 Mrs. "Williams in relating some particulars respecting 
 the death of her husband, says, on the day before his de- 
 cease, I was at length enabled to resign and give him up 
 
1% 
 
 % (tribute for tire Jfrgrn. 
 
 357 
 
 to the Lord to do his pleasure concerning him. I asked 
 one of the Kafirs if he had no wish to see his teacher be- 
 fore the Lord took him to himself. " Yes, but I do not 
 like to ask you, because I think it will make your heart 
 sore." He then came and sat down by the bedside. I 
 asked him if he prayed. " Yes." " What do you pray 
 for ?" "I pray the Lord as he hath brought us a teacher 
 over the great sea and hath thus long spared him to tell us 
 His word, that he would be pleased to raise him up again 
 to tell us more of that Great Word." I asked, " Do you 
 pray for me?" "Yes." "What do you ask when you 
 pray for me ? " "I pray that if the Lord should take away 
 your husband from you, he would support and protect you 
 and your little ones in the midst of this wild and barbarous 
 people." 
 
 " This was to me a precious sermon," adds Mrs. Wil- 
 liams, "at such a season, from the mouth of a Kafir." 
 
 INTELLIGENT AND ELOQUENT KAFIR CAPTIVE FEMALE. 
 
 During the residence of Thos. Pringle in South Africa, 
 he made an excursion to Bethelsdorp, where he was wel- 
 comed by the resident Missionary. 
 
 " While tea was preparing," he writes, "and before the 
 twilight had yet closed in, my host was called to speak to a 
 stranger. This was a Kafir woman, accompanied by a little 
 girl of 8 or 10 years of age, and having an infant strapped 
 to her back. She was one of a number of Kafir females, 
 who had been made prisoners by order of the Commandant 
 on the frontier, for crossing the line of proscribed demarca- 
 tion without permission, and who were now to be given out 
 in servitude among the White inhabitants of this district. 
 The woman before us was to be forwarded by the mis- 
 sionary, to a colonist, about 20 miles to the westward. 
 
 " While the constable who brought her was delivering his 
 message to this effect, the Kafir woman looked at him and at 
 
 't?^ 
 
% €nfati far tljB Jfogra. 
 
 us with keen and intelligent glances ; and though she very 
 imperfectly understood his language, she appeared fully to 
 comprehend its import. When he had finished, she stepped 
 forward, drew up her figure to its full height, extended 
 her right arm, and commenced a speech in her native 
 tongue. Though I did not understand a single word she 
 uttered, I have seldom been more struck with surprise and 
 admiration. The language, to which she appeared to give 
 full and forcible intonation, was highly musical and sono- 
 rous ; her gestures were natural, graceful, and impressive, 
 and her dark eyes and handsome bronze countenance, were 
 full of eloquent expression. Sometimes she pointed back 
 towards her own country, and then to her children. Some- 
 times she raised her tones aloud, and shook her clenched 
 hand, as if she denounced our injustice, and threatened us 
 with the vengeance of her tribe. Then again she would 
 melt into tears, as if imploring clemency, and mourning for 
 her helpless little ones. Some of the villagers who had 
 gathered round, being whole or half Kafirs, understood her 
 speech, and interpreted it in Dutch to the Missionary ; 
 but he could do nothing to alter her destination, and could 
 only return kind words to console her. For my own part, 
 I was not a little struck by the scene, and could not help 
 beginning to suspect that my European countrymen, who 
 thus made captives of harmless women and children, were 
 in reality greater barbarians than the savage natives of 
 Caffraria." 
 
 " After our interview with the Kafir female," continues 
 Thos. Pringle, " I attended the evening service in the rustic 
 chapel of Bethelsdorf. The place was occupied by a very 
 considerable number of the inhabitants of the village, a 
 large proportion being females. The demeanour of the 
 audience was attentive and devout, and their singing of the 
 missionary hymns was singularly pleasing and harmonious. 
 The effect of the music was no doubt greatly heightened by 
 the reflections which the sight of this African congregation 
 
 <m%sl 
 

 - 
 
 
 ... . 
 
m 
 
 % €nhtt for t\)t Jfrgtn. 
 
 359 
 
 naturally suggested. I saw before me the remnant of 
 an aboriginal race, to whom this remote region, now occu- 
 pied by White Colonists, had at no distant period belonged. 
 As I sat and listened to the soft and touching melody of 
 the female voices, or gazed on the earnest, upturned, swarthy 
 countenances of the aged men, who had probably spent their 
 early days in the wild freedom of nomadic life, and worn 
 out their middle life in the service of the Colonists, it was 
 pleasing to think that here, and in a few other institutions 
 such as this, the Christian humanity of Europe, had done 
 something to alleviate European oppression, by opening 
 asylums, where, at least, a few of the race were enabled to 
 escape from personal thraldom, and to emerge from heathen 
 darkness into the glorious light and liberty of the Gospel." 
 
 JAN TZATZOE; A CHRISTIAN KAFIR CHIEF. 
 
 Jan Tzatzoe is an hereditary Chief of the Amakosa 
 Kafirs, a tribe whose country borders on that formerly be- 
 longing to the Hottentots. His father, who was always 
 held in high estimation by the other Chiefs, for his integ- 
 rity and peaceable disposition, as well as for the good order 
 so uniformly maintained among his people, was living a 
 few years ago, supposed to be nearly one hundred years of 
 age, though he had long been too feeble to take any share 
 in the government of his people. This old Chief was re- 
 lated to Habaki, the grandfather of Gaika, and conse- 
 quently belongs to the ancient reigning families of the 
 country. 
 
 His son, Jan Tzatzoe, was born about the year 1791, 
 and while yet a child, his father removed, with his tribe, 
 into the Zuirveld, where the old Chief and his people were 
 residing, when the London Missionary Society's Institution 
 at Bethelsdorp was established. According to the custom 
 of the country, the old Chief had several wives. The mother 
 of Tzatzoe being a woman of the highest rank among them, 
 
^( 
 
 360 
 
 51 €M& fnr % ffltgm. 
 
 and a great favourite, the father determined that her son 
 should succeed him in the chieftainship of the tribe ; and 
 in order to secure for him every possible advantage, he re- 
 quested Dr. Vanderkemp and James Read, to receive him 
 into the Missionary Institution at Bethelsdorp, which he 
 entered in 1804. He was then about thirteen years of age, 
 and, though an unclothed, untutored African boy, he 
 evinced a mildness and docility of disposition, a patient en- 
 durance of the restraints which his altered circumstances 
 imposed, and a persevering application to his lessons, which 
 greatly endeared him to his teachers. The venerable Dr. 
 Vanderkemp, who had long mourned over the injustice 
 and cruelty practised towards the African race, received 
 his young pupil with the most grateful joy, — loved him, 
 and treated him as his own child, and spared no pains, 
 while engaged in teaching him the use of letters, and a 
 knowledge of the Dutch language, to instil into his mind 
 the principles of truth and justice, while he sought to im- 
 press upon his heart the sublime doctrines of the Bible. 
 On two occasions the Doctor took his industrious and ob- 
 servant scholar with him to Cape Town, and endeavoured 
 by every means in his power to prepare him to discharge, 
 with the greatest benefit to his race, the duties to which in 
 future years he would be called. 
 
 In 1815, a remarkable attention to personal religion 
 prevailed among all classes at Bethelsdorp ; and during 
 this period there is reason to believe that Tzatzoe, then 
 about twenty-four years of age, experienced, by the influ- 
 ence of the Holy Spirit, that entire change which rendered 
 him a sincere and decided Christian. In him, as in most 
 instances among the heathen, one immediate effect of the 
 participation of Divine mercy y was a desire to make the 
 salvation of Christ known to his countrymen. He sought 
 to improve the period of his continuance at Bethelsdorp, 
 with greater diligence than ever, and from higher motives ; 
 and in order to promote, by every possible means, the 
 
% €xMh for tju ftgrn. 
 
 improvement of his countrymen, he applied himself to the 
 most useful mechanical arts, and learned to work in wood 
 as a carpenter and wheelwright, and also to work in iron 
 and stone. About this time he married a pious female of 
 the Hottentot nation, who had long been connected with 
 the Institution at Bethelsdorp. In the following year, 
 Tzatzoe accompanied that eminently devoted man of God, 
 John Williams, to the neighbourhood of Gaika's residence, 
 and continued with him till the lamented death of Williams 
 interrupted the Kafir mission. 
 
 In 1817, when Lord Charles Somerset, then Governor of 
 the Cape of Good Hope, visited the frontier, and entered 
 into a treaty with Gaika, the chief of the tribes inhabiting 
 the country adjacent to the Kat river, Tzatzoe was present, 
 and acted as interpreter. He afterwards returned to Be- 
 thelsdorp, and was chosen by the people one of the local 
 authorities for hearing complaints and adjusting differences 
 among the inhabitants of the place. His conduct, in dis- 
 charging the duties of this office, which has ever been found 
 of great importance to the harmony and order of the settle- 
 ment, was distinguished by great shrewdness, and the most 
 scrupulous adherence to integrity and justice. 
 
 Tzatzoe continued at Bethelsdorp until 1817, when he 
 accompanied John Brownlee to his own country, and ren- 
 dered important services in the commencement of the missions 
 among the people in that neighbourhood. He also, shortly 
 afterwards, rendered very valuable aid to W. Shaw, Wes- 
 leyan missionary, in the establishment of the mission at 
 Wesleyville, and W. Shaw has frequently expressed his 
 deep sense of obligation to Tzatzoe for the advantages 
 derived from his assistance and advice, especially in the 
 early stages of his labours among the Kafirs. 
 
 Tzatzoe's aged father, who had long been anxious for the 
 establishment of a mission in his own territory, now repeated 
 his solicitations to his son, and to the Missionaries, re- 
 questing that they might be instructed in religion, and the 
 
 3 a 
 
% €nhk for tju Ifrgrn. 
 
 arts of civilized life. In compliance with his request, the 
 mission at the Buffalo river was commenced in 1826 by 
 John Brownlee, aided by Tzatzoe, who has ever since 
 resided at the station, acting as an assistant missionary. In 
 this capacity his exertions have been peculiarly acceptable 
 and valuable. His knowledge of the opinions, habits, and 
 superstitions of his countrymen have afforded important 
 facilities in exposing their errors, and instructing them in 
 a more excellent way : and he has been employed with 
 great advantage in preaching the gospel, and assisting in 
 the translation of the Scriptures into his native language. 
 
 John Williams and John Brownlee have borne the warm- 
 est testimony to his zeal and talents, and he was always 
 regarded by Dr. Vanderkemp with peculiar affection and 
 solicitude. 
 
 While Tzatzoe was occupied in assisting the mission- 
 aries, the duties connected with the civil affairs of his tribe 
 were discharged by an elder brother ; but Tzatzoe was 
 held in such high estimation that he was frequently con- 
 sulted in matters of importance ; such, in fact, was the in- 
 fluence of his acknowledged integrity and justice, that the 
 subjects of other chiefs often mutually requested him to 
 decide matters in dispute between them. On one occasion 
 two Kafirs, appeared before the young chief, each claiming 
 as their own a colt which they led to the place. In 
 support of their claims, each stated that he was in posses- 
 sion of the dam of the colt. Having listened to their 
 respective statements, Tzatzoe directed them to bring both 
 the animals, and then ordered the colt to be let loose be- 
 fore all the people. This was no sooner done, than it 
 repaired to one of the animals, by which it was immediately 
 recognized, and treated with expressions of evident plea- 
 sure, while it was unnoticed by the other animal, which it 
 also seemed to avoid. The dispute was now at an end, and 
 all parties appeared pleased at the manner in which the 
 proprietorship in the animal was so satisfactorily determined. 
 
 <ms] 
 
% 
 
 % €x\Mi far tjp Jtfrgro. 
 
 363 
 
 When a disastrous war broke out between the Kafirs 
 and the colonists, Tzatzoe successfully exerted his influence 
 to restrain his tribe from joining their countrymen in en- 
 tering the colony ; and afterwards, when called to assist 
 the colonial government, he led 400 men to the field, where 
 he continued with the British forces till hostilities ceased 
 and peace was made with the Kafirs. On his return, he 
 found the land of his tribes in the occupancy of his friends, 
 the colonial forces, who had taken possession of his house, 
 and the grounds which he had stocked with fruit trees, and 
 brought under cultivation ; thus depriving him of the fruits 
 of the labours of many years, obliging him again to begin 
 the formation of a settlement in the uncultivated wilder- 
 ness, and to fix his dwelling in another part of his own 
 hereditary land. These flagrant injuries made a deep im- 
 pression on his mind, but his clear judgment told him that 
 England is calumniated in the government of her colonies, 
 and that a direct appeal to herself w r ould procure immediate 
 reparation. To obtain the restoration of his rightful pro- 
 perty, or some compensation, and to solicit further assist- 
 ance in promoting the moral and spiritual improvement of 
 his countrymen, he resolved on visiting Great Britain. 
 
 Soon after the passing of the act for the abolition of 
 Slavery in the British colonies, the attention of many of 
 the benevolent friends of the African and other native tribes 
 was directed to the effects which had followed the inter- 
 course of civilized with uncivilized men in different parts 
 of the world, more especially in countries bordering on our 
 own colonies ; to the principles on w T hich such intercourse 
 had generally been conducted, and the means by which it 
 might be rendered in future honourable to the British, and 
 beneficial to the most distant nations. In 1834, the sub- 
 ject was considered by parliament, and an address to the 
 King, in relation to the same, was unanimously agreed to. 
 This led to the appointment of a select committee, for the 
 purpose of prosecuting an inquiry, highly honourable to 
 
 m 
 
 m 
 
M( 
 
 364 
 
 % €xlkk to tjjB Jfogrn. 
 
 the nation, and replete with promise to the tribes with whom 
 we may be brought into contact — namely, " to consider 
 what measures ought to be adopted with regard to the na- 
 tive inhabitants of countries where British settlements are 
 made, and to the neighbouring tribes, in order to secure 
 to them the due observance of justice, and the protection 
 of their rights — to promote the spread of civilization — and 
 to lead them to the peaceful, voluntary reception of the 
 Christian religion." 
 
 The imperative necessity for such an inquiry becomes at 
 once established by the statement of a few notorious facts. 
 The first lands acquired by the Dutch at the Cape of Good 
 Hope, were paid for by " a few trinkets and flasks of 
 brandy." In consideration of this payment they subse- 
 quently possessed themselves of 48,000 square miles, and 
 finally of the entire productive part of the Hottentot ter- 
 ritory. The next aggression consisted in seizing the cattle 
 of the aborigines, and appropriating them to their own uses ; 
 an injustice which the European governor declined to pun- 
 ish, because so many settlers were implicated in this system 
 of plunder. In addition to the spoliation of their cattle 
 and lands, " when a Hottentot offended a settler, he was 
 tied to a waggon-wheel, and severely flogged, or dispatched 
 on an errand, and then waylaid and destroyed." In short, 
 the spirit of extermination seemed to be the influencing 
 power in the government of the Cape, and the survivors 
 were only sure of life, so long as they could contribute by 
 the labour of their hands to enrich the stranger. 
 
 Dr. Philip, superintendent of the London Missionary 
 Society in South Africa, the intrepid advocates of 
 the natives, who had exerted himself successfully in 
 securing their civil liberty, as well as in imparting many 
 religious advantages, having been required to attend the 
 committee of the House of Commons, returned to Eng- 
 land in the spring of 1836. It was on this occasion that 
 Jan Tzatzoe, and Andries StofHes, a Christian Hottentot, 
 
% €rilmfa far tliu Srgrn. 
 
 365 
 
 with a patriotism that reflects honour on their race, availed 
 themselves of the opportunity of crossing the Atlantic 
 with Dr. Philip, in hopes of creating amongst the Eng- 
 lish people, a kindlier feeling, and a warmer interest in 
 behalf of their country. 
 
 Early in the summer of 1836, Dr. Philip and his 
 African companions were repeatedly called to appear 
 before the Committee of the House of Commons, insti- 
 tuted for the purpose of enquiring into the inhuman 
 treatment of the injured Aborigines. The evidence 
 given on these occasions was published by order of par- 
 liament, and is of great importance. Andries Stofnes 
 delivered his testimony with great animation and feeling, 
 but evident sincerity ; and the Chief gave his evidence with 
 that simple dignity and frankness which a consciousness of 
 the truth of his own statements, and a confidence in the 
 integrity and justice of his auditors, could not fail to inspire. 
 Evidence, demonstrating beyond doubt or contradiction, 
 the absence of all foundation for some of the statements 
 that had been made against him, was produced : he was 
 listened to with the most respectful attention, and there 
 was a general impression, that the nation to which he be- 
 longed, notwithstanding the ignorance and superstition 
 under which they still laboured, would, so far as intellec- 
 tual faculties are concerned, bear a comparison with more 
 highly civilized and powerful communities.* 
 
 * The engraving facing the title-page of the present volume represents 
 the appearance of the African witnesses before the committee. It is from 
 a painting by Room, procured by subscription among the friends of Dr. 
 Philip, and presented to the Directors of the London Missionary Society. 
 The scene is in one of the rooms where the committee, of which Sir T. F. 
 Buxton, Bart., was chairman, held its sittings. Tzatzoe is in the act of 
 giving his evidence. At the opposite end of the table i3 James Bead, jun., 
 acting as interpreter for the chief, who spoke and wrote before the com- 
 mittee in the Dutch language. Dr. Philip is seated in the foreground, on 
 the right, and Stolfles occupies a chair behind the table at the end of which 
 Tzatzoe is standing. James Read, sen. is standing behind the chair on 
 which Stoffles is seated. The likenesses are said to be exceedingly good, 
 especially those of the Hottentot and the Kafir chief. 
 
^l< 
 
 166 
 
 1 €xihit fnr % Jfrgrn, 
 
 The following extracts, taken from different parts of the 
 printed evidence of the Chief, will shew the kind of ques- 
 tions proposed by the committee, and the manner in which 
 they were answered. The evidence of Stoffles was pain- 
 fully instructive and affecting, though comparatively brief. 
 A large portion of Tzatzoe's examination related to the 
 late war with his nation ; but on this subject, one answer — 
 his reason for not taking any part on either side at first — 
 must suffice. 
 
 Will you mention the reasons which induced you to re- 
 frain from taking any part with your countrymen against 
 the colony ? — In the first place I am a Christian, and the 
 Scriptures tell us not to fight, or to shed blood ; and that 
 is the first reason why I remained quiet. 
 
 Again, after being questioned on the extent and effects 
 of missionary labours in Kaffraria, and more particularly 
 among his own tribe, and whether any places of worship 
 had been erected ; he was asked, and answered as follows : 
 
 How many ? — One church among my own tribe, and Mr. 
 Ross had a station in the neighbourhood. 
 
 What was the capacity of that place of worship ? — It was 
 great ; much longer than this room. 
 
 How many persons would it accommodate ? — 300, and 
 some of the people would sit under the trees outside. 
 
 Did that number of persons usually attend divine service 
 on the Sabbath? — Yes. 
 
 Did the Missionaries establish an infant school ? — Yes, 
 my daughter was the teacher of an infant school. 
 
 How many children were there in that school ? — About 
 100. 
 
 Was there any school for older children ? — Yes. 
 
 How many scholars were in that school? — between 30 
 and 50. 
 
 When you were summoned to attend this committee, 
 was that summons unexpected ? — I expected it. 
 
 Did you not come to England understanding that this 
 
% €x\Mt for \\t Jfogrtt. 
 
 367 
 
 committee was sitting, with the view of being examined 
 before it ? — Yes. 
 
 You were told at the Cape of Good Hope that a com- 
 mittee of this sort was sitting ? — Yes. 
 
 Who told you ? — I saw it in the newspapers. 
 
 Did you ask any advice as to the mode of examination 
 in these committees, and how you should give your answers ? 
 — I did not inquire. 
 
 Is your father also a Kafir chief ? — Yes. 
 
 How many years have you taken the reins of govern- 
 ment ? — I have governed since I came back to Kafir land. 
 
 How many years is that ago ? — Ten or twelve years. 
 
 Have you taken the oath of allegiance to the king ? — Yes. 
 
 Are you a field cornet at this moment ? — Yes. 
 
 Under such circumstances, did you get permission of 
 the colonial government to come to this country ? — Yes, I 
 got permission from Colonel Smith to go to Cape Town ; 
 and when I came to the Cape, I got permission from the 
 governor to come to England. 
 
 Do you appear before the committee here as a Mission- 
 ary, to advocate the cause of the Kafirs ? — I stand here as 
 an assistant Missionary, and a Kafir chief. 
 
 Who desired you to preach ? — When I felt the power of 
 the word of God, I went to the Hottentots, and preached 
 what God had done unto me ; and so the Missionaries en- 
 gaged me. 
 
 Has any portion of your land been seized by the govern- 
 ment ? — Yes. 
 
 What reasons did they give to you, who was an ally of 
 the British government, for taking away your land ? — No 
 reason that I know of, they did not tell me why they took 
 the country. 
 
 Why did not you complain to the Governor at the Cape 
 before you came here ? — I thought it was enough that the 
 governor knew that I had no part in the war, that I was 
 not guilty, and he should have known that. 
 
368 
 
 % €nUk fax % jfegnr. 
 
 Did not you think that the Governor would have done 
 you justice, if you had made your complaint known to 
 him? — No, he would not have done it, as he took the 
 ground without having any right to it. 
 
 How came you to think that the government in England 
 would be more ready to do you justice than the govern- 
 ment at the Cape ? — Because from the time of Dr. Van- 
 derkemp to this time, the Missionaries used to tell us that 
 the good people and right people were here, and that jus- 
 tice was here. 
 
 Had not you heard that the Governor of the Cape was 
 very anxious to do justice to all the native people ? — Yes, 
 I had so ; but he did me no justice. 
 
 Are you quite certain that the governor knew that your 
 country was taken from you ? — The governor was there 
 when the houses were building — the fort. 
 
 Was he aware that it was building upon land that be- 
 longed to you ? — Certainly ; he must have known it. 
 
 Did the governor give you any compensation for the loss 
 of your buildings ? — No. 
 
 Did you ever make any application to the Governor for 
 redress ? — Why should I go to the governor, if he takes 
 my things from me ? 
 
 Were the lands from which the Governor removed you, 
 cultivated lands ; or lands in a state of nature ? — He took 
 my own piece of ground that I had cultivated, and my 
 garden and my trees. 
 
 What did he give you in exchange ? — Nothing. 
 
 In what condition was the new place which the governor 
 appointed to you ; was it cultivated, or uncultivated ? — ■ 
 The place where I am at present is uncultivated. 
 
 Were there any fruit trees in the new place where the 
 Governor had appointed you to go ? — No ; it is a wilder- 
 ness. 
 
 In whose territory was that wilderness ? — It belongs to 
 me. 
 
% €xlh\i far tip 3fjp. 
 
 369 
 
 So that, in fact, the Governor removed you from one 
 spot in your own territory which was cultivated, to another 
 spot in your own territory which was uncultivated ? — Yes. 
 
 Did the Governor know at the time that he was commit- 
 ting this robbery upon you ? — Yes ; I am sure that he 
 must have known it, and therefore I did not speak to him 
 about it. 
 
 Did not the land that was taken away by the Governor, 
 in reality belong to the Missionary Society, and not to you ? 
 — It belongs to me. 
 
 The evidence of Taztzoe and S toffies on other points 
 was equally explicit and conclusive — but their testimony 
 before a section of the British senate was not the only im- 
 portant object that was accomplished : besides the incalcu- 
 lable advantage to the native tribes of Africa, of their ap- 
 pearing before a committee of the British parliament as 
 witnesses for their countrymen of the wrongs they had en- 
 dured, their visit to England and Scotland afforded to 
 multitudes a satisfaction of the highest order, and must 
 have benefitted the cause of Christian missions throughout 
 the world. They entered our domestic circles, and attended 
 our religious assemblies, and were affectionately and cor- 
 dially welcomed as brethren by Christians of every deno- 
 mination; their intelligent and pious conversation glad- 
 dened the hearts of all who had intercourse with them, 
 and their truly exemplary deportment exemplified the 
 influence of the gospel on their hearts. New demonstra- 
 tions were given of the power of the gospel, new motives 
 to engage in its propagation supplied, and firmer hopes in- 
 spired of its speedy and universal extension. The eloquence 
 of the Hottentot produced impressions that will never be 
 forgotten. At a public meeting in Exeter Hall, London, 
 for receiving statements from Dr. Philip and his friends in 
 reference to the missions in South Africa, Andries Stoffles, 
 addressing the crowded assembly on the effects of the gos- 
 pel, spoke thus : — 
 
 3b 
 
 >V* 
 
I €nhk for tjre Jfogrn. 
 
 " I wish to tell you what the Bible has done for Africa. 
 When the Bible came amongst us, we were naked ; we 
 lived in caves and on the tops of the mountains ; we had no 
 clothes, but painted our bodies. At first we were sur- 
 prised to hear the truths of the Bible, which charmed us 
 out of the caves, and from the tops of the mountains ; made 
 us throw away all our old customs and practices, and live 
 among civilized men. We are civilized now ; we know 
 there is a God. I have travelled with the Missionaries in 
 taking the Bible to the Bushmen, and other nations. When 
 the word of God has been preached, the Bushman has 
 thrown away his bow and arrows. I have accompanied 
 the Bible to the Kafir nation ; and when the Bible spoke, 
 the Kafir nation threw away his shield and all his vain cus- 
 toms. I went to Latakoo, and they forsook all their evil 
 works ; they threw away their assagais ; and became the 
 children of God. The only way to reconcile man to man, 
 is to instruct him in the truths of the Bible. I say again, 
 where the Bible comes, the minds of men are enlightened ; 
 where it is not, there is nothing but darkness ; it is dan- 
 gerous, in fact, to travel through such a nation. Where 
 the Bible is not, man does not hesitate to kill his fellow ; 
 he never even repents afterwards of having committed mur- 
 der. Are there any of the old Englishmen here who sent 
 out the word of God ? I give them my thanks : if there 
 are not, I give it to their children. Your Missionaries, 
 when they came to us, suffered with us, and wept with us, 
 and struggled for us, till they obtained for us the charter 
 of our liberties — the Fiftieth Ordinance. [The animation 
 with which the last clause of this sentence was uttered by 
 An dries S toffies, produced a deep sensation throughout the 
 whole auditory. The Fiftieth Colonial Ordinance was issued 
 by General Bourke in 1828, placing the Hottentots on the 
 same footing as other free subjects in the Colony. Since 
 the passing of this Ordinance, though not exempt from 
 oppression, their circumstances have been greatly improved.] 
 
% ttlrate far tjj? Jfip. 
 
 371 
 
 When the Fiftieth Ordinance was published, we were then 
 brought to the light. Then did the young men begin to 
 learn to write and read. Through that Ordinance we got 
 infant schools, and our children have been instructed, and 
 are making progress in learning. You, the posterity of 
 the old Englishmen, I address you on this occasion ; I am 
 standing on the bones of your ancestors, and I call upon 
 you, their children, to-day, to come over and help us. Do 
 you know what we want ? We want schools and school- 
 masters — we want to be like yourselves." 
 
 At the same meeting, the late Edward Baines, Esq., 
 M.P. for Leeds, a member of the Committee by which the 
 Africans were examined, delivered the following honour- 
 able testimony in their favour ; — 
 
 " The Kafir chief," he said, " had given his evidence 
 with an artlessness and dignity which proved that he was 
 indeed a Chief. There was about his evidence that which 
 showed that he had the interest of his nation at heart — 
 that he came here imbued with a truly noble spirit, and 
 with the desire of communicating that spirit to others, and 
 of teaching us how we might make the Aborigines of 
 Africa happy, instead of rendering their country desolate. 
 He had taught us a great lesson in political economy. He 
 had told us that, by doing justice to the people of Africa, 
 we should induce them to become our customers and friends. 
 In this way the African chief had imparted knowledge to 
 the British senate. 
 
 "These witnesses," he added, "did not assume to be the 
 instructors of the Aborigines Committee, but they did in 
 reality impart to them much valuable instruction ; and he 
 would venture to predict, that from this day forward there 
 never would be heard complaints of the driving of the na- 
 tive inhabitants from one river to another, of usurping and 
 seizing their cattle, and of appropriating their territory. 
 He could not sufficiently impress upon the meeting the 
 beneficial consequences of the visit of the persons, now 
 
sk 
 
 372 
 
 % €vMi fur \\t JI?grn. 
 
 before them, to Europe. They had given information as to 
 the state of their country, and imparted a tone to the pub- 
 lic feeling as to the wrongs of the native inhabitants in our 
 colonies that would never be obliterated." 
 
 The Kafir nation received, so far as the seizure of terri- 
 tory was concerned, all the justice and restitution that the 
 British government could award ; the country so unjustly 
 taken from them was restored, and the most friendly rela- 
 tions entered into with the rulers and people. Anxious to 
 benefit his countrymen, Tzatzoe took back to Africa, not, 
 as has been too often the case, arms and ammunition for 
 annihilating the human race, but implements of husbandry, 
 — the axe and the spade, the pruning-hook and the plough, 
 emblems of peace ! with a large supply of books, and all 
 the apparatus for schools. He was welcomed with the most 
 cordial affection by the chiefs and people of his nation, who 
 were in a state of most intense anxiety about his return ; 
 and he was followed by the prayers and benedictions of all 
 good men, who must feel a deep interest in all that tends 
 to the civilization of Africa, and the accomplishment of 
 the promise which declares, that " Ethiopia shall stretch 
 forth her hands unto God." 
 
 James Backhouse, a Minister of the Society of Friends, 
 in his Narrative of a visit to the Mauritius and South Africa, 
 mentions Tzatzoe as having interpreted for him to his com- 
 fort. He also visited him at his own house in 1839. "I 
 was comforted," says J. B., " while sitting a short time 
 with him, in a very perceptible feeling of the love of our 
 Heavenly Father, uniting our hearts in gospel fellowship." 
 
 One of the Missionaries in Kafirland, by whom Tzatzoe 
 is well known, writes thus : — " Tzatzoe possesses consider- 
 able talent ; his addresses are pointed and powerful, and 
 always command the attention of his hearers. As a preacher, 
 his perfect knowledge of the Kafir character, and his ac- 
 quaintance with their customs, give him an advantage which 
 few Europeans can attain in preaching to Kafirs. But the 
 
 \§ 
 
% €riktr for tjp Srgni. 
 
 tact which he displays in combating Kafir prejudices and 
 superstition, is really surprising. I have often listened 
 with delight and astonishment to his discourses, which are 
 so full, so simple, and yet so powerful. The ease, too, with 
 which he can effectually arrest the attention of his coun- 
 trymen, is matter of admiration. Here is a specimen of 
 the great power of God, in reclaiming a savage, and making 
 him an instrument in reclaiming others." 
 
 The late lamented Thomas Pringle, during his residence 
 in South Africa, visited the Missionary station at the Buf- 
 falo river, commenced in compliance with the request of 
 Tzatzoe's aged father, and has left the following record of 
 his visit : — 
 
 " A rugged mountain, round whose summit proud, 
 The eagle sailed, or heaved the thunder-cloud, 
 Poured, from its cloven breast, a gurgling brook ; 
 "Which down the grassy glades its journey took ; 
 Oft bending round, to lave, with rambling tide, 
 The groves of evergreen on either side. 
 Fast by this stream, where yet its course was youug, 
 And stooping from the heights, the forest flung 
 A grateful shadow o'er the narrow dell, 
 Appeared the Missionary's hermit cell. 
 Woven of wattled boughs, and thatched with leaves, 
 The sweet wild jasmine clustering to its eaves, 
 It stood, with its small casement gleaming through, 
 Between two ancient cedars ; round it grew 
 Clumps of acacias and young orange bowers, 
 Pomegranate hedges, gay with scarlet flowers ; 
 And pale-stemmed fig-trees, with their fruit yet green, 
 And apple blossoms waving light between. 
 All musical it seemed with humming bees, 
 And bright plumed sugar-birds among the trees 
 Fluttered, bike living blossoms. 
 
 " In the shade 
 Of a grey rock, that midst the leafy glade 
 Stood like a giant sentinel, we found 
 The habitant of this fair spot of ground — - 
 A plain, tall Scottish man, of thoughtful mien ; 
 Grave, but not gloomy. By his side was seen 
 
 •:■: 
 
 m y 
 
% €xihit fnr % Jf?gra. 
 
 An Ancient Chief of Amakosa's race, 
 
 With javelin armed, for conflict or for chase ; 
 
 And seated at their feet, upon the sod, 
 
 A youth was reading from the word of God, 
 
 Of Him who came for sinful men to die, 
 
 Of every race and tongue beneath the sky. 
 
 " Unnoticed, towards them we softly stept, 
 Our friend was rapt in prayer — the warrior wept, 
 Leaning upon his hand : the youth read on ; 
 And then we hailed the group — the Chieftain's son, 
 Training to be his country's Christian guide — 
 And Brownlee, and old Tzatzoe by his side." 
 
 ANDEIES STOFFLES. 
 
 The Hottentot churches which have been gathered by 
 the missionaries in South Africa, contain many eminent 
 examples of Christian character and worth. With these 
 fellow members of the same spiritual body, the Christians 
 of Europe and other parts of the world would find it de- 
 lightful occasionally to hold personal intercourse ; but such 
 meetings have been hitherto exceedingly rare, nor is it 
 probable that circumstances will arise to make them of 
 more frequent occurrence for the future. Andries S toffies 
 was one of the very few of the Hottentot converts whom 
 we have had the happiness of welcoming amongst us in 
 Great Britain. By multitudes of the friends of Africa in 
 this country, he is affectionately remembered, as one who 
 was renewed after the image of Christ. 
 
 Stoffles, as has already been stated, came to plead the 
 cause of his wronged and suffering countrymen ; and to 
 ask, on their behalf, the sympathy and aid of British Chris- 
 tians. He was a powerful advocate, for he possessed, in 
 union with the influences of religion, the eloquence of na- 
 ture and the strength of truth, and left no heart unmoved, 
 no mind unconvinced by his statements and his appeals. 
 Having sickened in our ungenial climate, he returned to 
 Africa, but only survived a few days after reaching the 
 
I Ctilwb fnr tjj? Sfrgrn. 
 
 375 
 
 Cape. To his latest hour he had peace and joy in believ- 
 ing, and the light of the Saviour's love fell fully on his 
 soul as it departed to the world of glory. 
 
 The following brief account of the life of Andries 
 Stoffles, detailing Ins conversion to Christianity, his pro- 
 gress in the Christian life, and imprisonment for preaching 
 the gospel, his attachment to the Missionary cause, his 
 patriotic visit to England, with some particulars of his 
 death, will be found interesting. 
 
 Andries Stoffles was born in South Africa, about the 
 year 17T6. He was a Hottentot of the Gonah tribe, in- 
 habiting a country called the Zuirveld, lying between the 
 Gamtoos and the Great Fish River. From his boyhood, 
 Stoffles was a close observer, and was gifted with an excel- 
 lent memory. With a naturally sound judgment, he pos- 
 sessed an active mind and a sanguine temperament ; and 
 consequently, at an early age he was found mingling in the 
 fierce feuds and conflicts which arose at that period be- 
 tween the Dutch settlers and the Hottentots. In one of 
 these engagements, he was severely wounded, and narrowly 
 escaped the loss of life. On another occasion, a waggon 
 went over his body and nearly killed him. After his con- 
 version, the remembrance of occurrences which had so 
 nearly proved fatal, always deeply affected him, and he was 
 frequently heard to remark, that had he died then, he should 
 have been lost for ever. 
 
 An event which greatly determined his future course in 
 life, was the circumstance of his being taken prisoner by 
 the Kafirs, and carried from his own country into Kafir- 
 land. There he resided for some time, learnt the Kafir 
 language, and was employed as an interpreter, in which 
 capacity he was taken by a Kafir chief to Bethelsdorp, 
 about the year 1810. Stoffles was then in a savage state, 
 and arrayed in the manner of the Kafirs, his only clothing 
 a dressed cow skin thrown loosely over his shoulders, and 
 his body smeared with grease and red ochre. When he 
 
 1 
 
% MMi for t(re jfrgrn. 
 
 first attended divine worship at Bethelsdorp, he was so ig- 
 norant of its purpose and meaning, as to suppose that the 
 people had assembled to receive rations of provisions, or 
 presents of beads and buttons. But he was soon unde- 
 ceived — divine grace speedily reached his heart, though it 
 was some time before his mind was fully enlightened as to 
 the way of salvation. His second attendance in the house 
 of God, which has been characteristically described by him- 
 self, made a deep impression upon him. The conviction of 
 sin smote immediately upon his conscience, and he was no 
 longer the same man. He returned to the Kafirs, and tried 
 to be happy in his former ways ; in dancing, and merri- 
 ment, and idle mirth ; but conscience pursued him, and he 
 could find no rest. 
 
 Labouring under a deep sense of sin, and having in vain 
 sought relief to his mind in heathen companionship, Stoffles 
 returned to Bethelsdorp, and again listened to the preach- 
 ing of the gospel ; but his convictions were only strength- 
 ened, and the agitation of his mind increased in proportion. 
 Overcome by his internal conflicts he frequently hastened 
 from the chapel to the bush, weeping aloud. Here, it is 
 said, he would spend hours, and even days, apart from 
 human intercourse, praying to God for mercy, and seeking 
 for rest to his heavy laden spirit. In this state he con- 
 tinued for two or three years, bowed down under the con- 
 sciousness of guilt, beset with the terrors of self-condemna- 
 tion, and unable to apply to himself the rich remedies of 
 the gospel of peace. But He who hath promised not to 
 break the bruised reed, nor quench the smoking flax, at 
 length shed abroad a clearer light in his soul — the way of 
 salvation through a crucified Saviour was fully revealed to 
 him — his penitential sorrow did not cease, but its bitterness 
 was gone — he saw by faith the " Lamb slain from the foun- 
 dation of the world " — the burden of sin passed away — his 
 eye glistened, and his heart was filled with joy, for the 
 blood of Christ had imparted peace to his soul. 
 
% <£rilrate for tyt llrgrn. 
 
 377 (M 
 
 L^m> 
 
 ml 
 
 &~- 
 
 Turned from darkness to light, Stoffles believed himself 
 called upon to testify of the grace of God to those around 
 him, manifesting the utmost anxiety for the salvation of 
 his fellow men. His conversations, addresses, and prayers, 
 deeply impressed all who heard him. Often were whole 
 assemblies of natives and Europeans melted into tears when 
 he spoke to them of the dying love of the Saviour. This 
 was the subject ever uppermost in his mind, and in dwell- 
 ing upon it, his flow of language was peculiar to himself. 
 His wife and many of his relations also became converted. 
 
 Some time after his conversion, a magistrate, residing at 
 a distance from Bethelsdorp, applied to the station for a 
 few men to assist in some public works. Stoffles volunteered 
 to go, but no sooner arrived in the locality than he began 
 to preach to the Hottentots and Slaves, with great effect. 
 There was much weeping, and it was said that he would 
 drive all the people mad. He was forbidden to preach ; 
 but he continued to do so, believing it right to obey God, 
 and he was consequently imprisoned. He now began 
 preaching to the prisoners, who were numerous, with simi- 
 lar effects ; so that the only alternative was to release him, 
 and send him back to Bethelsdorp. He ever considered it 
 an honour to have been in bonds for Christ's sake. 
 
 When the Missionaries for Lattakoo arrived in Africa, 
 Stoffles accompanied them to their station through the 
 country of the wild Bushmen, to many of whom he was 
 the first to convey the glad tidings of salvation. He assisted 
 in the opening of the Lattakoo Mission, and remained there 
 four years. To the Missionaries, who placed the fullest 
 confidence in him, he rendered essential service. He pos- 
 sessed such a knowledge of the native character, that the 
 brethren could always beneficially consult him. He tra- 
 velled with them to all the towns and villages of the 
 Bechuanas, accompanied the minister Campbell, on his 
 second journey to Kurachana ; and minister Miles, through 
 Kaffraria to the Tambookie country ; he likewise travelled 
 
 3c 
 
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% €i\fait for \\)t Jfogrn. 
 
 yd much with Dr. Philip. In all these journeys, though often 
 wearied with the work of the day, he never retired to rest 
 without singing a hymn and prayer. 
 
 Stoffles was a true patriot ; his concern for the welfare of 
 his country increased with his years, and he entered with 
 earnestness and intelligence into every subject connected 
 with it. He felt keenly the degraded condition of his 
 people, who had lost their hereditary lands, their property, 
 and their freedom ; and his mind was constantly engaged 
 in considering the means by which it could be improved. 
 When the Hottentots gained their civil liberties, his joy 
 was extreme, and when government offered them land at 
 Kat River, though it involved at first great hardship and 
 privation, yet as he thought it was for his country's good, 
 he was the first to go and take possession of what he termed 
 the Hottentots' Land of Canaan. He subsequently de- 
 voted himself entirely to the welfare of the settlement, and 
 the people at the several locations all regarded him as their 
 friend, their guide, and their defender. 
 
 His services, in reference to the spiritual concerns of 
 the people at Kat River, were also highly important. Until 
 a Missionary came to that part of Africa, Stoffles, with the 
 assistance of other pious natives, conducted the services on 
 the Sabbath, and every evening in the week. He after- 
 wards acted as deacon of the community of Hottentot 
 Christians at Philiptown, where 400 were united in fellow- 
 ship ; and with great benefit to the people, he watched 
 over the flock with great zeal, faithfulness, and activity. 
 He conducted the prayer meetings with marked propriety, 
 and his addresses on those occasions produced the happiest 
 effects among his countrymen. 
 
 Stoffles and his family were the first settlers at the Kat 
 River ; and for the prosperity of the settlement, his expe- 
 rience, abilities, influence, and efforts, were constantly em- 
 ployed, especially in promoting education, and extending 
 to every location the advantages of religious instruction. 
 
®&: H 
 
 ft (Tnlmfr fnr tjjp Jlrgrn. 
 
 379 
 
 In common with all the inhabitants of this important settle- 
 ment, he mourned over the disastrous effects of the unjust, 
 capricious, and arbitrary detention of the Missionaries 
 from their station, after the termination of a war with the 
 Kafirs, which prevented them resuming- their labours of 
 love and usefulness. To ask from the equity and honour- 
 able feeling of the government at home, a remission of this 
 decree, and the privilege of their return, which had been 
 denied by the Governor in the colony, was one of his prin- 
 cipal objects in visicing Great Britain. 
 
 Early in 1836, S toffies embarked for England, in com- 
 pany with Dr. Philip, James Read, jun., and Jan Tzatzoe, 
 the Kafir chief; and arrived in London in the fifth month. 
 Besides being desirous of exerting himself in England on 
 behalf of his country ; he wished to see, he said, and be- 
 come acquainted with, the people by whom the Gospel had 
 been sent to their Heathen land ; and to express his grati- 
 tude to them for the inestimable blessing. These objects 
 he effected, but not to the extent which he desired. Before 
 the Aborigines Committee of the House of Commons, he 
 stated the grievances of his afflicted countrymen, and pro- 
 duced a strong impression in favour of their claims and his 
 own. To the friends of missions, in various parts of the 
 kingdom, his animated and eloquent addresses, joined with 
 his fervent, unaffected piety, afforded the highest interest, 
 and the most hallowed delight. 
 
 But his health soon began to decline, principally owing 
 to the hostile influence of the climate. It was recommended 
 that he should leave England immediately, and towards the 
 conclusion of the year he embarked for Africa, accompa- 
 nied by J. Read, jun., and E. Williams. At the com- 
 mencement of the voyage, his health apparently rallied ; 
 but after crossing the line, a relapse followed, and on his 
 arrival at the Cape, he sunk rapidly, and died in the early 
 part of 1837, aged about 60 years. 
 
 In his dying hours, his mind was calm and resigned. He 
 
 V 
 
f (^^^^ : 
 
 g^l 
 
 380 
 
 % €rite for tju Jfrgrn. 
 
 TT3 
 
 had never, he said, enjoyed more of the presence of God, 
 his Saviour, than during the voyage. When he ceased to 
 anticipate recovery, he expressed regret at not being spared 
 " to go and tell his people what he had seen and heard in 
 England. He would go and tell his story in Heaven, but 
 he thought they knew more there than he could tell them." 
 
 The death of Stoffles was lamented by multitudes of the 
 natives, both within and beyond the colony ; the people of 
 Kat river were scarcely to be comforted, and it was feared 
 by some that his wife and daughter, who were exceedingly 
 attached to him, would fall sacrifices to their grief. But 
 many prayers were offered on their behalf, that their deep 
 affliction might bring forth abundantly the peaceable fruits 
 of righteousness. 
 
 In personal appearance, Andries Stoffles was of middle 
 stature, stout, and robust, but active, with a countenance 
 remarkably intelligent and expressive. The portrait of him 
 in the engraving facing the title page of this volume, in 
 which he is represented seated at the table, is said to be an 
 exceedingly good one. 
 
 EXTRACT OF A LETTER FROM JOHN CANDLER. 
 
 Jamaica, 1840. 
 In the afternoon we reached Spanish Town. An Anti- 
 Slavery Convention of delegates from the whole island, met 
 the next morning, and a public meeting was held in the 
 evening in the Baptist Chapel, attended by about 2000 
 persons, the main body of it consisting of lately emancipated 
 Slaves. It was a meeting of amazing interest. Imagine a 
 platform in the capital of Jamaica, the chair occupied by a 
 great planter, a member of the Legislative Council, sur- 
 rounded by Missionaries of several denominations, mem- 
 bers of the Established Church, some of the Society of 
 Friends, and planters of large property, who lately pos- 
 sessed numerous Slaves, and who now rejoice in the change 
 
% (frtlraft far tip Urgra. 
 
 from Slavery to Freedom. Before us, in the body of the 
 chapel and the spacious galleries, a dense crowd of men 
 and women of all colours, admirably attired, and behind 
 the platform, tier upon tier of intelligent Black men, from 
 the neighbouring properties, who had come in troops to 
 enjoy the pleasures of the evening, and respond to the ob- 
 servations that pleased them. Some of the speeches were 
 excellent, particularly those of Capt. Stuart, Win. Knibb, 
 John Clarke ; and J. J. Gurney's pointed address to the 
 Black people fixed their attention deeply. They are a 
 very shrewd people. 
 
 GRATEFUL SLAVES. 
 
 The more I have seen of the Negroes in Jamaica, writes 
 Dr. Madden, and observed their conduct, the more reason 
 I have to think that they are naturally a good-humoured, 
 easily-contented, kind-hearted race, amply disposed to ap- 
 preciate kind treatment and to be grateful for it. Of their 
 disposition to appreciate benefits, even in the' trifling way 
 I have endeavoured to be serviceable to them, by protect- 
 ing them from injustice to the best of my poor ability, I 
 have had proofs enough of their grateful feelings towards 
 me. One poor fellow of the name of Cochrane came to me 
 the other day to take leave of me : I had never rendered 
 him the slightest service, but I had been civil to him, and 
 he had been in the habit of coming to my house. He took 
 leave of me with tears in his eyes : Dr. Chamberlaine was 
 present : he took me aside and put a paper into my hand, 
 which he said was a small present, which he hoped I would 
 accept, to think of him when I was gone. I opened the 
 paper, and to my surprise, I found it contained three 
 Spanish doubloons, (equal to £10. sterling). I cannot de- 
 scribe what I felt in assuring this poor Negro I did not 
 need his gold to remember him and his race with kindly 
 feelings. It was with difficulty I could prevail on him to 
 
 W 
 
 &®M 
 
382 
 
 % €vMz far \)t 3fop» 
 
 take it back. He turned away abruptly from me, and that 
 night I had a kid sent to me, which he sent me word he 
 hoped might be of use to me on my voyage home. 
 
 Two days ago, an old man, whom I had never seen be- 
 fore, entered the gate as I was going out, and addressed 
 me in Arabic, he was a native of Africa, and he presented 
 a pair of ducks, which he said he brought for me a long 
 way, to make part of my sea stock. He seemed to think I 
 was a friend to his countrymen, and he wished to prove to 
 me that he was grateful for it. I accepted the old man's 
 ducks, with more gratification than, perhaps, a European 
 minister ever felt at receiving a diamond snuff-box from the 
 Sultan. In short, for the last week, I have been receiving 
 more presents of fruit and poultry than I know what to do 
 with. In every instance in which I have been able to ren- 
 der any service to a Negro, I have found him mindful of 
 it, and far more grateful for it than I could have expected. 
 
 SIMEON WILHELM 
 
 Was born on the west coast of Africa, about the year 1800, 
 and was received when nine years old into the Missionary 
 School at Bashia. He manifested a teachable, gentle, af- 
 fectionate disposition, had a pleasing countenance, and was 
 much gratified with the pains taken to instruct himself and 
 other African children in knowledge and religion. About 
 the year 1815, he was baptized, and had the name of Si- 
 meon Wilhelm given to him, after the missionary Wilhelm, 
 who was much attached to him. 
 
 In 1816, Edward Bickers teth visited the Settlements of 
 the Church Missionary Society in Africa, and staid some 
 time at Bashia. " The more I saw of Simeon," says he, 
 " the more I was pleased with him, and as he desired to 
 visit England, that he might qualify himself to be useful 
 to his countrymen, it appeared that I might be really serv- 
 ing the cause of religion by taking him to England. His 
 
 ImT 
 
heart bounded within him, and his eyes beamed with joy and 
 thankfulness, when I told him he might go with me. He 
 promised to do everything that I wished, and he never 
 broke this promise." 
 
 The African youth set sail with his kind preceptor in 
 1816. "During our passage," writes the latter, "we often 
 sang hymns together, in a retired part of the deck ; and I 
 had frequently interesting conversation with him. The 
 weather was, in general, very favourable ; but towards the 
 end of the voyage it became stormy. On the 13th of 
 August, in particular, we had a very stormy night ; but 
 Simeon did not seem in any way alarmed or agitated. 
 He slept in my cabin, and I talked with him on our danger; 
 but he seemed wholly to rely on God, committed himself 
 to his protection at bed-time, and soon fell asleep. 
 
 After arriving in England, Edward Bickersteth being 
 himself too much occupied to superintend his education, 
 the offer of F. Cunningham, Vicar of Pakefield, to instruct 
 him in useful knowledge, and prepare him to become a 
 blessing to his countrymen, was gladly accepted. He so- 
 journed under the hospitable roof of that gentleman for 
 some time, where his conduct gave great satisfaction, 
 but his health soon required his being removed, and he 
 was admitted into the National School in Shoe-lane, where 
 he soon rose to the first class. Here he was attacked with 
 a pulmonary complaint, and as it was feared the climate of 
 this country would not suit his constitution, it was pro- 
 posed that he should return to Africa, and his physician 
 informed him of it. He expressed a very strong desire to 
 remain in England, and as he cheerfully resigned his life 
 to God, it was thought best to indulge him with staying. 
 He gradually recovered from this sickness : and his grati- 
 tude, exemplary conduct, meek and affectionate spirit, in- 
 creased the love of those about him. 
 
 " His general behaviour," says E. Bickersteth, " was 
 truly exemplary. Those who had the happiness of seeing 
 
 m 
 
 
384 
 
 51 €xiMt for fyj Jfogrn. 
 
 it, will never forget his meek, gentle, and affectionate spirit. 
 He was grateful for the least kindness. His ardent attach- 
 ment to myself, the way in which his eye followed me when 
 I at any time left home, and the manner in which he wel- 
 comed me on my return, showed how sensible he was of 
 the least kindness. He was always very attentive when 
 the Scriptures were explained, and heartily joined when a 
 psalm or hymn was sung. We found it sometimes useful 
 to refer, when reading the Scriptures, to parallel passages. 
 Those who first found these passages, read them aloud. 
 Simeon was frequently, if not generally, the first, on these 
 occasions, being well acquainted with his Bible." 
 
 Arabic being understood by the Man dingoes, on the 
 western coast of Africa, and the knowledge of it giving an 
 ascendancy in their opinion, Simeon began to learn Arabic ; 
 and had made, before his death, considerable progress in 
 reading and writing that language. He had also begun to 
 learn Latin. 
 
 His worthy preceptor requested him to endeavour occa- 
 sionally, to write on any texts which he might choose, such 
 sermons as he would wish to address to his countrymen 
 when he should return to Africa. I regret that space will 
 not allow the insertion of some of these, indicating as they 
 do a clear discernment of the gospel, and of its powerful 
 influence on the mind of this African youth ! Several let- 
 ters he wrote show where his treasure and his heart were. 
 " Oh, may I fear the Lord," he writes, " that he may teach 
 me, above all, to love Him and keep his commandments. 
 May the Lord deliver me from the vanity of my own 
 heart, and entirely keep me from the world, and not let 
 me be a mere professor of religion, but a doer of it ! &c. 
 
 When he became, from increasing weakness, confined to 
 his bed, the servants of the family waited on him with un- 
 wearied affection. He was attended by medical men, who 
 strove to recover him to health and usefulness, but in vain. 
 The Missionary, Henry C. Decker, watched over him wit 11 
 
 W) 
 

 % €x\h\i for tljr- llrgrn. 
 
 the most constant and kind attention, and his copious notes 
 made during his last illness, furnish an interestingly affect- 
 ing view of the gradually closing scene. 
 
 " Simeon," he says, " delighted in prayer, and in hearing 
 the Bible read to him ; and reminded me of a tender lamb, 
 which the faithful Shepherd bears in his arms, and nurses 
 in his bosom. I asked him sometimes if he was comforted 
 in his mind. 'Can you think on the Saviour?' 'Yes.' 
 1 Have you hope that your sins are forgiven you ? ' ' O 
 yes ! — He has shed his blood for me.' " 
 
 " He was very grateful for every thing that was done for 
 him. He desired me one day to read some chapters in the 
 Bible. I read the 3rd and 17th chapters of John, and 
 made some remarks on them. After being silent about 
 half an hour, he said : ■ True repentance ! pardoning grace ! 
 sanctification ! ' — and frequently repeated these words. I 
 asked him if he wanted anything. He answered : ' No ! 
 I must be silent and pray. I have very much to think re- 
 specting true repentance.'' He was, through the night, 
 very silent, and much occupied in prayer." 
 
 One morning H. D. having prayed with him, he prayed 
 beautifully himself at some length. " I was very glad to 
 hear this prayer," says H. D., " and was obliged to retire 
 for some minutes, in order to give free course to my tears 
 of gratitude to the Lord, for the grace given to this dear 
 youth. He was all the day very quiet and patient, not- 
 withstanding the increase of his fever. He expressed him- 
 self as being happy, and able to think on the Saviour and 
 his love ; but added, ' I have much to think respecting con- 
 version : therefore I want to be silent, and to pray in my 
 thoughts.' 
 
 " Simeon's illness continued to increase. When I some- 
 times spoke to him, he would say, ' I must be silent : I 
 have much to think on, and to pray for. I must be really 
 converted.' The Holy Spirit seemed to be more and more 
 preparing him for his heavenly mansion. After I had 
 
 \G) 
 
 3d 
 
386 
 
 % €x\hk for tjjt Higrii. 
 
 ^f communicated something comfortable to him, he remarked, 
 with a smiling countenance, ' That is a joyful message,' — 
 meaning it was adapted to his state — ' I am comfortable, I 
 feel no pain, all is over, I pray only that I may love the 
 Saviour more, who is so kind to me.' It was delightful to 
 see him so happy. He found it a great comfort, that he 
 had physicians, who not only provided him with medicines 
 for the body, but spoke to him concerning his soul. 
 
 " He one day asked for some paper, and tried to write ; 
 but being too weak to hold the pen, he said : ' Mr. Decker, 
 tell the boys at Bashia,' naming four of them, ' that Simeon 
 is going to the Saviour in heaven ; but he prays with his 
 dying lips to the Lord, that they may turn with all their 
 hearts to Jesus, and may be really converted by the power 
 of the Holy Spirit. He begs them to give over all their 
 hearts to him, that none of them, by remaining in unbelief 
 and sin, may be lost ; but that all, as true believers, may 
 meet with him in heaven.' " On his friend's saying, " Simeon, 
 you are very happy ; you will in a short time see the Sa- 
 viour in whom you have believed, and be a partaker of his 
 glory :" raising his voice, he exclaimed : " O Saviour, come ! 
 O Lord Jesus ! take me home to Thee ; I want to be with 
 Jesus ! — -You go to Africa, and I to heaven ; but we are 
 united in Christ." He afterwards said : " O Lord ! look 
 with thy compassion on a poor Negro lying here ! O Lord ! 
 hear the prayer of a dying Negro, and convert my country- 
 men ! send true preachers to them. Take me to heaven, 
 Lord Jesus ! " All present were moved to tears. 
 
 About two o'clock, on the morning of his death, he 
 asked for some refreshment ; when he had ate and drank, 
 he said cheerfully : " This is the last time — I want no more 
 — I shall go to my Saviour in heaven." He then poured out, 
 with a loud and distinct voice, a fervent prayer for himself, 
 for his relatives, for his countrymen, and for all his friends 
 and benefactors. He spoke continually of the joy of 
 being for ever with the Lord. About nine, he said to a 
 
3Sf fc (fC 
 
 % €nMt fnr tju JJrgrn. 
 
 387 
 
 & 
 
 companion, " pvay for Simeon, that the Lord may give him 
 patience." He then fell into a slumber ; and about ten 
 o'clock, after an illness of six weeks, he calmly fell asleep 
 in Jesus. 
 
 One of the kind friends who had been a good deal with 
 him during his last illness, and witnessed his final close, 
 observed, in a letter written soon after : — " This young 
 African died, under the most clear, decided, and powerful 
 influence of divine grace. His Christian intelligence and 
 tenderness charmed every one around him. His love to his 
 poor country was ardent, and his prayers unceasing. His 
 death has deeply impressed all of us who witnessed it. We 
 have had many anxious hours in this house respecting 
 Africa ; but God has placed before our eyes a scene, which 
 is a full reward for all that we have felt and feared. These 
 first-fruits gathered home to God assure us that an abun- 
 dant harvest will follow." 
 
 John Cooper, a brother-in-law of E. Bickersteth's, says : 
 — " I visited Simeon occasionally during his illness ; but 
 within the last week of his life, I saw him daily, and sat 
 up with him part of the two nights preceding the last. He 
 was usually in a serene and heavenly state of mind. At 
 every interview, I was constrained to admire the grace of 
 God in him. I cannot repeat all that he said on these oc- 
 casions ; but it was expressive of that humble and believing 
 state of mind, and that lively hope and longing to be with 
 Christ, which the Christian, who has borne the burden and 
 heat of the day for half a century, might rejoice to expe- 
 rience when he comes to die." 
 
 LOTTIS DESKOTJLEAUX. 
 
 Pinsum, a captain in the Slave Trade, and a Planter of 
 St. Domingo, had a confidential Slave, whom he was per- 
 petually flattering with the hope of speedy freedom ; but 
 the more pains he took to render himself useful, the more 
 
^.( 
 
 JA 38S 
 
 % €xlMi for \\)t J&gra. 
 
 firmly were his fetters rivetted. Louis Desrouleaux, whose 
 schemes for obtaining his liberty rendered him very 
 economical and laborious, soon amassed funds more than 
 sufficient to purchase his freedom. He offered them with 
 transport for the purchase of his independence, which had 
 been so often promised him. " I have too long traded with 
 the blood of my fellow-creatures," said his master, in a 
 tone of humiliation ; " be free ; you restore me to myself." 
 
 Pinsum, whose heart had been rather led astray than 
 corrupted, now sold all his effects, and embarked for France 
 with great riches ; but in a few years lost all and returned 
 to St. Domingo. Those who, when he was rich, called 
 themselves his friends, now took very little notice of him ; 
 but his emancipated Slave, who had acquired a fortune by 
 his industry, now supplied the place of his former friends. 
 Hearing of the situation of his old master, he hastened to 
 find him, and gave him lodging and food. Perceiving him, 
 however, unhappy, he proposed that he should return again 
 to France, and reside where his feelings would not be mor- 
 tified by the sight of ungrateful men. " My gratitude will 
 follow you," said the Negro, embracing his old master, 
 " here is a contract for an annual income of 1500 livres." 
 
 Pinsum wept for joy ; the annuity was always paid be- 
 forehand ; and some presents, as tokens of friendship, often 
 accompanied it, until the death of Louis Desrouleaux, in 
 1774. 
 
 PEINCE GAGANGHA ACQUA 
 
 A BRIEF NOTICE OF PRINCE GAGANGHA. EMANUEL ACQUA, SON OF ACQUA, KING 
 OF THE CAMAKONES, COMMUNICATED IN A LETTER TO THE AUTHOR BY 
 JOHN BURTT. 
 
 London, 5th of 2nd Mo., 1848. 
 My Dear Friend, 
 
 Amidst the attempts which have been made to depress 
 the African character, by exhibiting it as incapable of im- 
 provement, it becomes not only an agreeable, but an 
 
 W~ 
 
ft 
 
 E&r 
 
 1 £rttntte for tjie Jtfrgrn. 
 
 imperative duty, to adduce evidence of an opposite nature ; 
 and to show that circumstances, whether their influences 
 be good or evil, operate no less powerfully on the sable in- 
 habitants of a tropical climate, than on the natives of more 
 northern latitudes, where opportunities have been employed 
 to remove the ignorance of uncivilized man, and to invest 
 him with the glorious light of religion and science. How 
 has it raised the brutal to the rational — the degraded to 
 the noble — the idolatrous to the Christian character ! 
 What was once the condition of Druidical Britain, when, 
 in the most barbarous manner, parents sacrificed their off- 
 spring to senseless deities ? And to what can her present 
 position amongst the nations be attributed, but to that 
 expansion of knowledge, human and divine, with which she 
 has been pre-eminently favoured by the providence of 
 Him who hath made of one blood all the inhabitants of 
 the earth ? 
 
 These observations are naturally suggested by an out- 
 line of the history and character of Prince Gagangha 
 Emanuel Acqua, who, in 1832, having obtained permis- 
 sion of his father, the King of the Camarones, to visit 
 Cuba, embarked on board a Spanish schooner, as he him- 
 self expressed it, " to see the White man's country." The 
 vessel was freighted with a cargo of Slaves, probably in 
 part supplied by Acqua's father, who, like himself, had 
 been brought up in the odious traffic in human beings. 
 She was pursued and taken by an English man-of-war, on 
 board of which the Prince was detained about five months, 
 and was deprived of 300 dollars, the whole of what he had 
 brought for his travelling expenses. 
 
 Such a privation excited an unfavourable feeling on the 
 part of the sufferer, who could not clearly understand that 
 the fact of his having been met with on board a Slave-ship, 
 was, to say the least, a circumstance of strong suspicion of 
 wrong doing. While on board this vessel, he assisted in 
 capturing two other ships engaged in the same iniquitous 
 
390 
 
 % €vU& far \)t 3fegr& 
 
 traffic, one of which was freighted with 646 of his miser- 
 able countrymen. Acqua was taken to Jamaica, from 
 whence he proceeded to England, hoping to obtain a free 
 passage to Sierra Leone or Fernando Po. He was probably 
 encouraged in this hope not only by reflecting on his rank 
 as an African Prince, but as being the son of a chief whose 
 liberality to our countrymen was well known in his gratui- 
 tous supplies of provisions to the English captains on the 
 coast of Fernando Po. 
 
 On reaching Portsmouth, destitute of money, the Board 
 of Admiralty furnished him with the means of proceeding 
 to London, where, having letters of introduction from 
 several naval officers, he became a recipient of those 
 kindly attentions which well-recommended foreigners meet 
 with in the British metropolis. Here, amongst others, he 
 found a warm benefactor in Joseph Phillips, formerly of 
 Antigua, now a magistrate in the "West Indies. Under his 
 roof Prince Acqua was entertained in the kindest manner, 
 while waiting for an opportunity to return to his own 
 country. During his stay of some months in London, he 
 was under constant anxiety to be restored to his family 
 connexions ; which was rendered more intense by his per- 
 petual fear, that they would be distressed with a belief 
 that he had met with an untimely end. Thus, the feelings 
 of filial affection wrought powerfully on his yet untutored 
 mind, and evidenced the possession of moral qualities, which 
 his Christian friends felt it incumbent on them to cultivate 
 for the augmentation of his own happiness, as well as for 
 the benefit of those who might hereafter fall within the 
 sphere of his influence. 
 
 It is probable that until his arrival in England he had 
 seldom associated with such as recognize any feeling of jus- 
 tice towards his oppressed countrymen, or any desire to 
 promote the cause of humanity where it might interfere 
 with their own sordid interest. Trained in early life to 
 supply the Slave Captains with the victims of their avarice, 
 
% €tifok far tlji Jfogm 
 
 his mind had necessarily been brutalized by a system which 
 comprises every description of cruelty and fraud ; never- 
 theless, amidst the gloom of ignorance, of guilt, and super- 
 stition, the rudiments of future usefulness were discernible ; 
 and, from the judicious care he now experienced, it may 
 be hoped that his visit to our shores has already proved an 
 event of substantial benefit. 
 
 At the period referred to, I frequently saw him at my 
 own house, or at the residence of Joseph Phillips. We 
 perambulated many parts of the metropolis together, when 
 every faculty would at times appear to be absorbed in ad- 
 miration and astonishment ; and it required some care not 
 to overcharge his mind with those sudden transitions, which, 
 from the intensity of excitement, might prove almost over- 
 whelming. Under the dome of the cathedral, while sur- 
 veying its magnificent roof, he was far from being insensible 
 of that sublimity of feeling which has generally been con- 
 sidered incompatible with the African intellect. There, I 
 observed the hand which had probably set fire to many a 
 Negro hut, and seized and bound the terrified inhabitant, 
 itself bound as by the spell of some power hitherto un- 
 known ; and which, placed on his temples, seemed for a 
 time perfectly disabled by the sudden rush of new and 
 multitudinous ideas that evidently oppressed him. The 
 same effect was observable when from the summit of the 
 monument he was shown the habitations of two millions of 
 human beings. On such occasions he would for some mo- 
 ments appear incapable of articulation, only manifesting 
 his feelings by a peculiar expression of the countenance, 
 presently followed by some such expressions as these — 
 " Ah ! White men know everything ; I cannot speak what 
 I think." 
 
 Prince Acqua more and more highly appreciated Euro- 
 pean knowledge ; and I well recollect, while upon the lofty 
 column already named, he was not only greatly affected with 
 the stupendous scene, but at that juncture in particular, 
 
 M 
 
392 
 
 % flMrate far \\t Jlrgra. 
 
 he was earnest in soliciting me to go home with him 
 to instruct the Camarone people in useful learning, as- 
 suring me that I should be liberally rewarded in the best 
 products of the soil ; and judging from an observation which 
 I once heard him make in connection with the superior 
 attainments of Europeans over his own countrymen, the 
 schoolmaster is indeed wanted in his father's dominions. 
 Their mode of accounting for our superiority is, by sup- 
 posing that at the creation, " White men" were made of 
 the best material, while the refuse only had been used in 
 the formation of our sable brethren. In his own country, 
 when anything of peculiar excellence was exhibited, he 
 said it was common to view it as the immediate workman- 
 ship of a divine hand ; " but now," he exclaimed with evi- 
 dent delight, " I have myself seen such things made by 
 men." Such expressions were interesting as throwing a 
 light on our species when in an uncivilized state ; but the 
 following account which he gave of the manner of supply- 
 ing the White traders with their victims is truly affecting. 
 It naturally leads to the sad reflection, how deplorable it 
 is that professing Christians should occasion the horrible 
 outrages on humanity which are daily perpetrated. 
 
 " We take many men," said he, " who can shoot : my 
 father has forty hundred men who can use guns which he 
 has bought. We walk many days until we come near, and 
 then only walk at night, and enter the village. A few men 
 fire their guns ; the people awake and run out ; we fire 
 and kill a few, and surprise them all during their fright. 
 We take as many as we can away, and drive them before us 
 tied together, and sell them to the factors. We give them a 
 man for a gun ; sometimes for hatchets and clothes. It is 
 wrong to sell a man, but they (the White Christians) will 
 have nothing else for their guns and clothes. It is your 
 fault that we sell him : you do more wrong than we do, 
 because you know better. You have the Book ; you 
 know God, &c." 
 
 >i 
 
 Wl 
 
% €x\fo\t far tjjB Urgra. 
 
 393 
 
 It was interesting to witness the gradations by which the 
 cheering beams of intelligence occupied the former abodes 
 of ignorance and superstition. After being shown many 
 mechanical operations, he was conducted through various 
 exhibitions of natural history, antiquities, &c. ; and while 
 enjoying the rich gratification afforded by the British Mu- 
 seum, I found ample opportunity for observing the gifts, 
 which, although long uncultivated, had been liberally be- 
 stowed on this our sable brother by the common parent of 
 mankind. At the same time I rejoiced in the assurance 
 that in England at least, he had a circle of friends, who, 
 during his continuance amongst them, were anxious so to 
 exercise his various faculties, that they might be as per- 
 fectly developed as circumstances would allow. In the 
 British Museum, Acqua, with much interest, drew my at- 
 tention to specimens of ingenuity brought from his own 
 country, which he quickly discovered ; and the readiness 
 with which he comprehended my explanations of things 
 hitherto unknown, afforded abundant evidence that his 
 stock of general knowledge was not only increasing, but that 
 correct views on the most important subjects were also 
 taking possession of his mind. Pointing out some of the 
 idols of Fernando Po, he showed his sense of the absurdity 
 of holding them in reverence by emphatically remarking 
 that if they were Gods they would not suffer themselves 
 to be taken captive, and be there confined within the nar- 
 row precincts of a house. 
 
 An excitement arising from anxiety to return home 
 operated against any systematic mode of instruction which 
 Prince Acqua might otherwise have received, yet his ac- 
 quirements of a religious nature were satisfactorily pro- 
 gressing. The following anecdote was related to me by my 
 friend Jeremiah Wifrln, the elegant translator of Tasso : — 
 
 The prince having been taken to two places of public 
 worship, described what he saw and felt in a manner which 
 proved his attention and discrimination. Having taken his 
 
 6 E 
 
Vv( 
 
 
 394 
 
 51 €i\Mi fnf \\t HBgrn. 
 
 seat in the place to which he was first introduced, he ob- 
 served the air of indifference with which several came in and 
 walked to their seats : to him, he said, some appeared proud 
 and haughty, and others light and inattentive ; but little 
 seriousness being discernible. The music, he said, pro- 
 duced no effect on his mind but an inclination to dance. 
 At the second place to which he was taken, he said he saw 
 a number of persons sitting in a serious frame of mind, 
 amongst whom he soon became serious himself. Presently 
 one of them arose, and spoke in a manner which he said 
 appeared " wonderful" ; his spiritual condition being so 
 clearly addressed as forcibly to remind him of his former sins, 
 and to convince him " how wicked he was." His conscience 
 was so powerfully awakened, that in a humble state of 
 mind, yet with an originality of expression which was com- 
 mon to him, he declared to his friends that he had been 
 wholly subdued. " The preacher," said he, " gave me a 
 great blow, and knocked me down." 
 
 During his stay in London, Prince Acqua was introduced 
 to Lord John Russell, and to that indefatigable friend of 
 the African, Thos. Fowell Buxton. The latter, amongst 
 other marks of attention, presented him with a case furnished 
 with the necessary apparatus for writing, and having the 
 following inscription engraved on a plate : — 
 
 GAGANGHA EMANUEL ACQUA, 
 
 PRINCE ROYAL OF THE CAMARONES TN AFRICA. 
 
 THIS CASE WAS PRESENTED TO HIM WHEN IN ENGLAND, 
 
 NOV. 10, 18 32, 
 
 BY THOMAS FOWELL BUXTON, ESQ., 
 
 MEMBER OF THE BRITISH PARLIAMENT, 
 
 THE FAITHFUL ADVOCATE FOR THE ABOLITION OF THE SLAVE TRADE 
 
 AND SLAVERY THROUGHOUT THE WORLD. 
 
 Considerable pains were taken to imbue the mind of Ac- 
 qua with a due regard to the natural rights of man, and the 
 
 t5 r\€D 
 
ft €nlwt? for tjre Jfegrs. 
 
 395 
 
 importance of treating all our fellow creatures with justice 
 and humanity ; and it was a great satisfaction that he who 
 had been trained to cruelty, and made familiar with atro- 
 city and bloodshed, became so far a convert to the cause of 
 right, as to declare his sense of the evils of Slavery, and to 
 condemn the traffic in men as a system of the grossest ini- 
 quity. Whilst lamenting that his own people took part 
 in supporting it, he justly complained of those European 
 nations which employed their capital in perpetuating its 
 horrors ; stating that scarcely a White man who visited his 
 native shores was worthy of being trusted : that they op- 
 posed every measure for instructing his countrymen, the 
 more easily to impose on their ignorance. " Only one," 
 said he, " of all the captains who have had transactions with 
 my father has been a good man." All the rest he charged 
 with having deceived and robbed either the king or his 
 people ; who, degraded as they are, nevertheless earnestly 
 desire improvement. 
 
 For the purpose of being educated, two of Acqua's 
 brothers had formerly been confided to the care of a Liver- 
 pool merchant of high standing ; instead of which he em- 
 ployed them in manual labour several years, and finally 
 sent them back nearly as ignorant as they were on the 
 day of their arrival ; by which dishonest conduct the laud- 
 able intentions of their father were cruelly defeated. 
 
 With a vivid recollection of such treatment, the prince 
 naturally feared that his long absence from his native land 
 would create in his father's mind painful apprehensions for 
 his safety. Alas ! alas ! what confidence can the untaught 
 African place in the refined, the intelligent, the highly 
 professing European ! 
 
 Prince Acqua was partially acquainted with the English, 
 Spanish, and Portuguese languages. His complexion was 
 of a jet black ; and scientific men much admired the 
 organic structure of his head. His general bearing was 
 also considered to indicate a degree of conscious superiority ; 
 
396 
 
 % trite for tip JJrgrn. 
 
 and, notwithstanding the disadvantages of his early train- 
 ing, he was remarkably humane towards the poor ; which 
 was once particularly evinced when we met with an in- 
 dustrious artisan, whose wages were inadequate to his 
 wants. With a countenance full of commiseration, he 
 solemnly uttered these expressive words, " God Almighty 
 does not like it to be so." Deeply interesting and instruc- 
 tive were many of his expressions, characterized as they 
 often were with energy, originality, and native simplicity ; 
 and I may here observe that the solicitude which had been 
 felt for his welfare during a visit of some months, was not 
 diminished by his departure for Sierra Leone ; to which 
 place a free passage was granted by the Government. 
 
 Prince Acqua left England near the end of 1832; and 
 by a letter from Captain Stevens dated " Sierra Leone, the 
 22nd of Jan., 1833," we received many gratifying particu- 
 lars respecting him ; especially his grateful acknowledg- 
 ments of the kindness he had received in London ; of 
 which he requested the Captain to say he could not find 
 sufficient words to express the fullness of his feeling. Sa- 
 tisfactory mention was also made of his continued progress 
 in useful learning, and his desire to adhere to the instruc- 
 tions which had been bestowed upon him. Captain Stevens 
 likewise expressed his belief that if Acqua should continue 
 to cherish the feelings and principles which then actuated 
 him, he would prove instrumental in promoting the cause 
 of human happiness in his own country. 
 
 To so true a friend of the Coloured people as thyself, I 
 need make no apology for the length of this letter, the 
 tenor of which appears to harmonize with thy " Tribute 
 for the Negro," and to corroborate the opinion entertained 
 by thee of the capacity of the African for receiving moral 
 and intellectual improvement. Prince Acqua arrived in 
 England ignorant, superstitious, and vitiated ; the natural 
 result of disadvantages which had ever attended him ; but 
 after a few months of judicious management, his range of 
 
 ■u M 
 
51 tiftMe far tjjt Srgrn. 
 
 397 
 
 thought was enlarged and refined ; moral and religious 
 principles were readily imbibed ; and instead of desiring 
 to renew those outrages on humanity to which he had been 
 unhappily trained, there was reason to hope that he re- 
 turned to his native land, with a sincere disposition to 
 labour for its permanent improvement. 
 
 Having now, my dear friend, complied with thy request, 
 as far as many interruptions would allow, 
 
 I have only to subscribe myself, 
 Friends' Boarding House, Affectionately thine, 
 
 Liverpool Street, London. JOHN BURTT. 
 
 m 
 
 BENOIT THE BLACK. 
 
 Benoit the Black, of Palermo, also named Benoit of St. 
 Philadelphia, or of Santo Fratello, and sometimes Benoit the 
 Moor, was a Negro, the son of a Negress Slave. Roccho 
 Pirro, author of the Sicilia Sacra, characterizes him by 
 these words : — " Nigro quidem corpore sed candore animi 
 prseclarisimus quem et miraculis Deus contestatum esse 
 voluit." " His body was black, but it pleased God to tes- 
 tifiy by miracles the whiteness of his soul." 
 
 Historians praise in Benoit that assemblage of eminent 
 virtues, which, content to have God only as a witness, 
 conceal themselves from the sight of man ; for real virtues 
 are mostly silent. Sometimes, however, the modest veil 
 which conceals merit is removed, and it is owing to this 
 that Benoit has escaped oblivion. He died at Palermo, in 
 1589, where his tomb and memory are generally revered. 
 Roccho Pirro, Father Arthur, Gravima, and many other 
 writers, are full of eulogy concerning this venerable 
 Negro. 
 
 BENJAMIN COCEBANE. 
 " I had a visit very lately," says Dr. Madden, " from 
 three Mandingo Negroes, natives of Africa. They could 
 
^l( 
 
 398 
 
 51 €xihli fnr tju &grfl, 
 
 (skLli 
 
 TP 
 
 all read and write Arabic ; and one of them showed me a 
 Koran written from memory by himself. One of them, 
 Benjamin Cockrane, a free Negro who practised with no 
 •little success as a doctor in Kingston, was in the habit of 
 coming to me on Sundays, to give me information about 
 the medical plants and popular medicine of the country ; 
 and a more intelligent and respectable person, in every 
 sense of the word, I do not know. As an Arabic scholar, 
 his attainments are very trifling, but his skill as a Negro 
 doctor, one of the English physicians of Kingston assured 
 me was considerable. He had lately known him called to 
 a young lady, where, with his herbs and simples he had 
 effected a successful cure of a serious malady. When he 
 comes to me, he drives in his own gig, attended by his ser- 
 vant. His history is like that of hundreds of others in 
 Jamaica, ' except these bonds,' which he, by extraordinary 
 industry and good conduct, has managed to shuffle off. I 
 took down the heads of his story pretty much in his own 
 words, as he related it to me in the presence of the attorney- 
 general, to whom I made him known, likewise to Dr. Cham- 
 berlain ; and I believe both these gentlemen will vouch for 
 the fact that there is at least one Negro in the world who 
 is an intelligent, well-conducted, right-thinking man, and 
 not so very nearly connected with the class of brutes, as 
 the reverend author of ' Annals of Jamaica' would lead us 
 to infer. 
 
 "I received a letter, about a month before I left Jamaica, 
 from my friend Cockrane. He wished to become a mem- 
 ber of the College of Physicians here, and, knowing no 
 reason why a Negro should not be admitted, if duly quali- 
 fied, I undertook to speak to one of the officers, and as- 
 certain if there would be any opposition to his presentation 
 as a candidate for examination on the score of complexion, 
 provided he was duly qualified. Had I remained, it was 
 my intention to assist him to carry his purpose into 
 effect." 
 
ROSETTA; THE NEGRO GIRL. 
 
 The following narrative evinces that the Negro character 
 is not devoid of either humanity or magnanimity, when 
 fairly tested; and also, that the female of that unjustly de- 
 graded race, is as competent to sustain the several charac- 
 ters of wife, mother, and friend, in all their endearing 
 socialities, as those who assume a much higher standing in 
 the great human family. John Minns was born about the 
 year 1770, and received a good, plain, and religious educa- 
 tion at " The Friends' School and Workhouse," Clerken- 
 well — an establishment belonging to the Society, carried 
 on in a large old-fashioned mansion, said to have been the 
 residence of Oliver Cromwell, or some of his court. From 
 this establishment, he was placed out as an apprentice to a 
 baker, a Friend, of Reading. Having acquired a compe- 
 tent knowledge of his business, he absconded from his 
 place, for some unknown cause, being then about eighteen 
 years of age. 
 
 After considerable search and inquiries instituted by his 
 friends, he was given up as lost ; but, to their surprise and 
 joy, after sixteen years' hopeless suspense, he was heard 
 of, and as carrying on a prosperous business as a baker, in 
 one of the Bahama islands. It appears that after so long 
 a life of secrecy in exile, his heart began to feel for his aged 
 father and the rest of the family, and a strong desire to 
 know, should they be still in the land of the living, how 
 they fared. Accordingly, he made a confidant of one of 
 his friends, who w r as about to embark for England, and en- 
 trusted him with the secret of his history, charging him to 
 search out his father, and make known to him that his son 
 John was still alive, and give him an outline of his remark- 
 able history. From this time a warm and affectionate cor- 
 respondence took place between John Minns and his father 
 and sister, which was continued during their lives. 
 
 John Minns, after absconding from his apprenticeship, 
 engaged himself in some subordinate situation in a ship 
 
 IK. 
 
400 
 
 % €x\Mt far \\t Ifrgra. 
 
 about to sail for the West Indies. This was at a period 
 when the Slave-trade and Slavery were in the zenith of 
 their dark domain, and ruled and reigned over the hearts 
 and consciences of every class of men. Being of sober and 
 frugal habits, after a few years he acquired a little pro- 
 perty, and commenced trading in various articles of mer- 
 chandize amongst the islands. 
 
 On one of these expeditions he took his passage onboard 
 a vessel which foundered off New Providence, one of the 
 Bahama islands. On board the same ship there was a 
 Slave dealer with several Negroes, whom he had to dispose 
 of when he should fall in with a market suited to his pur- 
 pose. Having been some time at sea, the ship sprang a 
 dangerous leak, and at length was deserted by the captain 
 and crew when about two miles from shore. The Slave 
 dealer found it impossible to save the lives of the Negroes 
 by means of the ship's boat, which, indeed, was scarcely 
 equal to carry the captain and crew, besides some other 
 passengers then on board. As a forlorn hope, therefore, 
 he took off the manacles from his Slaves, and gave them 
 the chance of saving their lives by swimming. By some 
 circumstance, whether by accident or design does not ap- 
 pear, the boat put off with all the crew and passengers ex- 
 cept John Minns, who was left on board the sinking ship. 
 Not being able to swim, his distress of mind, on reflecting 
 on his hopeless situation, may be more easily conceived 
 than described. With the prospect of immediate death 
 before him, he endeavoured to resign himself to the will 
 of God, and put up a prayer for mercy to his soul. 
 
 It pleased Providence, however, to move the heart of 
 one of the female Slaves on board (named Rosetta) to his 
 situation, and to devise means for his preservation. She 
 procured a feather-bed from one of the berths, and having 
 securely lashed it to his back, she requested him to lower 
 himself down the ship's side into the sea, when she would 
 assist him to gain the shore. This expedient appeared to 
 
 (TIT 
 
% €xiMi for tjjr #rgrn. 
 
 401 
 
 John Minns but a forlorn hope, yet, as no other means 
 were at hand, and time was wearing fast away, he submitted 
 himself to the generous proposal. His sable benefactress, 
 being herself an able and expert swimmer, was soon in the 
 sea to assist the poor, helpless, White man, down the ship's 
 side. She then laid him gently on the bosom of the un- 
 stable element, with the bed attached to his back, and 
 having secured one corner of it between her teeth, she pro- 
 ceeded on her perilous voyage, towing her singular cargo 
 towards the shore ; and in this way they both reached the 
 land in safety. 
 
 After John Minns had devoutly acknowledged the inter- 
 position of a kind Providence in his preservation, he en- 
 deavoured to devise a suitable retribution to her who had 
 been the means of his remarkable escape from impending 
 death. He concluded it was his duty, by every means in 
 his power, to endeavour to obtain Rosetta's freedom from 
 Slavery. Most of the other Slaves had, by great exertion, 
 reached the shore ; and, as they were soon in a condition 
 to be offered for sale, their owner gave public notice of it 
 in the island. John Minns now entered into a negotiation 
 for the purchase of Rosetta ; but her cruel owner, instead 
 of sympathizing with his feelings, took the advantage of 
 asking such an exorbitant price for her as was quite beyond 
 his means ; and for some time it was doubtful whether the 
 desired change of masters for the meritorious girl could be 
 accomplished. Rosetta was aware of these impediments, 
 and extremely anxious that they should be surmounted, 
 fondly hoping that he whom she had been the means of de- 
 livering from a watery grave, would, from motives of gra- 
 titude and compassion, be the means of restoring her to 
 freedom, and, perhaps, to her endeared connexions in 
 Africa, from whose embraces she had been cruelly torn 
 away. 
 
 This was indeed a time of anxious suspense to poor Ro- 
 setta ; but at length, to her great joy, the bargain was 
 
TV 
 
 402 
 
 % €x\Mt far tjjj Jhgrn. 
 
 concluded ; she found herself in the hands of a kind and 
 humane master, and now she neither feared the lash of the 
 taskmaster, nor the abuse of the manager. John Minns 
 soon afterwards commenced business as a baker at Nassau, 
 in the island of New Providence ; and as his trade in- 
 creased, he found Rosetta of great advantage to him, not 
 only in his business, but in his domestic arrangements. 
 Besides a high character for fidelity to her employer, and 
 a capacity for domestic duties, she possessed the form and 
 figure of an African beauty — was young, strong, and active. 
 
 All these circumstances tended to create an attachment 
 in his mind towards his faithful servant, and he not only de- 
 termined to free her by law from bondage, but also to make 
 her his wife. Their marriage, brought about by events of 
 so extraordinary a character, was productive of a large 
 share of happiness to both parties. They had a family of 
 children, and lived for several years in great harmony, until 
 Rosetta died in giving birth to an infant. On her death- 
 bed she conversed with great composure on her approaching 
 end. She spoke very affectionately to her sorrowful hus- 
 band, and addressed each of her children separately ; but 
 it was supposed she had forgotten the infant, when, after a 
 considerable pause, she said, " And God will be a father to 
 the motherless child," and almost immediately she breathed 
 her last. Her loss, as described by her husband, was 
 lamented in the neighbourhood where she resided, and her 
 funeral was attended by a large concourse of the inhabi- 
 tants, rich and poor, black and white, bond and free. Her 
 husband always spoke of her with the greatest affection, 
 affirming, that during the years she had been his wife, she 
 never gave him a moment's pain, nor did he ever receive an 
 unkind word from her lips. 
 
 Rosetta Minns used to describe herself as the daughter 
 of an African prince ; and it is supposed she was taken 
 captive in one of those cruel wars which are fomented be- 
 tween the chiefs by European intrigue, for the sake of 
 
|m 51 €tM& far ijj? Urgrn. 
 
 sharing in the spoil — the prisoners on either side being 
 sold into Slavery. She appeared to have, at first, but very 
 indistinct views of Christianity, but said that missionaries 
 had been amongst her people. On further intercourse with 
 Christian society, her mind became expanded and capable 
 of receiving the truths of the Gospel in its purity and sim- 
 plicity. One of her greatest enjoyments was that of lis- 
 tening to the reading of the Bible, and she was accustomed 
 to speak in terms of great admiration of the efforts of the 
 Bible Society to spread the Scriptures throughout the 
 world ; frequently expressing her anxious wish that her 
 beloved relatives in her native land might become ac- 
 quainted with the contents of that blessed book. 
 
 A trivial circumstance may be noticed here, as charac- 
 teristic of the abject feeling of caste which pervades the 
 Negro mind, in regard to the well-known prejudice against 
 colour in the Whites. John Minns was once reading to 
 his wife a letter which he had received from his sister in 
 England, in which the following passage occurred : — " Give 
 my love to poor sister." On hearing this, poor Rosetta 
 was overcome with gratitude and astonishment, to find that 
 a female of another complexion than her own could not 
 only love her, but was willing to acknowledge her as a sis- 
 ter — at hearing which she broke out into tears. 
 
 John Minns was employed by the Government as baker 
 to the King's troops, and was much respected in the island. 
 The authorities there had regard to those religious scru- 
 ples which he was known to entertain, as respects fighting 
 and swearing. He was never required to take an oath, or 
 to do military duty, although the law then required every 
 man to bear arms, and to be prepared to be called out on 
 military service. Free persons of Colour were subjected 
 to many privations and indignities, and liable, without clear 
 proof of title to freedom, to be reduced to Slavery. It 
 was a practice with John Minns, in order to make their 
 title to freedom beyond dispute or cavil, to buy a piece of 
 
 M 
 
 W> 
 
^( 
 
 (®/1TP 
 
 404 
 
 % €xlhk for i\)t jStp, 
 
 freehold for each of his children, soon after they were born, 
 taking care to have it legally registered in the name of the 
 child. Two of his sons (Men of Colour) were educated in 
 England, and were persons of considerable talent ; they em- 
 ployed their pen in remonstrating against the unjust restric- 
 tions to which the free people of Colour were then subject. 
 They were not only debarred the franchise, but their oath, 
 when opposed to the word of a White man, was not re- 
 garded in any of the courts of justice, which exposed them 
 to much vexation and pecuniary loss from unprincipled and 
 litigious persons. Such has been the reformation of late 
 years in the jurisprudence of these islands, that Free Per- 
 sons of Colour are admitted to all the rights of citizenship. 
 It is understood that these two individuals are now in office 
 under the Government, and one of them in the commission 
 of the peace. 
 
 DISINTERESTED TESTIMONY TO NEGEO ABILITY 
 AND FAITHFULNESS. 
 
 Robert Jowitt, of Leeds, states that he was much pleased 
 with an intelligent American gentleman from Virginia, who 
 visited England some years ago. In conversing with him 
 on the subject of Slavery, he acknowledged it to be a very 
 great evil, and that the wretched condition of the State in 
 which he resided afforded strong evidence of it ; but he 
 considered it a necessary evil, so interwoven with their 
 various institutions that it could not by any means be 
 abolished. 
 
 We need not be surprised at this gentleman's viewing 
 Slavery in this light, as he was himself interested in the 
 system ; yet on this very ground, his evidence respecting 
 the capabilities of the Negro is the more valuable. He 
 asserted that he had not the slightest doubt of the equality 
 of the Black and White races ; and moreover, that the in- 
 tegrity and faithfulness of some of the Blacks was remark- 
 able. As a proof of this, he instanced a Slave he had in 
 
51 'dfritatfe far tin Ifogra 
 
 405 
 
 his own employment at home, who was a most valuable 
 assistant to him, and in whom his confidence was unbounded. 
 
 ALEXANDRE PETION. 
 
 Alexandre Petion, already alluded to in our " Glance 
 at the History of St. Domingo," was one of the first Presi- 
 dents of the republic of Hayti. He was a Mulatto, but 
 of a very dark complexion, and received his education in 
 the military school of Paris. Being a man of cultivated 
 understanding, and attractive manners, and moreover, well 
 instructed in the art of war, he served in the French, and 
 afterwards in the Haytian armies, with success and reputa- 
 tion. He was in high esteem as a skilful engineer, in 
 which capacity he rendered the most essential service to 
 Toussaint and Desalines. 
 
 Petion was a man of fine talents, acute feelings, and 
 honourable intentions, but not fully adapted for the station 
 he was called upon to fill. The Haytians, just liberated 
 from absolute Slavery, without education, habits of thought, 
 moral energy, and perfect rectitude of character, so neces- 
 sary in a government perfectly republican, stood in need of 
 a ruler less kind, gentle, and humane, than Petion. In con- 
 sequence of this, his people relaxed in their attention to 
 agriculture, his finances became disorganized, and his coun- 
 try impoverished. The unfortunate Petion, disheartened at 
 a state of things which he saw no means of remedying, 
 sunk into a state of despondency, which ended, it is said, 
 in voluntary death. 
 
 Petion was perhaps less beloved in his life-time, than his 
 memory has been venerated since his death. High mass is 
 said every year for his departed soul, with great pomp and 
 circumstance, according to the rites of the Romish church ; 
 and the people appear to look back upon him with more 
 than a common feeling of kindness and regard, as the father 
 and friend of his country. His body, encased in a coffin, 
 
 ■ gffi ^ ^ 
 
 
 sS) 
 
406 
 
 % €x\Mi fnr \\t %%m» 
 
 lies in an open cenotaph fronting the government house, 
 and by the side of it, that of his only daughter: both 
 coffins are occasionally decorated with simple native 
 offerings. 
 
 " There is no doubt," says Candler, " that Petion was a 
 patriot, and that he sincerely desired the welfare of Hayti : 
 he was greatly averse to the shedding of blood, and had 
 often to check the impetuosity and vengeance of the gene- 
 rals who commanded under him ; some accounts represent 
 him to have starved himself to death through vexation at 
 the slow progress of his people towards civilization ; this 
 may have been the case, as he was of a sanguine tempera- 
 ment, and was exceedingly thwarted in some of his plans 
 for the public good ; but a physician of Port-au-Prince 
 assured me that such was not really the fact, and that he 
 died of inanition from natural causes." 
 
 An interesting and pleasing trait in the character of Pe- 
 tion is exhibited in an anecdote related by the author above 
 quoted, with which I shall conclude this brief sketch. " In 
 1815, a visit of a religious character was paid to some parts 
 of Hayti by Stephen Grellet, a native of France, and a min- 
 ister of the Society of Friends. Petion, who was at that 
 time President of the Island, received him with great cor- 
 diality, and permitted him to preach to his soldiers from 
 the steps of the palace ; himself and his staff attending as 
 auditors." 
 
 JAMES W. C. PENNINGTON. 
 
 The minister of the first Coloured Presbyterian church 
 in New York, a man truly exemplary, and of high moral 
 and religious standing, is a fugitive from Slavery. His 
 parents and grand-parents were stolen from Africa and died 
 in Slavery. He was therefore born a Slave, and remained 
 one a considerable portion of his life. Such, in all proba- 
 bility, he would have continued to remain, had he not 
 
I Crikfc for tljne Jfegm 
 
 .$> 
 
 effected his escape from the oppressor ; — have worn out his 
 life in perpetual bondage, and ended his days, like most of 
 his race, under the galling yoke of fetters and chains, or 
 the smart inflicted by the whip of the unrelenting driver. 
 This estimable man, who, in Slavery was degraded to 
 nearly a level with the brute, is still liable to be re-enslaved 
 according to the laws of the United States. In him we 
 have a specimen of what the Slave population consists, and 
 a living proof as to how far they are capable of being ele- 
 vated, in a moral, intellectual, and religious point of view. 
 James W. C. Pennington was born in Maryland, in 1809. 
 His grandfather was a Chief of the Mandingoes, and both 
 his parents and grand-parents being Negroes, he is of pure 
 African blood and descent. He was a Slave until twenty 
 years of age, at which period he effected his escape. 
 
 The fugitive first found a shelter at the house of a Friend 
 in Pennsylvania, with whom he remained six months. " It 
 was while living with this Friend," he observes, " and by 
 his kind attention in teaching me, that I acquired my first 
 knowledge of writing, arithmetic, and geography." In these 
 he made rapid progress during the six months, at the ex- 
 piration of which, it became necessary for his safety to 
 remove further north, to be more out of the reach of men- 
 stealers. He therefore removed to Long Island. Here, 
 he soon felt the loss of his kind Friend and tutor, but he 
 was successful in obtaining employment, and remained in 
 the service of one gentleman for three years, during the 
 whole of which period his scanty leisure was closely occu- 
 pied in study. 
 
 Pennington had so far improved himself at the expiration 
 of five years from the time of his escape from Slavery, that 
 an application was made to him, to teach a small school of 
 Coloured children, at New Town, near Flushing, on Long 
 Island. Being previously examined by a committee, his 
 services were accepted, and he taught the school success- 
 fully for two years. 
 
 M 
 
% €i\hit for tju if?grn. 
 
 Having experienced, about three years prior to this 
 period, a saving change of mind, and feeling a strong desire 
 to become more useful, Pennington removed to New Haven 
 in Connecticut, where he obtained a larger school, and also 
 entered a Theological Seminary to prepare himself for the 
 ministry. Here, he taught and studied history, astronomy, 
 algebra, philosophy, logic, rhetoric, and systematic theo- 
 logy. At the expiration of three years he returned to 
 New Town, renewed his former services there, and being 
 also ordained as a minister of the Gospel, he soon gathered 
 aflourishing congregation. After labouringhere two yearshe 
 was removed to Hartford in Connecticut, where he preached 
 eight years, and part of the time also taught a school. 
 
 Pennington has been five times appointed to a seat in 
 the General Conventions for the improvement of the Free 
 Coloured people. In 1843, he was elected by Connecticut 
 State, to attend the World's Anti-Slavery Convention ; 
 also by the American Peace Society to represent them in 
 the World's Peace Convention, both these meetings being 
 held the same year in London. On this occasion, he ad- 
 dressed the Anti-Slavery Convention at considerable length, 
 his speech occupying several closely printed octavo pages 
 in the report of the proceedings of that interesting and im- 
 portant assembly. It is well expressed, and contains much 
 valuable statistical information. Our limits preclude any 
 extracts being given. 
 
 During his visit in England, Pennington preached in 
 many of the principal chapels of the Independents and other 
 Dissenters. He moved on a footing of social and intellec- 
 tual equality with the ministers and people of his own 
 persuasion ; he was, in fact, owing to his abilities as a 
 preacher, sought out to supply the pulpits of some of the 
 most popular ministers of the day. 
 
 On Pennington's return to America, he was received 
 with much favour, and has subsequently exchanged pulpits 
 with eight or ten of the leading ministers in Connecticut. 
 
ZC/ 2 ;l/ /<> r^/fT'y^ 
 
 s 
 
 MANC II E STEB : 
 William IRWIN, 39. OLOHAM S' 
 

% frilmtr for tjji Jfcgfli. 
 
 409 
 
 )% 
 
 He is a member of the Hartford Central Association of 
 Congregational Ministers, which consists of about twenty 
 of the leading ministers of that denomination in the State. 
 He has been twice elected President of this Association, in 
 which capacity he presided over assemblies composed en- 
 tirely of Whites. At a recent meeting at which he was 
 chosen President, two young men presented themselves for 
 licenses to preach. The rules require the President to 
 examine the candidates on experimental religion, Church 
 history, and various parts of theology. This he did ac- 
 ceptably ; the White candidates were both licensed, and 
 their certificates were signed by the Black President. One 
 of the young men was a native of Kentucky, a Slave State, 
 though not himself a Slave-holder. At the same meeting, 
 Pennington was appointed a deputation to the General 
 Conference of Congregational ministers of the State of 
 Maine. A short time ago, a friend, without his knowledge, 
 constituted him a member for life of the American Tract 
 Society, by paying the necessary amount of money. 
 
 James W. C. Pennington is now the settled minister of 
 the first Coloured Presbyterian church of New York, and 
 is a member of the Presbytery. In 1841 he published a 
 volume of about 100 pages, 12rno., entitled " A Text Book 
 of the Origin and History of the Coloured People." He 
 has also published an " Address on West India Emancipa- 
 tion," some sermons, &c. When the question of granting 
 the privilege of citizens to the Coloured population was 
 brought before the people of Connecticut, one of the pub- 
 lic papers objected to the measure on the ground that the 
 Blacks are inferior to the Whites. Pennington invited a 
 public meeting, and refuted the calumny before a very large 
 audience of Whites. 
 
 The portrait of this worthy man is engraved from a 
 photograph, taken at the gallery of Samuel Topham, of 
 Leeds, who kindly allowed the author the use of a duplicate 
 he had preserved for himself. 
 
 m 
 
 3g 
 
IGNATIUS SANCHO. 
 
 The parents of this interesting Negro were brought from 
 Guinea, in a Slave-ship, and he was horn on its passage to 
 the Spanish West Indies in 1729. When they arrived at 
 Carthagena, he was baptized by the Bishop, who named 
 him Ignatius. The change of climate, and other sufferings, 
 soon brought his mother to the grave ; and his father being 
 doomed to the horrors of Slavery, in a moment of despair, 
 put an end to his existence with his own hands. 
 
 The little Slave was not two years old when he was taken 
 to England, and presented to three young maiden ladies, 
 sisters, who resided at Greenwich. Their prejudices 
 against the African had taught them that ignorance was 
 the only security for his obedience, and that to enlarge the 
 mind of their Slave would only assist in emancipating his 
 person. They surnamed him Sancho, from his droll and 
 humorous nature, and a fancied resemblance to the Squire 
 of Don Quixote, and ever afterwards he called himself 
 Ignatius Sancho. 
 
 The Duke of Montague, who was a frequent visitor at 
 the house of Sancho's mistresses, admired in the Negro 
 boy a native frankness of manner, which, though unrefined 
 by education, was yet unbroken by servitude. The Duke 
 took an interest in him, and frequently brought him home 
 to the Duchess, encouraged his turn for reading with pre- 
 sents of books, and urged on his mistresses the duty of cul- 
 tivating by education a genius of such apparent fertility. 
 But his advice was unheeded by the unfeeling ladies, who 
 were inflexible, and even sometimes threatened to return 
 the Negro into Slavery. 
 
 At length, on the death of his mistresses, his kind friend 
 and patron the Duke of Montague being also deceased, 
 the Duchess, who secretly admired his character, admitted 
 him into her household, where he remained till she died, 
 when, through economy and a legacy she left him, he was 
 possessed of £70., and an annuity of £30. This might have 
 
WL 
 
 % C'rihtr fnr tjp Jlrgro. 
 
 411 
 
 enabled him to establish himself respectably in life, but 
 being subject to like passions as other men, he fell into 
 bad company, and was reduced to suffering. Pie was re- 
 tained a few months at Montague House. That roof had 
 been ever auspicious to him ; and the then Duke soon 
 placed him about his person, where he became habituated 
 to regularity of life. 
 
 In 1773, repeated attacks of gout and constitutional dis- 
 ease rendered him incapable of further attendance in the 
 family. Having married an interesting and very deserving 
 young woman of West Indian origin, his annuity, with the 
 assistance of that munificence which had protected him 
 through various vicissitudes, enabled him to commence the 
 business of a grocer, by which, and his wife's industry, he 
 reared a numerous family in a life of domestic virtue, which 
 gained the public esteem. 
 
 Ignatius Sancho devoted himself earnestly to the cause 
 of Negro freedom, and amid the trivial interruptions of a 
 shop he also applied himself to study. The muses and the 
 poets he imitated with some success ; he constructed two 
 pieces for the stage ; the theory of music he discussed, 
 published, and dedicated to the Princess Royal ; and paint- 
 ing was so much within the circle of his judgment and 
 criticism, that Mortimer came to consult him. His repu- 
 tation as a wit and humourist were considerable ; and his 
 acquaintances of no mean sort ; he corresponded with 
 Sterne, and it is said that Garrick was very fond of him. 
 
 Two volumes of Sancho's letters were published, with a 
 fine portrait of the writer. I cannot with justice omit the 
 insertion of a few extracts from them, exhibiting, as they 
 do, considerable epistolary talent, rapid and just conception, 
 as well as universal philanthropy — demonstrating that a n 
 untutored African may possess abilities of no mean order. 
 The reader must remember they were not written for pub- 
 lication, no such idea being ever entertained by the writer. 
 None of them were printed from duplicates preserved by 
 
 < CTTNo) 
 
412 
 
 % €nhk for tju llBgrn. 
 
 himself, but were collected from the various friends to 
 whom they were addressed. 
 
 " July 23, 1777. 
 
 " Poor Lady S still lingers this side the world. 
 
 Alas ! when will the happy period arrive that the sons of 
 mortality may greet each other with the joyful news, that 
 sin, pain, sorrow, and death, are no more ; skies without 
 clouds, earth without crimes, life without death, world 
 without end ! — peace, bliss, and harmony, where the Lord 
 God, all in all, King of kings, Lord of lords, reigneth 
 
 omnipotent — for ever ! May you, dear M , and all I 
 
 love, yea the whole race of Adam, join with my unworthy 
 self, in the stupendous, astonishing, soul-cheering hallelu- 
 jahs ! where charity may be swallowed up in love, hope in 
 bliss, and faith in glorious certainty." 
 
 " Mr. W has paid the debt to nature : — last Sunday 
 
 heaven gained a worthy soul, and the world lost an honest 
 man ! a Christian ! a friend to merit ; a father to the poor 
 and society ; a man, whose least praise was his wit, and his 
 meanest virtue, good humour ; may you, and all I love and 
 honour, in God's good time, join him ! " 
 
 The following is from a letter written to a young man 
 who had gone to reside abroad : — 
 
 " Read your Bible ; as day follows night, God's blessing 
 follows virtue ; honour and riches bring up the rear, and 
 the end is peace. 
 
 " Youth is naturally prone to vanity ; such is the weak- 
 ness of human nature, that pride has a fortress in the best 
 of hearts. I know no person that possesses a better than 
 yourself, but although flattery is poison to youth, yet truth 
 obliges me to confess that your correspondence betrays no 
 symptom of vanity, but teems with truths of an honest 
 affection, which merits praise, and commands esteem. 
 
" In one of your letters, you speak (with honest indig- 
 nation) of the treachery and chicanery of the Natives.* 
 My good friend, you should remember from whom they 
 learnt those vices. The first Christian visitors found them 
 a simple, harmless people ; but the cursed avidity for 
 wealth, urged them and all succeeding travellers to such 
 acts of deception, and even wanton cruelty, that the poor 
 ignorant Natives soon learnt the knavish and diabolical arts 
 which they imbibed from their teachers. 
 
 " I am sorry to observe that the practice of your coun- 
 try, (which as a resident I love, and for the freedom and 
 many blessings I enjoy in it, shall ever have my warmest 
 wishes, prayers, and blessings) ; I say, it is with reluctance 
 that I must observe, your country's conduct has been uni- 
 formly wicked in the East and West Indies, and on the 
 coast of Guinea. Commerce was meant by the goodness 
 of the Deity to diffuse the various productions of the earth 
 into every part, to unite mankind in brotherly love and 
 mutual dependence. The enlightened Christian should 
 diffuse the riches of the Gospel of Peace, with the com- 
 modities of Iris respective land. Commerce attended with 
 strict honesty, and with religion for its companion, would 
 be a blessing to every shore it touched at. In Africa, 
 the poor wretched natives, blessed with the most fertile 
 and luxuriant soil, are rendered so much the more miser- 
 able for what Providence meant as a blessing — the Chris- 
 tian's abominable traffic in Slaves, and the horrid cruelty 
 and treachery of the petty kings, encouraged by their 
 Christian customers, who carry them strong liquors, to in- 
 flame their national madness, and powder and fire arms, to 
 furnish them with the means of killing and kidnapping — 
 but enough ; — it is a subject that sours my blood, and I 
 am sure will not please the friendly bent of your social 
 
 * Allusion is here made to the remarks in a letter describing the Blacks 
 as a set of canting, deceitful people, who have not such a word as gratitude 
 in their language, &c, and will explain the succeeding observations. 
 
% $ritafe fa tjj? Mt$u. 
 
 affections. I mention these only to guard my friend against 
 being too hasty in condemning the knavery of a people, 
 who, bad as they may be, possibly were made worse by their 
 Christian visitors. 
 
 " Make human nature thy study wherever thouresidest ; 
 whatever the religion, or the complexion, study their 
 hearts. Simplicity, kindness, and charity be thy guide ; 
 with these even savages will respect you, and God will 
 bless you ! 
 
 " It is with sincere pleasure I hear you have a lucrative 
 establishment. Your good sense will lead you to proper 
 economy, as distant from frigid parsimony, as from a heed- 
 less extravagancy ; but as you may possibly have some time 
 to spare for necessary recreation, give me leave to obtrude 
 my poor advice. I have heard it more than once observed 
 of fortunate adventurers, that they have come home en- 
 riched in purse, but wretchedly barren in intellect. The 
 mind wants food as well as the stomach ; should not we 
 wish then to increase in knowledge as well as in money ? 
 Young says, "Books are fair virtue's advocates and friends." 
 Now my advice is, to preserve about £20 a year for two 
 or three seasons, by which means you may gradually form 
 a useful, elegant little library. Suppose now the first year 
 you send the order, and the money, to your father, for the 
 following books, which I recommend from my own super- 
 ficial knowledge as useful. A man should know something 
 of geography and history ; nothing more useful or pleasant. 
 " Robertson's Charles V.," " Goldsmith's History of 
 Greece," " of Rome," "of England." Two small volumes 
 of " Sermons," useful, and very sensible, by Mr. Williams, 
 which are as good as fifty, for I love not a multiplicity of 
 doctrines ; a few plain tenets, easy, simple, and directed to 
 the heart, are better than volumes of controversy. " Spec- 
 tators," " Guardians," and " Tattlers," you have of course. 
 " Young's Night Thoughts," " Milton," and " Thomson's 
 Seasons," were my summer companions for nearly twenty 
 
51 €xihh far tin Urgrn. 
 
 years ; they mended my heart, improved my veneration to 
 the Deity, and increased my love to my neighbours. 
 
 "You have to thank God for strong natural parts, a 
 feeling, humane heart : you write with sense and judicious 
 discernment ; — improve yourself, my dear young friend, that 
 if it should please God to return you to your friends with 
 the fortune of a man in upper rank, the embellishments 
 of your mind may be ever considered as greatly superior to 
 your riches, and only inferior to the goodness of your heart. 
 
 " I give you the above as a sketch ; your father and 
 others of your friends will improve upon it in the course 
 of time ; the above is enough at first, in conformity with 
 the old adage, — " A few books, and a few friends, and 
 those well chosen." Your father, who sees every improve- 
 ment with delight, observes that your handwriting is much 
 better. If my long epistles do not frighten you, and I live 
 till the return of next spring, perhaps I shall be enabled 
 to judge how much you are improved since your last fa- 
 your. "Write me a deal about the natives, the soil, the 
 produce, the manners of the people, customs, prejudices, 
 fashions, and follies. Alas ! we have plenty of the two 
 last here, and what is worse, we have a detestable brother's 
 war, where the right hand is hacking and hewing the left, 
 whilst angels weep at our madness, and devils rejoice at 
 the ruinous prospect. 
 
 " Mrs. Sancho joins me in good wishes ; I join her in 
 the same, in which double sense believe me, 
 " Yours, &c, &c, 
 
 "IGNATIUS SANCHO." 
 
 The following was addressed to the same. 
 
 " My worthy and much respected friend, 
 " Pope observes, — 
 
 ■ Men change with fortune, manners change with climes ; 
 Tenets with books, and principles with times !' 
 
 " Your friendly letter convinced me that you are still 
 
 K 
 
% €x\h\t for tju Srgrn. 
 
 the same, and gave, in that conviction, a tenfold pleasure. 
 You carried out from England, (through God's grace) an 
 honest friendly heart, a clear discerning head, and a soul 
 impressed with every humane feeling. That you are still 
 the same, gives me more joy than the certainty would of 
 your being worth ten Jaghires. The truest worth is that 
 of the mind ; the blessed rectitude of the heart ; the con- 
 science unsullied with guilt ; the undaunted, noble eye, 
 enriched with innocence, and shining with social glee ; 
 peace dancing in the heart, and health smiling in the face. 
 May these be ever your companions ! as for riches, you 
 will ever be more than rich while you thankfully enjoy, and 
 gratefully assist the wants, as far as you are able, of your 
 fellow creatures. 
 
 " But I think, and so will you, that I am preaching. I 
 only meant to thank you, which I most sincerely do, for 
 your kind letter. Believe me, it gratifies a better principle 
 than vanity, to know that you remember your dark-faced 
 friend at such a distance ; but what would have been your 
 feelings, could you have beheld your worthy, thrice worthy 
 father, joy sitting triumphant in his honest face, speeding 
 from house to house amongst his numerous friends, with 
 the pleasing testimonials of his son's love and duty in his 
 hands, every one congratulating him and joining in good 
 wishes, while the starting tear plainly proved that over-joy 
 and grief give the same livery ? 
 
 " You met with an old acquaintance of mine, Mr. G — . 
 I am glad to hear he is well ; I hope he will take example 
 by what he sees in you ; and you, young man, remember, 
 if ever you should unhappily fall into bad company, that 
 example is only the fool's plea, and the rogue's excuse, for 
 doing wrong things. You have a turn for reflection, and 
 a steadiness, which, aided by the best social disposition, 
 must make your company much coveted, and your person 
 loved. Forgive me for presuming to dictate, when I well 
 know you have many friends much more able from 
 
5 
 
 m 
 
 % €tM& for tjjr Ifrgrn. 
 
 knowledge and better sense, though I deny a better 
 will. 
 
 " You will, of course, make men and things your study ; 
 their different geniuses, aims, and passions : you will also 
 note climes, buildings, soils, and products, which will be 
 neither tedious nor unpleasant. If you adopt the rule of 
 writing every evening your remarks on the past day, it will 
 be a kind of friendly tete-a-tete between you and yourself, 
 wherein you may sometimes happily become your own 
 monitor ; and hereafter, those little notes will afford you a 
 rich fund, whenever you shall be inclined to retrace past 
 times and places. I say nothing upon the score of reli- 
 gion ; for, I am clear, every good affection, every sweet 
 sensibility, every heartfelt joy, humanity, politeness, cha- 
 rity, — all, all, are streams from that sacred spring; so 
 that to say you are good tempered, honest, social, &c, &c, 
 is only in fact saying you live according to your Divine 
 Master's rules. 
 
 " Continue in right thinking, and you will act well ; by 
 which you will insure the favour of God, and the love of 
 your friends, amongst whom pray reckon, 
 " Yours faithfully, 
 
 "IGNATIUS SANCHO." 
 
 " To Edward Young, Esq., on the death of Lord . 
 
 " Richmond, April 21, 1770. 
 " Honoured Sir, 
 " I bless God, their Graces* continue in good health, 
 though as yet they have not seen anybody. I have duly 
 acquainted his Grace with the anxious and kind enquiries 
 of yourself and others of his noble friends : time will, I 
 hope, bring them comforts. Their loss is great indeed ; and 
 not to them only. The public have a loss ; — goodness, wis- 
 dom, knowledge, and greatness were united in him. Heaven 
 has gained an angel ; but earth has lost a treasure. 
 * Probably the Duke and Duchess of Montague. 
 
 3h 
 
% frilmfe for tjjE jfegfn, 
 
 " Hoping you are as well as you wish your friends, I am, 
 honoured Sir, &c. 
 
 "IGNATIUS SANCHO." 
 
 "To M 
 
 " ' He, who cannot stem his anger's tide, 
 Doth a wild horse without a bridle ride.' 
 
 " It is, my dear M — , the same with the rest of our pas- 
 sions ; we have reason given us for our rudder ; religion is 
 our sheet anchor ; our fixed star, hope ; conscience our 
 faithful monitor ; and happiness the grand reward. We 
 all in this manner can preach up trite maxims, but mark 
 how we act. It is much easier to speak than to act ; but 
 we know good from evil ; and we have powers sufficient to 
 withstand vice, if we choose to exert ourselves. In the 
 field, if we know the strength and situation of the enemy, 
 we place outposts and sentinels, and take every prudent 
 method to avoid surprise. In common life we must do the 
 same ; and trust me, my honest friend, a victory gained 
 over passion, immorality, and pride, deserves Te Deums, 
 better than those gained in the fields of ambition and 
 carnage. 
 
 " It is the most puzzling affair in nature, to a mind that 
 labours under obligations, to know how to express its feel- 
 ings. Your former tender solicitude for my well-being, 
 and your present generous remembrance, appear friendly 
 beyond the common actions of those we in general style 
 good sort of people ; but I will not teaze you with thanks, 
 for I believe such kind of hearts as you are blessed with, 
 have sufficient reward in the consciousness of acting hu- 
 manely. It is the hope and wish of my heart, that your 
 comforts in all things may multiply with your years ; that 
 in the certain great end, you may immerge without pain, 
 full of hope, from corruptible pleasure, to immortal and in- 
 corruptible life, happiness without end, and past all human 
 comprehension ; — there may you and I, and all we love, 
 
51 iKrikfc for tljt JJrgrn. 
 
 419 im 
 
 meet ; — the follies, the parties, distinctions, feuds of am- 
 bition, enthusiasm, lust, and anger of this miserable, inotley 
 world, all totally forgot, every idea lost, and absorbed in 
 the blissful mansions of redeeming love." 
 
 "Aug. 8, 1777. 
 
 " To J. M. 
 
 " ' Know thy own self, presume not God to scan ; 
 The proper study of mankind is man.' 
 
 " There is something so amazingly grand, so stupen- 
 dously affecting, in contemplating the works of the Divine 
 architect, either in the moral or the intellectual world, 
 that I think one may rightly call it the cordial of the soul ; 
 it is the medicine of the mind, and the best antidote against 
 pride, and the supercilious murmurings of discontent. 
 Smoking my morning pipe, the friendly warmth of that 
 glorious planet the sun, the leniency of the air, the cheer- 
 ful glow of the atmosphere, made me involuntarily cry, 
 ' Lord, what is man, that thou in thy mercy art so mindful 
 of him ! or what the son of man, that thou so parentally 
 carest for him ! ' David, whose heart and affections were 
 naturally of the first kind, and who had indeed experienced 
 blessings without number, pours forth the grateful senti- 
 ments of his enraptured soul in the sweetest modulations 
 of pathetic oratory. The tender mercies of the Almighty 
 are not less to many of his creatures ; but their hearts, un- 
 like the royal disposition of the shepherd king, are cold, 
 and untouched with the sweet ray of gratitude. Let us, 
 without meanly sheltering our infirmities under the exam- 
 ple of others, perhaps worse taught, or possessed of less 
 leisure for self-examination, — let us look into ourselves, 
 and by a critical examination of the past events of our lives, 
 fairly confess what mercies we have received, what God in 
 his goodness hath done for us, and how our gratitude and 
 praise have kept pace, in imitation of the son of Jesse. 
 Such a research would richly repay us, for the end would 
 
 >^t 
 
 mm 
 
 tlL 
 
 5 
 
 k22 
 
1 €tMt for tff Jffgrn. 
 
 be conviction, so much on the side of miraculous mercy, 
 such an unanswerable proof of the superintendency of divine 
 Providence, as would effectually cure us of rash despon- 
 dency, and melt our hearts with devotional aspirations, till 
 we poured forth the effusions of our souls in praise and 
 thanksgiving. When I sometimes endeavour to turn my 
 thoughts inwards, to review the power or properties the 
 indulgent all-wise Father has endowed me with, I am struck 
 with wonder and with awe, — worm, poor insignificant rep- 
 tile as I am, with regard to superior beings, mortal like my- 
 self. Amongst, and at the very head of our riches, I reckon 
 the power of reflection. Where ? where, my friend, doth 
 it lay ? Search every member from the head to the feet, 
 all, all ready for action, but all dead to thought ; it lies not 
 in matter : it is a something which we feel and acknow- 
 ledge to be quite past the power of definition ; it is that 
 breath of life which the sacred Architect breathed into the 
 nostrils of the first man, the image of his gracious Maker. 
 Let it animate our torpid gratitude as it rolls on, although 
 diminished by our cruel fall, through the whole race. ' We 
 are fearfully, and wonderfully made,' were the sentiments 
 of the royal psalmist upon a self review, but had he been 
 blessed with the full blaze of the Christian dispensation, 
 what would have been his raptures ? the promise of never- 
 ending existence and felicity, to possess eternity, — ' glo- 
 rious, dreadful thought,' — to behold the wonders of im- 
 mensity, to pass from good to better, increasing in goodness, 
 knowledge, love ; to glory in our Redeemer, to joy in our- 
 selves ; to be acquainted with prophets, sages, heroes, and 
 poets of old times, and join in symphony with angels. 
 
 " You, happily disengaged from various cares of life and 
 family, can review the little world of Man with steadier 
 eye and more composed thought than your friend, declining 
 fast into the vale of tears, and beset with infirmity and pain. 
 Write now and then, as thought prompts, and inclination 
 leads; refute my errors; where I am just, give me your 
 
 QTT 
 
% €i\Mt for [\t Urgrn. 
 
 421 
 
 plaudit. Your welfare is truly dear in my sight ; and if 
 any man lias a share in my heart, or commands my respect 
 and esteem, it is J — M — ." 
 
 Ignatius Sancho was much interested for the unfortunate 
 Dr. Dodd, and addressed him whilst in prison. He also 
 wrote the following for the Morning Post : — 
 
 " I am one of the many who have been often edified by 
 the graceful eloquence and truly christian doctrine of the 
 unfortunate Dr. Dodd. As a divine, he had, and still has, 
 my love and reverence ; his faults I regret ; but, alas! I feel 
 myself too guilty to cast a stone ; justice has her claims ; 
 but mercy — the anchor of my hope, inclines me to wish he 
 might meet with royal clemency. His punishments have 
 already been severe ; the loss of royal favour ; the cowardly 
 attacks of malicious buffoonery ; and the over-strained zeal 
 for rigid justice in the prosecution. Oh ! would to God 
 the bishops and clergy would join in petitioning the throne 
 for his life ! it would save the holy order from indignity, and 
 even the land itself from the reproach of making too un- 
 equal distinctions in punishments. He might, by the rec- 
 titude of his future life, and due exertion of his matchless 
 powers, be of infinite service, as chaplain to the poor con- 
 victs on the river, which would be a punishment, and, at 
 the same time, serve for a proof or test of his contrition, 
 and the sincerity of a zeal he has often manifested in the 
 pulpit, for the service of true religion. He may rise the 
 higher by his late fall, and do more real service to the 
 thoughtless and abandoned culprits, than a preacher whose 
 character might be deemed spotless. If this hint should 
 stimulate a pen, or heart, like the good Bishop of Chester's, 
 to exert itself in behalf of a man who has formerly been 
 alive to every act of heaven-born charity, the writer of this 
 will have joy, even in his last moments, in the reflection 
 that he paid a mite of the vast debt he owes to Dr. Dodd 
 as a preacher." 
 
422 
 
 % #$tafe for \\t Jfogra, 
 
 Sancho addressed the following letter to Sterne, wishing 
 to interest him on behalf of his oppressed and suffering 
 race : — 
 
 " It would be an insult on your humanity (or perhaps 
 look like it) to apologise for the liberty I am taking. I 
 am one of those people called Negroes. The first part of 
 my life was rather unlucky, as I was placed in a family 
 who judged ignorance the best and only security for obe- 
 dience. A little reading and writing I got by unwearied 
 application. The latter part of my life has been, through 
 God's blessing, truly fortunate, having spent it in the ser- 
 vice of one of the best and greatest families in the king- 
 dom : my chief pleasure has been books : philanthropy I 
 adore. How very much, good sir, am I (amongst millions) 
 indebted to you for the character of your amiable Uncle 
 Toby ; I declare I would walk ten miles in the dog-days 
 to shake hands with the honest corporal. Your sermons 
 have touched me to the heart, and I hope, have amended it, 
 which brings me to the point. In your tenth discourse, 
 page 78, second volume, is this very affecting passage ; 
 ' Consider how great a part of our species in all ages down 
 to this have been trod under the feet of cruel and capri- 
 cious tyrants, who would neither hear their cries nor pity 
 their distresses. Consider Slavery, what it is, how bitter a 
 draught, and how many millions are made to drink of it.' 
 Of all my favourite authors, not one has drawn a tear in 
 favour of my miserable Black brethren excepting yourself 
 and the humane author of Sir George Ellison. I think 
 you will forgive me ; I am sure you will applaud me, for 
 beseeching you to give one half hour's attention to Slavery, 
 as it is at this day practised in our West Indies. That 
 subject, handled in your striking manner, would ease the 
 yoke perhaps of many ; but if only of one — gracious God ! 
 what a feast to a benevolent heart ! and sure I am you are 
 an epicurean in acts of charity. You, who are universally 
 read, and as universally admired — you, could not fail. 
 

 % €iMii for tire Jtfrgrn. 
 
 423 
 
 Dear sir, think that in me you behold the uplifted hands 
 of thousands of my brethren. Grief, you pathetically ob- 
 serve, is eloquent : figure to yourself their attitudes ; hear 
 their supplicating addresses ! Alas ! — you cannot refuse. 
 Humanity must comply ; in which hope I beg permission 
 to subscribe myself, &c, 
 
 "IGNATIUS SANCHO." 
 
 As Sancho's style of writing is said to resemble Sterne's, 
 I shall perhaps be excused inserting his reply to the fore- 
 going. 
 
 " Coxwould, July 27, 1767. 
 
 " There is a strange coincidence, Sancho, in the little 
 events (as well as in the great ones) of this world ; for I 
 had been writing a tender tale of the sorrows of a friendless 
 poor Negro girl, and my eyes had scarcely done smarting 
 with it, when your letter of recommendation in behalf of 
 so many of her brethren and sisters came to me. But why 
 should it be so with her brethren, or yours, Sancho, any 
 more than mine ? It is by the finest tints and most insen- 
 sible gradations that nature descends from the fairest face 
 about St. James's to the sootiest complexion in Africa. 
 At which tint of these is it that the ties of blood are to 
 cease ? and how many shades must we descend lower still 
 in the scale, ere mercy is to vanish with them ? But 'tis 
 no uncommon thing, my good Sancho, for one half of the 
 world to use the other half of it like brutes, and then en- 
 deavour to make them so. For my own part, I never look 
 westward (when I am in a pensive mood at least), but I 
 think of the burthens which our brothers and sisters are 
 there carrying, and could I ease their shoulders from one 
 ouncs of them, I declare I would set out this hour upon a 
 pilgrimage to Mecca for their sakes. If I can weave the 
 tale I have wrote into the work I am about, it is at the ser- 
 vice of the afflicted, and a much greater matter ; for in 
 serious truth, it casts a sad shade upon the world, that so 
 great a part of it are, and have been, so long bound in 
 
 m 
 
1 €x\Mt for % Jfrgrn. 
 
 chains of darkness and in chains of misery ; and I cannot 
 but both respect and felicitate you, that by so much laud- 
 able diligence you have broke the one, and that, by falling 
 into the hands of so good and merciful a family, Providence 
 has rescued you from the other. 
 
 " And so, good-hearted Sancho, adieu ! and believe me 
 I will not forget your letter. 
 
 " Yours, &c, 
 
 "L. STERNE." 
 
 I shall conclude this selection of extracts from the two 
 volumes of Sancho's letters, with a short one written the 
 year before his death, in reply to one respecting their pub- 
 lication, a thing which he had evidently himself never con- 
 templated, though he made no objection to the proposal. 
 
 " I have just received your favour of the 20th inst. As 
 to the letters in question, you know, sir, they are not now 
 mine, but the property of the parties they are addressed 
 to. If you have had their permission, and think that the 
 simple effusions of a poor Negro's heart are worth mixing 
 with better things, you have my free consent to do as you 
 please with them, though in truth there wants no increase 
 of books in the epistolary way, nor indeed in any way, ex- 
 cept we could add to the truly valuable names of Robert- 
 son, Beattie, and Mickle, new Youngs, Richardsons, and 
 Sternes. 
 
 " Accept my best thanks for the very kind opinion you 
 are so obliging as to entertain of me, which is too pleasing 
 (I fear) to add much to the humility of 
 
 "I. SANCHO." 
 
 So much for the Negro, Ignatius Sancho, who died in 
 1780, having deservedly won the public esteem. Such was 
 the man whom philosophers and anatomists have endea- 
 voured to degrade as a deterioration of the human species ; 
 such was the being whose identity with the great family of 
 
man has been called in question ; but whom Fuller, with a 
 benevolence and quaintness of phrase peculiarly his own, 
 designates " God's image cut in ebony." To the harsh 
 definition of the naturalist, political and legislative oppres- 
 sions have been added, aggravated towards them by vulgar 
 prejudice, and popular insult. 
 
 He who surveys the extent of culture to which Ignatius 
 Sancho had attained by self-education, must be convinced 
 that the perfection of the reasoning faculties does not alto- 
 gether depend on a peculiar conformation of the skull, or 
 the colour of a common integument, in defiance of that 
 wild opinion, "which," says a learned writer, "restrains 
 the operations of the mind to particular regions, and sup- 
 poses that a luckless mortal may be born in a degree of 
 latitude too high or too low for wisdom or for wit." 
 
 ■^9 
 
 EVA BARTELS. 
 
 " Eva Bartels," says Shaw in his Memorials of South 
 Africa, "is a Mulatto woman, who was living in Cape 
 Town, when we commenced our school for the heathen. 
 Two Slave girls first brought her to our religious services. 
 She was about fifty years old, and was very desirous of 
 learning to read the Scriptures, which she soon accom- 
 plished. She not merely learned to read, however, but the 
 divine spirit so wrought upon her heart, that there was not 
 a shadow of a doubt of her real conversion to God. She 
 became humble and lowly, was regular in her attendance 
 on the means of grace, and her conduct was most circum- 
 spect. She was an example of piety to all around her, and 
 was zealous in inviting and bringing others to the means of 
 grace. 
 
 " Going to visit her on one occasion, when in affliction, 
 I found her engaged in prayer. She knew not that I was 
 present, and prayed thus : — ' Oh ! how I have sinned ! 
 Oh ! how I have sinned ! but thou, Lord, hast had mercy. 
 
 3i 
 
426 
 
 % €x\Mt for \\t Jfogrn; 
 
 Thou hast had mercy upon me ; thou hast given me the 
 joy of salvation. Lord Jesus Christ, thou hast shed thy 
 precious blood for me.' When told that I was present, she 
 said, — ' Mynheer, I was almost in despair for a time, for I 
 have been a great sinner. I therefore requested that I might 
 be left alone, in order that I might wrestle with the Lord, 
 and cry to him for help. I took up the book to see if 
 there was anything for me, and as I continued in prayer, 
 those sweet words fell upon my heart, — ' Ho, every one 
 that thirsteth, come ye to the waters.' This invitation 
 brought me such peace and joy, that all my sorrows de- 
 parted, and I have now strong consolation. I have been 
 thinking of the great love of God in giving his Son. We 
 are debtors, and have nothing wherewith to pay our debt ; 
 but Jesus Christ came and discharged it by the shedding of 
 his blood. While thus meditating, I shed many tears ; but 
 they were tears of joy, on account of the great love of God 
 to sinners.' 
 
 " On another occasion, when several persons were in the 
 room, who were expecting that the time of her departure 
 was at hand, she desired them to raise her up on the bed, 
 and support her with pillows. This being done, she began 
 to address those around her, exhorting them to come to 
 the Redeemer. From this sickness she was restored to 
 health, and became a ' living epistle' to all who knew her, 
 continuing to adorn her profession by a holy walk and con- 
 versation. She has become a mother in our Israel, and 
 though often afflicted, is like a tree planted by the rivers 
 of water, bringing forth fruit in old age." 
 
 JOHN MOSELY, 
 
 ~ Of Hartford, in Connecticut, an aged Coloured man, 
 was well known for his industry, prudence, and integrity. 
 Having no relations, he devoted his property to charitable 
 objects. By his will, he gave to the Hartford Female 
 
(sUJi 
 
 51 €tMi for tip lirgrn. 
 
 Beneficent Society, 100 dollars ; to the American Colo- 
 nization Society, 200 dollars ; to the Bible Society, 100 
 dollars ; to the Education Society, 100 dollars; and after 
 other legacies, the residue of his estate to a Missionary 
 Society. 
 
 NANCY PITCHFORD, 
 
 A woman of Colour, died at Hartford in 1834, aged 67. 
 For the first forty years of her life^ she was a Slave. She 
 sustained an excellent character, was for many years a pro- 
 fessor of religion, and gave satisfactory evidence of sincere 
 and lively piety. At the time of her death, she had ac- 
 quired, by her industry and care, more than 400 dollars, 
 which, (after paying the expenses of her last sickness and 
 funeral,) she left to charitable purposes. 
 
 L0TT CAREY. 
 
 This self-taught African was born a Slave, near Rich- 
 mond, in Virginia. He was the only child of parents, 
 themselves Slaves, who were of a pious turn of mind ; and 
 though he had no instruction from books, the admonitions 
 of his father and mother may have laid the foundations of 
 his future usefulness. In 1804, the young Slave was sent 
 to Richmond, and hired out as a common labourer, at a 
 warehouse in the place. 
 
 At this time he was excessively profane, and much ad- 
 dicted to intoxication ; but God was pleased to awaken 
 him to a sense of his sinfulness. Happening to hear a ser- 
 mon, he became very desirous of being able to read, chiefly 
 with a view of becoming acquainted with the nature of 
 certain transactions recorded in the New Testament. 
 Having procured a Bible he commenced learning his let- 
 ters, by trying to read the chapter he had heard illustrated 
 in the sermon ; and by a little perseverance and assistance, 
 
 II© 
 
428 
 
 % €x\Mt for % Jftgra. 
 
 he was able to read. This acquisition created in him a 
 desire to write ; an accomplishment he soon also mastered. 
 
 He now became more useful to his employers, by being 
 able to check and superintend the shipping of tobacco ; 
 and having, in time, saved 850 dollars, (nearly £170 ster- 
 ling,) he purchased his freedom and that of two of his chil- 
 dren. " Of the real value of his services while in his em- 
 ployment (says an American writer), no one but a dealer in 
 tobacco can form an idea. Notwithstanding the hundreds 
 of hogsheads which were committed to his charge, he could 
 produce any one the moment it was called for ; and the 
 shipments were made with a promptness and correctness 
 such as no person, White or Coloured, has equalled in the 
 same situation. The last year in which he remained in 
 the warehouse, his salary was 800 dollars, and he might 
 have received a larger sum, if he would have continued." 
 
 For his ability in his work, besides being highly es- 
 teemed by his master, he was frequently rewarded by the 
 merchant with a five-dollar note. He was allowed to sell, 
 for his own benefit, small parcels of damaged tobacco. It 
 was by saving the little sums obtained in this way, with 
 the aid of subscriptions by the merchants, to whose inte- 
 rests he had been attentive, that he was enabled to pur- 
 chase the freedom of his family. He also bought a house 
 and some land, in Richmond, and when the colonists were 
 fitted out for Africa, he was enabled to bear a considerable 
 part of his own expenses. 
 
 Soon after making a profession of religion, Lott Carey 
 commenced holding meetings, and exhorting the Coloured 
 people ; and, though he had little knowledge of books, or 
 acquaintance with mankind, he frequently exhibited a 
 boldness of thought, and a strength of native intellect, 
 which no acquirement could have given him. While em- 
 ployed at the warehouse, he devoted his leisure time to 
 reading such books as accident threw in his way ; and it is 
 said that a gentleman, on one occasion taking up a volume 
 
(? 
 
 which he had left for a few moments, found it to be 
 " Smith's Wealth of Nations." 
 
 As early as 1815, Lott Carey began to feel special inte- 
 rest in the cause of African missions, and contributed, pro- 
 bably more than any other person, in giving origin and 
 character to the African Missionary Society, established 
 that year in Richmond. His benevolence was practical, 
 and whenever and wherever good objects were to be 
 effected, he was ready to lend his aid. He was among the 
 earliest emigrants to Africa. At the close of his farewell 
 sermon in the first Baptist meeting house in the city, be- 
 fore his departure, he remarked in substance as follows : — 
 " I am about to leave you ; and expect to see your faces 
 no more. I long to preach to the poor African the way of 
 life and salvation. I do not know what may befall me, 
 whether I may find a grave in the ocean, or among savage 
 men, or more savage wild beasts on the coast of Africa ; 
 nor am I anxious what may become of me. I feel it my 
 duty to go ; and I very much fear, that many of those who 
 preach the gospel in this country, will blush when the 
 Saviour calls them to give an account of their labours in 
 his cause, and tells them, ' I commanded you to go into all 
 the world, and preach the gospel to every creature :' (and 
 with the most forcible emphasis he exclaimed :) the Saviour 
 may ask — ' Where have you been ? What have you been 
 doing ? Have you endeavoured to the utmost of your 
 ability to fulfil the commands I gave you — or have you 
 sought your own gratification and your own ease, regard- 
 less of my commands ? ' " 
 
 Being twice married, he lost his second wife shortly after 
 arriving at Sierra Leone. Of her triumphant death, he 
 gives a most affecting account in his journal of that date. 
 On his arrival in Africa, Lott Carey saw before him a 
 wide and interesting field, demanding various and powerful 
 talents, and the most devoted piety. His intellectual 
 ability, firmness of purpose, unbending integrity, correct 
 
 ?"v>Q 
 
430 
 
 % €nfak fnr tlj? jf jgrn. 
 
 { judgment, and disinterested benevolence, soon placed him in 
 a conspicuous station, and gave him a wide and command- 
 ing influence. Though naturally diffident and retiring, his 
 worth was too evident to allow of his remaining in obscurity. 
 An American writer, in speaking of this intelligent Negro 
 about this period of his life, makes the following obser- 
 vations : — " Lott Carey is now more than forty years of 
 age. He is possessed of a constitution peculiarly fitted for 
 toil and exposure ; and has felt the effects of climate per- 
 haps less than any other individual on the Cape. He has 
 always shown that sort of inflexible integrity and correct- 
 ness of deportment towards all which necessarily commands 
 respect ; but he will probably never be able to divest him- 
 self of a kind of suspicious reserve towards White people, 
 especially his superiors, which universally attaches itself to 
 those reared in Slavery. The interests of the colonies, 
 and the cause of his countrymen, both in Africa, and in 
 this country, lie near his heart. For them he is willing 
 to toil, and to make almost any sacrifice; and he has 
 frequently declared, that nothing could induce him to 
 return." 
 
 The peculiar exposure of the early emigrants, the scan- 
 tiness of their supplies, and the want of adequate medical 
 attention, subjected them to severe sufferings. To relieve 
 these, Lott Carey obtained all the information in his power 
 concerning the diseases of the climate, and the proper 
 remedies. He made liberal sacrifices of his property in 
 behalf of the poor and distressed, and devoted his time 
 almost exclusively to their relief. His services as a phy- 
 sician to the colony were invaluable, and were long ren- 
 dered without hope of reward. He was made Health 
 Officer and General Inspector of the Settlement of Mon- 
 rovia, but he refused for some time to accept any other 
 civil office. During the sickly season of the year, he was 
 mostly occupied in attending the sick, having no other phy- 
 sician among them. But amidst his multiplied cares and 
 
 isii 
 
% €nhk for i$& Jffgtf. 
 
 431 
 
 efforts for the colony, he never neglected to promote civili- 
 zation and Christianity among the natives. 
 
 In 1826, Carey was elected vice-agent of the colony, and 
 discharged the duties of that important office till his death, 
 which occurred in 1828, in the most melancholy manner. 
 One evening, while he and several others were engaged in 
 making cartridges to defend the colony against a Slave- 
 trader, a candle was accidentally overturned, which ignited 
 some powder, producing an explosion which resulted in 
 the death of eight persons. Carey survived for two days. 
 Such was the unfortunate death of this active Coloured 
 apostle of civilization on the coast of Africa, where his 
 memory will long be cherished. The career which he pur- 
 sued, and the intelligence which marked his character, 
 prove that the race of Blacks is not destitute of moral worth 
 and innate genius, and that their culture would liberally 
 produce an abundant harvest of the best principles and 
 those results which dignify human nature. 
 
 TESTIMONY OF JOSEPH STTJRGE RESPECTING THE 
 INTELLECTUAL POWERS OJ THE NEGRO. 
 
 (COMMUNICATED TO THE AUTHOR.) 
 
 Birmingham, 11 mo., 17, 1847. 
 Esteemed Friend, 
 
 I am in receipt of thy letter, expressing a wish that I 
 would state in writing, my opinion whether the natural or 
 acquired intellectual powers of man are affected by the 
 colour of his skin. 
 
 My opportunities of personal observation, extend only 
 to the West Indies, and (with the exception of one or two 
 of the Slave States) to those parts of the United States 
 where Slavery does not exist ; but where the prejudice 
 against colour is greater than in the very heart of Slavery. 
 What I have seen has, however, long brought conviction to 
 my own mind, that those who would brand their brethren 
 
432 
 
 % Ctttafe for 1$ Jfrgra, 
 
 ^m 
 
 by creation with the stamp of inferiority, because they are 
 " guilty of a skin not coloured like their own," not only 
 maintain a doctrine opposed to divine revelation, but to 
 the records of history and experience, and the results of all 
 candid and dispassionate observation. 
 
 It is not disputed that the people of different nations 
 have traits of character peculiar to themselves, and that 
 these traits may be materially influenced by the constitu- 
 tion of the Government which rules over them. When 
 they are Slaves and have no protection from the arbitrary 
 will of their owners, the degrading effect is often so great 
 and permanent, that it not only affects the immediate ob- 
 ject, but becomes to a certain extent hereditary, requiring 
 successive generations under the happy influence of free- 
 dom fully to remove, though we have many bright excep- 
 tions to this, even amongst those who have been born and 
 grown up as Slaves themselves. It is, however, a remark 
 which I have heard made by others, and which is confirmed 
 by my own observation, that the Black and Coloured chil- 
 dren, even of Slaves, and who are Slaves themselves, while 
 too young to feel the evils and degradation of their lot, 
 show a brightness and quickness of capacity, which is 
 fully equal, if not superior, to that of White children who 
 are born free. This holds good when they are compared 
 with White children born in tropical climates, and there- 
 fore cannot be attributed to the early development of the 
 faculties in those climates. 
 
 I will only quote the following testimony in favour of 
 my views, from Ebenezer Read, the master of Walmer's 
 Free School, which has a large endowment, administered 
 by the corporation of Kingston in Jamaica, where it is 
 situated. I visited this school in 1837. The number of chil- 
 dren on the list was about 500, and from 1815, it had been 
 open to, and was attended by, White, Black, and Brown 
 children. The master stated that " for the last 35 years 
 he had been employed in that city, in the tuition of all 
 
51 ttlrafe for tip Ifrgra. 
 
 433 
 
 classes and colours, and had no hesitation in saying that 
 the children of Colour (which included Black) were equal 
 both in conduct and ability to those who were White ; 
 that they had always carried off more than their proportion 
 of prizes, and at one examination, out of seventy prizes 
 awarded, sixty -four were obtained by children of Colour." 
 Multitudes of proofs, equally strong, might be added 
 to this, demonstrating that when "God made of one blood 
 all the families of the earth," he also endowed them with 
 talents and capacities, which, however they may be modi- 
 fied or altered by external circumstances, gave no section 
 of the human family a right to boast that they inherited 
 any superiority which might not in the course of events, 
 be claimed and manifested, with equal justice by those 
 whom they most despise. 
 
 I am, respectfully, 
 
 JOSEPH STURGE. 
 
 '6S? 
 
 CORNELIUS. 
 
 In 1801, the mission of the Moravians in the Danish 
 Island of St. Thomas was deprived of one of the most 
 intelligent and useful native assistants, who for more than 
 fifty years had walked worthily of his calling by the Gos- 
 pel — the Negro Cornelius : a man in many respects distin- 
 guished among his countrymen. 
 
 About the year 1750, he became concerned for the sal- 
 vation of his soul, and felt a strong impulse to attend the 
 preaching of the missionaries, and their private instructions. 
 Being baptized, he ever after remained faithful to the 
 grace conferred upon him. He had an humble and grow- 
 ing sense of the depravity of his heart, and made daily 
 progress in the knowledge of Christ. 
 
 He was blessed with a good natural understanding, and 
 having learned the business of a mason, received the appoint- 
 ment of master-mason to the royal buildings, in which 
 
 3 K 
 
 m 
 
M( 
 
 434 
 
 % €iiMt far % %%n. 
 
 employment he was esteemed by all who knew him, as a 
 clever, upright, and disinterested man. He laid the foundation 
 of six chapels belonging to the mission in the Danish islands. 
 He was able to write and speak the Creole, Dutch, Danish, 
 German, and English languages. Till 1767, he was a Slave 
 in the royal plantation, afterwards belonging to Count Schim- 
 melman. He first purchased the freedom of his wife, and 
 then laboured hard to gain his own liberty, which he effected 
 after much entreaty and the payment of a considerable ran- 
 som. God blessed him and the work of his hands in such 
 a manner, that he also purchased by degrees the emancipa- 
 tion of his six children. 
 
 In 1754, he was appointed assistant in the mission. After 
 his emancipation, he greatly exerted himself in the service 
 of the Lord, especially among the people of his own Colour, 
 and spent whole days and nights in visiting them. He pos- 
 sessed a peculiar talent for expressing his ideas with great 
 clearness, which rendered his discourse pleasing and edify- 
 ing to White people as well as to Negroes. Yet he was by 
 no means elated by the talents he possessed. His character 
 was that of an humble servant of Christ, who thought too 
 meanly of himself to treat others with contempt. To dis- 
 tribute to the indigent, and assist the feeble, was the delight 
 of his heart, and they always found in him a generous and 
 sympathizing friend, and faithful adviser. 
 
 Whilst zealously exerting himself in promoting the 
 welfare of his countrymen, he did not neglect the con- 
 cerns of his family. We have heard how sedulously he cared 
 for their temporal prosperity, in working hard to purchase 
 their freedom. But he was more solicitous for the welfare 
 of their souls. God blessed his instructions, and he had 
 the joy of seeing his whole family share in the salvation of 
 the Lord. Being found faithful, they were employed as 
 assistants in the mission. 
 
 The infirmities of age increasing upon him, Cornelius 
 ardently longed to depart and be with Christ. A constant 
 
ft Criltttfe far tju $rgrn. 
 
 435 
 
 cough and pain in his side damped his great activity, caused 
 occasional dejection of mind, and seemed at times to shake 
 his faith and fortitude. He now and then complained of 
 a declension of his love to Jesus ; and once, while medita- 
 ting on that text — " I have somewhat against thee, because 
 thou hast left thy first love," he exclaimed, " Ah ! I too 
 have left my first love ! " A few days before his end, being 
 visited by one of the missionaries, he said, " I ought to 
 have done more, and loved and served my Saviour better. 
 Yet I firmly trust that He will receive me in mercy, for I 
 come to Him as a poor sinner, having nothing to plead but 
 His grace, and righteousness through His blood." His 
 children and several of his grandchildren having assembled 
 round his bed, he addressed them in a very solemn and 
 impressive manner to the following effect : — 
 
 " I rejoice exceedingly, my dearly beloved children, to 
 see you once more together before my departure, for I 
 believe that my Lord and Saviour will soon come and take 
 your father home to himself. You know, dear children, 
 what my chief concern has been respecting you, as long as 
 I was with you ; how frequently I have exhorted you not 
 to neglect the day of grace, but to surrender yourselves 
 with soul and body to your Redeemer, and to follow Him 
 faithfully. My dear children, attend to my last wish and 
 dying request. Love one another ! Do not suffer any 
 quarrels and disputes to arise among you after my decease. 
 No, my children," raising his voice, " love one another cor- 
 dially : let each strive to shew proofs of love to his brother 
 or sister ; nor suffer yourselves to be tempted by any- 
 thing to become proud, for by that you may even miss of 
 your soul's salvation, but pray our Saviour to grant you 
 lowly minds and humble hearts. If you follow this advice 
 of your father's, my joy will be complete, when I shall 
 once see you all again in eternal bliss, and be able to say 
 to our Saviour — Here, Lord, is thy poor unworthy Cor- 
 nelius, and the children Thou hast given me. I am sure 
 
 ^ 
 
% €riirate far tip jfegrfc 
 
 our Saviour will not forsake you ; but, I beseech you, do 
 not forsake Him." He fell gently asleep in Jesus, on the 
 29th of November, being about 84 years of age. 
 
 MOBAVIAN MISSIONS AMONGST THE NEGHOES OF 
 THE WEST INDIES. 
 
 The account of Cornelius just related, affords an evidence 
 of the success attending the efforts of the early Moravian 
 Missions in the Danish West India Islands, of which men- 
 tion was made, and some interesting particulars given, in 
 Part I. of this volume. 
 
 The early attempts towards the conversion 'of the Negroes 
 met with great opposition from the Planters. When Count 
 Zinzendorf visited these Islands in 1739, a few years after 
 the first efforts to introduce Christianity amongst the 
 Slaves, he found them in a state of unusual oppression, 
 because it was imagined that if they became Christians, 
 they would also become more intelligent, and then it would 
 be impossible for the trifling number of White people — in 
 comparison with whom the Blacks were fifty, if not a hun- 
 dred, to one — to keep such an immense number in awe. 
 Their conversion was also opposed, because the Negro 
 women, if converted, would no longer yield themselves to 
 a licentious life. 
 
 For these, and other causes, the Whites endeavoured to 
 prevent the Blacks from becoming Christians. But the 
 Negroes, unwilling to be restrained, their desire for salva- 
 tion being incredibly great, were treated very harshly, and 
 in some instances with cruelty. A public tumult was once 
 excited in St. Thomas, and the missionaries were threat- 
 ened to be sent out of the Island, because they taught the 
 Slaves to be better Christians than their masters. The 
 Negroes' Meeting House was entered in a boisterous man- 
 ner, and the poor creatures were beaten most cruelly, and 
 chased away with oaths, curses, and horrid blasphemies. 
 
% €riirafe far \)t %%U. 
 
 These things, however, made the Gospel sweeter to 
 them, and they received it with joy and many tears : yet 
 so strong did the current of persecution become, that Zin- 
 zendorf, unable to do anything towards effectually prevent- 
 ing it, determined to return to Europe, and refer the matter 
 to the Danish Government. The Negroes wept much at 
 the thoughts of losing him, and assured him they would 
 continue faithful to the Saviour. Before the Count took 
 his departure, the awakened Negroes in St. Thomas drew 
 up a letter to the King of Denmark, in the Creolian tongue, 
 stating their distress to him in very natural expressions, 
 and most pathetically entreating that they might not 
 be prevented from becoming acquainted, through the 
 ministry of the missionaries, with our Lord Jesus Christ, 
 for their eternal salvation. This was written in 1739, and 
 signed by several of them, in the name of 650 Negroes. 
 A simi]ar letter was addressed to the Queen of Denmark, 
 and signed by a Negro woman, in the name of 250 of her 
 own sex, concerned for the salvation of their souls. 
 
 The Count brought with him from St. Thomas, a Negro 
 named Andrew, who was not only awakened, but an assis- 
 tant in the Negro Church ; a very hopeful young man, 
 whose liberty the Count had purchased, that he might visit 
 the churches in Germany, and afterwards return to minister 
 to his own people. Andrew is described in the Memoirs 
 of Count Zinzendorf, as " a pleasing instance of the power- 
 ful grace which operated at that time amongst the 
 Slaves." 
 
 Would our limits allow, numerous evidences might be 
 adduced of the operation of divine grace on the hearts of 
 the Negroes in the Danish West Indies. Oldendorp's 
 account of the Moravian Missions in those Islands abounds 
 with evidences of this kind. To that work I must refer 
 the reader, after giving a few translations from it, 
 kindly made for me by my friend Martha Shipley, of 
 Headingley. 
 
 W 
 
 Wpw^ 3 
 
% €tiMt fnr \\t JfrgttT, 
 
 PABTICUIABS RESPECTING DAVID, ABRAHAM, AND OTHERS OF THE 
 BLACK ASSISTANT MISSIONARIES. 
 
 Abraham was an assistant Missionary in St. Croix, 
 about the year 1758. He and others are thus mentioned 
 in connection with Brother J. G. Rantsch : — " The native 
 assistants he found efficient, and some of them eminently 
 useful helpers. He acknowledged that without their aid 
 he could not have carried out his extensive plan of labour. 
 " The assistant David, (of whose gifts and successful la- 
 bours among his people mention has been several times 
 made in this History) he recognized as a servant of the 
 Lord, and an ornament of the Negro congregation, by 
 whom he was much beloved and esteemed. Besides him, 
 the helper Abraham was useful in holding lectures, different 
 classes, and in speaking publicly at funerals." 
 
 Some, both male and female assistants, were so circum- 
 stanced that they could make visits into districts not easily 
 accessible to the missionaries. Maria Magdalena, and 
 Catherine Barbara visited the fellow-believers of their own 
 sex, in the south of the island, to endeavour by private 
 communications to promote their growth in the knowledge 
 of Christ. At another time they visited the west of the 
 island, and were everywhere received with joy. Similar 
 visits were made by the helpers David, Nathaniel, Henry, 
 and Abraham. 
 
 SUSANNA. 
 
 In Susanna, who died in 1755, evidence was afforded how 
 great and blessed is the operation of divine grace on the 
 most corrupt of human hearts. Before she was brought 
 by the power of the Gospel from Satan to God, she was 
 known as an uncommonly vicious and profligate person. 
 She became so much changed as to be the astonishment of 
 all. On her bed of sickness, she had no greater solicitude 
 than to be with her Saviour. 
 
 JOAS, 
 
 Of the Mandingo nation, was baptized in 1750. He 
 
% €x\Mi far tire J&grfc 
 
 became, through grace, a meek and gentle man, and found 
 great comfort in the knowledge of the Redeemer, to whom 
 he thought he could never be sufficiently grateful, for 
 having brought him out of darkness into his marvellous 
 light. During his sickness, which was consumption, the 
 only occupation which afforded him comfort and joy, was 
 meditating on the Saviour who had died for him on the 
 cross. His earnest desire to be with Christ was fulfilled by 
 his happy release in November, 1755. 
 
 PETER AND ABRAHAM. 
 
 In 1742, Abraham was chosen as Peter's colleague. 
 Both were useful in public teaching. Their discourses 
 were evangelical, and had for their subjects, reconciliation 
 by the death of Jesus, and the grace which the sinner may 
 obtain through Christ. The character of Peter showed 
 itself in all his communications, which were full of love and 
 gentle feeling, and found an entrance into the hearts of his 
 audience. 
 
 Abraham was more energetic ; his discourses had much 
 strength, which carried his hearers along with him. To 
 listen to him his Coloured brethren hastened in great num- 
 bers. Many White persons also came to hear him, and 
 listened with astonishment. By one of his sermons on the 
 occasion of a Negro funeral in 1744, the whole of the con- 
 gregation was much affected. Besides having an excellent 
 special gift in preaching, he also possessed much experi- 
 ence, love, patience, and wisdom. He had an advantage 
 over the White teachers in perfectly understanding the 
 Negro language, in which the former were deficient, and 
 was also better acquainted than they were with the Negro 
 character, superstitions, habits, and dispositions. When 
 the Brother Rantsch, during his visit, in 1745, heard Abra- 
 ham's public testimony, he confessed it was with humili- 
 ation and reverence that he considered the powerful 
 working of the grace of God in this Slave, and through 
 him in many others. 
 
% frtimfe fnr tire JI ?grn. 
 
 The decease of this Negro is thus recorded by Olden- 
 dorp : — " In 1759, the mission lost the aged assistant Abra- 
 ham, in a very melancholy manner. He had lived for nine 
 years at Krumbay, where he not only had the oversight of 
 the Negroes on that plantation, but also had the charge of 
 testifying to the Negroes of this district the salvation which 
 is in Jesus Christ, and administering exhortation and con- 
 solation to them. In June, he gave to one of the Negroes 
 under him permission to- bring a bundle of fire-wood to the 
 village to sell, on condition that he first carried fodder for 
 the horses. This Negro, whose name was Joshua, was 
 bringing his wood to market without fulfilling the condi- 
 tion required. In order to resent this disobedience, Abra- 
 ham stepped in the way, threw the bundle from his head, 
 and insisted upon his obedience. Joshua refused to turn 
 back, and endeavoured to make his way to the village by 
 another path. At this Abraham became so angry that he 
 endeavoured to compel him to his duty, when Joshua in a 
 great rage seized his knife, threw Abraham to the ground, 
 gave him several stabs, and then went away. Abraham's 
 wounds were soon bound up, and he was taken to the vil- 
 lage for better assistance, but they were of such a nature 
 as to leave but little hope of recovery. 
 
 The believers among his people, hastened in numbers to 
 their honoured teacher, to wait upon him, and help him, 
 in his painful situation ; and he employed his little remain- 
 ing strength in testifying to them, that he remained stead- 
 fast to the doctrine he had so often laid before them, and 
 was ready to leave this world with joy, earnestly exhorting 
 them to continue in the same faith, and not to neglect their 
 day of gracious visitation. During the night, whilst con- 
 versing with two of the brethren who sat up with him, his 
 purified spirit departed, the 10th of June, 1759. His 
 remains were interred the same day at Newhernhut, on 
 which occasion there was a large gathering of both White 
 persons and Negroes, many tears being shed. The Negro 
 
1 CtiWe far tji Jfrgrn. 
 
 441 
 
 congregation lost in him their most gifted teacher, and the 
 labourers in the mission their most trusty assistant. For 
 more than twenty years he had laboured for the spreading 
 of the knowledge of Jesus Christ amidst many sufferings, 
 and his labours were eminently blessed. His public tes- 
 timonies were full of power and unction, and even where 
 they did not penetrate the hearts of his hearers, never failed 
 to excite their astonishment. 
 
 After his murderer had wandered about the bush for 
 some days, in despair, he delivered himself up in a repen- 
 tant state of mind to the judge, candidly acknowledged his 
 crime, and received his punishment from the executioner. 
 Full of confidence in the mercy of the Saviour, he sub- 
 mitted to the sentence of death, and showed much firmness 
 at the time of execution. 
 
 It was my intention to have inserted some sketches or 
 outlines of addresses delivered by the Black assistant mis- 
 sionaries of the Danish islands on various occasions, but 
 space will not admit. They may not equal those of Watts 
 or Doddridge in style, but they breathe the same spirit. 
 
 INTELLIGENT AFRICANS. 
 
 One of the missionaries at Sierra Leone accompanied 
 the Niger expedition in 1842, sanctioned by government, 
 for extending the missionary operations up the Niger. 
 They took with them a liberated African, named Samuel 
 Crowther, who, when a boy, was taken from a Slave ship, 
 and educated in the Society's school at Sierra Leone, and 
 who made so much progress both in theological and general 
 knowledge (being able to read the Greek Testament) that 
 he was sent to England to be presented as a candidate for 
 holy orders to the Bishop of London. Another native, 
 named King, likewise accompanied the expedition, and 
 when the health of the Europeans failed, he was deemed 
 competent to be left in charge of the model farm at the 
 
 3l 
 
 te 
 
US 
 
 442 
 
 % €x\h\i fnr tire Jfognu 
 
 confluence of the Tshadda and the Niger. Another native, 
 Simon Jonas, was employed in forming the treaties which 
 Captain Trotter entered into with chiefs below the con- 
 fluence. The competency of that individual was most 
 striking. Mr. Schon drew up a paper in which he details 
 the proceedings of Simon Jonas, in carrying on a commu- 
 nication with King Obi, on the subject of Slavery. The 
 mode of his carrying on a negotiation is illustrative of the 
 power of the native African, with a moderate degree of 
 training in Sierra Leone, to become a really efficient agent 
 in imparting knowledge to his countrymen. 
 
 A NEGRO SLAVE AND POET. 
 Dr. Madden has made a translation of the life of a Slave 
 recently liberated in Cuba, written in Spanish, whose name, 
 for various reasons, he thinks it advisable not to publish. 
 It was my intention to have given an outline of this history 
 as well for its interest, as exhibiting a clearness of style 
 and composition highly creditable to a self-taught Negro 
 Slave. Space will only admit of a few extracts in addition 
 to the information already given, at pages 130 and 131 of 
 the present volume. 
 
 It would be tedious, says he, to detail the particulars of 
 my early history, in which there was nothing but happiness. 
 At the age of twelve years, I had composed some verses in 
 memory, not being wished to learn to write. I dictated 
 them by stealth to a young Mulatto girl named Serafina, 
 which verses were of an amatory character. 
 
 I passed on without many changes to my fourteenth 
 year ; but the important part of my history began when I 
 was about eighteen, when fortune's bitterest enmity was 
 turned on me. For the slightest crime of boyhood, I was 
 shut up in a place for charcoal, for 24 hours at once. I 
 was extremely timid, and my prison was so obscure, that 
 at mid-day no object could be distinguished in it without 
 
 H 
 
 M^ 
 
 m 
 
% Wlmte for % Jfogrt. 
 
 5m1A 
 
 a candle. Here, after being flogged, I was placed, with 
 orders to the Slaves, under threats of the greatest punish- 
 ment, to abstain from giving me a drop of water. What I 
 suffered from hunger and thirst, tormented, with fear, in a 
 place so dismal, and almost suffocated with the vapours 
 arising from the common sink close to my dungeon, and 
 terrified by the rats that passed over me, may be easily 
 imagined. My head was filled with frightful fancies, and 
 I often imagined I was surrounded by evil spirits, and 
 praying aloud for mercy, I would be taken out and almost 
 flayed alive, and again shut up. This kind of punishment 
 was so frequent that every week I suffered a like martyrdom 
 twice or thrice. I attribute the smallness of my stature 
 and the debility of my constitution to the life of suffering 
 I led, daily receiving blows on the face that often made 
 the blood spout from both my nostrils. 
 
 We passed five years in Matanzas, where my employ- 
 ment was to sweep and clean the house at sunrise, before 
 any one was up ; this done I had to seat myself at the door 
 of my mistress, that she might find me there when she 
 awoke, then I had to follow her about wherever she 
 went, like an automaton, with my arms crossed. When 
 meals were over, I had to gather up what was left, and 
 clear away the dishes, and when they rose from table I had 
 to walk behind. Then came the hour of sewing ; I had to 
 seat myself in sight of my mistress to sew women's dresses, 
 to make gowns, &c, and mend all kinds of clothing. 
 
 At the hour of drawing, which a master taught, I was 
 stationed behind a chair, and what I saw done, and heard 
 corrected and explained, made me count myself as one of 
 the pupils of the drawing-class. One of the children gave 
 me an old tablet and a crayon ; and next day I began 
 making mouths, eyes, and ears, until I perfected myself, so 
 as to be able to copy a head so faithfully, that my master 
 said I would turn out a great artist. 
 
 At night I had to go to sleep at some distance, where my 
 
 dw< 
 
 TNS) 
 
444 
 
 % fritafo for % flrgrn. 
 
 mother lived (in the Negro barracones). My only comfort 
 was to fly to her arms, who, with my brother Florence waited 
 up till my arrival. 
 
 More than twice they sat up for me while I was in con- 
 finement in the stocks for a trifling offence, waiting a sor- 
 rowful morning. My mother, all anxiety when I did not 
 come, used to approach where the stocks were, and call to 
 me, " Juan," and I, sighing, would answer her, and then 
 she would say outside, " Ah, my child !" and call on her 
 husband in his grave — for at this time my father was dead. 
 Three times I remember the repetition of this scene, at 
 other times I used to meet my mother seeking me — once 
 above all, a memorable time to me — when the event which 
 follows happened : — 
 
 We were returning from the town late one night, when 
 the carriage was going very fast, and I was seated as usual, 
 with one hand holding the bar, and having the lanthorn in 
 the other ; it fell out of my hand ; I jumped down to get 
 it, but such was my terror, I was unable to come up with 
 the carriage. I followed, well knowing what was to come ; 
 when I came to the house, I was seized by the mayoral. 
 Leading me to the stocks, we met my mother, who giving 
 way to the impulses of her heart, came up to complete my 
 misfortunes. On seeing me, she attempted to inquire what 
 I had done, but the mayoral ordered her to be silent, and 
 treated her as one raising a disturbance. Without regard 
 to her entreaties, and being irritated at being called up at 
 that hour, he raised his hand, and struck my mother with 
 the whip. I felt the blow in my own heart ! To utter a 
 loud cry, and from a downcast boy, with the timidity of 
 one as meek as a lamb, to become all at once like a raging 
 lion, was a thing of a moment — -with all my strength I fell 
 on him with teeth and hands, and it may be imagined how 
 many cuffs, kicks, and blows, were given in the struggle 
 that ensued. 
 
 My mother and myself were carried off and shut up in 
 
 §- 
 
 ~V) 
 
m 
 
 % €riimte far tire Jfogm 
 
 445 
 
 the same place ; two twin children were brought to her to 
 suckle, while her own were left weeping alone in the hut. 
 Scarcely had it dawned, when the mayoral, with two Ne- 
 groes acting under him, led us as victims to the place of 
 sacrifice. I suffered more punishment than was ordered, 
 in consequence of my attack on the mayoral. But who 
 can describe the powers of the laws of nature on mothers ? 
 the fault of my mother was, that seeing they were going to 
 kill me, as she thought, she inquired what I had done, and 
 this was sufficient to receive a blow and to be further chas- 
 tised. At beholding my mother in this situation, for the 
 first time in her life, (she being exempted from work) 
 stripped and thrown down to be scourged, overwhelmed 
 with grief and trembling, I asked them to have pity on 
 her for God's sake ; but at the sound of the first lash, in- 
 furiated like a tiger, I flew at the mayoral, and was near 
 losing my life in his hands ; but let us throw a veil over the 
 rest of this doleful scene. 
 
 There never passed a day without bringing some trouble 
 to me ; I cannot relate the incredible hardships of my life, 
 full of sorrows ! My heart sickened through sufferings : 
 once after having received many blows on the face, and 
 that happened almost daily, my mistress said, " I will make 
 an end of you before you are of age." 
 
 From my infancy I was taught to love and fear God, 
 and my trust in him was such, that I always employed part 
 of the night in praying to God to lighten my sufferings, and 
 preserve me from mischief ; and I firmly believe my prayers 
 were heard, and to this I attribute the preservation of my 
 life once on occasion of my running away. 
 
 Although oppressed with so many sufferings, sometimes 
 I gave way to the impulses of my naturally cheerful char- 
 acter. I used to draw decorations on paper, figures on 
 cards or pasteboard, &c. 
 
 About this time I went to the lady of Senor Apodaca, 
 a grandee of Havannah. A painter was employed there in 
 
 
 m 
 
 G) 
 
446 
 
 % €x\Mt for \\t Mt$n, 
 
 painting some emblems. I helped him, and he gave me 
 ten dollars for my work, and having for amusement painted 
 some garlands, he saw that I might be useful to him, and 
 asked my mistress to lend me to him, but she would not 
 consent ; at the conclusion of his work he gave me two 
 dollars more. 
 
 As I was treated with kindness, I began to be more calm 
 and composed, and to forget the late harsh behaviour to- 
 wards me. I wrote a great many sonnets. Poetry requires 
 an object, but I had none to inflame my breast — this was 
 the cause of my verses being poor. I was very anxious to 
 read every book or paper that fell in my way, and if I met 
 with any poetry I learnt it by heart. When my mistress 
 had company she had always some poet invited, who recited 
 verses and composed sonnets extempore ; I had in a corner 
 of the room some ink in an egg-shell, and a pen, and while 
 the company applauded and filled their glasses with wine, 
 away I went to my corner, and wrote as many verses as I 
 could remember. 
 
 Three or four months after this, my mistress turned 
 cross and peevish, and was continually threatening me. 
 Believing that if I could go to Havannah I should have my 
 liberty, I began to think seriously about escaping. One 
 morning when all the people were at church, a free servant 
 called me aside, and said in a whisper, "my friend, if you 
 suffer, it is your own fault ; make your escape, and present 
 yourself before the Captain-General at Havannah, state 
 your ill treatment to him, and he will do you justice ;" at 
 the same time showing me the road. 
 
 I waited till twelve o'clock ; saddled a horse for 
 the first time in my life, and put on a bridle, but with 
 such trembling I hardly knew what I was about ; after 
 that, I knelt down, said a prayer, and mounted. I 
 thought nobody saw me, but knew afterwards I was seen 
 by several of the Negroes, who offered no impediment to 
 my flight. 
 
1 €nkak for tjp llrgrn. 
 
 Dr. Madden has translated some of the poems composed 
 by this Slave, specimens of which must close the foregoing 
 extracts from his life. " A few of these poems," says the 
 Doctor, " I have put into English verse, rendered so as to 
 give the sense of the writer (sometimes purposely obscured 
 in the original) as plainly as practicable. To leave no doubt 
 of their authenticity, I have deposited the originals in the 
 Spanish language, in the hands of the Secretary of the 
 Anti-Slavery Society. To form a just opinion of their 
 merit, it is necessary to consider the circumstances under 
 which they were written, which cannot be estimated by one 
 ignorant of the nature of Cuban Slavery." 
 
 TO CALUMNY. 
 
 Silence, audacious wickedness which aims 
 
 At honour's breast, or strikes with driftless breath, 
 
 The lightest word that's spoken thus defames, 
 And where it falls inflicts a moral death. 
 
 If, with malign, deliberate intent, 
 
 The shaft is sped, the bow that vibrates yet 
 
 One day will hurt the hand by which 'tis bent, 
 And leave a wound its malice justly met. 
 
 For once the winged arrow is sent forth, 
 
 Who then may tell where, when, or how 'twill fall ? 
 
 Or, who may pluck its barb from wounded worth, 
 And send it back, and swiftly too withal. 
 
 /m 
 
 RELIGION. 
 
 Yes, tho' in gloom and sadness I may rise, 
 
 One blessed strain can soothe my troubled soul, 
 No sooner wakened than with streaming eyes, 
 
 Upward I look, and there I seek my goal. 
 Soaring in spirit o'er the things of earth, 
 
 The spark imprisoned bursts its bonds of clay ; 
 I feel delight above all human mirth, 
 
 And wrapt in love, I live but then to pray ; 
 
 To thee, dear Father ! — mighty and supreme ! 
 
 Immense ! eternal ! infinite ! and blest ! 
 Oh, how the grandeur of the theme doth seem 
 
 To enlarge my thoughts, and to inflame my breast 
 
 (& 
 
M( 
 
 448 
 
 % €xxbk far \\i $t$m. 
 
 Hail, blessed faith ! thou only liope and trust, 
 Solace most sweet, and stay of hope most sure ; 
 
 Thou sole support and shield of the opprest, 
 
 The weak, the wronged, the wretched, and the poor. 
 
 In thee, all trouble is absorbed and lost ; 
 
 In ev'ry breath of thine there's vital air ; 
 Whose mild and genial influence, the just 
 
 Rejoice to find, the wretched e'en may share. 
 For thee, when darkness brooded o'er the land, 
 
 A remnant, faithful to the law they feared, 
 Still wept and sighed — 'till mercy's hour at hand, 
 
 The mighty standard of the cross was reared. 
 
 Then in the depths of fear, as by a spell, 
 
 The voice of hope was heard, the tidings glad, 
 Of truth eternal, far and wide were spread, 
 
 And demons trembled as their idols fell ; 
 But soon the foe of truth and justice came, 
 
 Far worse there's none than tyranny can prove, 
 That fitting agent of a spirit's aim, 
 
 Indocile ever to the God of love. 
 
 But vain was all that monster's rage renewed, 
 
 Thousands of martyrs fell beneath its sway ; 
 Still in that cradle purpled with their blood, 
 
 The infant faith waxed stronger every day. 
 Now the triumphant gospel is our guide, 
 
 Our sure conductor to eternal light : 
 The future vast ; the heavenly portals hide 
 
 Their joys no longer from our spirit's sight. 
 
 'Tis thou, O G-od, by faith who dost reveal 
 
 Mysterious wonder to our senses weak : 
 When thou dost speak to hearts that deeply feel, 
 
 And humbly hear when thou dost deign to speak. 
 Oh, when the mantle of thy peace descends, 
 
 How the soid then exults in her attire ! 
 The garb of grace to every thought extends, 
 
 And wraps reflection in seraphic fire. 
 
 In thee, I find all purity and peace, 
 
 All truth and goodness, wisdom far above 
 
 All worldly wisdom, might beyond increase, 
 And yet surpassing these, unbounded love. 
 
Oh, that its lights were shed on those whose deeds 
 Belie the doctrines of the church they claim ; 
 
 Whose impious tongues profane their father's creeds, 
 And sanction wrong, e'en in religion's name. 
 
 Oh, Grod of mercy, throned in glory high, 
 
 O'er earth and all its miseries, look down 
 Behold the wretched, hear the captive's cry, 
 
 And call thy exiled children round thy throne ! 
 There would I fain in contemplation gaze, 
 
 On thy eternal heauty, and would make 
 Of love one lasting canticle of praise, 
 
 And every theme but that henceforth forsake. 
 
 THIRTY YEARS. 
 
 When I think on the course I have run, 
 From my childhood itself to this day, 
 
 I tremble, and fain would I shun, 
 The remembrance its terrors array. 
 
 I marvel at struggles endured, 
 With a destiny frightful as mine, 
 
 At the strength for such efforts : — assured 
 Tho' I am, 'tis in vain to repine. 
 
 I have known this sad life thirty years, 
 And to me, thirty years it has been 
 
 Of suff'ring, of sorrow and tears, 
 Ev'ry day of its bondage I've seen. 
 
 But 'tis nothing the past — or the pains, 
 Hitherto I have struggled to bear, 
 
 When I think, oh, my G-od ! on the chains, 
 That I know I'm yet destined to wear. 
 
 ciUsJ 
 
 THE CUCUYA; OR FIRE-FLY. 
 
 The fire-fiy is heedlessly wandering about, 
 
 Through field and through forest is winging his route, 
 
 As free as the butterfly sporting in air. 
 
 From flower to flower it flits here and there : 
 
 Now glowing with beautiful phosphoric light, 
 
 Then paling its lustre and waning in night : 
 
 It bears no effulgence in rivalry near, 
 
 But shrouds ev'ry gleam as the dawn doth appear. 
 
 It sparkles alone in the soft summer's eve, 
 Itself, though unseen, by the track it doth leave, 
 
2 €n\uik fur tip i 1 rgrn. 
 
 Tbe youth of the village at night-fall pursue 
 O'er hill and o'er dale, as it comes into view ; 
 Now shining before them, now lost to their eyes, 
 The sparkle they catch at, just twinkles and dies ; 
 And the mead is one moment all spangled with lire, 
 And the next, every sparklet is sure to expire. 
 
 On the leaf of the orange awhile it disports, 
 When the blossom is there, to its cup it resorts, 
 And still the more brightly and dazzling it shines, 
 It baffles its tiny pursuer's designs. 
 But see the sweet maiden, the innocent child, 
 The pride of the village — as fair as the wild 
 And beautiful flowers she twines in her hair — 
 How light is her step, and how joyous her air ! 
 
 And oft as one looks on such brightness and bloom, 
 On such beauty as hers, one might envy the doom 
 Of a enptive " Cucuya," that's destined like this, 
 To be touched by her hand, and revived by her kiss ; 
 Imprisoned itself, by a mistress so kind, 
 It hardly can seem to be closely confined, 
 And a prisoner thus tenderly treated in fine, 
 By a keeper so gentle, might cease to repine. 
 
 In the cage which her delicate hands have prepared, 
 The captive " Cucuya" is shining unscared, 
 Suspended before her, with others as bright, 
 In beauty's own bondage revealing their light. 
 But this amongst all is her favourite one, 
 And she bears it at dusk to her alcove alone, 
 'Tis fed by her hand on the cane that's most choice, 
 And in secret it gleams, at the sound of her voice. 
 
 Thus cherished, the honey of Hybla would now 
 Scarce tempt the " Cucuya" her care to forego ; 
 And dady it seems to grow brighter, and gain 
 Increasing effulgence, forgetting its pain. 
 Oh ! beautiful maiden, may heaven accord, 
 Thy care of the captive, its fitting reward ; 
 And never may fortune the fetters remove, 
 Of a heart that is thine in the bondage of love. 
 
 n 
 
/Lr-- 
 
 % itiimfe for \\)i iOrgrn 
 
 THE CLOCK THAT GAINS. 
 
 The Clock's too fast they say ; 
 But what matter how it gains ! 
 
 Time will not pass away 
 Any faster for its paius. 
 
 The tiny hands may race 
 Round the circle, they may range, 
 
 The Sun has but one pace, 
 And his course he cannot chaugc. 
 
 The beams that daily shine 
 On the dial, err not so, 
 
 For they're ruled by laws divine, 
 And they vary not, we know. 
 
 But though the Clock is fast, 
 Yet the moments I must say, 
 
 More slowly never passed, 
 Than they seemed to pass to-day. 
 
 THE DREAM. 
 
 ADDRESSED TO MY YOUNGER BROTHER. 
 
 Tnorj knowest, dear Florence, my sufferings of old, 
 The struggles maintained with oppression for years, 
 
 We shared them together, and each was consoled 
 
 With the whispers of love that were mingled with tears. 
 
 But now, far apart, this sad pleasure is gone, 
 We mingle our sighs and our sorrows no more ; 
 
 The course is a new one that each has to run, 
 And dreary the prospect for either in store. 
 
 But iu slumber, our spirits, at least, shall commune, 
 Behold, how they meet in the visions of sleep ; 
 
 In dreams that recal early days, like the one 
 
 In my brother's remembrance, I fondly would keep. 
 
 For solitude pining, in anguish of late 
 
 The heights of Quintana I sought, for repose, 
 
 And there of seclusion enamoured, the weight 
 Of my cares was forgotten — I felt not my woes. 
 
 Exhausted and weary, the spell of the place 
 
 Soon weighed down my eyelids, and slumber theu stole 
 
 So softly o'er nature, it left not a trace 
 Of trouble or sorrow, o'ercasting my soul. 
 
 <>l 
 
 r$> 
 
I seemed to ascend like a bird in the air, 
 
 And the pinions that bore me, amazed me the more ; 
 
 I gazed on the plumage of beauty so rare, 
 
 As they waved in the sun, at each effort to soar. 
 
 My spirit aspired to a happier sphere, 
 
 The buoyancy even of youth was surpassed ; 
 
 One effort at flight not divested of fear, 
 
 And the flutter ensued, was successful at last. 
 
 And leaving the earth and its toils, I look down, 
 Or upwards I glance, and behold with surprise, 
 
 The wonders of God, and the firmament strewn 
 With myriads of brilliants, that spangle the skies. 
 
 The ocean of ether around me, each star 
 
 Of the zodiac shining, above either pole 
 Of the earth as a point in the distance afar, 
 
 And one flap of the wing, serves to traverse the whole. 
 
 The bounds which confine the wide sea, and the height 
 Which separates earth from the heavenly spheres ; 
 
 The moon as a shield I behold in my flight, 
 And each spot on its surface distinctly appears. 
 
 The valley well known of Matanzas is nigh, 
 
 And trembling, my brother, I gaze on that place, 
 
 Where, cold and forgotten, the ashes now he 
 
 Of the parents we clung to in boyhood's embrace. 
 
 How the sight of that place sent the blood to my heart, 
 
 I shudder e'en now to recal it, and yet 
 I'd remind you of wrongs we were wont to impart, 
 
 And to weep o'er in secret at night when we met. 
 
 I gazed on that spot, where together we played, 
 Our innocent pastimes came fresh to my mind ; 
 
 Our mother's caresses, the fondness displayed, 
 In each word and each look of a parent so kind. 
 
 The ridge of that mountain, whose fastnesses wild 
 
 The fugitives seek, I beheld, and around 
 Plantations were scattered of late where they toiled, 
 
 And the graves of their comrades are now to be found. 
 
 The mill-house was there and its turmoil of old, 
 
 But sick of these scenes, for too well they were known ; 
 
 I looked for the stream, where in childhood I strolled 
 By its banks when a moment of peace was my own. 
 
But no recollections of pleasure or pain 
 
 Could drive the remembrance of thee from my core ; 
 I sought my dear brother, embraced him again, 
 
 But found him a Slave, as I left him before. 
 
 " Oh, Florence," I cried, " let us fly from this place, 
 The gloom of a dungeon is here to affright ! 
 
 'Tis dreadful as death or its terrors to face, 
 And hateful itself as the scaffold to 6ight. 
 
 " Let us fly on the wings of the wind, let us fly, 
 
 And for ever abandon so hostile a soil 
 As this place of our birth, where our doom is to sigh 
 
 In hapless despair, and in bondage to toil." 
 
 To my bosom I clasped him, and winging once more 
 My flight in the air, I ascend with my charge, 
 
 The sultan I seem of the winds, as I soar, 
 
 A monarch whose will sets the prisoner at large. 
 
 Like Icarus boldly ascending on high, 
 
 I laugh at the anger of Minos, and see 
 A haven of freedom aloft, where I fly, 
 
 And the place where the Slave from his master is free. 
 
 The rapture which Daedalus inly approved 
 
 To Athens from Crete, when pursuing his flight, 
 
 On impetuous pinions, I felt when I moved 
 
 Through an ocean of ether, so boundless and bright. 
 
 But the moment I triumphed o'er earth and its fears, 
 And dreamt of aspiring to heavenly joys : 
 
 Of hearing the music divine of the spheres, 
 And tasting of pleasure that care never cloys, 
 
 I saw in an instant, the face of the skies, 
 So bright and serene but a moment before, 
 
 Enveloped in gloom, and there seemed to arise 
 The murmur preceding the tempest's wild roar. 
 
 Beneath me, the sea into fury wa3 lashed, 
 
 Above me, the thunder rolled loudly, and now 
 
 The hurricane round me in turbulence dashed, 
 
 And the glare of the lightning e'en flashed on my brow. 
 
 The elements all seemed in warfare to be, 
 
 And succour or help there was none to be sought ; 
 
 The fate of poor Icarus seemed now for me, 
 
 And my daring attempt its own punishment brought. 
 
 
 HP 
 
% frftaft fnr i\i Jfegnt 
 
 'Twas then, oh, my God ! that a thunder-clap came, 
 And the noise of its crash broke the slumbers so light, 
 
 That stole o'er my senses and fettered my frame, 
 
 And the dream was soon over, of freedom's first flight. 
 
 And waking, I saw thee, my brother, once more; 
 
 The sky was serene and my terrors were past ; 
 But doubt there was none of the tempests of yore, 
 
 And the clouds that of old, our young hopes overcast. 
 
 FREDERICK DOUGLASS 
 
 Was born a Slave, on a plantation in Maryland, about 
 the year 1817, and remained in that servile condition till 
 about twenty-one years of age, when he effected his escape 
 from fetters and chains. The history of his life of Slavery, 
 which has been widely circulated, * presents a dismal 
 picture of what is endured by the Negro race in the Slave- 
 holding states of the Union. 
 
 The narrative of Douglass, written by himself, consider- 
 ing how long and dark was the career he had to run as a 
 Slave, in the poorest school for the human heart and in- 
 tellect, and how few have been his opportunities for subse- 
 quently improving his mind, is highly creditable to his head 
 and heart. He who can peruse it without a tearful eye, a 
 heaving breast, an afflicted spirit, — without being filled 
 with an abhorrence of Slavery and all its abettors, and ani- 
 mated with a determination to seek the immediate over- 
 throw of that execrable system, — must have a flinty heart 
 indeed. It presents no exaggerated picture of Slavery. 
 Many have suffered incomparably more, while few on the 
 plantations have suffered less, than himself. Yet how de- 
 plorable was his situation ! what terrible chastisements 
 were inflicted upon his person ! what still more shocking 
 outrages were perpetrated upon his mind! with all his 
 noble powers and sublime aspirations, how like a brute 
 
 * Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, an American Slave, writ- 
 ten by himself. Dublin : Webb and Chapman. 1845. 
 
OT 
 
 51 Crtimfc for tip? JJrgrn. 
 
 455 
 
 was he treated, even by those professing to have the same 
 mind in them that was in Christ Jesus ! to what dreadful 
 liabilities he was continually subjected! how destitute of 
 friendly counsel and aid, even in his greatest extremities ! 
 How heavy was the midnight of woe which shrouded in 
 blackness the last ray of hope, and filled the future with 
 terror and gloom ! What longings after freedom took pos- 
 session of his breast, and how his misery augmented, in 
 proportion as he grew reflective and intelligent, — thus de- 
 monstrating that a happy Slave is an extinct man ! How 
 he thought, reasoned, felt, under the lash of the driver, 
 with the chains upon his limbs ! what perils he encountered 
 in his endeavours to escape from his horrible doom ! and 
 how signal have been his deliverance and preservation in 
 the midst of a nation of pitiless enemies ! 
 
 The narrative of Douglass contains many affecting inci- 
 dents, many passages of great eloquence and power; per- 
 haps the most thrilling one of all is the description he gives 
 of his feelings, as he stood soliloquizing respecting his fate, 
 and the chances of his one day being a free man, on the 
 banks of the Chesapeake Bay — viewing the receding vessels 
 as they flew with their white wings before the breeze, and 
 apostrophizing them as animated by the living spirit of 
 freedom. "Who can read that passage, and be insensible to 
 its pathos and sublimity ? " Compressed into it is a whole 
 Alexandrian library of thought, feeling, and sentiment — 
 all that can, all that need be urged, in the form of expos- 
 tulation, entreaty, rebuke, against the crime of crimes, — 
 making man the property of his fellow-man ! O, how ac- 
 cursed is that system, which entombs the god-like mind of 
 man, defaces the divine image, reduces those who by crea- 
 tion were crowned with glory and honour, to a level with 
 four-footed beasts, and exalts the dealer in human flesh 
 above all that is called God ! Why should its existence be 
 prolonged one hour ? Is it not evil, only evil, and that con- 
 tinually ? What does its presence imply but the absence 
 
 &i 
 
 M 
 
456 
 
 % €i\Mt fnr \)i Jlrgrn. 
 
 of all fear of God, all regard for man, on the part of 
 the people of the United States ? Heaven speed its eternal 
 overthrow ! " 
 
 What a disgrace on Free and Enlightened America! 
 Here we have a man in physical proportions and stature 
 commanding and erect, in intellect richly endowed, in 
 natural eloquence a prodigy, in soul manifestly " created 
 but a little lower than the angels ; " yet a Slave, aye, a 
 fugitive Slave, trembling for his safety on American soil. 
 Capable of high attainments as an intellectual and moral 
 being, almost without an education, an ornament to society, 
 and yet, by the law of his country, by the voice of its 
 people, by the terms of the Slave Code, only a piece of 
 property, a beast of burden, a chattel personal, never- 
 theless ! 
 
 It would be superfluous to say much here respecting the 
 talents of Douglass, which are so self-evident. Few have 
 not had an opportunity of judging of his abilities for them- 
 selves, and thus increasing their respect for him and for his 
 race. As a public speaker, he excels in pathos, wit, com- 
 parison, imitation, strength of reasoning, and fluency 
 of language, frequently giving utterance to many noble 
 thoughts and thrilling reflections, and his eloquent appeals 
 have extorted the highest applause of multitudes on both 
 sides of the Atlantic. " There is in him," says W. L. 
 Garrison, " that union of head and heart, which is indis- 
 pensable to an enlightenment of the heads, and a winning 
 of the hearts of others. May his strength continue to be 
 equal to his day ! May he continue to grow in grace, and 
 in the knowledge of God,' that he may be increasingly ser- 
 viceable in the cause of bleeding humanity ;" and let the 
 calumniators of the Coloured race despise themselves for 
 their baseness and illiberality of spirit, and henceforth cease 
 to talk of the natural inferiority of those who require no- 
 thing but time and opportunity to attain to the highest 
 point of human excellence. 
 
 m 
 
,el<^- c e- A. ^-t-c^4 Zk-^5 / 
 
 MAJJC BLESTER.: 
 
 •- ':■ IRWIN 39. OLDHAM STI 
 
% ftiirafe for tjp Jfogm 
 
 457 / 
 
 OBSERVATIONS ON NEGRO CHARACTER AND ABILITY, 
 
 COMMUNICATED BY DR. WINTERBOTTOM, OF SOUTH SHIELDS, IN A 
 LETTER TO THE AUTHOR DATED MARCH 9TH, 1848. 
 
 For more than half a century, I have felt a strong and 
 sincere attachment to the much injured African. In 1792, 
 I went out to Africa in the service of the Sierra Leone 
 Company, and resided in Free Town four years, as physi- 
 cian to the Colony. Here I had, of course, abundant op- 
 portunities of observing the Negro character, and if my 
 unbiassed testimony can be of any avail, I declare it as my 
 opinion, that the Negro in his native country, is of a mild 
 and benevolent disposition, hospitable, and capable of strong 
 and warm attachment to those who treat him with kindness. 
 I speak from much experience, having repeatedly visited 
 the African in his native country, passed the night in his 
 hut, and partaken of his kindness and hospitality. 
 
 With respect to their powers of mind, I consider the 
 Africans to be upon a level with the generality of Europeans. 
 The schools of Free Town and the neighbouring districts 
 are crowded with as fine children as we usually meet with 
 in England ; and they can produce as perfect specimens of 
 active, intelligent, and sprightly pupils, as are to be found 
 in any of our British schools of the same class. 
 
 The natives of Africa, in general, live in a state of gross 
 ignorance and idolatrous superstition, the Mahometans ex- 
 cepted. But they duly appreciate the advantages of edu- 
 cation, and are, universally, anxious to have their children 
 taught to read and write. A Missionary settling in one of 
 their villages would be hailed with joy, and meet with the 
 utmost kindness and respect. 
 
 Allow me to add, that my brother, captain of one of the 
 Sierra Leone Company's vessels, accompanied my excellent 
 friend, Mr. Watt, in his visit to Teembo, capital of the 
 Foulah country. They travelled on foot upwards of 500 
 miles, and were, everywhere, most kindly and hospitably 
 received, particularly at the capital by the king. 
 
 Hlf 
 
 ~dG^t 
 
 3 N 
 
458 
 
 I €xiMt far fire Jl^grn. 
 
 In a letter subsequently received from Dr. Winterbot- 
 tom, the following addition on this subject occurs : — 
 
 Upwards of half a century has elapsed since my return 
 from that very interesting country, Africa ; of course many 
 circumstances have escaped my recollection, but I must 
 ever remember with pleasure and with gratitude, the uni- 
 form kindness shown to me by my Black brethren. 
 
 I have been acquainted with several extremely intelligent 
 Africans. Mr. Cooper, a friend of mine, was particularly 
 noticed by the Governor and Whites of the colony. He 
 was very gentlemanly in his appearance and manners, and 
 well informed. He set to music, for the use of the church, 
 Pope's beautiful ode " Vital Spark," which I have listened 
 to with much pleasure, as sung by the sweet voices of the 
 very devout Black women. 
 
 Among the liberated Africans I have had many in- 
 stances related to me since I left the colony, of men, who, 
 until the age of manhood, had never seen or heard of a 
 letter, making such progress in reading, writing, and arith- 
 metic, as to be now able to manage the accounts of a store, 
 or large shop, and also the details of a vessel's cargo. Many 
 of the women are equally expert. The children in the 
 schools are also extremely quick and docile. 
 
 From what I have seen, it is my solemn and unbiassed 
 opinion, that education alone constitutes the whole differ- 
 ence between the European and the African. 
 I am, dear Sir, yours truly, 
 
 THOS. M. WINTERBOTTOM. 
 
 SICANA, A KAFIR CHIEF. 
 
 During his last illness, the mind of this enlightened 
 Chief was elevated above the world by the hope of eternal 
 blessedness. Feeling that he had but a short time to live, 
 so long as he was able to speak he explained to those around 
 him the nature and importance of the Christian's hope ; 
 
1 €nhh for tire Jtfrgrn. 
 
 459 
 
 exhorting them to faith in Christ, whatever sacrifices their 
 constancy might cost them ; and he expired in the midst 
 of his people, in a truly Christian manner, resigning his 
 soul into the hands of that Saviour who had redeemed him, 
 exclaiming, " Come, Lord Jesus, come quickly ; I commit 
 my soul into thy hands ; it is thine, for thou hast re- 
 deemed it by thy blood." 
 
 Sicana was a poet, and composed hymns, which he re- 
 peated to his people, till they could retain them upon their 
 memories. The following specimen of his poetical abilities, 
 the people are still accustomed to sing to a low monoto- 
 nous air. 
 
 Ulin guba inkulu siambata tina 
 Ulodali bom' uadali pezula, 
 Umdala uadala idala izula, 
 Yebinza inquinquis zixeliela. 
 Utika urukula gozizuline, 
 Yebinza inquinquis noziliniele. 
 Umze uakonana subiziele, 
 Umkokeli ua sikokeli tina, 
 Uenza infaina zenza go bomi ; 
 Imali inkula subiziele, 
 Wena wena q'aba inyaniza, 
 Wena wena kaka linyaniza, 
 Wena wena klati linyaniza ; 
 Inveua inh'inani subiziele, 
 Ugaze laku ziman'heba wena, 
 Usankla zaku ziman'heba wena, 
 Umkokili ua, sikokeli tina : 
 Ulodali bom' uadali pezula, 
 Umdala uadala idala izula. 
 
 TKANSLATIOX. 
 
 Mantle of Comfort ! God of Love ! 
 
 The Ancient One on High ! 
 Who guides the firmament above. 
 
 The heavens and starry sky ; 
 
 Creator — Ruler — Mighty One ; 
 
 The Only Good,— All-wise ; 
 To Him, the Great Eternal God, 
 
 Our fervent prayers arise. 
 
460 
 
 % ftfttab fnr \\i llrgrn. 
 
 Giver of life, we call on Him, 
 
 On His high throne above, 
 Our Rock of Refuge still to be, 
 
 Of safety and of love. 
 
 Our trusty shield, our sure defence, 
 
 Our leader still to be, 
 We call upon our pitying God, 
 
 Who makes the blind to see. 
 
 We supplicate the Holy Lamb 
 Whose blood for us was shed, 
 
 Whose feet were pierced for guilty man, 
 Whose hands for us have bled. 
 
 Even our God who gave us life, 
 From Heaven, His throne above, 
 
 The great Creator of the world, 
 Father, and God of Love. 
 
 Jane Bragg. 
 
 JASMIN THOUMAZEATJ 
 
 Was born in Africa, in 1714. He was brought to St. 
 Domingo and sold for a Slave, when 22 years of age. 
 Obtaining his freedom, he married, and in 1756 established 
 a hospital at the Cape for poor Negroes and Mulattoes. 
 More than forty years were devoted by him and his wife 
 to this benevolent Institution, and his fortune was subser- 
 vient to the wants of its inmates. The only regret they 
 felt, while their time and substance were devoted to these 
 destitute objects, arose from a fear, that after they were 
 gone, the hospital might be abandoned. 
 
 The Philadelphia Society at the Cape, and the Agricul- 
 tural Society at Paris, decreed medals to Jasmin, who died 
 near the close of the century. 
 
 PAUL CUFFE. 
 
 This intelligent, enterprising, and benevolent Negro, 
 was the youngest son of John Cuffe, a Negro dragged 
 from his home and connexions, and sold into Slavery, in 
 
% 'dtilinft fnt tjit IJtgrn. 
 
 
 SJJi 
 
 which he remained most of his life ; but at last, by good 
 conduct and industry, he amassed sufficient to purchase his 
 freedom, and also a farm of 100 acres. He married a 
 woman of Indian descent, and brought up a family of four 
 sons and six daughters respectably, near New Bedford, 
 Massachusetts. 
 
 Paul was the youngest son, and when he was about 
 fourteen, his father dying, the care of supporting their 
 mother and six sisters devolved jointly upon Paul and his 
 brothers. The land which their father had left them 
 proving unproductive, afforded but little provision for the 
 family. They therefore laboured under great disadvan- 
 tages, and did not possess the means of acquiring even the 
 rudiments of a good education. 
 
 Paul, however, was not easily discouraged, and found 
 opportunities for improvement and of cultivating his mind. 
 Through his own indefatigable exertions, with a little 
 assistance occasionally, he soon learned to read and write, 
 and also attained a knowledge of arithmetic. Some esti- 
 mate may be formed of the natural talent with which he 
 was endowed for the speedy reception of learning, from the 
 fact that he acquired such a knowledge of navigation in 
 two weeks, as enabled him to command a vessel in voyages 
 which he subsequently made to England, to Russia, to 
 Africa, the West Indies, and several ports of the United 
 States. 
 
 Paul Cuffe's three brothers continued respectable far- 
 mers at Westport. Paul, however, was inclined to the pur- 
 suit of commerce. He conceived that it furnished more 
 ample rewards to industry than agriculture, and being con- 
 scious that he possessed qualities which, under proper cul- 
 ture, would enable him to pursue commercial employments 
 with success, he entered at the age of sixteen, as a common 
 hand on board a vessel destined to the Bay of Mexico, on a 
 whaling expedition. His second voyage was to the West 
 Indies ; but on his third, which was during the American 
 
 w 
 
 %(• 
 
 w 
 
(skLli 
 
 462 
 
 % €rihufe fa tjj* Jfrgrn. 
 
 war, he was captured by a British ship. After three 
 months' detention as a prisoner at New York, he returned 
 to Westport, where, owing to the continuance of hos- 
 tilities, he spent about two years in agricultural pursuits. 
 
 The Free Negro population of Massachusetts being ex- 
 cluded from all participation in the rights of citizenship, 
 bearing, however, a full share of every state burden, Paul, 
 though not yet twenty years of age, felt deeply the injus- 
 tice done to himself and his race, and resolved to make an 
 effort to obtain for them the rights which were their due. 
 Assisted by his brother, he drew up and presented a re- 
 spectful petition on the subject to the state legislature. 
 Notwithstanding the prejudices of the times, the propriety 
 and justice of the petition were perceived by a majority of 
 the legislative body, and an act was passed, granting to the 
 Free Negroes all the privileges of White citizens. This 
 was a day equally honourable to the petitioners and to 
 the legislature ; in which justice and humanity triumphed 
 over prejudice and oppression ; it should be gratefully 
 remembered by every person of Colour, and Paul Cuffe 
 should always be united in its recollection. This enactment 
 was not only important as far as regarded the state of Mas- 
 sachusetts ; the example was followed at different periods 
 by others of the united provinces, so that the exertions of 
 Paul Cuffe and his brother influenced permanently the 
 welfare of the whole Coloured population of North America. 
 Paul, being now about twenty years of age, again turned 
 his attention to commercial pursuits, encountering many 
 adverse circumstances under which most men would have 
 sunk. He began with an open boat, but by prudence and 
 perseverance, he was at length enabled to obtain a good 
 sized schooner, then a brig, and afterwards a ship. By 
 ■;> judicious plans and diligence in their execution he gradually 
 increased his property. In 1806, he owned a ship, two 
 brigs, and several small vessels, besides considerable pro- 
 perty in houses and lands. In a pecuniary point of view 
 
 >yj 
 
% 'dbriimfc for tjp Jfjgrn. 
 
 463 
 
 he became not only independent, but had wherewith to 
 contribute largely to the relief of others, and of the African 
 race especially. 
 
 Some idea may be formed from the following circum- 
 stance, of the low estimation in which the African race are 
 held, and of the energy required to rise above the crushing 
 weight of prejudice. One of Paul's voyages was to Vienna 
 in Nanticoke Bay. On his arrival, the inhabitants were 
 filled with astonishment, and even alarm ; a vessel owned 
 and commanded by a Black man, and manned with a crew 
 of the same colour, was unprecedented and surprising The 
 fear of a revolt on the part of their Slaves was excited 
 among the inhabitants of Vienna, and an attempt was made 
 to prevent Paul from entering the harbour. On examina- 
 tion, his papers proved to be correct, and the custom-house 
 officers could not legally refuse the entry of his vessel. 
 Paul combined prudence with resolution, conducting him- 
 self with candour, modesty, and firmness ; and his crew 
 behaved, not only inoffensively, but with a conciliating pro- 
 priety. In a few days the inimical association vanished, 
 and the inhabitants treated the Negro captain and his crew 
 with respect and even kindness. Many of the principal 
 people visited his vessel, and at the pressing invitation of 
 one of them, Paul dined with his family in the town. He 
 sold his cargo, received in lieu of it three thousand bushels 
 of Indian corn, which he conveyed to Westport, where it 
 was in great demand, and it yielded our hero a clear profit 
 of a thousand dollars. 
 
 Paul Cuffe experienced the disadvantages of his limited 
 education, and he resolved, as far as it was practicable, to 
 relieve his children from similar embarrassments. The 
 neighbourhood had neither a tutor nor a school, though 
 many were desirous one should be established. Paul con- 
 vened a meeting for making arrangements to accomplish 
 this object, the great utility of which was so evident. A 
 collision of opinion respecting mode and place occasioned 
 
 a 
 
 fg 
 
% €%Mt for fyt $i$n. 
 
 them to separate without arriving at any conclusion. Per- 
 ceiving that all efforts to procure a union of sentiment were 
 fruitless, Paul took the matter into his own hands, and 
 erected a school-house on his own ground, entirely at his 
 own expense, and threw it open to the public. How gra- 
 tifying to humanity is this anecdote ! and who that justly 
 appreciates human character, would not prefer Paul Cuffe, 
 the son of an African Slave, to the proudest statesman that 
 ever dealt destruction amongst mankind ? 
 
 In his person, Paul Cuffe was tall, well formed, and athletic ; 
 his deportment conciliating, yet dignified and prepossess- 
 ing ; his countenance blending gravity with modesty and 
 sweetness, and firmness with gentleness and humanity ; in 
 speech and habit plain and unostentatious. His whole ex- 
 terior indicated a man of respectability and piety ; and reli- 
 gion, influencing his mind, added, in advancing manhood, 
 to the brightness of his character, and confirmed his dispo- 
 sition to practical good. He joined the Society of Friends, 
 and became a minister amongst them, frequently exercising 
 his gift to comfort and edification. 
 
 When the state of his affairs were such, as to render it 
 necessary that all his resources should be employed in the 
 pursuit of his private concerns, Paul Cuffe was still de- 
 sirous in some way to advance the interests of the commu- 
 nity. When he was prevented from pursuing his business 
 during the rigours of the winter, he often devoted his time 
 in teaching navigation to his sons and the young men in 
 the neighbourhood. On his voyages, he imparted a know- 
 ledge of this invaluable science to those under him, and 
 had the honour of training up, both amongst the White 
 and Coloured population, a considerable number of skilful 
 navigators. 
 
 Paul Cuffe was upright in all his transactions in trade ; 
 knowing himself to be accountable to God for the mode of 
 using and acquiring his possessions, he believed it to be his 
 duty to sacrifice private interest rather than engage in any 
 
m 
 
 9)<L 
 
 iww 
 
 enterprise, however lawful in the eyes of the world, or how- 
 ever profitable, that had the slightest tendency to injure 
 his fellow-men. On this ground, he would not deal in in- 
 toxicating liquors or in Slaves, though he might have done 
 either, without violating the laws of his country, and with 
 considerable pecuniary gain. What an incalculable de- 
 crease would there be in the aggregate of human misery 
 were all Christians willing to follow the example of this 
 despised son of Ethiopia, and be actuated by a similar 
 spirit. 
 
 Being naturally possessed of a tender, feeling mind, Paul 
 Cuffe deeply mourned over the degraded and miserable 
 condition of his African brethren ; and in his active exer- 
 tions in their behalf, he shone forth most conspicuously as 
 a man of worth. He observed many benevolent men en- 
 deavouring to release them from bondage, and to instil 
 into their minds the light of knowledge and religion, but 
 the force of interest and prejudice combined, operated so 
 powerfully, as to give the Negro but lktle encouragement 
 to hope for an advancement to respectability in a state 
 of society where so few incentives to improvement were 
 afforded them. 
 
 Such being the case, Paul Cuffe turned his attention to 
 Sierra Leone, believing from various communications, that 
 his endeavours to contribute through it to the welfare 
 of his fellow-men, might not be ineffectual. His affairs 
 being in a flourishing state, and being desirous to ap- 
 propriate a portion of what he had received from an ever- 
 bountiful Providence to the benefit of his unhappy race, 
 he embarked in 1811, in his own brig " Traveller," manned 
 entirely by persons of Colour, his nephew, Thomas Wainer, 
 being the captain. After a short passage, they arrived at 
 Sierra Leone, when he acquainted himself with the state 
 and condition of the colony, having frequent conversations 
 with the Governor and principal inhabitants, and sug- 
 gesting important improvements. Amongst others, he 
 
(Ski* 
 
 466 
 
 % tifciWk far fyt Jltgrn. 
 
 recommended the formation of a society for promoting the 
 interests of its members and the colonists in general ; 
 which was immediately formed, and named " The Friendly 
 Society of Sierra Leone," being principally composed of 
 respectable Men of Colour. The following epistle emanated 
 from this society. It bears the marks of native beauty and 
 simplicity, breathing a Christian spirit throughout. 
 
 "epistle of the friendly society of SIERKA LEONE. 
 
 " ' To the saints and faithful brethren in Christ ; grace 
 be unto you, and peace from God our Father, and from 
 the Lord Jesus Christ.' 
 
 " We desire to humble ourselves with thankful acknow- 
 ledgment to the Father and Fountain of all our mercies, 
 for the liberty and freedom we enjoy. And our prayer to 
 God is, that our brethren who live in distant lands and are 
 held in bondage, groaning under the galling chain of Sla- 
 very, may be liberated, and enjoy the freedom that God has 
 granted unto all. 
 
 " Dearly beloved brethren in the Lord, may the power 
 and peace of God rule in all your hearts, for we feel, from 
 an awful experience, the distresses that many of our African 
 brethren groan under ; therefore our minds are engaged to 
 desire all the professors in Christ, diligently to consider our 
 case, and to put it to the Christian query : whether it is 
 agreeable to the testimony of Jesus Christ, for one professor 
 to make merchandize of another ? We are desirous that this 
 may be made manifest to the professors of all Christian 
 denominations, who have not abolished the holding of 
 Slaves. 
 
 " We salute you, beloved brethren, in the Lord, with 
 sincere desires that the work of regeneration may be more 
 and more experienced. It would be a consolation to us, 
 to hear from the saints in distant lands, and to receive all 
 who are disposed to come unto us, with open arms. 
 
 " Our dearly beloved African brethren, we also salute 
 
 <PTNi 
 
% €x\Mt for fyt ftgrn. 
 
 467 
 
 you in the love of God. Be obedient unto your masters, 
 with your prayers lifted up to God, whom we would re- 
 commend you to confide in, who is just as able in these 
 days to deliver you from the yoke of oppression, as he hath 
 in times past brought your forefathers out of the Egyptian 
 bondage. Finally, brethren, may the power and peace of 
 God rule in all your hearts. 
 
 " ' Grace be unto you, and peace from God our Father, 
 and the Lord Jesus.'" 
 
 This epistle was signed by sixteen respectable Men of 
 Colour. Let the candid reader decide who are Christians, 
 such men, or their tyrannical oppressors ? 
 
 After remaining about two months at Sierra Leone, Paul 
 Cuffe sailed to England ; for the African Institution, ap- 
 prised of his benevolent designs, forwarded him an invita- 
 tion which induced him to come over, bringing with him a 
 cargo of African produce. For the more effectual promo- 
 tion of his primary object, he left his nephew, Thomas 
 Wainer, in the colony, and brought with him to England, 
 Aaron Richards, a native of Sierra Leone, with an inten- 
 tion of educating him, and particularly of instructing him 
 in the art of navigation. 
 
 From the exertions of one individual, however ardently 
 engaged, we ought not to form too high expectations ; but 
 from the little information that can be obtained of his en- 
 deavours among the colonists at Sierra Leone, and the 
 open reception he met with amongst them, there are strong 
 grounds for hoping that the seeds of improvement he scat- 
 tered, were not sown upon an unfruitful soil. 
 
 Paul Cuffe, with his brig " Traveller," navigated by eight 
 Men of Colour, arrived at Liverpool, in the 8th mo. 1811 ; 
 and the crew during their stay, "were remarkable for their 
 good conduct, and proper behaviour ; and the greatest 
 cordiality appeared to prevail amongst them." * They 
 
 * Liverpool Mercury. 
 
1 €xihk for tire fflqm. 
 
 remained in England about two months, where Paul met 
 with every mark of attention and respect. He visited Lon- 
 don twice, the second time at the request of the Board of 
 the African Institution, who were desirous of consulting 
 with him as to the best means of carrying their benevolent 
 views respecting Africa into effect. Having an opportunity 
 of laying his intentions, and opening his prospects before 
 the association, they cordially acquiesced with him in all 
 his plans, and gave him authority to carry over from the 
 United States a few Coloured persons of good character, 
 to instruct the colonists in agriculture and mechanical 
 arts. 
 
 To the honour of the British government, Cuffe sailed 
 from England with a license from them to prosecute his 
 voyage to Sierra Leone, carrying with him some goods as 
 a consignment to the " Friendly Society," to encourage 
 them in the way of trade. 
 
 Is it possible to conceive a more animating spectacle 
 than a vessel commanded by a free and enlightened African, 
 trading to the port of Liverpool, not many years before, 
 the nidus of the Slave Trade ! and to see him prosecuting 
 his voyages, with a vessel not laden with instruments of 
 destruction, cruelty, and oppression, but manned with 
 Sable, yet free and respectable seamen, rescued from the 
 galling chain of Slavery, and now employed in honourable 
 commerce ? 
 
 Having again safely arrived at Sierra Leone, delivered 
 the goods, and given some salutary instructions, Cuffe 
 once more set sail for America. 
 
 Thus terminated his two first missions to Africa ; under- 
 taken from the purest motives of benevolence, and almost 
 entirely at his own expense and risk. Unwearied, he went 
 about doing good, devoting most of his time and talents 
 to benevolent purposes. — Christian reader, canst thou be- 
 lieve that such a man was possessed of a soul inferior to 
 thine own ? 
 
On Paul Cuffe's arrival in his native land, he was joyfully 
 welcomed by his family and friends, and every comfort 
 awaited his command. But the sufferings of his fellow- 
 creatures, groaning under cruel oppression, and groping 
 in the dark and horrible night of heathenish superstition 
 and ignorance, were indelibly stamped on his mind. He 
 could not rest at ease ; nor think of enjoying comfort and 
 repose whilst he might be instrumental in the hand of Pro- 
 vidence in meliorating their sufferings. Far from being 
 discouraged by the labours and dangers he had already un- 
 dergone, and unmindful of the ease which the decline of 
 life requires, and to which his long continued exertions 
 gave him a peculiar claim, he renewed his benevolent la- 
 bours. Scarcely had the first transports of rejoicing at 
 his return to the bosom of his family and friends subsided, 
 ere he prepared for another voyage to Sierra Leone. 
 
 In the hope of finding persons of the description given 
 by the African Institution, qualified to instruct the colo- 
 nists in agriculture and mechanical arts, he visited most 
 of the large cities in the United States, held frequent con- 
 ferences with the most respectable Men of Colour, and 
 others who had distinguished themselves as the friends of 
 the Negro ; recommending them to form associations for 
 the furtherance of the work in which he was engaged. 
 Societies were formed in Philadelphia and New York, and 
 a number of eligible Coloured persons were selected, who 
 were willing to go with him and settle in Africa. Before 
 he was ready for the voyage, the war commenced between 
 America and Great Britain. This formed a barrier to his 
 operations, which he was so anxious to prosecute, that he 
 travelled to Washington, a distance of about 500 miles, to 
 solicit the favour of Government in his intended under- 
 taking, and to obtain permission to carry with him those 
 persons and their effects who had volunteered to accom- 
 pany him to Sierra Leone. Although his plan was highly 
 approved, his application proved unsuccessful, the policy of 
 
470 
 
 % frilrttfr for tip Jfegm 
 
 the Government not admitting of such an intercourse with 
 an enemy's colony. He had therefore no other alternative 
 than to remain quietly at home, and wait the event of the 
 war. 
 
 The delay thus occasioned, instead of diminishing his 
 ardour, was employed in improving and maturing his plans, 
 and in extending his correspondence, which already em- 
 braced some of the most distinguished philanthropists. 
 On the termination of the war, he prepared for his depar- 
 ture, and towards the end of the year 1815, he sailed with 
 thirty-eight Africans, who were to give instruction at 
 Sierra Leone, in farming and the mechanical arts. After 
 a voyage of fifty -five days, they landed safely on the soil 
 of their forefathers. 
 
 In his zeal for the welfare of his race, Paul CufFe had 
 considerably exceeded the instructions of the African Insti- 
 tution, by which he was advised to carry over in the first 
 instance, six or eight persons ; he had therefore no claim 
 for the passage and other expenses attending the removal 
 of any above that number. This he had previously con- 
 sidered, generously resolving to bear the expense of thirty 
 himself, rather than deprive any who were engaged, of an 
 opportunity of going where they might be so beneficially 
 employed. When these persons were landed at Sierra 
 Leone, it was necessary to provide for the destitute until 
 they were able to do so for themselves. For this also, 
 he applied to his own resources ; so that he expended out 
 of his private funds nearly 4000 dollars for the benefit of 
 of the colony. 
 
 On his arrival at Sierra Leone, he presented his passen- 
 gers to the Governor, who gave to each family a small 
 piece of ground in the town, and thirty to fifty acres of 
 land, according to their number, about two miles distant. 
 
 Paul CufFe remained at the colony this time about two 
 months. On this occasion he drew up an address to his 
 African brethren, containing much affectionate advice and 
 
&£&% 
 
 # 
 
 % €xM\t for tjp JSrgrn. 
 
 471 
 
 pious exhortation, the general tenor of which may be 
 judged of from the following extracts : — 
 
 " Beloved friends and fellow-countrymen, I earnestly 
 recommend to you the propriety of assembling yourselves 
 together to worship the Lord your God. God is a Spirit, 
 and they that worship him acceptably, must worship him 
 in spirit and in truth. 
 
 " Come, my African brethren, let us walk in the light 
 of the Lord ; in that pure light which bringeth salvation 
 into the world. I recommend sobriety and steadfastness ; 
 that so professors may be good examples in all things. I 
 recommend that early care be taken to instruct the youth, 
 while their minds are tender ; that so they may be pre- 
 served, from the corruptions of the world, from profanity, 
 intemperance, and evil company. 
 
 " May servants be encouraged to discharge their duty 
 with faithfulness ; may they be brought up to industry, 
 and may their minds be cultivated for the reception of the 
 good seed, which is promised to all who seek it. I want 
 that we should be faithful in all things, that so we may 
 become a people giving satisfaction to those who have 
 borne the burden and heat of the day, in liberating us from 
 Slavery." 
 
 These appear to have been the simple expressions of his 
 feelings ; the language of his heart. When he took his 
 departure, it was like a father taking leave of his children, 
 receiving the tokens of overflowing affection, commending 
 them with pious admonition to the protection of Almighty 
 God. "I leave you," says he, in the concluding part of his 
 address, — " I leave you in the hands of Him who is able to 
 preserve you through time, and crown you with that bles- 
 sing which is prepared for all who are faithful to the end." 
 
 In 1817, Paul Cuffe was seized with a complaint which 
 proved fatal. During his illness, which continued about 
 half-a-year, the subject of ameliorating the condition of his 
 race continued deeply impressed on his mind, and his 
 
 >V* 
 
472 
 
 51 €xiMt for tire JlBgrn. 
 
 decaying powers were occupied in an extensive correspon- 
 dence with their friends. Though now unable to serve 
 them as he had done, he was gratified in finding his views 
 adopted by a number of the most benevolent and influ- 
 ential men in America. 
 
 Such then, is a hasty sketch of Paul Cuffe ; pourtraying 
 the activity of his labours in behalf of the African race. 
 His whole life may be said to have -been spent in their 
 service. To their interests he devoted the acquisitions of 
 his youth, the time of his later years, and even the thoughts 
 of his dying pillow ! He died in 1817, his labours and his 
 life being thus terminated in the 59th year of his age. 
 
 " As a private man," says Peter Williams, " Paul Cuffe 
 was just and upright in all his dealings, an affectionate 
 husband, a kind father, a good neighbour, and a faithful 
 friend. Pious without ostentation, he manifested in all his 
 deportment that he was a true disciple of Jesus ; and 
 cherished a charitable disposition to professors of every 
 denomination, who walked according to the leading prin- 
 ciples of the gospel. Regardless of the honours and plea- 
 sures of the world, in humble imitation of his Divine master, 
 he went from place to place doing good ; looking not for 
 his reward among men, but in the favour of his heavenly 
 Father. Thus walking in the ways of piety and usefulness, 
 in the smiles of an approving conscience, and the favour of 
 God, he enjoyed through life, an unusual serenity and 
 satisfaction of mind ; and when the fatal messenger arrived 
 to cut the bonds of mortality, it found him in peace, ready 
 and willing to depart. In that solemnly interesting period, 
 when nature with him was struggling in the pangs of dis- 
 solution, such a calmness and serenity overspread his soul 
 and manifested itself in his countenance and actions, that 
 the heart of the greatest reprobate, at beholding him, would 
 respond to the wish, ' Let me die the death of the right- 
 eous, and let my last end be like his.' 
 
 " A short time previous to his final close, feeling sensible 
 
dUJI 
 
 v~TP 
 
 SI ®Mt for t\)i Ifrgrn. 
 
 that his end was near, he called his family together to bid 
 them adieu ! It was an affecting scene : a scene of inex- 
 pressible solemnity — of tears and bitter anguish on the one 
 hand, and christian firmness and resignation on the other. 
 His wife and children, and several other relatives beinsr 
 assembled around him, he reached forth his enfeebled hand, 
 and after shaking hands with each, and giving them some 
 pious advice, he commended them to the tender mercies 
 of Jehovah, and bade them all a final farewell." 
 
 Having taken leave of his family, and commended them 
 to the care of God, his mind seemed almost entirely occu- 
 pied in anticipating the glory of which he would shortly 
 be made a partaker, and in contemplating the blessedness 
 of being for ever with his Redeemer. To one of his 
 neighbours who came to visit him, he said, " Not many 
 days hence and ye shall see the glory of God ; I know that 
 my works are all gone to judgment before me ; and soon 
 after he added, " It is all well, it is all well." 
 
 Thus did he experience a happy transition from works 
 to rewards, from a state of trial and probation to a glorious 
 never-ending eternity! Whatever the shade of his complexion 
 might be, his faith was steadfastly fixed on the Redeemer, 
 in the merits of whose sufferings and death he most surely 
 believed, and through whom he had a well-grounded hope 
 of eternal life. 
 
 The following extract from an American paper, affords 
 an additional testimony to the character of this excellent 
 man : — " Died, at Westport, on the 7th of Sept., Paul 
 Cuffe, a very respectable Man of Colour, in the 59th year 
 of his age. A descendant of Africa, he overcame by native 
 strength of mind, and firm adherence to principle, the pre- 
 judices with which its descendants are too generally viewed. 
 Industrious, temperate, and prudent, his means of acquiring 
 property, small at first, were gradually increased ; and the 
 strict integrity of his conduct gained him numerous friends, 
 to whom he never gave occasion to regret the confidence 
 
 1 
 
 o P 
 
 >• 
 
<si§R? 
 
 474 
 
 1 €xlktt fnr ill? $t$n. 
 
 they had placed in him. His mercantile pursuits were 
 generally successful ; and, blessed with competence, if not 
 with wealth, the enlarged benevolence of his mind was 
 manifested, not only in acts of charity to individuals, and 
 in the promotion of objects of general utility, but more 
 particularly in the deep interest he felt for the welfare of 
 his brethren of the African race. 
 
 " He was concerned, not only to set them a good example 
 by his own correct conduct, to admonish and counsel them 
 against the vices and habits to which he found them most 
 prone — but more extensively to promote their welfare, and 
 at considerable sacrifice of property, he three times visited 
 the colony of Sierra Leone. After his first voyage thither, 
 he went to England, where he was much noticed by the 
 members of the African institution, who conferred with 
 him on the best manner of extending the means of civiliza- 
 tion to the people of Africa, some of whom have since ex- 
 pressed their satisfaction in his pious labours in the colony ; 
 believing them to have been productive of much usefulness 
 to that settlement. 
 
 " Grave, humble, and unassuming in his deportment, he 
 was remarkable for great civility and sound discretion. 
 Through several months' severe affliction, he was preserved 
 in much christian patience, fortitude, and resignation ; 
 feeling entire confidence in that grace which had been 
 vouchsafed to him in life, and by which, through faith 
 and obedience, he felt a comfortable hope of admittance 
 into peace and rest. He has left a widow and several 
 children to lament the loss of an affectionate husband and 
 parent. 
 
 " Many of his neighbours and friends evinced their res- 
 pect for his memory by attending his funeral, which was 
 conducted agreeably to the usages of the Society of Friends, 
 of which he was a member ; and at which several lively 
 testimonies were borne to the truth, that the Almighty pa- 
 rent ' has made of one blood all the nations of men,' and 
 
 TlTf 
 
% (Tribute far tip? Ilrgrn. 
 
 that, ' in every nation, he that feareth Him and worketh 
 righteousness is accepted by Him.' " 
 
 We have now concluded the sketch of this interesting 
 descendant of Africa : — we have followed him in his gradual 
 rise, through a host of difficulties and prejudices to which 
 the unfortunate descendants of Ethiopia are subjected ; 
 from a state of poverty, ignorance, and obscurity, to one 
 of wealth, influence, respectability, and honour. Having 
 thus elevated himself with an unsullied conscience by native 
 energy of mind, we have seen him devoting the whole of 
 his time and his talents to pious and benevolent purposes: 
 we have beheld him traversing the globe, at the risk of his 
 own life and property, in endeavouring to promote the 
 happiness of his fellow-creatures : — we have seen that his 
 motives were pure and disinterested, for he dispensed his 
 thousands of dollars at once when occasion required : — we 
 have seen him indeed, a man, and a Christian, maintaining a 
 higher standard than that of many professors, refusing to deal 
 in anything, however lawful or lucrative, that could injure 
 his fellow men : — we have heard that he was a good neigh- 
 bour, an affectionate husband, and a kind parent : — we have 
 beheld him crossing the mighty deep, visiting the land of 
 his forefathers, carrying with him the light of science and 
 religion, and diffusing it through those vast benighted re- 
 gions ; so that the untutored tribes of Ethiopia learnt to 
 consider him as a father and a friend : — we have seen also 
 that the philanthropists of Great Britain and America were 
 not ashamed to seek for counsel and advice from this son 
 of a poor African Slave ! We have heard him commend 
 his wife and his children to the Almighty, and die the death 
 of the righteous, in full assurance of a glorious immortality, 
 through the merits and intercession of a crucified Re- 
 deemer. Surely no prejudice will denounce such a man, 
 because of his 
 
 " Fleecy locks and black complexion," 
 as being possessed of an inferior soul. 
 
 tsriNS) 
 
M< 
 
 476 
 
 % €i\Mi fur tjp lltgrn. 
 
 b-s: 
 
 M<i 
 
 EXTRACT OF A LETTER FROM MARYLAND, RESPECTING 
 TWO LIBERATED SLAVES. 
 
 I am happy to think as you do as respects trading in 
 man or keeping him as a Slave ; the custom is most ini- 
 quitous ; neither consonant with reason, the laws of God, 
 or of man. Those forced from the places of their nativity, 
 are deplorable objects of commiseration. 
 
 I never bought more than two Slaves myself, during 
 20 years residence here, and one of these proved to be the 
 son of an African Prince ; a most comely youth : and hav- 
 ing observed his uncommon good parts, I sent him to 
 school, and used him only as a Free man. The Directors 
 of the African Company offering a reward for him, I pre- 
 sented the poor creature with his freedom. I also gave 
 him an order for the aforesaid reward, and sent him to 
 London, from whence he remitted the sum he cost me, and 
 sundry goods to the amount of £300, with a letter in his 
 native language, which has been translated by Dr. Desaguil- 
 liers, of Cambridge. 
 
 The next Slave I purchased, was a lad who had been 
 stolen from his free parents. He decayed and pined so 
 much, and expressed so sensible a sorrow at his cruel 
 separation from his aged parents, relations, and countrymen, 
 that I likewise set this poor creature free, and sent him to 
 his native place. Providence again caused my being further 
 rewarded for performing this my duty as a Christian. 
 The truly honest father, from the produce of his plantation, 
 made me presents to the amount of £50, with directions to 
 draw upon him for the full cost of the poor youth, which 
 I never intend, having been more than paid already by his 
 presents. 
 
 I write this to convince you, that the inhabitants of 
 Africa are not such senseless, brutish creatures, as some 
 thoughtless, and interested authors have represented them. 
 They are undoubtedly capable of receiving instruction, and 
 far outdo us in many commendable virtues. Their greatest 
 
unhappiness apparently, is, in having become acquainted 
 with (those calling themselves) Christians ! 
 
 ASHTON WARNER 
 
 Was a Slave in St. Vincents, his parents being in Slavery 
 at the time of his birth. Whilst he was an infant, their 
 master died, and the estate was put to sale that the pro- 
 perty might be divided among his family. 
 
 Ashton had an aunt, Daphne Crosbie, who had likewise 
 been a Slave, but who was now free, having had some 
 money left her by a Coloured gentleman. Enjoying the 
 blessings of freedom herself, she was desirous of emanci- 
 pating her friends, particularly the Slaves on the estate on 
 which she was born, and with whom she had shared in her 
 early days all the sorrows of Negro servitude. Though 
 she was thoroughly black, she possessed a large and Chris- 
 tian heart, which felt deeply for the wrongs of her op- 
 pressed race. The character of this Negro woman is sin- 
 gularly interesting : though born a Slave, and consequently 
 labouring under every disadvantage of colour and educa- 
 tion, she possessed a spirit of disinterested benevolence 
 which might do honour to any nation and to any rank. 
 She devoted all her little property either in purchasing the 
 freedom of the Slaves who had formerly been her compa- 
 nions in bondage, or in improving their condition. 
 
 Daphne Crosbie, by payment of a certain sum, procured 
 the emancipation of Ashton Warner's parents, and he, 
 being then only an infant at the breast, was included as a 
 part of themselves. For many years they continued to 
 enjoy the blessings of freedom, until their happiness be- 
 came frustrated by their old master making a very unjust 
 claim upon Ashton Warner when he wasabout ten years old, 
 in consequence of which he w r as arrested and re-enslaved. 
 He was never subjected to the most cruel and degrading 
 inflictions which form so prominent and characteristic a 
 
 ^? : 
 
% € ritaft for % ifegm 
 
 sin 
 
 rTP 
 
 feature in the discipline of the Slave system, yet, having 
 once tasted the sweets of liberty, he was capable of discri- 
 minating between the advantages conferred by it, and the 
 evils arising from its deprivation. He regarded a state of 
 freedom as the greatest of all earthly blessings, and asserted 
 his independence with the resolution which a sense of jus- 
 tice and a love of liberty alone can give. 
 
 The Slave grovels in the dust, and passively yields up 
 his body to the degrading lash ; resistance he feels is use- 
 less, and only increases the miseries of his condition. Ani- 
 mated by no hope, and bound to his employer by no ties 
 of reciprocal interest, he drags on from day to day his bru- 
 talized existence, and looks forward to death as the only 
 termination of his woes. He sinks into a living machine 
 whose actions are guided and enforced by the will of ano- 
 ther, and his words and looks correspond with his mental 
 and bodily abasement. But in Ashton, the inextinguishable 
 spark of liberty, once kindled, repelled all the threats of 
 managers and overseers to degrade him to a Slave. He 
 felt his importance in the scale of humanity, and while yet 
 a boy he asserted his natural rights as a man. 
 
 The Narrative written by Ashton Warner, of his life in 
 Slavery, contains many painfully interesting incidents, de- 
 tailed in an impressive manner, for though an uneducated 
 Negro, he was very intelligent, and spoke remarkably good 
 English. He succeeded at last in making his escape, and 
 after a train of adventures, arrived in England in 1830, 
 where he suffered from destitution in a strange land, as 
 well as the effects of exposure to an uncongenial climate, 
 which proved fatal. He died in the London Hospital the 
 following year, whilst his Narrative was passing through 
 the press. 
 
 After recounting the sufferings to which the Slaves are 
 subjected, he remarks, " People so harshly treated, and so 
 destitute of every comfort, cannot be supposed to work 
 with a willing mind. They have no home which they can 
 
?M 
 
 % €x\Mt for tire Jfogm. 
 
 479 
 
 call their own. They are worked beyond their strength, 
 and live in perpetual fear of the whip. They are insulted, 
 tormented, indecently exposed, and degraded; yet English 
 people wonder that they are not contented. Some have 
 even said that they are happy ! Let such people place 
 themselves under the same yoke, and see if they could bear 
 it. Such bondage is ruin both to the soul and body of the 
 Slave ; and I hope every good Englishman will daily pray 
 to God that the yoke of Slavery may soon be broken from 
 off the necks of my unfortunate countrymen for ever." 
 
 Our limits preclude any further extracts from the Nar- 
 rative of this Negro Slave. The gentleman who assisted 
 him in writing it, and who published it after his decease, 
 remarks that he " possessed very prepossessing manners 
 and appearance, and his amiable disposition and natural 
 intelligence were striking proofs of what the African is 
 capable, were his mental powers suffered to expand under 
 the genial influences of civilization and Christianity." 
 
 ALEXANDER CRTTMMELL, 
 
 Who is described as being of pure African origin and pa- 
 rentage, is one of the only four episcopally ordained Coloured 
 clergymen in the United States, having been the minister 
 of a church in New York, composed of Coloured persons, 
 for about ten years, and is a remarkable instance of what 
 an African can become by religious and literary cultivation. 
 I regret being unable to present any outline of his history, 
 or insight into the means by which he has arrived at his 
 present intellectual attainments. A few particulars respect- 
 ing him are given at page 139 of the present volume. As 
 further proof of his ability as a writer, I have made the 
 following extracts from an Address delivered by him in 
 New York, in 1847, entitled 
 
 " A EULOGY ON THE LIFE AND CHARACTER OF THOMAS CLARKSON." 
 
 " This funeral observance, melancholy as it is in its signi- 
 
 <FTK 
 
 ^W 
 
&M\ 
 
 480 
 
 % €xW& for \\t Jfogrn. 
 
 ■:iV 
 
 U 
 
 ficance, has yet its softening aspects. Mournful as are the 
 associations connected with the event which excites our 
 regrets, yet there are many and peculiar solaces. For dis- 
 tressing as it is to behold the benignant sons of freedom, 
 sink, one after another, below the horizon, there is allevia- 
 tion in the thought, that there were many who rejoiced in 
 the full-orbed glory of their open day ; and now that they 
 have receded from our skies, the light they have left behind 
 does not stream upon this generation unappreciated and 
 disregarded. It has not always been thus. It is but 
 recently that the holy and the good have been able to com- 
 mand deserved attention. The world has been rolling on 
 six thousand years in its course ; and now, in these latter 
 days, the Philanthropist is just beginning to obtain the re- 
 gard and honour he so richly merits. During this long 
 period, mankind, absorbed in trifling and fruitless anxieties, 
 have passed by, and neglected, the great good men of earth. 
 The record of the past of human history, is a memorial of 
 this shameful fact ; true, with but few exceptions, of 
 nearly all nations, in all periods of time. 
 
 " The fragments snatched from the almost barren past of 
 Egyptian history, relate chiefly to the murderous exploits 
 of a Sesostris or a Shishak ; and the remains of its high 
 and unequalled art, are the obelisks and the urns, com- 
 memorative of bloody conquerors — or the frowning pyra- 
 mids, upon whose walls are the hieroglyphic representations 
 of War, Conquest, and Slavery. The annals of Greece 
 and Rome are but slightly varied in their aspects, and their 
 teachings. They favour us with but few of the features of 
 the worthy and the good. They do, indeed, reveal some 
 slight touches of a slowly rising civilization ; but restrained 
 ever by the tightened grasp of a cold-hearted heathenism. 
 Their largest spaces are devoted to the exploits of infirm 
 and furious deities, or to the memories of men chiefly 
 distinguished by the brutality of animal passions. The 
 literature they have transmitted to our day, is chiefly the 
 
 %( 
 
 <RTSa) 
 
 U 
 
1 (Eriinifr for fjjj jlrgrn. 
 
 481 
 
 gorgeous representation of sanguinary deeds, dressed up in 
 the glowing imagery of master poets ; or the fulminations 
 of passionate men, exciting, by wondrous oratory, to scenes 
 of strife and vengeance. 
 
 " This is the general colouring of history. In the past, its 
 more numerous pages are given to the names and exploits 
 of such men as Caesar, Hannibal, Alexander, and Tamer- 
 lane ; and in times nearer to our own day we find it thus. 
 The records of the middle ages are mostly narratives of 
 Crusaders and Troubadours. And in our own immediate 
 era, Marlborough and Gustavus, Napoleon, Nelson, and 
 Wellington, have attracted as much notice and admiration 
 as any of their contemporaries in the quieter walks of civil 
 life, however distinguished for talent or for genius. 
 
 " All this, however, pertains mostly to the jjast of human 
 history. We have advanced to a different era, and have 
 reached a more open day. War, conquest, and valour, 
 have no longer their own way entirely, nor pursue, un- 
 molested, their own career. The mind of this age is not 
 wholly absorbed in the sanguinary and the warlike. Moral, 
 benevolent, and Christian characteristics begin to attract 
 attention. The dazzling scintillations of the Chieftain or 
 the War-god, are now decidedly eclipsed by the steady and 
 enduring lustre of the Moralist, the Friend of Man, the 
 Christian, or the adventurous Missionary. The gods of 
 this world are fast losing rank. Higher, nobler, and wor- 
 thier objects are now receiving human admiration. The 
 tribute of the Poet's lays, or the Orator's lofty periods, are 
 as freely given to the Philanthropist, as heretofore they 
 were bestowed upon the Hero and the Conqueror. Art, 
 Poetry, and Eloquence, are his willing votaries to speak his 
 praise. 
 
 ' The Historic Muse, 
 
 Proud of the treasure, marches with it down 
 
 To latest times; and Sculpture in her turn 
 
 Gives boud iu stone and all-enduring brass 
 
 To guard them, and immortalize her trust.' 
 
 11 
 
 3q 
 
 W 
 
1 €tMi for tjjr- H Bgrn. 
 
 (®np 
 
 Pi 
 
 " Such being the change in the world's morals and the 
 world's sentiments, it is by no means extraordinary, but 
 natural and befitting, that we have assembled here this 
 evening to commemorate distinguished worth and eminent 
 moral character." 
 
 After detailing the incidents of Clarkson's early life, and 
 adverting to the position of the Anti-Slavery cause when 
 first espoused by the distinguished philanthropist, he con- 
 tinues : — 
 
 " Among the various ills, which in consequence of the 
 entrance of sin into the world, have flooded humanity — 
 the wars, diseases, intemperance, impurity, poverty, idol- 
 atry, and wretchedness, which have degraded the race — 
 none have been more general, none more deadly, than 
 Slavery. No portion of the globe has been exempt from 
 this curse. Every land on the face of the earth has been 
 overshadowed by it. And where now we see the blooming 
 fruits of art and civilization, and behold the giant tread of 
 progress, there once were erected the shambles of the 
 Slave-dealer, and there were seen the monuments of op- 
 pression. The whole western part of Europe was once in 
 a state of abject vassalage. The system of Feudalism, with 
 its most degrading characteristics, is hardly yet entirely 
 extirpated from some of its foremost nations. In Russia, 
 millions of wretched serfs, even now, in wretchedness and 
 poverty, suffer the infliction of the knout, and are subject 
 to irresponsible power and unrestrained tyranny. England 
 herself, grand and mighty empire as she is, can easily trace 
 back the historic foot-prints to the time when even she was 
 under the yoke. And the blood which beats high in 
 her children's veins, and mounts their brows, and circles 
 their hearts, is blood which, though flowing down to 
 them through a noble lineage of many ages, still, in its 
 ancestral sources, was the blood of Slaves ! Although 
 Christianity had ameliorated the condition of the lowly 
 
& 
 
 & dtikttb for ijjr Snjrn. 
 
 4S3 
 
 poor, and stricken the chain from the vassal, yet she had 
 not obliterated the memory of its ills, nor neutralized the 
 natural repugnance to its abominations. Thus, when Sla- 
 very was again presented to the eye of Europe, distressing 
 another class of victims, the warm heart of Europe was 
 prompt and punctual with sympathy and brotherhood." 
 
 After mentioning many eminent persons who have, in 
 various ages, manifested their repugnance to Slavery and 
 the Slave Trade, he observes : — 
 
 " From this it appears that some sensibility had been 
 manifested in behalf of bleeding, suffering Africa. It was 
 not, however, either universal in its prevalence, regular in 
 its development, or definite in its aims and objects. It 
 pervaded the wide space of centuries, but lacked clear and 
 evident junctures, and determinate links. From this we 
 may perceive the moral grandeur of Clarkson's position. 
 He was the first who commenced a systematic, well-planned 
 effort, for the destruction of this colossal iniquity. He 
 stood up, and measured the broad proportions and the 
 lofty height of this grand villainy ; and not content with 
 the utterance of his condemnation thereof, he determined 
 in the strength of God, no matter how deep laid might be 
 its foundations, how lofty its altitude, nor how gigantic its 
 form, that it should yet be uprooted and lay prostrate in 
 the dust ! " 
 
 Gladly would I transcribe the whole of our Sable wri- 
 ter's " Eulogium on the life and character" of the illus- 
 trious philanthropist, which abounds in pathos and many 
 rich touches of eloquence. But our limits forbid, and 
 passing over twenty closely printed pages, I must draw 
 these brief extracts to a close with his own concluding 
 observations, which are specially addressed to his own 
 oppressed race : — 
 
 " Let us not be unmindful," says he, " of the prerogatives 
 
 <tu^ 
 
 
% Urtkte for tjj? J&gro. 
 
 and obligations arising from the fact, that the exhibi- 
 tion of the greatest talent, and the development of the 
 most enlarged philanthropy in the 19th century, have been 
 bestowed upon our race. The names of the great lights of 
 the age — Statesmen, Poets, and Divines, in all the great 
 countries of Europe, and in this country too, are inseparably 
 connected with the cause and destiny of the African race. 
 This has been the theme whence most of them have reaped 
 honour and immortality. This cause has produced the de- 
 velopment of the most noble character of modern times ; 
 — has given the world a Wilberforce and a Clarkson. 
 Lowly and depressed as we have been, and as we now are, 
 yet our interests, and our welfare, have agitated the chief 
 countries of the world, and now, before all other questions, 
 are shaking this nation to its very centre. The providences 
 of God have placed the Negro race, before Europe and 
 America, in the most commanding position. From the 
 sight of us, no nation, no statesmen, no ecclesiastics, and 
 no ecclesiastical institution, can escape. And by us and 
 our cause, the character and greatness of individuals and of 
 nations, in this day and generation of the world, are to be 
 decided, either for good or for evil : — and so, in all coming 
 times, the memory and the fame of the chief actors now 
 on the stage will be decided, by their relation to our cause. 
 The discoveries of Science, the unfoldings of Literature, 
 the dazzlings of Genius, all fade before the demands of 
 this cause. This is the age of brotherhood and hu- 
 manity ; and the Negro Race is its most distinguished test 
 and criterion. 
 
 " And for what are all these providences ? For nothing ? 
 He who thinks so must be blinded — must be demented. In 
 these facts are wound up a most distinct significance, and 
 with them are connected, most clear and emphatic obliga- 
 tions and responsibilities. The clear-minded and thoughtful 
 Coloured Men of America must mark the significance of 
 these facts, and begin to feel their weight. For more than 
 
 flTf 
 
 >w 
 
% €x\Mi far tju Jfegra. 
 
 two centuries we have been working our way from the 
 deep and dire degradation into which Slavery had plunged 
 us. We have made considerable headway. By the vigorous 
 use of the opportunities of our partial freedom, we have 
 been enabled, with the Divine blessing, to reach a position 
 of respectability and character. We have pressed, some- 
 what, into the golden avenues of Science, Intelligence, and 
 Learning. We have made impressions there ; and some 
 few of our foot-prints have we left behind. The mild light 
 of Religion has illumined our pathway, and Superstition 
 and Error have fled apace. The greatest paradoxes are 
 evinced by us. Amid the decay of nations, a rekindled 
 life starts up in us. Burdens under which others expire, 
 seem to have lost their influence upon us ; and while they 
 are ' driven to the wall,' destruction keeps far from us its 
 blasting hand. W r e live in the region of death, yet seem 
 hardly mortal. We cling to life in the midst of all reverses : 
 and our nerveful grasp thereon cannot easily be relaxed. 
 History reverses its mandates in our behalf : — our dotage 
 is in the past. ' Time writes not its wrinkles on our 
 brow ;' our juvenescence is in the future. All this, with 
 the kindly nature which is acknowledgedly ours — -with the 
 gifts of freedom vouchsafed us by the Almighty in this 
 land, in part, and in the West Indies, — with the intellec- 
 tual desire everywhere manifesting itself — and the exceed- 
 ing interest exhibited for Africa by her own children and 
 by the Christian nations of the world — are indications 
 from which we may not gather a trivial meaning nor a nar- 
 row significance. 
 
 " The teaching of God in all these things, is, un- 
 doubtedly, that ours is a great destiny, and that we should 
 open our eyes to it. God is telling us all that, whereas 
 the past has been dark, grim, and repulsive, the future 
 shall be glorious ; — that the horrid traffic shall yet be en- 
 tirely staunched — that the whips and brands, the shackles 
 and fetters of Slavery shall be cast down to oblivion ; — 
 
 (T9 
 
 fyi'A 
 
ffifi*. 
 
 Lr-i 
 
 2) 
 
 486 
 
 1 Crtate far tire Jfogrfl. 
 
 that the shades of ignorance and superstition, that have so 
 long settled upon the mind of Africa, shall be dispelled ; — 
 and that all her sons, on her own broad continent, in the 
 Western Isles, and in this Republic, shall yet stand erect 
 beneath the heavens, — 
 
 ' With, freedom chartered on their manly brows,' 
 
 their bosoms swelling with its noblest raptures — treading 
 the face of Earth in the links of Brotherhood and Equality, 
 and in the possession of an enlarged and glorious Liberty ! 
 " May we be equal to these providences, may we prove 
 deserving of such a destiny ! And God grant that when 
 at some future day, our ransomed, and cultivated posterity, 
 shall stand where we now stand, and bear the burdens that 
 we now bear, they may reap the fruits of our foresight, 
 our virtues, and our high endeavours. And may they have 
 the proud satisfaction of knowing, that we, their ancestors, 
 uncultured and unlearned, amid all trials and temptations, 
 were men of integrity ; — recognized with gratefulness their 
 truest friends dishonoured and in peril. Were enabled to 
 resist the seductions of ease and the intimidations of power. 
 Were true to themselves, the age in which they lived, their 
 abject race, and the cause of man. Shrunk not from trial, 
 nor from suffering : — but conscious of responsibility, and 
 impelled by duty, gave themselves up to the vindication 
 of the high hopes, and the lofty aims of true humanity !" 
 
 The foregoing are only brief extracts from nearly 40 
 closely printed 8vo. pages, which, for appropriateness of 
 language, as well as beauty and chasteness of expression, 
 could not be easily surpassed. 
 
 It has been stated that Alexander Crummell visited Ens 1 - 
 land in 1848, on which occasion he addressed the annual 
 meeting of the Anti- Slavery Society in London. He was 
 also in Liverpool on a visit at Mr. Ewbanks', a clerg}mian 
 at Everton, in whose church (St. George's) he officiated as 
 a minister, by permission of the Bishop of the diocese. On 
 
 P^k) 
 
 we 
 
:-:,^0 
 
 51 Crilinfr for tjp linjrn. 
 
 this occasion, great interest was evinced in hearing the Negro 
 preacher. The church was crowded by a most respectable 
 congregation to repletion — many parties being unable to 
 obtain seats, and fain to stand at the entrances, and others 
 obliged to retire, hopeless of even this last accommodation. 
 
 All eyes were rivetted on the preacher as he ascended the 
 pulpit. He is a good-looking man, of small stature, of 
 black complexion, and of an intelligent countenance. His 
 voice is strong and manly ; his articulation so clear, and 
 his pronunciation of the English language so generally ac- 
 curate, with, at the same time, a rapid flow of words and a 
 modesty of bearing, that he immediately won the deep at- 
 tention of his hearers ; the first general feeling being that 
 of astonishment. 
 
 After a brief prayer, he took for his text a clause from 
 the 8th of the 3rd chapter of Paul's Epistle to Titus — 
 " That they which have believed in God might be careful 
 to maintain good works." He opened his discourse by an 
 exposition of the nature, duties, and objects of Christianity, 
 dwelling especially on the obligation of all to redeem the 
 human race from sin to salvation. The subject was at once 
 grand and majestic. The promulgation of Christian truth 
 was not only incumbent, but necessary. Science had taken 
 rapid strides of late years ; wind and tide had been almost 
 overcome ; transit from place to place had been wonder- 
 fully accelerated ; the busy wheel of the steamer had almost 
 superseded the sluggish sail ; and a velocity had been at- 
 tained on shore almost approaching the lightning's speed. 
 But they must not let physical advancement exceed spiri- 
 tual advancement, which last was also proceeding, as was 
 happily manifested in many parts of the world. He alluded 
 to the retardations as regards the last, by false reasoners 
 and infidel writers ; to the idolatry and paganism that still 
 prevailed over the greater portion of the earth, and to the 
 Romanism which still presented its brazen front. Millions 
 of their fellow-men were yet in chains, and left in ignorance, 
 
 9^. 
 
488 
 
 % $riimt? for tjp? Jlrgrn. 
 
 and the Slave Trade was yet carried on in an aggravated 
 manner. He trusted, however, that the time would come 
 when these evils would be removed, and that Christians 
 would work together until the last Slave-ship had disap- 
 peared, the last groan of suffering humanity had died away, 
 and all the nations of the earth should acknowledge Christ 
 as their sole ruler and Redeemer. He appeared before 
 them as one of the most helpless and forlorn of the races 
 of men. His countrymen had had to undergo a fiery or- 
 deal, and had long been subjected to the grossest tyranny. 
 Africa had long been a prey to fire, famine, and the sword. 
 The Slave Trade had there destroyed domestic peace and 
 affection, and engendered even murder among families. 
 From the land of his fathers ascended the cries and the 
 groans of the oppressed. England had done herself immor- 
 tal honour by abolishing Slavery in her colonies. France 
 and Germany had followed the noble example, and it was 
 hoped Holland and other countries would yet join them. 
 They might deem it strange that he should come from so 
 opulent a city as New York to solicit aid in England, but 
 a brief statement would serve to explain. There were in 
 the United States a vast number of Slaves, who were 
 bought and sold like cattle. Husbands were torn from 
 their wives, children from their parents, and the whip was 
 applied to the quivering flesh of even women and children. 
 There was not one out of 1000 of them who had ever 
 heard of the Gospel. In the Northern States Slavery did 
 not exist ; but the Africans were excluded, by caste, from 
 trades or social intercourse, as if they were a separate order 
 of beings. If they attended a church they were placed 
 apart, and dare not (as he had that day done there) approach 
 the Communion Table. They were also excluded from the 
 schools, and their remains, when dead, from the church- 
 yard. Without, therefore, a hope of advancement in life, 
 they grew up in vice, and often fell into premature graves. 
 There were 400,000 of them without culture, and in the 
 
 ffff 
 
 %( 
 
% €xihk for tjjB Jftgrn. 
 
 489 
 
 Southern States education was forbidden amongst them. 
 In New York there were between 20,000 and 30,000, 
 many of whom had no church to attend. He had come to 
 implore assistance to elevate them to the dignified station 
 of men and Christians, — for they wanted education, but, 
 still more, the Gospel. He was desirous to purchase a 
 site, and to build upon it a church for his increasing con- 
 gregation. The Bishops of London, Oxford, and LandafF, 
 to whom he had been recommended, had approved of his 
 mission, and a committee had been formed in London to 
 forward his views. 
 
 He concluded by a more general application of his 
 text — the doing of good works. They had, he found, 
 great demands upon them to support the noble charities 
 of their own country ; but the Apostle enjoined that 
 they should do all good works. The field was stony, but 
 if they sowed upon it, the seed would not, by the bles- 
 sing of God, be unproductive, or be lost, but bring forth 
 fruit. Let them cast their bread upon the waters, and 
 they would find it after many days. " Do thou thy part, 
 and leave to Him the rest." 
 
 The preacher (of whose address this is but an imperfect 
 sketch) evidently made a strong impression upon his 
 auditory, and a general whisper ran through the congrega- 
 tion, expressive of surprise at his attainments, and admira- 
 tion of his Christian and philanthropic views. He spoke 
 calmly, not vindictively, of the wrongs of his countrymen, 
 and exhibited talents as a scholar and an orator in unob- 
 trusive and neat figures of speech, which stamp him as a 
 man of reading and intelligence. His manner is agreeable 
 and energetic, and he is, assuredly, a living proof of the 
 capability of the African race to be elevated to a high 
 standard of intellectual and religious culture. The coun- 
 tenance of this Negro clergyman, though black, is described 
 as interesting and well-formed, beaming with bright 
 intelligence, and his expression free and manly ; and, 
 
 Ur 
 
[Q 
 
 490 
 
 % €rMU for tjre Jfep. 
 
 notwithstanding American prejudice, the Archbishops, 
 Bishops, and Clergymen of Britain, acknowledge him as a 
 brother and an equal. " When I was in America," says 
 he, "I thought I tvas a man; — in England I feel, — 
 I know that I am ! " 
 
 ANECDOTE ILLUSTRATIVE OF FAITHFULNESS. 
 
 Colonel Ashley dwelt much on the trustiness and strong 
 attachment of Negroes, when well treated. There were 
 no people in the world that he would trust his property 
 and life with sooner than Negroes. He stated the following 
 fact in confirmation of this sentiment : — 
 
 " During the insurrection of 1816, by which the neigh- 
 bouring parishes were dreadfully ravaged, he was suddenly 
 called from home on military duty. After he had pro- 
 ceeded some distance, he recollected that he had left 5000 
 dollars in an open desk at home. He immediately told the 
 fact to his Slave who was with him, and sent him back to 
 take care of it. He knew nothing more of his money until 
 the rebellion was quelled and peace restored. On returning 
 home, the Slave led him to a cocoa-nut tree near by the 
 house, and dug up the money which he had buried under 
 its roots. He found the whole sum secure. The Negro 
 might have taken the money, and he would never have 
 suspected him, but would have concluded that it had been 
 in common with other large sums, seized upon by the insur- 
 gents." History does not furnish many nobler specimens 
 of genuine honesty and faithfulness. 
 
 MAROSSI; THE BECHUANA BOY. 
 
 " This poor heathen Bechuan 
 Bore on his brow the port of man ; 
 A naked, homeless, exile he — 
 But not debased by Slavery." 
 
 The Bechuana's are tribes inhabiting the eastern parts 
 
 «NS) 
 
 % 
 
% €xiMt for tire %t%x$* 
 
 491 
 
 of South Africa. Thomas Pringle, in his Narrative of a 
 Residence in South Africa, mentions several hundred 
 natives of these tribes being driven from the North East, 
 mostly in a state of utter starvation. These refugees had 
 been forced from their homes by the ravages of banditti, 
 called Bergenaars, aided and encouraged by unprincipled 
 "White Colonists, who supplied them with arms and am- 
 munition in exchange for cattle, and for the children and 
 females of the slaughtered tribes. To prevent these un- 
 fortunate refugees from being reduced to a state of absolute 
 Slavery, they were apprenticed out by the Government on 
 certain conditions as to good treatment. " Several families 
 of them," says Pringle, " were sent to our location, who 
 proved very faithful servants. Many of them fell under 
 my personal observation ; and one, Marossi, a poor orphan 
 boy, about ten years of age, was placed, by a singular 
 accident, under my own protection, and afterwards accom- 
 panied me to England." 
 
 " Ik ben alleenig in de waereld ! " — " I'm in the world 
 alone ! " was the touching expression of Marossi, the 
 Bechuana orphan boy, in his broken Dutch, when he first 
 fell under Thomas Pringle's protection in 1825, having 
 been carried off from his native country by the Bergenaars. 
 He was sold by a Boor for an old jacket only a few months 
 previously, when the hamlet of his tribe had been sacked by 
 these banditti. 
 
 Thomas Pringle has immortalized this occurrence in a 
 beautiful and touching poem. The incidents are from the 
 boy's own simple narrative, with the exception of his 
 flying to the desert with a tame Springbok, — a poetical 
 license, suggested by seeing, a few days afterwards, a 
 Slave- child playing with a Springbok fawn. This elegant 
 animal (Gazella Euchore) is of the Antelope family, about 
 the size of the Fallow Deer. 
 
 " I sat at noontide in my tent, 
 
 And looked across the Desert dun, 
 
492 
 
 >M 
 
 % €x\hk for ttjr llrgrn. 
 
 Beneath the cloudless firmament 
 
 Far gleaming in the sun, 
 When from the bosom of the waste 
 A swarthy Stripling came in haste, 
 With foot unshod and naked limb, 
 And a tame Springbok followed him. 
 
 " With open aspect, frank yet bland, 
 And with a modest mien he stood, 
 Caressing with a gentle hand 
 
 That beast of gentle blood ; 
 Then, meekly gazing in my face, 
 Said, in the language of his race, 
 With silent look, yet pensive tone, 
 ' Stranger — I'm in the world alone ! ' 
 
 " ' Poor boy ! ' I said, ' thy native home 
 Lies far behind the Stormberg blue : 
 Why hast thou left it, boy ! to roam 
 
 This desolate Karroo ? '* 
 His face grew sadder while I spoke ; 
 The smile forsook it ; and he broke 
 Short silence with a sob-like sigh, 
 And told his hapless history. 
 
 " ' I have no home i ' replied the boy : 
 
 ' The Bergenaars — by night they came, 
 And raised their wolfish howl of joy, 
 
 While o'er our huts the flame 
 Resistless rushed ; and, aye, their yell 
 Pealed louder as our warriors fell 
 In helpless heaps beneath their shot ; 
 — One living man they left us not ! 
 
 " ' The slaughter o'er, they gave the slain 
 To feast the foul-beaked birds of prey ; 
 And, with our herds, across the plain 
 
 They hurried us away — 
 The widowed mothers and their brood. 
 Oft, in despair, for drink and food 
 We vainly cried : they heeded not, 
 But with sharp lash the captive smote. 
 
 " ' Three days we tracked that dreary wild, 
 Where thirst and anguish pressed us sore ; 
 
 * The Great Karroo is a desert about 300 miles long, and 70 to 80 broad. 
 
a €xMt far % Urgrn. 
 
 493 
 
 And many a mother and her child 
 
 Lay down to rise no more. 
 Behind us, on the desert brown, 
 We saw the vultures swooping down ; 
 And heard, as the grim night was falling, 
 The wolf to his gorged comrade calling. 
 
 " ' At length was heard a river sounding 
 'Midst that dry and dismal land, 
 And, like a troop of wild deer bounding, 
 
 We hurried to its strand — 
 Among the maddened cattle rushing ; 
 The crowd behind still forward pushiug, 
 Till in the flood our linibs were drenched, 
 And the fierce rage of thirst was quenched. 
 
 '" Hoarse-roaring, dark, the broad Grareep,* 
 In turbid streams was sweeping past, 
 Huge sea-cows f in its eddies deep 
 
 Loud snorting as we passed ; 
 But that relentless robber clan 
 Bight through those waters wild and wan, 
 Drove on like sheep our wearied band : 
 — Some never reached the farther strand. 
 
 " ' All shivering from the foa ming flood, 
 We stood upon the stranger's ground, 
 When, with proud looks and gestures rude, 
 
 The White Men gathered round : 
 And there, like cattle from the fold, 
 By Christians we were bought and sold, 
 'Midst laughter loud and looks of scorn — 
 And roughly from each other torn. 
 
 " ' My mother's scream, so long and shrill, 
 My little sister's wailing cry, 
 (In dreams I often hear them still ! ) 
 
 Rose wildly to the sky. 
 A tiger's heart came to me then, 
 And fiercely on those ruthless men 
 I sprang. — Alas ! dashed on the sand, 
 Bleeding, they bound me foot and hand. 
 
 " ' Away — away, on prancing steeds, 
 The stout man stealers blithely go, 
 
 * The native appellation of the Orange river. 
 t The Sea-Cow, or Zeekee, is the Hippopotamus 
 
 w 
 
 
494 
 
 % €vMi for tj$ H£grn. 
 
 Through long low vallies fringed with reeds, 
 
 O'er mountains capped with snow, 
 Each with his captive, far and fast ; 
 Until yon rock-bound ridge we passed, 
 And distant stripes of cultured soil 
 Bespoke the land of tears and toil. 
 
 " ' And tears and toil have been my lot, 
 Since I the White Man 's Slave became, 
 And sorer griefs I wish forgot — 
 
 Harsh blows, and scorn, and shame ! 
 Oh ! Englishman ! thou n'er canst know 
 The injured bond-man's bitter woe, 
 When round his breast, like scorpions, cling 
 Black thoughts, that madden while they sting ! 
 
 " 'Yet this hard fate I might have borne, 
 And taught in time my soul to bend, 
 Had my sad yearning heart forlorn 
 
 But found a single friend : 
 My race extinct, or far removed, 
 The Boor's rough brood I could have loved ; 
 But each to whom my bosom turned 
 E'en like a hound the Black Boy spurned. 
 
 " ' While, friendless thus, my master's flock 
 I tended on the upland waste, 
 It chanced this fawn leapt from the rocks, 
 
 By wolfish wild dogs * chased : 
 I rescued it, though wounded sore 
 And dabbled in its mother's gore ; 
 And nursed it in a cavern wild, 
 Until it loved me like a child. 
 
 " ' Gently I nursed it ; for I thought 
 (Its hapless fate so like to mine) 
 By good Utikaf it was brought, 
 
 To bid me not repine, — 
 Since in this world of wrong and ill, 
 One creature lived that loved me still, 
 Although its dark and dazzling eye 
 Beamed not with human sympathy. 
 
 " ' Thus lived I, a lone orphan lad, 
 
 My task the proud Boor's flocks to tend ; 
 
 * A species of Hyaena. f The Supreme Being. 
 

 % €x\Mt far tjp JBtgtf. 
 
 And this poor fawn was all I had 
 
 To love, or call my friend ; 
 When suddenly, with haughty look 
 And taunting words, the tyrant took 
 My playmate for his pampered boy, 
 Who envied me my only joy. 
 
 " ' High swelled my heart ! — But when the star 
 Of midnight gleamed, 1 softly led 
 My bounding favourite forth, and far 
 
 Into the Desert fled. 
 And here, from human kind exiled, 
 Three moons on roots and berries wild 
 I've fared ; and braved the beasts of prey, 
 To 'scape from spoilers worse than they. 
 
 " ' But yester morn a Bushman brought 
 The tidings that thy tents were near ; 
 And now with hasty foot I've sought 
 
 Thy presence, void of fear ; 
 Because they say, O English Chief, 
 Thou scornest not the Captive's grief: 
 Then let me serve thee, as thine own — 
 For I am in the world alone !' 
 
 " Such was Marossi's touching tale, 
 
 Our breasts they were not made of stone : 
 His words, his winning looks prevail — ■ 
 
 We took him for ' our own.' 
 And one, with woman's gentle art, 
 Unlocked the fountains of his heart ; 
 And love gushed forth — till he became 
 Her child in every thing but name." 
 
 " This little Bechuana," writes the author of the above, 
 accompanied us to England ; and with the gradual develop- 
 ment of his feelings and faculties, he became interesting in 
 no ordinary degree. He was indeed a remarkable child. 
 With a great flow of animal spirits and natural hilarity, he 
 was at the same time docile, observant, reflective, and 
 always unselfishly considerate of others. He was of a singu- 
 larly ingenuous and affectionate disposition ; and, in pro- 
 portion as his reason expanded, his heart became daily more 
 thoroughly imbued with the genuine spirit of the Gospel, 
 
496 
 
 % <f titrate for tju Jftpc 
 
 
 so that all who knew him, involuntarily and with one 
 consent, applied to this African boy, the benignant words 
 of our Saviour — ' Of such is the Kingdom of Heaven.' 
 He was baptized in 1827, and took his baptismal vows in 
 the most devout and sensible manner. Shortly afterwards, 
 he died of a pulmonary complaint, under which he had for 
 many months suffered with exemplary meekness." 
 
 EXTRAORDINARY FIDELITY OF A NEGRO BOY. 
 
 During the American war, a gentleman with his lady 
 were coming in a ship, under convoy, from the East 
 Indies : his wife died whilst on their passage, and left two 
 infant children, the charge of whom fell to a Negro boy, 
 17 years of age. During the voyage, the gentleman, on 
 some account, left the ship and went on board the commo- 
 dore's vessel, which was then in company, intending, no 
 doubt, to return to his children. During this interval they 
 experienced a dreadful storm, which reduced the ship in 
 which the children remained to a sinking state. A boat 
 was dispatched from the commodore's to save as many 
 of the passengers and crew as possible. Having almost 
 filled the boat, there was but just room, as the sailor 
 said, for the two infants ; or, for the Negro boy, but not 
 for the three. The boy did not hesitate a moment ; but 
 placing the two children in the boat, he said, " Tell 
 Massa that Cuffy has done his duty." The faithful 
 Negro was quickly lost in the storm, whilst the two 
 infants, through his devoted and heroic conduct, were 
 restored to their anxious parent. 
 
 Queen Charlotte, who heard of this extraordinary cir- 
 cumstance, requested Hannah More to write a poem upon 
 it, but she begged to be excused, saying, " That no art 
 could embellish an act so noble ! " 
 
I €xih\t far ttu Urgrn. 
 
 497 
 
 6s*7 
 
 THE "AMISTAD" CAPTIVES, AFRICANS FROM THE 
 MENDI COUNTRY. 
 
 Towards the close of 1839, a considerable sensation 
 was produced by a vessel of suspicious and piratical 
 character, observed near the coast of the United States, in 
 the vicinity of New York. It was represented as a " long, 
 low, black schooner," and manned by Negroes. A steamer 
 and several revenue cutters were dispatched after her, and 
 notice was given to the collectors of the various seaports. 
 This vessel, eventually captured by Lieut. Gedney, proved 
 to be the " Amistad," a Spanish Slaver, the Africans on 
 board of which, in consequence of the brutal treatment 
 received from the Whites, had broken their chains and risen 
 upon the crew, with the design of returning to their native 
 country. They were now in full possession of the ship, 
 having spontaneously submitted to the command of one of 
 their number, Cinque, a man of extraordinary natural 
 capacity. 
 
 An event so unprecedented as the capture of the " Amis- 
 tad," excited the most lively interest among all classes. 
 The Africans on board, 44 in number, were brought to 
 New Haven, and lodged in jail. A number of gentlemen 
 formed themselves into a committee to watch over their 
 interests, and judicial proceedings were commenced to 
 determine how they should be disposed of. The two 
 White Men claiming to be the owners of the Africans, 
 caused them to be indicted for piracy and murder. It is 
 not within the province of this work to enter into the 
 minutiae of the case, but I would just observe, that if we 
 draw a comparison between the deeds of the " Gentle- 
 manly and intelligent Christians," with that of the ruthless 
 gang of African bucaneers, who had providentially rescued 
 themselves from their first aggressors, it must be confessed 
 that the " heathen and barbarous Negroes," contrast very 
 favourably with the civilized Christian Spaniards. 
 
 These Africans proved to be natives of the Mendi 
 
 Ipi 
 
 3 s 
 
 )^ 
 
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 (4hb 
 
 ^) 
 
 b^y 
 
 Wr. 
 
 % €xiMt fnr % JiBgrn. 
 
 Country, and possessed no small degree of intelligence. 
 By means of interpreters, many particulars relative to their 
 cruel treatment were elicited. One of them gave an account 
 of the passage from Africa. On board the vessel there were a 
 large number of men, but the women and children were 
 far the most numerous. They were fastened together in 
 couples, by the wrists and legs, and kept in that situation 
 day and night. Two of the Africans, in giving this de- 
 scription, laid down upon the floor, to shew the painful 
 position in which they were obliged to sleep. By day it 
 was no better. The space between decks was so small — 
 according to their account, not exceeding four feet — that 
 they were obliged, if they attempted to stand, to keep a 
 crouching posture. The decks, fore and aft, were crowded 
 to overflowing. They said they suffered terribly. They 
 had rice enough to eat, but had very little to drink. If 
 they left any of the rice that was given to them uneaten, 
 either from sickness or any other cause, they were whipped. 
 It was a common thing for them to be forced to eat so 
 much as to vomit. Many died on the passage. 
 
 They were landed by night, at a small village near 
 Havana. Several White Men came to buy them, among 
 them the one claiming to be their master, who selected 
 such as he liked, and made them stand in a row. He then 
 felt each of them in every part of the body ; made them 
 open their mouths to see if their teeth were sound ; and 
 carried the examinations to a degree of minuteness of which 
 only a Slave dealer would be guilty. On their separation 
 at Havana, they said they were almost all in tears, because 
 they had come from the same country, and were now, in all 
 probability, to be parted for ever. 
 
 After tedious law proceedings, the ultimate decision was, 
 that the Amistad captives were Free men, fully entitled to 
 their liberty. The friends who had been interested in ob- 
 taining their rights, chartered a ship to convey them to 
 Sierra Leone, for their desire to return to their native 
 
 01 
 
% (Eriiiufr fnr tjp Urgrn. 
 
 499 
 
 country was constantly manifesting itself. One clay, one 
 of them remarked " If 'Merica men offer me as much gold 
 as fill this cap full up, and give me houses, land, and 
 every ting, so dat I stay in this country, I say No ! 
 No ! I want to see my father, my mother, my brother, 
 my sister." They expressed themselves willing to under- 
 go anything, short of losing their lives, to be enabled to 
 return to the Mendi Country. When liberated, they were 
 anxious to learn, as they said " It would benefit them in 
 their own country." Many of them learned to read, also 
 to write well, and to sing. Of arithmetic they were very 
 fond. They also cultivated as a garden 15 acres of land, 
 and raised a large quantity of corn, potatoes, onions, beets, 
 &c. The funds contributed in behalf of these poor African 
 captives being nearly expended, it became necessary to 
 raise sufficient to pay their outfit and passage, and if 
 possible, something in addition, to sustain a contemplated 
 mission to the Mendi Country. It was therefore concluded 
 for Lewis Tappan to accompany ten of the Africans in an 
 excursion through the United States, to excite compassion, 
 and raise funds for these purposes. 
 
 At the first meeting, convened at Boston, the audience 
 were much gratified, and a good impression was made. It 
 seemed to them marvellous that these men and children, 
 who, less than three years since, were almost naked savages 
 in the interior of Africa, should, under the untoward cir- 
 cumstances in which they had been placed for the largest 
 part of the time since they had been in a civilized and Chris- 
 tian country, appear so far advanced in civilization and 
 knowledge. 
 
 The second meeting was concluded with the Lord's 
 Prayer, each sentence being repeated in English by the 
 Mendians. A statement was then made of their past and 
 present condition, of their good conduct, their proficiency, 
 of their ardent desire to return to Mendi, and the favour- 
 able prospect of establishing a mission in their country. 
 
 lllte) 
 
 wg 
 
^vQ/ 
 
 500 
 
 % €tikfe fur tjrr S*gm 
 
 Three or four of the best readers were then called upon to 
 read a passage in the New Testament, selected by the 
 audience. One of them next related, in " Merica language," 
 their condition in their own country, their being kidnapped, 
 the sufferings of the middle passage, their stay at Havana, 
 the transactions on board the Amistad, &c. They were 
 then requested to sing two or three of their native songs. 
 This performance afforded great delight to the audience. 
 As a pleasing contrast, however, they sang immediately 
 after, one of the songs of Zion : — 
 
 " When I can read rny title clear 
 To mansions in the skies, 
 I'll bid farewell to every fear, 
 And wipe my weeping eyes." 
 
 This produced a deep impression ; and while these late 
 Pagans were singing so correctly and impressively a hymn, 
 in a Christian church, numerous weeping eyes testified 
 that the act and its associations touched a chord that 
 vibrated in many hearts. Cinque was then introduced to 
 the company, and addressed them in his native tongue. 
 " It is impossible," says Lewis Tappan, " to describe the 
 novel and deeply interesting manner in which he acquitted 
 himself. The subject of his speech was similar to that of 
 his countryman who had spoken in English ; but he related 
 more minutely and graphically the occurrences on board 
 the ' Amistad.' The easy manner of Cinque, his natural, 
 graceful, and energetic action, the rapidity of his utter- 
 ance, and the remarkable and various expressions of his 
 countenance, excited admiration and applause. He was pro- 
 nounced a powerful natural orator, and one born to sway the 
 minds of his fellow-men. Should he be converted and be- 
 come a preacher of the cross in Africa, what delightful 
 results may be anticipated ! " 
 
 In some places visited, the hearers were astonished at 
 the performance of Kali, only eleven years of age. He 
 could not only spell any word in the Gospels, but 
 
 M 
 

s. 
 
 I / l^Z/c-^A. 
 
 TH.) 
 
 MA NO H ESTE Etl 
 
 WILLIAM IRWIN, J9, CLUHAM 
 
1 Critefe for tire Jfrgrn. 
 
 sentences, without any mistake ; such as " Blessed are the 
 meek, for they shall inherit the earth," naming each letter 
 and syllable, and recapitulating as he went along, until he 
 pronounced the whole sentence. 
 
 Joseph Sturge being in Philadelphia at the time these 
 interesting Africans were there, had an opportunity of 
 being present at one of the public meetings which they at- 
 tended. " On this occasion," he writes, " a very crowded 
 and miscellaneous assembly collected to see and hear the 
 Mendians, although the admission had been fixed as high 
 as half a dollar, with the view of raising a fund to carry 
 them to their native country. Fifteen of them were present, 
 including one little boy and three girls. Cinque, their 
 Chief, spoke with great fluency in his native language ; and 
 his action and manner were very animated and graceful. 
 Not much of his speech was translated, yet he greatly in- 
 terested his audience. The little boy could speak our lan- 
 guage with facility ; and each of them read, without hesita- 
 tion, one or two verses in the New Testament. It was im- 
 possible for any one to go away with the impression, that 
 in native intellect these people were inferior to the Whites. 
 The information which I privately received from their 
 tutor, and others who had full opportunities of appreciating 
 their capacities and attainments, fully confirmed my own 
 very favourable impressions." 
 
 One of the Africans being interrogated by a minister, he 
 stated the Mendians believed in a Great Spirit, adding, 
 afterwards, " We owe everything to God ; He keeps us 
 alive and makes us free. When we go home to Mendi we 
 tell our brethren about God — Jesus Christ — and heaven." 
 Another of the Africans being asked, " What is faith ?" 
 replied, " Believing in Jesus Christ, and trusting in him." 
 Their answers to questions showed they had not only 
 read, but understood the Scriptures, and hopes were enter- 
 tained that one or two, at least, knew experimentally the 
 value of religion. The fact that there is no system of 
 
■xli 
 
 idolatry in Mendi, for missionaries to oppose, and the 
 natives tenaciously to adhere to, was an encouraging fact 
 with regard to the contemplated mission. Another pleasing 
 and remarkable fact existed — labour was suspended every 
 seventh day, and has been so from time immemorial. The 
 people do not engage in any religious services, but dress 
 in their best apparel, feast on that day — as some Christians 
 do — visit, &c. 
 
 The Mendian Negroes, 30 to 40 in number, embarked from 
 New York, for Sierra Leone, towards the close of 1841, 
 accompanied by five missionaries and teachers. The British 
 Government manifested a praiseworthy interest in their 
 welfare, and assisted them to reach their own country from 
 Sierra Leone. Many of them had parents, wives, brothers, 
 sisters, and children at home. What a joyful meeting would 
 it be of relations and friends, when they were descried on 
 the hills of Mendi. Their stay in the United States was 
 of great service to the Anti- Slavery cause, and there is 
 reason to hope that under their auspices, Christianity and 
 civilization may be introduced into their native country. 
 
 TESTIMONY OF Dr. THOMPSON IN PARLIAMENTARY 
 REPORT ON THE SLAVE TRADE. 
 
 Being asked if he believed that " the pure Negro from 
 the interior was endowed with the same faculties of pro- 
 gression as the essentially European ?" he replied, " I 
 have come to that conclusion after looking at the subject 
 carefully." 
 
 On being asked whether he believed any inferiority to 
 exist in the Coloured man in any of his gradations to the 
 European ? his reply was, " No ; I think that he is capable 
 of rising to almost any point in civilization ; we may judge 
 from the people in the interior of Africa, who are Negro, 
 and yet have wise institutions. They have shown that if they 
 had more frequent communication with civilized nations, 
 they might have risen to the highest point of civilization." 
 
 % 
 

 LLEWELLYN CUPIDO MICHELS, 
 Was born in South Africa, being a descendant of a 
 celebrated Hottentot Chief. When quite young he was 
 sent to Hankey, to attend a missionary school. Edward 
 Williams the missionary then resident there, was struck 
 with the appearance of intelligence in the child. A deep 
 interest in the native tribes, and a desire to promote their 
 civilization, induced him to take six of their children into 
 his own family, that he might attend to their moral and 
 religious instruction himself, with a view to their being 
 ultimately placed as teachers in the native school. Cupido 
 became one of these pupils, and by his amiable and gentle 
 disposition, gained the affections of the family. 
 
 In this guarded situation, his mind appears to have been 
 early impressed with the necessity of seeking the Lord, 
 and he frequently resorted to his "praying spot in the 
 bush," a practice common with the native converts in South 
 Africa, and he was considered a hopeful character. 
 
 In 1843, the declining health of the missionary induced 
 him to return to his native land, and he brought the young 
 Hottentot with him to educate, and become fitted for 
 usefulness. After spending a few months in Wales, Cu- 
 pido was placed in the mission school at Walthamstow ; 
 and shortly after, Edward Williams, his kind protector, 
 died ; he had been a faithful labourer in the Lord's vine- 
 yard, and his removal in the prime of life was deeply felt 
 in the mission field. Previous to his death he committed 
 Cupido to the care of James Backhouse, a minister of the 
 Society of Friends, who had undertaken to raise the funds 
 necessary for his education. He greatly felt the loss of 
 his early friend, but he steadily pursued his studies, and 
 became a general favourite in the school. In 1846, his health 
 declining, he left Walthamstow, and became an inmate in 
 in the family of James Backhouse, at York. His inquiring 
 mind, combined with much intelligence and simplicity of 
 manners, endeared him to the family circle ; his religious 
 
 ffHSi 
 
 •'01 Vs^ 
 
 v3 
 
^( 
 
 504 
 
 % €ritatte ftr tj# Jfjgrn, 
 
 C^JJib 
 
 thoughtfulness was very apparent, and his ardent attach- 
 ment to his own country was often strikingly pourtrayed. 
 He continued to decline rapidly, but it was interesting to ob- 
 serve how much his thoughts were turned to subjects of the 
 highest importance. He was frequently engaged in prayer, 
 and several times requested that his friends would pray 
 for him. 
 
 Being told that the doctor considered his recovery very 
 doubtful, he observed ; "I should liked to have lived a 
 little longer to have gone to Africa; " but added, "the 
 Lord's will must be right." He remarked that in looking 
 back to his past life, there were many things which gave 
 him great regret, and said with much earnestness, " I do 
 wish that I had lived nearer to the Lord." 
 
 Being asked if he had any message to send to James 
 Backhouse, who was absent from home on religious 
 service ; he said, " Give my dear love to him, and tell him 
 I believe this illness has been greatly blessed to me ; it has 
 made me feel very thankful for all my blessings, and drawn 
 me nearer to the Lord Jesus. I hope his work prospers, 
 and that when it is finished, if we are permitted to meet, 
 it may be with joy in the Lord." 
 
 As he was becoming much weaker, the remark being made 
 that his present state of trial was not likely to last long, 
 he said, that he believed it was not, and requested to have 
 a letter read to him which had been received from Jane 
 Williams, the widow of his first christian caretaker, in 
 which she expressed her desire, that whether he lived or 
 died, the Lord might be his portion for ever, &c. With 
 this he was much pleased ; he sent a message of love to 
 her, and spoke of her kind care in keeping him near to her 
 when he was a little boy ; regarding this as a link in the 
 chain of Divine Providence, which had been so wonder- 
 fully extended to him up to the present time ; he spoke 
 with joyful anticipation of meeting her husband in heaven, 
 and continued, " Oh Lord take care of his children ; watch 
 
 W 
 
 
 )V5 
 
51 ffilmfe for tjp jfrgra. 
 
 505 
 
 ->~ 
 
 MH> 
 
 over them as he used to do over us." He again referred 
 to the hope he had entertained of returning to labour in 
 the Lord's vineyard, in his native land ; how his heart had 
 yearned to be made instrumental in the conversion of his 
 benighted countrymen, and more especially of his own 
 immediate connexions, saying, " Oh Lord! take thine 
 own work into thine own hands ; and by thy Holy Spirit, 
 visit their hearts, and turn them unto righteousness." 
 
 In reference to his own state he said, " I believe that 
 the blood of Jesus has cleansed me from all sin ;" and 
 with a countenance beaming with joy and gratitude, he ex- 
 claimed, " Oh Lord, blessed and praised be thy Holy Name." 
 
 At one time his soul seemed filled with the love of his 
 Saviour, and he emphatically exclaimed, " Why do not 
 all sinners come to Christ !" Seeing those around him 
 weep, he said, " I wish you to be comforted ; do not cry at 
 that which is the will of God ; the Lord bless and reward 
 you for all your kindness to me." He then took an affec- 
 tionate leave of them, and gave directions respecting the 
 distribution of his books. 
 
 He continued to praise and magnify God, and said, "I 
 am thirsty here, but I shall soon drink of the river of life ; 
 I am going to that place where there will be no want." He 
 died in the 9th month, 1846, aged about 17, doubtless to 
 join the ransomed of all nations, kindreds, people and 
 tongues, who have washed their robes, and made them 
 white in the blood of the Lamb. His remains were in- 
 terred in the burial ground belonging to the Friends in York. 
 
 THE GRATEFUL NEGRO. 
 
 Some years ago, a gentleman who had been possessed 
 of considerable property, became embarrassed in his cir- 
 cumstances, and was arrested by his creditors, and confined 
 in the King's Bench ; from whence there was no proba- 
 bility of his being liberated, unless some law proceedings 
 
 3 T 
 
 M 
 
 TO 
 
 1 
 
506 
 
 % €nhk far tire Jfogrn. 
 
 (upon his succeeding in which, the recovery of great part 
 of his property depended,) should be decided in his favour. 
 
 Thus situated, he called a Negro who had served him 
 with the greatest faithfulness, and said, " Robert, you 
 have lived with me many years, but I am now unable to 
 maintain you any longer : you must leave me, and en- 
 deavour to find another master." The poor Negro, well 
 remembering his master's kindness, replied, " No, Massah ! 
 me no leave you ; you maintain me many years, me now 
 try what I can do for you." He went and procured em- 
 ployment as a day-labourer, and regularly brought his 
 earnings to his master, on which, although small, they 
 managed to subsist for some time, until the lawsuit was 
 decided in the master's favour, and he thereby regained 
 possession of a very considerable property. 
 
 Mindful of his faithful Negro, one of his first acts was 
 to settle an annuity upon him for the remainder of his life, 
 sufficient to secure to him the enjoyment of those comforts 
 he had so well deserved. 
 
 oil© 
 
 THE FAITHFUL NEGEESS. 
 
 In the dreadful earthquake which made such ravages in 
 St. Domingo, in 1770, a Negress of Port-au-Prince found 
 herself alone in the house of her master and mistress, with 
 their youngest child, whom she nursed. The house shook 
 to its foundation. Every one had taken flight; she alone 
 could not escape without leaving her infant charge in dan- 
 ger. She flew to the chamber, where it lay in the most 
 profound sleep. At that moment the walls of the house 
 fell in. Anxious only for the safety of her foster child, 
 she threw herself over it, and serving as a sort of arch, 
 saved it from destruction. The child was indeed saved ; 
 but the unfortunate Negress died soon after, the victim of 
 her fidelity. 
 
 <F1K 
 
yf 
 
 91 
 
 51 i:\Mt for tjp Jtajrn. 
 
 F.KANCIS WILLIAMS, 
 
 The son of African parents, was born in Jamaica, about 
 the year 1700. He died when about 70 years of age, a 
 little before the publication of Long's History of Jamaica, 
 which appeared in 1774, in which are contained some par- 
 ticulars respecting him. 
 
 Struck with the conspicuous talents of this Negro when 
 he was quite young, the Duke of Montague, governor of 
 the Island, proposed to try, whether, by an improved educa- 
 tion, he would be equal to a White Man placed in the same 
 circumstances. He accordingly sent him to England, where 
 he commenced his studies in a private school, and after- 
 wards entered the University of Cambridge, where he made 
 considerable progress in mathematics and other branches 
 of science. 
 
 During his sojourn in Europe, he published the poem 
 commencing — - 
 
 " Welcome, welcome, brother debtor." 
 
 This piece obtained so much vogue in England, that 
 certain individuals, irritated in discovering anything meri- 
 torious emanating from a Negro, attempted, but without 
 success, to dispute its being exclusively his own production. 
 
 After remaining several years in England, Williams re- 
 turned to Jamaica, where the Duke of Montague offered to 
 obtain him a place in the Council of the Government, 
 which however he declined accepting. Under the patron- 
 age of the Governor he opened a school, in which he taught 
 Latin and mathematics. He prepared himself a successor, 
 in a young Negro, who unfortunately became deranged. 
 The historian Long is very ready to narrate this circum- 
 stance, as a proof that African heads are incapable of 
 abstruse study, such as is required in the more advanced 
 stages of geometry, granting however, that there exists a 
 greater adaptation to the free exercise of the intellectual 
 powers in Creoles than in the Natives of Africa. But 
 
 dli^) 
 
 I 
 
 -•" >T 
 
508 
 
 1 €rikt£ for tip Jffgra. 
 
 surely if a general deduction is to be drawn from the cir- 
 cumstances of this particular case, seeing that the exercise 
 of the intellectual faculties has proportionally disordered 
 the mental perceptions of the learned, and men of letters in 
 every department of society, we must, on the same grounds 
 necessarily conclude, that neither the one or the other are 
 fitted for profound study. The historian subsequently 
 refutes his own hypothesis, for, constrained to acknowledge 
 in Williams the existence of considerable talent, he has 
 with equal justice drawn a conclusion entirely at variance 
 with his former statement. 
 
 Williams wrote several poems in Latin, a mode of com- 
 position he made choice of, and it was his custom to present 
 a piece to the new Governors. That which he addressed 
 to Haldane is inserted in the History of Jamaica ; and, 
 although the historian accuses the author of imitation, and 
 of flattering the Governors by comparing them to heroes 
 of antiquity, it may be observed, that few of our own poets 
 have escaped similar reproaches* — not excepting Milton 
 himself. To furnish some idea of the talents of this intel- 
 ligent Negro, the poem above-mentioned is here transcribed, 
 addressed to George Haldane, Esq., Governor of Jamaica. 
 
 Integerrimo et fortissimo viro 
 Georgio Haldano, armigero, 
 Insula? Jamaicensis gubernatori ; 
 Cui, omnes morum, virtutumque dotes bellicarum, 
 In cumulum accesserunt. 
 
 CARMEN. 
 
 Denique venturum fatis volventibus annum, 
 
 Cuncta per extensum lata videnda diem, 
 
 Excussis adsunt curis, sub imagine clara 
 
 Felices populi, terraque lege virens. 
 
 Te duce, qua? fuerant malesuada mente peracta 
 
 Irrita conspectu non reditura tuo. 
 
 Ergo omnis populus, nee non plebecula cernet 
 
 Hsesurum collo te relegasse jugum, 
 
 Et mala, quae diris quondam crueiatibus, insons 
 
Insula passa fuit ; condoluisset onus, 
 VHJSD Ni vixtrix tua Marte niauus prius inclyta, nostris 
 
 Sponte ruinosis rebus adesse velit. 
 Optimus es servus regi servire Britanno, 
 Dum gaudet genio Scotica terra tuo : 
 Optimus beroum populi fulcire ruinam ; 
 Insula dum superest ipse superstes eris. 
 Victorem agnoscet te Guadaloupa, suoruni 
 Pespiciet merito diruta castra ducum. 
 Aurea vexillis flebit jactantibus Iris, 
 Cumque suis populis, oppida victa gemet. 
 Crede, meuin non est, vir Marti cbare, Minerva 
 Denegat iEthiopi bella sonare ducum. 
 Concilio, caneret te Buchananns et armis, 
 Carmine Peleidce, scriberet ille parem. 
 EJe poeta , decus patriae, tua facta referre 
 Dignior, altisono vixque Marone minor. 
 Flammiferos agitante suos sub sole jugales 
 Yivimus ; eloquium deficit omne focis. 
 Hoc demum accipias multa fuligine fusum 
 Ore sonaturo ; non cute, corde valet. 
 Pollenti stabibta manu, Deus almus, eandem 
 Omnigenis animam, nil probibente dedit. 
 Ipsa coloris egens virtus, prudentia ; bonesto 
 NuUus inest animo, nullus in arte color. 
 Cur timeas, quamvis dubitesve, nigerrima celsam 
 Csesaris occidui, scandere musa domum ? 
 Vade salutatiun, nee sit tibi causa pudoris, 
 Candida quod nigra corpora pelle geris ! 
 Integritas morum Maurum magis ornat, et ardor 
 Ingenii, et docto dulcis in ore decor ; 
 Hunc, mage cor sapiens, patriae virtutis armorque, 
 Eximit e sociis, conspicuumque facit. 
 Insula me genuit, celebres aluere Britanni 
 Insula, te salvo non dobtura patre. 
 Hoc precor 6 nullo videant te fine regentem 
 Florentes populos, terra, deique locus ! 
 
 The Abbe Gregoire has given a translation of this poem 
 in French ; and the historian Long, notwithstanding his 
 prejudice against the Negro race, thought it not beneath 
 his notice, for he not only translated it into English, and 
 versified it, but inserted it in his History of Jamaica. 
 
 When Williams published this poem, the Dean of 
 
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 510 
 
 St iffate for flji fegrn, 
 
 Middleham, indignant against the Slave holders, who wished 
 to class the Negroes with monkeys, remarked, " I never heard 
 it said that an Orang-outang had composed a poem ! " and 
 he adds, " we do not find amongst the defenders of Slavery, 
 one-half of the literary merit of Phillis Wheatley and 
 Francis Williams." 
 
 HENRY HIGHLAND GARNETT, 
 
 Was born in Maryland, in 1815. His great grandfather 
 was the son of an African Chief, stolen from his native 
 country in his youth and sold into Slavery on the shores of 
 Maryland. 
 
 The branch of his family thus transplanted into America, 
 were all held in slavery till 1822, when they escaped to the 
 non-slave holding States. Henry, the subject of this notice, 
 was then about eight years old, and with his father, mother, 
 and sister, and eight other fugitive Slaves, found an asylum 
 in New York. 
 
 They belonged to a Col. William Spencer, at whose death, 
 the estate passed into the hands of his nephew, who was 
 over-bearing and cruel ; the very personification of tyranny. 
 Henry's mother saw what she and her children had to ex- 
 pect from such a wretch, and resolved to make her escape. 
 She was a woman of great energy of character, and perform- 
 ed her work speedily. Having on one occasion obtained 
 permission to be absent two days, to attend the funeral of 
 a relative ten miles distant, they started about sun-set, 
 travelling all night towards the land of freedom ; hiding 
 themselves in the woods by day, till they found themselves 
 safe in New Hope, a village in Pennsylvania. At last they 
 reached New York city, where they remained about seven 
 years, and then it was their misfortune again to be hunted 
 by men-stealers, who came upon them at their residence. 
 The father and mother escaped as by a miracle ; the former 
 by leaping from the top of the house into the yard, and 
 
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 51 €Mtt far tl)t lirgrn. 
 
 511 
 
 sum 
 
 the latter by hiding herself in the hall till the men-stealers 
 went away. 
 
 The day following, Henry's only sister was seized, and 
 thrown into prison to await her trial as a fugitive from justice. 
 The best legal assistance was obtained by the friends of the 
 Slave on her behalf, and by great exertions they obtained 
 the discharge of the girl (who was only seventeen years of 
 age) from custody, and she was borne out of court in the 
 arms of her friends. 
 
 While these things were transpiring, Henry Garnett was 
 at Washington in the capacity of cabin-boy on board a 
 schooner. After completing the voyage, he returned to 
 New York, and received the terrible intelligence concern- 
 ing the persecution of his family. It came like a thunder- 
 bolt to his soul, and he sought an oportunity to avenge the 
 persecutors, but his friends possessing greater prudence, 
 removed him to the country, where he remained until 1830. 
 He then returned to New York, and entered the African 
 Free School, where he soon reached the highest class. In 
 1883, he was admitted into the Canal Street Collegiate 
 School, with several other Coloured youths, and commenced 
 the study of the Latin language. The opportunities which 
 the school offered, were limited ; for such was the effect 
 of prejudice, that the Coloured boys were not allowed to 
 meet in the room with Whites, and as might be ex- 
 pected, but little time or pains were bestowed on their 
 instruction. 
 
 In 1835, Henry H. Garnett travelled to New Hampshire, 
 a distance of 500 miles, and became a member of Canaan 
 Academy. He had been there but three months, when 
 the inhabitants assembled, and with a mob and sixty-five 
 yoke of oxen, removed and burned the house. They next 
 attacked the house in which the Coloured pupils boarded, 
 but met with stern resistance, and were driven back. A 
 gun was fired into H. H. Garnett's room, and another was 
 instantly discharged from within. 
 
 ! 9 
 
512 
 
 % €x\Mt for tip J$£grn. 
 
 The very day on which the Academy was destroyed, a 
 young and lovely Coloured girl entered the village, hoping 
 to drink from that fountain of learning. She had been a 
 member of Miss Crandali's school, at Canterbury, until that 
 noble lady was imprisoned in a dungeon, (which but a little 
 while previous had been occupied by a murderer) for the 
 crime of instructing Coloured females in learning and re- 
 ligion. The name of this young woman was Julia Williams. 
 When Henry Garnett beheld her, he admired her modest 
 and gentle demeanour, as well as her heroic spirit, and 
 formed an ardent attachment to her, which was reciprocated, 
 and resulted in their marriage in 1841. 
 
 Henry Garnett experienced a religious change of mind 
 in 1835, and united with the Frankfort Street Presbyterian 
 Church, in New York, at that time under the Pastoral 
 charge of the excellent T. S. Wright. After his conversion 
 he turned his attention to the Gospel Ministry, and repaired 
 to the Oneida Institute, in 1836, where he was received 
 with the utmost kindness by the President, Beriah Green, 
 and was treated with equality by the professors and his 
 fellow-students. There he gained the reputation of a 
 courteous and accomplished man, an able and eloquent de- 
 bater, and a good writer. His first public appearance was 
 before the American Anti-Slavery Society, in 1837, and 
 his address at once secured for him a standing among the 
 first class of speakers. 
 
 Henry Garnett graduated at the school at Whitestoun in 
 1840, and received his diploma. He then repaired to the 
 city of Troy, State of New York. He was ordained a 
 minister of the Presbyterian Church there in 1843, and 
 continues to be the pastor. 
 
 Henry Garnett is a most strenuous advocate of freedom, 
 temperance, and education. He has had a hearing in re- 
 lation to the restoration of the elective franchise to his op- 
 pressed brethren, before the Legislatures of New York and 
 Connecticut. He is an acceptable preacher, his discourses 
 
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 513 
 
 being evangelical and poetical. He usually speaks from notes, 
 rarely appearing with written sermons. Having complete 
 command of his voice, he uses it with skill, never failing 
 to fill the largest houses with perfect ease. One of his 
 most remarkable speeches was an address to the Negroes, 
 at a National Convention at Buffalo, in 1843, when, for 
 the space of two hours, the mighty assembly was swayed 
 as he pleased. Sometimes they wept, and sometimes they 
 cried for revenge ; and frequently they shouted aloud for 
 joy or for sorrow. He made another very remarkable speech 
 at Old Fanuil Hall, Boston, and has also published A 
 Discourse upon the Past and Present Condition, and 
 Destiny of the Coloured Race. He was for some time 
 connected with the " National Watchman." He is a 
 pure Black, about 32 years of age, and is scrupulously 
 careful of his personal attire.* 
 
 SOLOMON BAYLEY. 
 
 The following particulars are extracted chiefly from a 
 Narrative of Solomon Bayley, formerly a Slave, written by 
 himself, and published for his benefit by Robert Hurnard. 
 
 " During the early part of my residence in America," 
 says R. Hurnard, " I met with the account of Bayley 's 
 escape from Slavery, with the mental and bodily trials he 
 underwent, resulting from that step. Being much inte- 
 rested in the perusal of this simple and unadorned narrative, 
 I was induced to make some inquiry into the character and 
 circumstances of a man, the recital of whose sufferings and 
 wrongs had deeply excited my sympathy. The information 
 I obtained was in all respects gratifying, so far as related 
 to himself. He was described to be estimable as a religious 
 character, remarkably humble, patient of wrong, poor as 
 
 * In a pamphlet recently published by the Author, on behalf of the 
 Boston Anti-Slavery Bazaar, entitled " Caxumnt Refuted, by Facts 
 fkoii Liberia, &c.," some extracts from Garnett's Discourse are inserted. 
 May be had of Charles Gilpin, and through all Booksellers. 
 
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 to worldly possessions, but rich in faith, and in many other 
 Christian virtues. 
 
 " Feeling a strong inclination to see and converse with 
 him, I requested a friend who had known him many years, 
 and whom he sometimes visited, to introduce me to him, 
 and from an intimate knowledge, obtained at frequent inter- 
 views, the favourable sentiments I at first conceived of 
 his integrity and worth, were fully and satisfactorily con- 
 firmed., heightened, as they were, by his solid, instructive 
 conversation, and the just sense he appeared to entertain 
 of divine things. While narrating in my family the par- 
 ticulars of some severe domestic bereavements, with great 
 feeling and sensibility, it was evident that he was no 
 stranger to the source from whence true consolation is 
 derived. 
 
 "I had long felt a warm interest towards the descendants 
 of Africa generally ; but the peculiar regard which was 
 awakened in my mind towards this deserving individual, 
 made me anxious to obtain more of his history, and I 
 wrote him two or three times on the subject. We lived 
 fifty miles apart, and my avocations, as well as his, pre- 
 cluded our meeting again. I wished to possess it in his 
 own simple, unvarnished style ; but Solomon, being a self- 
 taught penman, and ignorant of orthography, made many 
 objections on the ground of his incapacity, and the 
 advanced period of his life : he was, however, at length 
 induced to comply with my request, and forwarded such 
 parts as I had particularly requested, which I now offer to 
 the candid public, presuming that every indulgence will be 
 granted to a man, whose life has been chiefly spent in 
 Slavery." 
 
 In reference to his early life, he says : " The Lord tried 
 to teach me his fear when I was a little boy. I delighted 
 in vanity and foolishness, and went astray ; but he found 
 out a way to overcome me, and to cause me to desire his 
 favour, and his great help ; and although I thought no one 
 
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 515 
 
 could be more unworthy of his favour, yet He looked on 
 me, and pitied me in my great distress. 
 
 " I was born a Slave in the State of Delaware, and was 
 carried into Virginia ; and the laws of Delaware said that 
 Slaves carried out of that State should be free. I asserted 
 my right, for which I was sent to Richmond, and put in 
 jail and irons, and from thence sent in a waggon back into 
 the country. After we left Richmond, in the bitterness of 
 my heart I cried out, ' I am past all hope ;' but it pleased 
 the Father of mercies to look upon me, and he sent a 
 strengthening thought into my heart — that He that made 
 the heavens and the earth, was able to deliver me. I looked 
 up to the sky, and then on the trees and ground, and I be- 
 lieved in a moment, that if He could make all these he was 
 able to deliver me. Then did that Scripture come into my 
 mind : — ' They that trust in the Lord, shall never be con- 
 founded.' I believed it, and went unperceived into the 
 bushes. When they missed me, they looked for me, but 
 not finding me, went on ; and that night I travelled through 
 thunder, lightning, and rain, a considerable distance." 
 
 His trials and difficulties in getting along were many and 
 various. In relating one of these he says, " I cried to the 
 Maker of heaven and earth to save me, and he did so. I 
 prayed to the Lord, and when night came on, I felt as if 
 the great God had heard my cry. Oh ! how marvellous is 
 his loving kindness towards men of every description and 
 complexion. Though he is high, yet hath he respect unto 
 the lowly, and will hear the cry of the distressed when they 
 call upon him, and will make known Ins goodness and his 
 power." 
 
 At Petersburg he met with a Coloured man from his 
 own neighbourhood, circumstanced like himself : they got a 
 small boat, went down the James River, and landed in 
 Chesapeake Bay. " But," says he, " we were hunted like 
 partridges on the mountains." His companion was pur- 
 sued and killed, having his brains knocked out ; on which 
 
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516 
 
 % €x\h\i to tip? JlBgrn. 
 
 Solomon makes the following remarks : — " Now, reader, 
 you have heard of the end of my fellow-sufferer, but I 
 remain yet as a monument of mercy, thrown up and down 
 on life's tempestuous sea ; sometimes feeling an earnest 
 desire to go away and be at rest ; but I travel on, in hopes 
 of overcoming at my last combat." 
 
 It being thought best for him to leave Virginia, he went 
 to Dover, in Delaware, a distance of about 120 miles. By 
 travelling in the night, and lying by in the day time, he 
 at length reached that place with great difficulty, being 
 closely hunted and pursued. 
 
 In concluding this part of his Narrative, he says : — " Oh ! 
 what pains God takes to help his otherwise helpless crea- 
 tures ! O that his kindness and care were more considered 
 and laid to heart ! " 
 
 In the second part of his Narrative, he remarks : — " I got 
 to Camden, when my master found me. He had not seen 
 me since he put me on the back country waggon, near 350 
 miles from Camden. He asked me what I was going to do. I 
 said : — ' How, master, I have suffered a great deal, and seen 
 a great deal of trouble ; I think you might let me go for 
 little or nothing.' He said : — ' I won't do that, but if you 
 will give me forty pounds bond, and good security, you 
 may be free.' " After much conversation between them 
 on the subject of his right to freedom, he continues : — ■ 
 " Finally he sold my time for 80 dollars, and I went to 
 work, and worked it out in a shorter time than he gave 
 me, and then I was a free man. And when I came to 
 think that the yoke was off my neck, and how it was taken 
 off, I was made to wonder and admire, and to adore the 
 orderings of kind Providence, who assisted me in all my 
 way." 
 
 Here he very feelingly recites the trials and exercises of 
 mind that attended him, for not adhering to that wisdom 
 and goodness of God, which had been so marvellously 
 manifested for his deliverance. " And now, reader," 
 
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3. iTniiufr fur tjjr JEJrgrn. 
 
 517 
 
 says he, " I will here record, that God is rich in 
 mercy towards sinners of the deepest dye ; for when 
 every other method failed, he sent a little boy to me, with 
 his finger at a text, ' The wicked is driven away in his 
 wickedness, but the righteous hath hope in his death.' 
 I began to read, and it pleased infinite goodness to look 
 upon me, and being unwilling that I should perish eter- 
 nally, he sent down his awakening power, and I was made 
 to quake and tremble ; and an impression abode on my 
 mind, that God was true, a just and a holy God, and that 
 no unclean thing could rest in his holy habitation. I saw 
 I was a sinner condemned to die, but a call reached my 
 soul, ' take heed that you entertain no hopes of heaven, 
 but what are built on a solid foundation.' A question 
 arose in my mind, what foundation I had to hope for 
 heaven ? I examined, and found I had none but what was 
 built on the sand. I resolved to amend my ways, but a 
 second thought came powerfully into my mind, if I made 
 another resolution, and broke it as I had done, the door of 
 mercy would be for ever shut against me. Then the good 
 Spirit brought to my mind the dangers and deaths from 
 which I had been delivered, through the mercy of an in- 
 dulgent God, and how I had called on him in trouble and 
 he had delivered me, and had answered me in the secret place 
 of thunder. At the same time, the Spirit of truth brought 
 all things to my remembrance, and I saw how hateful were 
 all my sins in the sight of a holy God. Let the Lord be 
 praised, both now and for ever, for the exceeding riches of 
 his grace to all who will look at their sins, and his good- 
 ness, and consider, before it be too late, and turn from the 
 evil of their ways, that they may understand the truth. 
 
 " The word sent to me in my distress was this : — ' Believe 
 on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved.' Then, 
 and not till then, did I ever desire saving faith ; but I 
 could not attain to it by all the exertion I could make ; 
 but I found in my distress, that faith is the gift of God, 
 
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 and that grace is not sown in the heart, till the heart is 
 broken and contrite : that is, in earnest to study and enter 
 into the saving plan of life and salvation ; which is — ' Let 
 the wicked forsake his way, and the unrighteous man his 
 thoughts ; let him turn unto the Lord, and he will have 
 mercy upon him, and abundantly pardon all that is passed.' 
 But when I was put to the test, to try my faith, I found I 
 had none ; then, in the bitterness of my spirit, I desired 
 the Lord to give me to feel the power of saving faith ; and 
 I struggled to lay hold on that word, ' Ask, and ye shall 
 receive, seek, and ye shall find : ' but this question made 
 me quake, ' Is your heart right ? ' Then I trembled, and 
 while I desired to know myself, this passed through my 
 mind : — ' Are you willing now to renounce the devil and 
 his works, and all the pomp and vanity of this wicked 
 world, and all the sinful lusts of the flesh ? ' and I was en- 
 abled, in my sinking, distressed state, to forsake every for- 
 bidden way for the sake of peace and pardon. Then did 
 God send down the power of saving faith ; then, Oh ! how 
 terrible I saw the length, and breadth, and depth, and 
 height, of God's eternal law : I also saw that heaven and 
 earth would pass away, before one jot or tittle of his law 
 should fail, or fall to the ground. Man must be converted, 
 or never enter into the kingdom of heaven. I went out to 
 some secret place to pray ; and as I walked I trembled ; 
 and when I got to the place, I could only pray, ' Lord 
 have mercy upon me.' I cried as if falling into despair ; 
 and having consented to forsake every wrong way, God 
 had mercy on me, and pardoned my sins : Glory be to God, 
 for ever and ever, Amen. Oh ! praise the Lord, whose 
 mercy is over all his works, from generation to generation. 
 How faithful and true he is to all who will yield to the 
 striving of his Spirit in their own hearts, before it takes its 
 everlasting flight. How careful ought we to be, for fear 
 we be left to ourselves ; then, blindness and hardness of 
 heart will take place, and the soul be left on the dark 
 
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 519 W& 
 
 M 
 
 mountains of unbelief, on which many have stumbled for 
 not following the light that visits their minds, which ap- 
 pears in youth, and continues shorter or longer, according 
 to the entertainment this heavenly messenger gets in the 
 heart. Reader, think how many are now on the road to 
 ruin, who are still slighting the call of grace, and if they 
 continue on, must overtake them that are already ruined. 
 I pray that none that ever see this, may go another step 
 towards the pit from whence there is no return. 
 
 ' O that all may taste and see, 
 The riches of His grace ; 
 The arms of love that compass me, 
 Would all mankind embrace ! ' " 
 
 The reader will be interested in perusing the following 
 extracts from letters written by this pious Negro. 
 
 >/TIP 
 
 To John Reynolds, Wilmington, Delaware. 
 
 Camden, Del. 7th Mo., 24th, 1825. 
 Dear Friend, 
 
 I received thy* very acceptable letter, and was not a 
 little comforted ; I was glad to hear from thee and thy dear 
 family and friends. I believe thou art trying to be a 
 beloved John, indeed, or a son of Abraham : for they that 
 are of faith are children of Abraham, and heirs according 
 to the promises. And the Lord gave a testimony concern- 
 ing him, saying, " I know him, that he will command his 
 children and his household after him." 
 
 O ! I pray that thou mayest continue to study the busi- 
 ness of life, which is to prepare for a blessed immortality, 
 and eternal life with the Father and the Son, according to 
 the Spirit of holiness which works in us both to will and 
 to do of his good pleasure ; and, if not resisted, will make 
 
 * Solomon Bayley was in the Methodist connexion. The phraseology 
 he used is not unusual in some parts of America amongst persons of different 
 denominations. 
 
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1 €xlhk for tju Jfegtn. 
 
 dUJA 
 
 us one in Him in spirit and in truth. O that we might be 
 enabled to walk before the Lord unto all pleasing ! 
 
 I thank thee, dear brother, for mentioning a thought for 
 my temporal and spiritual concerns. I am daily at a loss 
 how to express my thanks to the great Giver of every 
 blessing, who daily loads me with benefits. I think I am 
 enabled by his grace to esteem the cross of Christ more 
 than I used to do ; for I learn by the cross I must be cru- 
 cified to the world, and the world unto me. 
 
 But O ! dear friend, I find that knowledge pufFeth up ; 
 but it is charity alone that edifieth. True charity is not 
 puffed up. Now no man can have true charity without he 
 love God, and keep his commandments ; defined by the 
 blessed Jesus himself in these words : — " As you would 
 that men should do to you, do ye even so to them." 
 
 ! if all the world was engaged to run after this com- 
 mand, and follow this best of all rules, then harmony and 
 peace would flow through the minds of all people, nations, 
 tongues, and languages at once ; then righteousness would 
 cover the earth, as the waters do the great deep ; then, his 
 kingdom would come, and his will be done on earth as it is 
 in heaven ; then, all would be happy and free from all fear, 
 which hath torment — live happy — die happy — and all go to 
 heaven, according to the will of God, our Heavenly Father, 
 " who would have all men to be saved, and come to the 
 knowledge of the truth." 
 
 Now unto the King immortal, invisible, to the only wise 
 God our Saviour, be honour and praise both now and for 
 ever. Amen. 
 
 With good wishes to thee and thine, I conclude, 
 Thy friend, 
 
 SOLOMON BAYLEY. 
 
 Extracts of a letter to Robert Hurnard. 
 
 3rd Month, 26th, 1824. 
 
 1 thank thee, dear Robert, for spending a thought on 
 
1 <£ritmfe for tjp Stogm 
 
 so poor and unworthy a thing as I am ; but especially thank 
 God for putting it into thy heart to inquire anything about 
 the work of grace on my mind. I trust it is with gratitude 
 I now write unto thee of my call to the ministry ; and first 
 I may say, 
 
 " God works in a mysterious way, 
 His wonders to perform." 
 
 Secondly, He knows how to get himself honour and praise 
 by the most feeble ; for, to undertake to make such a 
 creature as I am work in his vineyard, was amazing to me ; 
 but there was a great work to do, to make me fit for any 
 thing at all. Surely he called me oftener than he did 
 Samuel, when he was a child. But after I was savingly 
 converted to God, he was pleased to pour into my heart 
 a measure of his universal love ; and when my heart was 
 filled with love towards God, and good will to all man- 
 kind, then a longing desire that all people might taste and 
 see the riches of his grace continued with me day and 
 night; then a strong impression to go on in the fear of 
 the Lord was felt ; and to speak to men of all descriptions 
 seemed to be required of me. 
 
 But O ! dear friend, after my mind was thus prepared, 
 I had a great warfare and strife ; first with man -fear, and 
 a man-pleasing spirit ; then with shame, desire of praise, 
 and a good name. 
 
 Now, dear friend, in this exercise of mind, there were 
 some scriptures came into my mind, to encourage and 
 strengthen me ; as the 2 Corinthians xii. 9 ; 2 Kings v. 4. 
 (enumerating many of this description.) All these scrip- 
 tures mightily helped to encourage me to go forward in 
 speaking to a dying people the words of eternal life. 
 
 O ! what an affecting view of the worth of souls came 
 into my mind ; and I thought if I could be made instru- 
 mental in the hand of the Lord in saving one soul, it would 
 be matter of rejoicing to all eternity. So I went on, trust- 
 ing in the Lord ; but I should soon have fainted in my 
 
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 mind, had it not been for the encouragement I met with 
 both from God and man. Now to him that sits upon the 
 throne, be honour and praise, world without end. Amen. 
 With good wishes to thee and thine, I conclude, 
 
 Thy friend, 
 
 SOLOMON BAYLEY. 
 
 In a subsequent letter, this pious Negro comments on 
 " the love of God manifested towards so unworthy a crea- 
 ture." And in allusion to his afflicted race, he says, " I 
 have great heaviness and continual sorrowing in heart for 
 their oppressions ; but I feel almost as much for the op- 
 pressor as the oppressed, because the Lord will shortly 
 bring them to judgment." 
 
 Being desirous of advancing the kingdom of the Re- 
 deemer amongst his countrymen, he went over to Liberia 
 about the year 1880. I have been able to obtain very 
 little further information respecting him. The proceeds 
 of the Narrative were forwarded to him there, by Robert 
 Hurnard, amounting to £25, which he gratefully acknow- 
 ledged. The following remarks appear to have allusion to 
 this: — " May the good Shepherd bless the friends who have 
 remembered me for good, and have thought to benefit me 
 at so great a distance," &c. 
 
 In a letter written from Monrovia in 1832, found amongst 
 the papers of the late Hannah Kilham, he alludes to a pros- 
 pect of returning to America again, to furnish some infor- 
 mation respecting the Liberian Colony, which he accom- 
 plished in 1833. Whether he visited Africa again is not 
 quite clear ; the probability is, that he has, ere this, been 
 permitted to enter into that rest which is prepared for the 
 people of God. 
 
 The venerable Thomas Clarkson, in speaking of his hav- 
 ing perused the Narrative of this pious Negro with much 
 pleasure and interest, makes the following just observation : 
 — " If the Slaves in our Islands and elsewhere are capable 
 
% €x\Mi far \\t %%u. 
 
 (and what should hinder them under divine grace) of bear- 
 ing such visible marks of the Image of God upon their minds, 
 how, beyond all example, abandoned must be the wicked- 
 ness of those who systematically treat them as brutes that 
 perish ? " 
 
 HANNIBAL, or ANNIBAL. 
 
 The Czar Peter I., during his travels, became acquainted 
 with Hannibal, a Negro who had received a good educa- 
 tion, and who, under this monarch, became, in Russia, a 
 lieutenant-general and director of artillery. He was de- 
 corated with the red ribband of the order of St. Alexander 
 Neuski. Bernardin St. Pierre and Colonel La Harpe 
 knew his son, a Mulatto who had the reputation of talents. 
 In 1784, he was lieutenant-general in a corps of artillery. 
 It was he who, under the orders of Prince Potemkin, min- 
 ister of war, commenced the establishment of a port and 
 fortress at Cherson, near the mouth of the Dnieper. 
 
 FACTS FROM LIBERIA. 
 
 The capabilities of the Negro race have been remarkably 
 exhibited within a few years on a portion of the Western 
 coast of Africa, colonized by Free Blacks from the United 
 States, most of them formerly Slaves, including aborigines 
 re-captured from Slave-vessels, as well as Negroes from the 
 adjoining districts. From this interesting locality, recently 
 constituted into the Free Republic of Liberia, overwhelm- 
 ing evidence might be adduced of the ability, sound judg- 
 ment, and Christian character of its Sable inhabitants and 
 legislators. Probably no government exists founded more 
 nearly on Christian principles ; and the community in gene- 
 ral is perhaps as purely moral as any in the world. 
 
 Several public schools have been established in the coun- 
 try, and all parents and guardians are required to send 
 
 <PTT\&) 
 
524 
 
 1 €i\Mt in tju Agra. 
 
 their children to them, or be subject to a pecuniary fine ; 
 so that there is scarcely a child over six years old that can- 
 not both read and write. The state of religion and morality 
 amongst the people is progressing. The exertions of the 
 authorities have been directed to the exclusion of ardent 
 spirits. A short time ago, one of the colonists assisted in 
 procuring a barrel of rum, which was landed twelve miles 
 distant from the colony ; he was fined one hundred dollars, 
 deprived of his license as a trader, and considered no longer 
 eligible to any office in the colony. Such are the stringent 
 efforts to keep down a vice, which, if once suffered to exist, 
 would no doubt prove detrimental. Internal improvements 
 keep pace with the increase of commerce, and the steady 
 revenue which arises therefrom, enables the authorities to 
 effect various public improvements. 
 
 These are remarkable facts. Here we behold a com- 
 munity of Blacks, in almost a defenceless state, located on 
 the border of a vast country, the swarming inhabitants of 
 which are enshrouded in ignorance ; — a regularly organised 
 government, still, however, in comparative embryo, the 
 germ of what may become a great and powerful nation, the 
 nucleus of a vast political and religious empire, from which 
 may radiate, far into the interior of this land of moral and 
 intellectual degradation, the elevating and ennobling prin- 
 ciples of civilization, and the benign and heavenly influences 
 of Christianity. — Liberia, amidst the gloom of midnight 
 darkness which envelopes the minds of the millions of 
 Africa's benighted children, stands as a beacon-light to 
 direct them to the port of freedom and the haven of ever- 
 lasting rest. 
 
 The present Governor of this interesting African Re- 
 public, 
 
 J. J. ROBERTS, 
 Under discouraging circumstances, left Virginia some ten 
 or twelve years ago, and, unaided by any culture beyond 
 that attainable on the spot, has placed himself among the 
 
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 most prominent of the citizens of the new republic. His 
 correspondence with the commanders of British cruizers on 
 the coast of Africa, and his state papers, exhibit a superior 
 force of character and diplomatic ability. The inaugural 
 address, annual messages, and speeches of this Coloured 
 statesman, before a Coloured Legislature, are highly in- 
 teresting and satisfactory. Having already reprinted con- 
 siderable extracts from the inaugural address of President 
 Roberts, I will only here transcribe a single paragraph 
 which occurs towards the conclusion of it. 
 
 " Let us inflexibly persevere," says he to his Coloured 
 brethren, " in exerting our most strenuous efforts, in an 
 humble and rational dependence on the great Governor of 
 all the world, and we have the fairest prospects of sur- 
 mounting all the difficulties which may be thrown in our 
 way. That we may expect, and that we shall have dif- 
 ficulties, sore difficulties yet to contend against, in our 
 progress to maturity, is certain : and, as the political hap- 
 piness or wretchedness of ourselves and our children, and 
 of generations yet unborn, is in our hands, nay, more, the 
 redemption of Africa from the deep degradation, supersti- 
 tion, and idolatry in which she has so long been involved, 
 it becomes us to lay our shoulders to the wheel, and man- 
 fully resist every obstacle which may oppose our progress 
 in the great work which lies before us. The Gospel is yet 
 to be preached to vast numbers inhabiting this dark con- 
 tinent, and I have the highest reason to believe, that it 
 was one of the great objects of the Almighty in establish- 
 ing these colonies, that they might be the means of intro- 
 ducing civilization and religion among the barbarous nations 
 of this country ; and to what work more noble could our 
 powers be applied, than that of bringing up from darkness, 
 debasement, and misery, our fellow-men, and shedding 
 abroad over them the light of science and Christianity ? The 
 means of doing so, fellow-citizens, are within our reach, 
 and if we neglect, or do not make use of them, what excuse 
 
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 shall we make to our Creator and final Judge? This 
 is a question of the deepest concern to us all, and which, 
 in my opinion, will materially affect our happiness in the 
 world to come. And surely, if ever it has been incumbent 
 on the people of Liberia to know truth and to follow it, it 
 is now. Rouse, therefore, fellow-citizens, and do your duty 
 like men : and be persuaded, that Divine Providence, as 
 heretofore, will continue to bless all your virtuous efforts." 
 
 The author was much gratified in perusing, a short time 
 ago, an anniversary speech delivered in 1846, at Mon- 
 rovia, the capital of Liberia, by 
 
 HILARY TEAGE, 
 A Coloured senator of the infant republic. Independent 
 of its embracing a beautiful exposition of the history, trials, 
 exertions, and aspirations of the Coloured colonists, it is a 
 continued flow of eloquence, whilst it breathes throughout 
 a truly Christian spirit. When I read it, I concluded the 
 speaker must be a " classical scholar," probably a " gra- 
 duate in some eastern college." To my surprise, I after- 
 wards ascertained he had never even seen a college, his 
 father having been a Slave in Virginia, which place Hilary 
 Teage left when very young, and went to Liberia, where 
 he received his education. Here he made rapid advances 
 in learning, soon overcoming the difficulties of several lan- 
 guages, both ancient and modern. 
 
 The following are a few extracts from the eloquent 
 speech of this Negro orator : — 
 
 " As far back towards the infancy of our race as history 
 and tradition are able to conduct us, we have found the 
 custom everywhere prevailing among mankind, to mark by 
 some striking exhibition, those events which were import- 
 ant and interesting, either in their immediate bearing or in 
 their remote consequences upon the destiny of those among 
 whom they occurred. These events are epochs in the his- 
 tory of man — they mark the rise and fall of kingdoms and 
 
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 of dynasties — they record the movements of the human 
 mind, and the influence of those movements upon the 
 destinies of the race ; and whilst they frequently disclose 
 to us the sad and sickening spectacle of innocence bending 
 under the weight of injustice, and of weakness robbed and 
 despoiled by the hand of an unscrupulous oppression, they 
 occasionally display as a theme for admiring contemplation, 
 the sublime spectacle of the human mind, roused by a con- 
 currence of circumstances, to vigorous advances in the 
 career of improvement. To trace the operations of these 
 circumstances from their first appearance, as effects from 
 the workings of the human passions, until, as a cause, they 
 revert with combined and concentrated energy upon those 
 minds from which they at first evolved, would be at once 
 a most interesting and difficult task ; and, let it be borne 
 in mind, requires far higher ability and more varied talent 
 than he possesses who this day has the honour to address 
 you. 
 
 " The utility of thus marking the progress of time — of 
 recording the occurrence of events — and of holding up re- 
 markable personages to the contemplation of mankind — is 
 too obvious to need remark. It arises from the instincts 
 of mankind, the irrepressible spirit of emulation, and the 
 ardent longings after immortality ; and this restless passion 
 to perpetuate their existence which they find it impossible 
 to suppress, impels them to secure the admiration of suc- 
 ceeding generations in the performance of deeds, by which, 
 although dead, they may yet speak. In commemorating 
 events thus powerful in forming the manners and senti- 
 ments of mankind, and in rousing them to strenuous ex- 
 ertion and to high and sustained emulation, it is obvious 
 that such, and such only should be selected, as virtue and 
 humanity would approve ; and that, if any of an opposite 
 character be held up, they should be displayed only as 
 beacons, or as a towering Pharos throwing a strong but 
 lurid light to mark the melancholy grave of mad ambition, 
 
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and to warn the inexperienced voyager of the existing 
 danger. 
 
 " Thanks to the improved and humanised spirit — or 
 should I not rather say, the chastened and pacific civiliza- 
 tion of the age in which we live, — that laurels gathered 
 upon the field of mortal strife, and bedewed with the tears 
 of the widow and the orphan, are regarded now, not with ad- 
 miration but with horror — that the armed warrior, reeking 
 with the gore of murdered thousands, who, in the age that 
 is just passing away, would have been hailed with noisy 
 acclamation by the senseless crowd, is now regarded only 
 as the savage commissioner of an unsparing oppression, or 
 at best, as the ghostly executioner of an unpi tying justice. — 
 He who would embalm his name in the grateful remem- 
 brance of coming generations — he who would secure for 
 himself a niche in the temple of undying fame — he who 
 would hew out for himself a monument of which his 
 country may boast — he who would entail upon heirs a 
 name which they may be proud to wear, must seek some 
 other field than that of battle as the theatre of his exploits." 
 
 Passing over a portion of the speech of this enlightened 
 and talented Negro ; he continues : — 
 
 " We have not yet numbered twenty-six years since he 
 who is the oldest colonist amongst us was the inhabitant — 
 not the citizen — of a country — and that too the country of 
 his birth — where the prevailing sentiment is, that he and 
 his race are incapacitated by an inherent defect in their 
 mental constitution, to enjoy that greatest of all blessings, 
 and to exercise that greatest of all rights, bestowed by a 
 beneficent God upon his rational creatures — namely, the 
 government of themselves. Acting upon this opinion, an 
 opinion as false as it is foul — acting upon this opinion, as 
 upon a self-evident proposition, those who held it pro- 
 ceeded with a fiendish consistency to deny the rights of 
 citizens to those whom they had declared incapable of 
 
1 frifotfe for tjjr Urgrn. 
 
 529 
 
 performing the duties of citizens. It is not necessary, and 
 therefore I will not disgust you with the hideous picture of 
 that state of things which followed upon the prevalence of 
 this blasphemous opinion. The bare mention that such an 
 opinion prevailed, would be sufficient to call up in the 
 mind, even of those who had never witnessed its opera- 
 tion, images of the most sickening and revolting character. 
 Under the iron reign of this crushing sentiment, most of 
 us who are assembled here to-day drew our first breath, 
 and sighed away the years of our youth. No hope cheered 
 us : no noble object looming in the dim and distant future 
 kindled our ambition. Oppression — cold, cheerless op- 
 pression, like the dreary region of an eternal winter, chilled 
 every noble passion and fettered and paralysed every arm. 
 And if among the oppressed millions there were found here 
 and there one in whose bosom the last glimmer of a gene- 
 rous passion was not yet extinguished — one, "who, from the 
 midst of the inglorious slumberers in the deep degradation 
 around him, would lift up his voice and demand those rights 
 which the God of nature hath bestowed in equal gift upon 
 all His rational creatures, he was met at once by those who 
 had at first denied and then enforced with the stern reply, 
 that for him and for all his race — Liberty and Expatria- 
 tion are inseparable. 
 
 "Dreadful as the alternative was — fearful as was the 
 experiment now proposed to be tried, there were hearts 
 equal to the task — hearts which quailed not at the dangers 
 which loomed and frowned in the distance, but calm, cool, 
 and fixed in their purpose, prepared to meet them with the 
 watchword — Give me Liberty or give me death. 
 
 " Passing by intermediate events, which, did the time 
 allow, it would be interesting to notice, we hasten to the 
 grand event — the era of our separate existence, when the 
 American flag first threw out its graceful folds to the 
 breeze on the heights of Mesurado, and the pilgrims, rely- 
 ing upon the protection of Heaven and the moral grandeur 
 
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 Z7 J of their cause, took solemn possession of the land in the 
 name of virtue, humanity, and religion. 
 
 "It would discover an unpardonable apathy were we to 
 pass on without pausing a moment to reflect upon the 
 emotions which heaved the bosoms of the pilgrims, when 
 the} r stood for the first time where we now stand. What 
 a prospect spread out before them ! ! They stood in the 
 midst of an ancient wilderness, rank and compacted by the 
 growth of a thousand years, unthinned and unreclaimed by 
 a single stroke of the woodman's axe. Few and far be- 
 tween might be found inconsiderable openings, where the 
 ignorant native erected his rude habitation, or savage as his 
 patrimonial wilderness, celebrated his bloody rights, and 
 presented his votive gifts to demons. The rainy season, 
 that terrible ordeal of foreign constitutions, was about 
 setting in ; the lurid lightning shot its fiery bolt into the 
 forest around them, the thunder muttered its angry tones 
 over their head, and the frail tenements, the best which their 
 circumstances would afford, to shield them from a scorching 
 sun by day and drenching rains at night, had not yet 
 been completed. To suppose that at this time, when all 
 things above and around them seemed to combine their 
 influence against them — to suppose they did not per- 
 ceive the full danger and magnitude of the enterprise they 
 had embarked in, would be to suppose, not that they were 
 heroes, but that they had lost the sensibility of men. True 
 courage is equally remote from blind recklessness and un- 
 manning timidity ; and true heroism does not consist in 
 insensibility to danger. He is a hero who calmly meets, 
 and fearlessly grapples the dangers which duty and honour 
 forbid him to decline. The pilgrims rose to a full percep- 
 tion of all the circumstances of their condition. But when 
 they looked back to that country from which they had 
 come out, and remembered the degradations in that house 
 of bondage out of which they had been so fortunate as to 
 escape, they bethought themselves ; and, recollecting the 
 
1 (Erilnitr for tip Ifrgrn. 
 
 high satisfaction with which they knew success would 
 gladden their hearts, the rich inheritance they would entail 
 upon their children, and the powerful aid it would lend to 
 the cause of universal humanity, they yielded to the noble 
 inspiration and girded them to the battle, either for doing 
 or for suffering. 
 
 " Let it not be supposed, because I have laid universal 
 humanity under a tribute of gratitude to the founders of 
 Liberia, that I have attached to their humble achievements 
 too important an influence in that grand system of agencies 
 which is now at work, renovating human society, and 
 purifying and enlarging the sources of its enjoyment. In 
 the system of that Almighty Being, without whose notice 
 not a sparrow falls to the ground: — 
 
 ' Who sees with equal eye as God of all, 
 A hero perish, or a sparrow fall : 
 Atoms or systems into ruin hurled, 
 And now a bubhle burst, and now a world ' : — 
 
 " In the system of the Almighty One, no action of a 
 mortal being is unimportant. Every action of every rational 
 creature hath its assigned place in his system of operations, 
 and is made to bear, however undesigned by the agent, with 
 force upon the end which his wisdom and goodness have in 
 view to accomplish." 
 
 I have already given more copious extracts from the 
 speech of this Negro senator than I had intended. His 
 concluding remarks are so beautifully appropriate I cannot 
 omit them. 
 
 "The last remark time will allow me to make under this 
 head, is, that 'Righteousness exalteth a nation, but sin is a 
 reproach to any people.' All attempts to correct the depravity 
 of man, to stay the head-long propensity to vice — to abate 
 the madness of ambition, will be found deplorably ineffi- 
 cient, unless we apply the restrictions and the tremendous 
 sanctions of religion. A profound regard and deference for 
 
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religion, a constant recognition of our dependence upon 
 God, and of our obligation and accountability to Him ; an 
 ever-present, ever-pressing sense of His universal and all- 
 controlling providence, this, and only this, can give energy 
 to the arm of law, cool the raging fever of the passions, and 
 abate the lofty pretensions of mad ambition. In prosperity, 
 let us bring out our thank-offering, and present it with 
 cheerful hearts in orderly, virtuous, and religious conduct. 
 In adversity, let us consider, confess our sins, and abase 
 ourselves before the throne of God. In danger, let us go 
 to Him, whose prerogative it is to deliver ; let us go to 
 Hinij with the humility and confidence which a deep con- 
 viction that the battle is not to the strong nor the race to 
 the swift, is calculated to inspire. 
 
 " Fellow-Citizens ! we stand now on ground never oc- 
 cupied by a people before. However insignificant we may 
 regard ourselves, the eyes of Europe and America are 
 upon us, as a germ, destined to burst from its enclosure 
 in the earth, unfold its petals to the genial air, rise 'to the 
 height and swell to the dimensions of the full-grown tree, 
 or (inglorious fate !) to shrivel, to die, and to be buried 
 in oblivion. Rise, fellow-citizens, rise to a clear and full 
 perception of your tremendous responsibilities ! ! Upon 
 you, rely upon it, depends in a measure you can hardly 
 conceive, the future destiny of your race. You — you are 
 to give the answer, whether the African race is doomed to 
 interminable degradation ; a hideous blot on the fair face 
 of Creation, a libel upon the dignity of human nature, or 
 whether they are incapable to take an honourable rank 
 amongst the great family of nations ! The friends of the colony 
 are trembling ; the enemies of the Coloured man are hoping. 
 Say, fellow-citizens, will you palsy the hands of your friends 
 and sicken their hearts, and gladden the souls of your 
 enemies, by a base refusal to enter upon the career of glory 
 which is now opening so propitiously before you ? The 
 genius of universal emancipation, bending from her lofty 
 
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 533 
 
 seat, invites you to accept the wreath of national indepen- 
 dence. The voice of your friends, swelling upon the breeze, 
 cries to you from afar — Raise your standard! assert your 
 independence ! ! throw out your banners to the wind ! ! 
 And will the descendants of the mighty Pharoahs, that 
 awed the world — will the sons of him who drove back the 
 serried legions of Rome and laid siege to the 'eternal city' 
 — will they, the achievements of whose fathers are yet the 
 wonder and admiration of the world — will they refuse the 
 proffered boon, and basely cling to the chains of slavery 
 and dependence ? Never ! never ! ! never ! ! ! Shades of 
 the mighty dead ! — spirits of departed great ones ! inspire 
 us, animate us to the task — nerve us for the battle ! Pour 
 into our bosom a portion of that ardour and patriotism 
 which bore you on to battle, to victory, and to conquest. 
 
 " Shall Liberia live ? Yes ; in the generous emotions 
 now swelling in your bosoms — in the high and noble pur- 
 pose now fixing itself in your mind, and ripening into the 
 unyieldingness of indomitable principle, we hear the in- 
 spiring response — Liberia shall live before God, and before 
 the nations of the earth. 
 
 " The night is passing away — the dusky shades are flee- 
 ing, and even now 
 
 1 Second day stands tiptoe 
 On the misty mountain top.' " 
 
 I should have been glad to have given more copious 
 extracts from this eloquent address, which affords through- 
 out such striking evidence of the capacity and attainments 
 of a Negro, whose education and life from early boyhood 
 are thoroughly African. It was my intention to have in- 
 serted the speech entire, but, owing to its length and press 
 of other matter, I am compelled to exclude any further 
 portion of it from the present volume. It exhibits, how- 
 ever, such an ample refutation of the calumnious charge of 
 Negro inferiority, that I have sent it to press entire, in the 
 
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 534 
 
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 form of a pamphlet, entitled, " Calumny Refuted, by 
 Facts from Liberia, &c.," which also includes copious 
 extracts from the inaugural address of President Roberts, 
 as well as from the discourse of H. H. Garnett (a fugitive 
 Slave), on the Past and Present Condition, and Destiny of 
 the Coloured Race.* 
 
 With all their advantages of education and opulence, I 
 challenge the abettors of Negro Slavery, who justify their 
 oppressive conduct towards their fellow-creatures on the 
 ground of their inferiority, to exhibit half the talent and 
 ability evinced in the eloquent addresses of these Coloured 
 legislators. Yet these are the men who are described as a 
 deterioration of our species, who, through vulgar prejudice 
 and popular insult, combined with political and legislative 
 enactments, have been degraded to a level with the brute. 
 
 <LV< 
 
 JOANNES JAAGER 
 
 Was residing among the Karree Mountains in South 
 Africa, when some of the people of Lily Fountain, passing that 
 way, spoke to him respecting the great truths of the Gospel. 
 On referring to this circumstance, he said, " I was living 
 ignorant of all spiritual things, and without God in the 
 world. I became so terrified on account of my sins, that I 
 fled to the rocks to hide myself. But I could find no re- 
 fuge from the frowning eye of God, which appeared to be 
 everywhere present." 
 
 He resolved to go to the mission station, more than 100 
 miles distant, and hear for himself. He soon heartily em- 
 braced the Gospel, the sound of which was so delightful 
 to him, that his joy was as " the joy of harvest, and as men 
 
 * " Calumny Refuted" is printed in aid of the Boston Anti-Slavery 
 Bazaar. The Author of "A Tribute for the Negro" will have pleasure in 
 supplying it, postage free, on receipt of 12 postage stamps. — Published also 
 by Charles Gilpin, Bishopsgate Street, London ; and may be had of Gr. 
 W. Taylor, Philadelphia, and William Harned, Anti-Slavery Office, New 
 York, and through all Booksellers. 
 
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 535 
 
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 rejoice when they divide the spoil." He sought the Lord 
 with many tears, and went forth weeping, but he found in 
 the Gospel a healing balm, and the peace of God, which 
 passeth the understanding. 
 
 Leaving the Karree country, he took up his residence 
 among the Christian converts. He was so desirous of learn- 
 ing to read, that he used to carry his book into the fields 
 with him, and if he met with any of the school-children, 
 he would engage them to sit down and become his instruc- 
 tors. He was soon able to read the Scriptures, which he 
 greatly loved, and was generally seen, whether on a journey 
 or at work, with a leathern bag under his arm, containing 
 the precious treasure. He also became so industrious in 
 building and cultivating the ground, that he excelled many 
 who had been much longer on the station. 
 
 The zeal of Joannes was variously manifested. The late 
 William Threlfall chose him on going to Great Namacqua- 
 land as a companion, and mentions him as one who had his 
 full confidence. A letter of W. Threlfall's states, that some 
 persons they had met with, gave alarming accounts of the 
 people and country beyond the Orange River. " They said 
 all they could," writes Threlfall, " to discourage Joannes 
 and Jacob Links, another South African, who were my 
 companions ; but these two brave fellows had their courage 
 and confidence steeled, and declared themselves fearless 
 through grace ; and that they were not only willing to suf- 
 fer, but to die, in the cause of the Lord Jesus." " I am sure," 
 he adds, " they had more courage than I had, for my heart 
 fainted within me ; but seeing their strength of faith, I got 
 the better of my fears. They are companions to my liking, 
 and often do my soul good, and put me to blush for the 
 weakness of my faith." 
 
 About five weeks after the date of this letter of W. Threl- 
 fall's, himself, Joannes, and the other companion, were all 
 cruelly murdered in the vicinity of Fish River. From the 
 general deportment of Joannes, who was a man of deep 
 
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 536 
 
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 piety and of fervent zeal for the glory of God, as well as 
 from the above extract, all who knew him believe that he 
 is now with the spirits of the just made perfect; 
 
 The murder of these apostolic labourers has been com- 
 memorated in the following lines, by James Montgomery, 
 the Bard of Christianity, and the Negro's Friend. They 
 will be read with the same melancholy pleasure that his 
 " West Indies " will ever be perused by an African ; and 
 both will hand down his name to posterity as the poet of 
 feeling, of beauty, and of power. 
 
 IN MEMORY OF THE MISSIONARY, WILLIAM THRELFALL, WHO, WITH TWO 
 NATIVE CONVERTS DEVOTED TO THE SERVICE OF THEIR COUNTRYMEN, 
 WERE TREACHEROUSLY MURDERED ON THEIR WAY TO CARRY THE 
 GOSPEL INTO GREAT NAMACQUALAND, IN 1825. 
 
 " Not by the lion's paw, the serpent's tooth, 
 By sudden sun-stroke, or by slow decay, 
 War, famine, plague, meek messenger of truth ! 
 Wert thou arrested on thy pilgrim way. 
 
 " Thy march was^throngh the savage wilderness, 
 Thine errand thither, like thy blessed Lord's, 
 To seek and save the lost, to heal and bless 
 Its blind and lame, diseased and dying hordes. 
 
 " How did the love of Christ, — that, like a chain, 
 Drew Christ himself to Bethlem from his throne, 
 And bound Him to the cross, — thy heart constrain, 
 Thy willing heart, to make that true love known ! 
 
 " The wings of darkness round thy tent were spread, 
 The wild beasts' howlings brake not thy repose, 
 The silent stars were watching over head, 
 
 Thy friends were nigh thee, — nigh thee were thy foes ! 
 
 " The sun went down upon thine evening-prayer, 
 He rose upon thy finish' d sacrifice ; 
 The House of Grod, the Grate of Heaven was there, 
 Angels and fiends had fixed on thee their eyes. 
 
 " At midnight, in a moment open stood 
 
 The eternal doors, to give thy spirit room ; 
 At morn, the earth had drunk thy guiltless blood ; — 
 But where on earth may now be found thy tomb ? 
 
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 " At rest beneath the ever-shifting sand, 
 
 This, thine unsculptured epitaph, remain, 
 Till the last trump shall summon sea and land, 
 ' To me to live was Christ, — to die was gain.' " 
 
 TESTIMONIES OF HANNAH KILHAM RESPECTING 
 THE NEGRO. 
 
 The benevolent Hannah Kilham, a well-known and 
 highly esteemed minister of the Society of Friends in Eng- 
 land, was deeply interested on behalf of the African race, 
 and under a sense of religious duty and the approval of the 
 society to which she belonged, she paid several visits to 
 Africa, with a view of promoting the welfare of her Coloured 
 brethren and sisters; and established schools at Sierra 
 Leone for that purpose. 
 
 " In observing the kind, lively, affectionate, and sympa- 
 thetic expression of countenance and manner of some of 
 my Kosso girls, (who had been some time under her care) 
 I felt comforted in believing, that, under proper care, the 
 African character might be trained to be receptive of good, 
 and become very lovely." 
 
 In alluding to depressing fears from the discouraging 
 appearance of some newly arrived Negro children, she 
 writes next day : — " To day, when arrayed in their little 
 garments, and introduced to the piazza, for me to try to 
 learn their names and nations, the affectionate smile soon 
 began to glisten on their countenances ; but yesterday 
 I had been ready to regard them as almost dead as to men- 
 tal cultivation, and incapable of exhibiting that degree of 
 animation which one longs to see on every human face." 
 
 " I have certainly cause to be pleased and comforted with 
 my dear children. Many can read the picture-lessons, and 
 also some of the Scripture lessons ; as well as write from 
 dictation the same lessons on their slates. It is scarcely 
 eight months since these were taken from the Slave-ship. 
 
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 538 
 
 1 Crihte for % Srgrn. 
 
 They can answer questions from surrounding objects, are 
 improving in reading, and learn to repeat hymns." 
 
 " There is great sweetness and beauty in the character 
 of some of the professors of religion among the Africans — ■ 
 an unassuming, humble, yet cheerful and affectionate de- 
 meanour, which, combined with their natural simplicity, 
 is exceedingly interesting. To bring out this character, a 
 kind and friendly manner is requisite ; for they are soon 
 repelled, and their minds are closed when they meet with 
 coldness and a disposition to keep them at a distance." 
 
 A NOBLE SLAVE EMANCIPATED. 
 
 By a colonial ordinance of the Governor of Guadaloupe, 
 a Slave named Felix was emancipated as a reward for gene- 
 rous conduct. 2000 francs were voted for that purpose by 
 the Colonial Council, 1500 francs being paid to his master, 
 and 500 to Felix himself as a gift. The following is the 
 account as contained in the report of the Council : — 
 
 " On the 8th of February, two brothers were covered with 
 the ruins around them. One of them fortunately succeeded 
 in extricating himself unhurt ; but the other was wounded 
 and dying, and his more fortunate brother was, for some 
 time, trying, with his precious load, to find his way out ; 
 but the obstacles were insurmountable, his strength was 
 exhausted, and the flames of conflagration were rapidly ap- 
 proaching. At that distressing hour he finds Felix by his 
 side. 'My friend,' he says, 'if you have a kind heart, 
 help me to save my brother, and I will give you a doub- 
 loon.' ' To day, nothing for money , all for the love of God,' 
 replied the noble and generous Slave ; and collecting all his 
 strength and energy, he surmounted all obstacles, and ar- 
 rived on the wharf, where he laid the dying man in a boat. 
 It is with the utmost difficulty that Felix has been dis- 
 covered, so anxious was he to conceal his noble conduct." 
 
I €x\Mi for % jfjgrn. 
 
 539 
 
 EUSTACE. 
 
 The devotion, intelligence, and noble spirit of this Negro, 
 are worthy of high commemoration. His whole life 
 evinced that the spirit of gratitude and benevolence may- 
 exist and bear fruit, even in the bosom of a Black Slave. 
 He was born in 1773, on the estate of M. Belin de Ville- 
 neuve, in St. Domingo, and always conducted himself in 
 such a manner as to gain universal esteem. 
 
 During a voyage made by M. Belin to Europe, the re- 
 volution broke out in St. Domingo. Eustace was about 
 twenty. Then commenced his life of self-devotion, the 
 characteristics of which were summed up in these words of 
 a phrenologist, who, without knowing him, thus denned 
 the disposition of Eustace, after examining his head : — 
 " Wisdom and courage, devoted to the service of goodness 
 and benevolence.'" This is an undoubted fact, however 
 much it may be disputed. 
 
 Soon after the tumults in the island were subsided, M. 
 Belin returned to St. Domingo. The faithful Slave, who 
 had been the means of saving many hundred lives, seeing 
 that his master was no longer safe, on account of a renewal 
 of the revolt, concealed him in a thick wood, and brought 
 him daily subsistence for some time. At last an oppor- 
 tunity offered for his safe retreat in an American vessel 
 from the dangers which surrounded him. Eustace made 
 arrangements for his master's passage, and agreed with the 
 captain to have him conveyed on board by night. But 
 this was not all. M. Belin, being in a state of complete 
 destitution, Eustace went to the Negroes of the plantation, 
 and, by his eloquence, induced them to supply their former 
 master with sufficient to preserve him from absolute want. 
 When M. Belin earnestly expressed his gratitude, Eustace 
 only requested as a return, that he might be permitted to 
 follow and serve him, and they sailed together. 
 
 At Baltimore they found numbers of the unfortunate in- 
 habitants of St. Domingo, who, formerly opulent, had taken 
 
 lire 
 
540 
 
 $ €xiMt for tip lirgrn. 
 
 refuge there in the deepest poverty. Their necessities 
 furnished the industrious activity of Eustace with an idea 
 which, with great exertion, he carried out. He established 
 a sort of commercial store, the profits of which he devoted 
 to the succour of the most needy of these unfortunates. 
 
 In 1794, St. Domingo became apparently tranquil, and 
 M. Belin and his preserver returned to the island, but a 
 renewed assault taking place on their arrival, they became 
 accidentally separated. Eustace sought M. Belin in vain, 
 but not giving up all hope, he saved from pillage every- 
 thing belonging to him. At last he heard of the safety of 
 his master, who was about to embark for St. Nicholas. 
 He followed him there with the property he had saved, 
 and the devoted Slave was welcomed in a manner due to 
 his character, and escorted through the town. Soon after 
 this he was liberated, which was a mere formality, chang- 
 ing neither his conduct nor his devotion. He continued 
 faithful to his master, and became his secretary, having 
 another opportunity of saving his life. 
 
 When M. Belin died, he left all his property to Eustace, 
 who devoted it to the succour of the unfortunate. After 
 the last revolution, inconceivable misery was felt in the 
 island ; and there was Eustace found, always doing good. 
 Some he supplied with money, to others he distributed 
 clothes, linen, and furniture ; he put orphan children out 
 to nurse at his own expense ; he assisted poor soldiers, and 
 when there was no more left for him to do, he offered him- 
 self as attendant on General Rochambeau, accompanied 
 him to England, and from thence to France. 
 
 The useful and benevolent career of Eustace, the Negro, 
 terminated only with his death. He arrived at Paris in 
 1812, and from that time he suffered not a day to pass 
 without exercising his charitable disposition. Hearing 
 that a poor widow, with four young children, was reduced 
 to cut grass for cattle to procure a subsistence, Eustace 
 sought her out, clothed her and her children, and apprenticed 
 
 life) 
 
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 the eldest of them, supplying him with necessary tools, so 
 that the boy soon became the prop and support of the 
 family. Another time, knowing that his master was un- 
 able to assist a poor relation whom he had long lost sight 
 of, Eustace secretly devoted all his gains to the support of 
 the feeble man for more than a year, leaving him to sup- 
 pose that these benefits flowed from the General. The 
 secret was not discovered, until the sick man, now cured, 
 came to thank his relative for his supposed generous as- 
 sistance. 
 
 The French Academy granted to Eustace, in 1832, the 
 prize of virtue, founded by Monthyon. This little history 
 shows how well it was merited. He died in 1833, a^ed 
 sixty-two. If virtue were honoured equally with fame 
 and genius, this poor Negro would have been considered 
 worthy of a noble monument. 
 
 WILLIAM WELLS BROWN. 
 
 This extraordinary man made his escape from Slavery 
 about thirteen years ago. His Narrative is a remarkable 
 one. I have read it with feelings of deep emotion. The 
 scenes and actions described in it are enough to " move 
 the very stones to rise and mutiny" against the National 
 Institution which makes them possible. It presents a dif- 
 ferent phase of the infernal Slave-system from that exhi- 
 bited in the touching story of Frederick Douglass, and 
 affords a glimpse of its hideous cruelties in other portions 
 of its domain. Many harrowing scenes are graphically 
 portrayed ; and yet with that simplicity and ingenuousness 
 which carry with them a conviction of the truthfulness of 
 the picture. 
 
 On his escape from Slavery, the first person he found 
 really to befriend him, and treat him as an equal, was a 
 Friend in Ohio, whom he calls " a Quaker of the George 
 Fox stamp," and who, he adds, " took me to his house, 
 
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 weeping for their children, breaking the night-silence with 
 the shrieks of their breaking hearts. We wish no human 
 being to experience emotions of needless pain, but we do 
 wish that every man, woman, and child in New England, 
 could visit a southern Slave-prison and auction-stand. 
 
 " I shall never forget a scene which took place in St. 
 Louis, while I was in Slavery. A man and his wife, both 
 Slaves, were brought from the country to the city, for sale. 
 They were taken to the rooms of the auctioneers. Several 
 Slave-speculators, who are always to be found at auctions 
 where Slaves are to be sold, were present. The man was 
 first put up, and sold to the highest bidder. The wife was 
 next ordered to ascend the platform. I was present. She 
 slowly obeyed the order. The auctioneer commenced, and 
 soon several hundred dollars were bid. My eyes were in- 
 tensely fixed on the face of the woman, whose cheeks were 
 wet with tears. But a conversation between the Slave and 
 his new master attracted my attention. I drew near them 
 to listen. The Slave was begging his new master to pur- 
 chase his wife. Said he, ' Master, if you will only buy 
 Fanny, I know you will get the worth of your money. 
 She is a good cook, a good washer, and her last mistress 
 liked her very much. If you will only buy her, how happy 
 I shall be.' The new master replied that he did not want 
 her, but if she sold cheap he would purchase her. I 
 watched the countenance of the man while the different 
 persons were bidding on his wife. When his new master 
 bid on his wife, you could see the smile upon his counte- 
 nance, and the tears stop ; but as soon as another would 
 bid, you could see the countenance change, and the tears 
 start afresh. From this change of countenance one could 
 see the workings of the inmost soul. But this suspense 
 did not last long ; the wife was struck off to the highest 
 bidder, who proved not to be the owner of her husband. 
 As soon as they became aware that they were to be sepa- 
 rated, they both burst into tears ; and as she descended 
 
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544 
 
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 from the auction-stand, the husband, walking up to her, 
 and taking her by the hand, said, ' Well, Fanny, we are to 
 part for ever on earth ; you have been a good wife to me ; 
 I did all that I could to get my new master to buy you, 
 but he did not want you, and all I have to say is, I hope 
 you will try to meet me in heaven. I shall try to meet you 
 there.' The wife made no reply, but her sobs and cries 
 told, too well, her own feelings. I saw the countenances 
 of a number of Whites who were present, whose eyes were 
 dim with tears at hearing the man bid his wife farewell. 
 
 " Such are but common occurrences in the Slave States. 
 At these auction-stands, bones, muscles, sinews, blood, and 
 nerves of human beings are sold with as much indifference 
 as a farmer in the north sells a horse or a sheep. And this 
 great American nation is, at the present time, engaged in 
 the Slave-trade. I have before me now the ■ Washington 
 Union,'' the organ of the Government, in which I find an 
 advertisement of several Slaves to be sold for the benefit 
 of the Government. They will, in all human probability, 
 find homes among the rice swamps of Georgia, or the cane 
 brakes of Mississippi. 
 
 " With every disposition on the part of those who are 
 engaged in it to veil the truth, certain facts have, from time 
 to time transpired, sufficient to show, if not the full amount 
 of the evil, at least that it is one of prodigious magnitude. 
 And what is more to be wondered at, is the fact that the 
 greatest Slave-market is to be found at the capital of the 
 country ! The American Slave-trader marches by the 
 capitol with his ' coffle-gang,' the stars and stripes waving 
 over their heads, and the constitution of the United States 
 in his pocket ! 
 
 " The Alexandrian Gazette, speaking of the Slave-trade 
 at the capital, says : — ' Here you may behold fathers and 
 mothers leaving behind them the dearest objects of affec- 
 tion, and moving slowly along in the mute agony of despair ; 
 there, the young mother, sobbing over the infant whose 
 
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 innocent smile seems but to increase her misery. From 
 some you will hear the burst of bitter lamentation, while 
 from others, the loud hysteric laugh breaks forth, denoting- 
 still deeper agony. Such is but a faint picture of the Ame- 
 rican Slave-trade.' " 
 
 The " Tribute for the Negro " has already exceeded 
 by many pages the limits originally designed. A mass of 
 facts, further demonstrative of the capabilities of the 
 calumniated race of Africa, both in a moral and intellec- 
 tual point of view, still remain in the Author's hands. A 
 mere enumeration of these, without entering into some 
 particulars, would only be tedious. A few, however, claim 
 a passing notice. 
 
 The power of Negro character, even in a state untutored 
 and half-savage, is strikingly exemplified in the history of 
 
 ZHLNGA, A FAMOUS QUEEN OF ANGOLA ; 
 
 who embraced Christianity during her sojourn at Loango. 
 
 Major Laing was astonished with the wisdom and good- 
 ness of 
 
 BE SENIERA, KING OF KOORANKO ; 
 
 who sent his minstrel to play before the traveller, and 
 sing a song of welcome. 
 
 The same traveller gives us some particulars of 
 
 ASSANA YEERA, A NEGRO KING, 
 
 of strict probity, and universally beloved by his subjects. 
 
 We have a remarkable monument of what Divine grace 
 can effect for a Hottentot in 
 
 JE.IANA, A SOUTH AFRICAN WIDOW ; 
 
 a proof that God is no respecter of persons, but " that in 
 every nation he that feareth Him, and worketh righteous- 
 ness, is accepted of Him." 
 
 LUCY CARPWELL, 
 
 a free Negress, of Virginia, was a remarkable instance of 
 
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 3 
 
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546 
 
 % €nMi for tyt Jbgrii. 
 
 the power of religion operating on the mind of the Negro. 
 The lucid intervals of her latter days were chiefly occupied 
 in thanksgiving and praise. 
 
 The possession of an enlarged and noble heart is evinced 
 in the history of 
 
 JOSEPH RACHEL, OF BARBADOES, 
 
 of whom philanthropists take pleasure in speaking. Hav- 
 ing become rich, he consecrated all his fortune to acts of 
 benevolence. The unfortunate, without distinction of 
 Colour, had a claim on his affections. He gave to the in- 
 digent, lent to those who could not make a return, visited 
 prisoners, gave them good advice, and endeavoured to 
 bring back the guilty to virtue. 
 
 JOHN WILLIAMS, 
 
 a Coloured man of New Jersey, naturally intelligent, was 
 brought by conviction to the knowledge of the truth, and 
 ended his days in prayer and thanksgiving to God. 
 
 JACOB LINKS, 
 
 a Christian convert of South Africa, with an animated 
 countenance, fluency of speech, and fervency of expression, 
 declared the glad tidings of the Gospel, to which he became 
 a martyr by being horribly murdered. He spent his 
 breath, like another Stephen, in praying for his murderers. 
 
 PETER LTNKS, 
 
 a brother of Jacob's, was also a bright light among the 
 Christian converts in South Africa, and was for a consi- 
 derable time very useful in the mission field. 
 
 ZILPHA MONTJOY, 
 
 an aged Negress of New York, afforded a pattern of ex- 
 emplary conduct. Her pious and circumspect life ren- 
 dered her an object of peculiar interest to many. 
 
 ALICE, A FEMALE SLAVE 
 
 in Pennsylvania, attained to the advanced age of 1 16 years, 
 
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% €Mt for tju JJrgrn. 
 
 547 //e 
 
 zealously attending divine worship till she was 95 years old. 
 The honesty, love of truth, temperance, and industry, of 
 this Negress, are highly commendable. 
 
 GEORGE HARDY, A COLOURED YOUTH, 
 
 discovered in his earliest years a quickness of discernment 
 and readiness of apprehension rarely surpassed, being able 
 to read the Bible when four years old. Though furnished 
 with very scanty sources of information or improvement, 
 he betrayed a vigour of intellect and originality of thought, 
 which a protracted and enervating disease never subdued. 
 
 QUASHI, A NEGRO SLAVE, 
 
 affords in the history of his tragical death, an illustration 
 that the despised race are highly capable of gratitude and 
 resentment, friendship and honour. 
 
 MOSES, A NEGRO OF VIRGINIA, 
 
 was a remarkable pattern of piety. His prayers seemed to 
 make all feel that the Almighty was present. " I thought 
 I could give up all my learning and worldly prospects," 
 says one, '"'to have the humility, the devotional spirit, and 
 the nearness to heaven of this pious Negro." 
 
 The interesting and deeply affecting history of the Slave 
 
 Z AN GAR A, 
 
 stolen from Africa when very young, is highly demonstra- 
 tive that the Negro is by no means excluded from the 
 possession of all the finer feelings of our nature. 
 
 Respecting the capabilities of two African youths edu- 
 cated at the Borough Road School in London, 
 
 CHARLES KNIGHT AND JOSEPH MAY, 
 
 a high testimony is given in the Minutes of Evidence 
 before the Committee of the House of Commons on the 
 West Coast of Africa. 
 
 The touching account of the sufferings and afflictions of 
 
 MAQUAMA, 
 
 a Negro Slave stolen from Africa, and who, when old and 
 
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 blind, was discarded in a helpless state, is related in a most 
 affecting manner. His observations bespeak him to have 
 been possessed of an intelligent and reflecting mind. — 
 " The prospect of eternal happiness which events have 
 led to," says he, "infinitely overpays all my sufferings." 
 
 JACOB HODGES, 
 
 a Negro of Canandaigua, furnishes one of the finest illus- 
 trations of the power of divine truth on the most ignorant 
 and wretched of mankind. 
 
 Who has not been delighted in perusing the Narrative of 
 
 THE NEGRO SERVANT, 
 
 related by the worthy Legh Richmond, who testifies of 
 him : — " The more I conversed with this African convert, 
 the more satisfactory were the evidences of his mind being 
 spiritually enlightened, and his heart effectually wrought 
 upon by the grace of God." " He bore the impression of 
 the Saviour's image on his heart, and exhibited the marks 
 of converting grace in his life and conversation, accom- 
 panied with singular simplicity and unfeigned sincerity." 
 
 BELINDA LUCAS, 
 
 was stolen from Africa when a child. She purchased her 
 freedom from Slavery, and lived to about 100 years of age. 
 Her Narrative affords a striking instance, in the despised 
 race, of honest, persevering industry and frugality. 
 
 The gratitude and affection evinced towards his former 
 master, by 
 
 GOMEZ, A NEGRO SLAVE, 
 
 so beautifully depicted by Chambers', bespeak him to have 
 been in possession of a warm and truly generous heart. 
 
 AFRIKANER, 
 
 a Namacqua chief of South Africa, whose striking life 
 has been portrayed by the missionary Campbell, was a 
 most remarkable monument of redeeming mercy and grace. 
 At one time he was a terror to his country, being a most 
 
 * 
 
 ff 
 
% Critatfe for tju Jfrgra. 
 
 549 
 
 lawless and resolute robber, so much dreaded that a thou- 
 sand dollars were offered to any man that would shoot him. 
 He became livingly converted, and having considerable 
 natural talents, undissembled piety, and humility, became 
 an ornament to the profession of Christianity ; affording 
 a striking example of the complete subjugation of one of the 
 fiercest spirits that ever trod the burning sands of Africa. 
 
 JUPITEE HAMMON, 
 
 a Negro Slave of Long Island, attained to considerable 
 advancement, both in an intellectual and religious point of 
 view. He published an Address to the Negroes of New 
 York, which contains much excellent advice, embodied in 
 language so excellent, that were it not well attested, its 
 genuineness might be justly questioned. 
 
 ANGELO SOLIMANN, 
 
 the son of an African Prince, who died at Vienna in 1796, 
 was stolen for a Slave when a youth. He was subsequently 
 distinguished by a high degree of culture and extensive 
 learning, but, above all, for his morality, and the excel- 
 lence of character which he sustained. 
 
 Most of those whose lives or actions have been recorded 
 in the present volume, have passed from the stage of life ; 
 their full claim to brotherhood may have been denied them 
 by their fellow-men ; but in the " life which is to come," 
 whose position will be most enviable, that of the oppressor 
 or the oppressed, when they shall stand face to face before 
 the throne of a just and jealous God ? 
 
 A few of those whose names appear in the foregoing 
 pages, still remain to wipe away the reproach of ages — to 
 silence the calumny of false prejudice, and fearlessly to de- 
 mand their rights as Men. Such are Pennington, Douglass, 
 Crummell, Garnett, Tzatzoe, W. Wells Brown, Remond, 
 Dr. Mc. Cune Smith, Edward Frazer, Bissette, Athill, Day, 
 T. S. Wright, Stephen Gloucester, S. R. Ward, Delany, 
 
 4 
 
550 
 
 % 4briMe for \)i %t%n. 
 
 Van Rensallaer, Gr. B. Vashon, Symphor L'Instant, W. 
 Lynch, and the intelligent legislators of Liberia, from 
 whose eloquent speeches extracts have been given. 
 
 But are these all? Nay, verily! a cloud of living witnesses 
 exist as " monumental pillars," to demonstrate before all 
 the world that the idea of their full equality with the rest 
 of mankind is by no means a merely theoretical one. 
 
 Though our limits are already so far exceeded, I shall 
 trespass a little further, in order to introduce to the reader's 
 observation a few additional Living Witnesses to the truth of 
 the proposition of an equality in the Black and White races 
 of mankind. 
 
 None of the statements which follow are made with any 
 intention of elating the individuals to whom allusion is 
 made, but simply from a desire to elucidate the capabi- 
 lities of the Negro for occupying that station in society 
 which an all-wise and beneficent Creator doubtless designed 
 they should enjoy, in common with the rest of mankind. 
 
 LIVING WITNESSES. 
 
 (52 
 
 JOSEPH THORNE, 
 
 Of Bridgetown, Barbadoes, a gentleman of dark com- 
 plexion, with Negro features and hair, was born a Slave, 
 and remained in that condition till about twenty years 
 of age. He now employs much of his time in labouring 
 among the Coloured people in the town and neighbour- 
 hood, in the capacity of a lay-preacher, in which he ren- 
 ders himself very useful. Being very competent for the 
 work, both as regards piety and talents, and possessing the 
 confidence of the Planters, he is admitted to many estates 
 to lecture on moral and religious duties. He is a member 
 of the Episcopal Church. Two American travellers observe 
 in their Journal : — " By invitation we breakfasted with 
 
% Criirate far tjp Jfrgrn. 
 
 551 t 
 
 Mr. Joseph Thome. In the parlour we met two Coloured 
 gentlemen — Mr. Hamilton, a local Wesleyan preacher, and 
 Mr. Cummins, a merchant of Bridgetown. We were 
 struck with the scientific appearance of Mr. Thome's par- 
 lour. On one side was a large library of religious, his- 
 torical, and literary works, the selection of which displayed 
 no small taste and judgment. On the opposite side of the 
 room was a fine cabinet of minerals and shells. In one 
 corner stood a number of curious relics of the aboriginal 
 Caribs, with interesting fossil remains, partly gathered 
 from the island, and partly from Demerara. On the tops 
 of the bookcase and mineral stand, were a number of 
 birds of rare species, procured from the South American 
 Continent. The centre table was also ornamented with 
 shells, specimens of petrifactions, and elegantly bound 
 books. The remainder of the furniture of the room was 
 costly and elegant. Before breakfast two of Mr. Thome's 
 children, little boys of six and four, stepped in to salute 
 the company. They were of a bright yellow, with slightly 
 curled hair. When they had shaken hands with each of 
 the company, they withdrew from the parlour, and were 
 seen no more. Their manners and demeanour indicated 
 the teachings of an admirable mother ; and we were not a 
 little curious to see the lady of whose taste and delicate 
 sense of propriety we had witnessed so attractive a speci- 
 men in her children. At the breakfast table we were in- 
 troduced to Mrs. Thorne, and we soon discovered, from 
 her dignified air, from the chaste and elevated style of her 
 conversation, from her intelligence, modest} 7 , and refine- 
 ment, that we were in the presence of a highly accomplished 
 lady." 
 
 (wrw 
 
 THOMAS HARRIS 
 " During our stay in Barbadoes, " observe the same 
 writers, " we had many invitations to the houses of Col- 
 oured gentlemen, of which we were glad to avail ourselves 
 
 <FT< 
 
552 
 
 % €x\Mt for tlrB jlegm 
 
 whenever it was possible. At an early period after our 
 arrival, we were invited to dine with Thomas Harris, Esq. 
 He politely sent his chaise for us, as he resided about a 
 mile from our residence. At his table we met two other 
 Coloured gentlemen — Mr. Thorne, of Bridgetown, and 
 Mr. Prescod, a gentleman of much intelligence and ability. 
 There was also at the table a niece of Mr. Harris, a modest 
 and highly interesting young lady. 
 
 " The dinner was enlivened by an interesting and well- 
 sustained conversation respecting the abolition of Slavery, 
 the present state of the colony, and its prospects for the 
 future. Lively discussions were maintained on points where 
 there chanced to be a difference of opinion, and we admired 
 the liberality of the views which were thus elicited. "We 
 are certainly prepared to say, and that too without feeling 
 that we draw any invidious distinctions, that in style of 
 conversation, in soundness of sentiment, in ingenuity and 
 ability of argument, this company would compare with any 
 company of White gentlemen that we met in the island. 
 There, in that choice circle of Coloured gentlemen, were 
 the keen sallies of wit, the admirable repartee, the satire, 
 now severe, now playful, upon the measures of the colonial 
 government, the able exposure of aristocratic intolerance, 
 of plantership chicanery, ofplottings and counter-plottings 
 in high places, the strictures on the intrigues of the 
 special magistrates and managers, and, withal, the just and 
 indignant reprobation of the uniform oppressions which 
 have disabled and crushed the Coloured people. 
 
 " In order that the reader may have a more distinct ac- 
 quaintance with Mr. Harris, the gentleman at whose table 
 we had the pleasure to dine, we will state a few facts respect- 
 ing him. He was born a Slave, and remained such until he 
 was 17 years of age. After obtaining his freedom, he en- 
 gaged as a clerk in a mercantile establishment, and soon 
 attracted attention by his business talents. About the same 
 period he warmly espoused the cause of the Free Coloured 
 
ft frUrafe fnr t|i jkgm 
 
 553 ^ 
 
 people, who were doubly crushed under a load of civil and 
 political impositions, and a still heavier one of prejudice. 
 He soon made himself conspicuous by his manly defence of 
 the rights of his brethren against the encroachments of the 
 public authorities, and personally incurred the marked dis- 
 pleasure of several influential characters, on account of his 
 devotion to the interests of his friends. After a protracted 
 struggle for the civil immunities of the Coloured people, 
 during which he repeatedly came into collision with public 
 men, and was often arraigned before the public tribunals, 
 finding his labours ineffectual, he left the island and went 
 to England. He spent some time there and in France, 
 moving on a footing of honourable equality among the dis- 
 tinguished abolitionists of those countries. There, amidst 
 the free influences and the generous sympathies which wel- 
 comed and surrounded him, his whole character ripened into 
 those manly graces and accomplishments which now so 
 eminently distinguish him. 
 
 " Since his return to Barbadoes, Mr. Harris has not taken 
 so public a part in political controversies ; but is by no 
 means indifferent to passing events. There is not, we ven- 
 ture to say, within the colony, a keener or more sagacious 
 observer of its institutions, its public men and their mea- 
 sures. When witnessing the exhibitions of his manly spirit, 
 and listening to his eloquent and glowing narrative of his 
 struggles against the political oppression which ground to 
 the dust himself and his brethren, we could scarcely credit 
 the fact that he was himself born and reared to manhood 
 A SLAVE!" 
 
 S. J. PRESCOD. 
 
 "We next had the pleasure," observe the same travellers, 
 " of breakfasting with Mr. Prescod. Our esteemed friend, 
 Mr. Harris, was of the company. Mr. Prescod is a young 
 man of Colour, lately married. His wife and himself were 
 
 4 B 
 
 W 
 
554 
 
 % €x\Mi far \\t &grn. 
 
 (STff 
 
 J££S 
 
 both liberally educated in England. He was the late editor 
 of the New Times, a weekly paper established since the 
 abolition of Slavery, and devoted chiefly to the interests of 
 the Coloured community. It was the first periodical, and 
 the only one, which advocated their rights ; and this it did 
 with the utmost fearlessness and independence. It boldly 
 exposed oppressions, whether emanating from the Govern- 
 ment-house, or originating in the Colonial Assembly. The 
 measures of all parties, and the conduct of every public 
 man, were subject to its scrutiny, and, when occasion re- 
 quired it, stern rebuke. 
 
 " Mr. Prescod exhibits a thorough acquaintance with the 
 politics of the country. On the subject of prejudice, he 
 spoke just as a man of keen sensibilities and manly spirit 
 might be expected to speak, who had himself been its 
 victim. He was accustomed to being flouted, scorned, and 
 contemned by those whom he could not but regard as his 
 inferiors, both in native talents and education. He had 
 submitted to be for ever debarred from offices which were 
 filled by men far less worthy, except in the single qualifi- 
 cation of a white shin, which, however, was paramount to 
 all other virtues and acquirements ! He had seen himself 
 and his accomplished wife excluded from the society of 
 Whites, though keenly conscious of their capacity to move 
 and shine in the most elevated circles of society. After all 
 this, it may readily be conceived, how he would speak of 
 prejudice. But while he spoke bitterly of the past, he 
 was inspired with buoyancy of hope, as he cast his eye to 
 the future, being confident that prejudice would disappear. 
 It had already diminished very much, and it would, ere 
 long, be wholly exterminated. 
 
 " We are very willing to hold up Mr. Prescod as a speci- 
 men of what Coloured people generally may become, with 
 proper cultivation ; or, to use the language of one of their 
 own number, ' with free minds, and space to rise.' " 
 
 Dr. Lloyd, in his Letters from the West Indies, observes, 
 
1 (Erihfr far tjp % rgrn. 
 
 555 
 
 respecting Mr. Prescod : — " We thought we had seldom 
 met with more intelligence and refinement," and adds, "in 
 England he would be esteemed as a gentleman ; whilst in 
 Barbadoes he is, in some degree, despised as a Coloured 
 man." 
 
 MR. JORDAN. 
 
 " In Jamaica," say Thome and Kimball, "the Coloured 
 people have been marching forward with rapid steps, in 
 every species of improvement. All offices are open to 
 them ; they are aldermen of the city, justices of the peace, 
 inspectors of the public institutions, trustees of schools, &c. 
 There are at least ten Coloured special magistrates of the 
 island, and four Coloured members of the Assembly. One 
 of these, Mr. Jordan, now sits in the same Assembly, side 
 by side with the man who, a few years ago, ejected him 
 disdainfully from his clerkship. He is a member of the 
 Assembly for the city of Kingston, where, but lately, he 
 was imprisoned and tried for his life. He is also alderman 
 of the city, and one of its local magistrates. He is now 
 inspector of the same prison in which he was formerly im- 
 mured as a pestilent fellow, and a mover of sedition. 
 
 " One of the largest book stores in Jamaica is owned by 
 this and another Coloured gentleman, Mr. Osborne. Con- 
 nected with it is an extensive printing office, from which 
 a newspaper is issued twice a week. Another paper, under 
 the control of Coloured men, is published at Spanish town. 
 These are the two principal liberal presses in Jamaica, and 
 are conducted with spirit and ability. Their influence in 
 the political and civil affairs of the island is very great. 
 They are the organs of the Coloured people, bond and 
 free ; and through them any violation of law or humanity 
 is exposed to the public, and redress demanded, and gene- 
 rally obtained. In literary merit and correctness of moral 
 sentiment, they are not excelled by any press there, while 
 
 te 
 
 
 '<&W 
 
556 
 
 | €cUb far tju Jfogro. 
 
 some of their White contemporaries fall far below them in 
 both. Besides the workmen employed in these two offices, 
 there are a large number of Coloured printers in the other 
 printing offices, of which there are several." 
 
 RICHARD HILL, 
 A Coloured gentleman, is the secretary of the special 
 magistrate department of Jamaica, a member of the As- 
 sembly, and one of the first men in the island for integrity, 
 independence, superior abilities, and extensive acquire- 
 ments. " It has seldom been our happiness," say Thome 
 and Kimball, " to meet with a man more illustrious for 
 true nobility of soul, or in whose countenance there were 
 deeper traces of intellectual and moral greatness. We are 
 confident that no man can see him without being impressed 
 with his rare combination of excellencies." 
 
 The same writers, on another occasion, observe : — " We 
 spent nearly a day with Richard Hill, Esq. He is a Co- 
 loured gentleman, and in every respect the noblest man- — 
 white or black — whom we met in the West Indies. He is 
 highly intelligent, and of fine moral feelings. His manners 
 are free and unassuming, and his language in conversation 
 fluent and well chosen. He is intimately acquainted with 
 English and French authors, and has studied thoroughly 
 the history and character of the people with whom the tie 
 of colour has connected him. He travelled two years in 
 Hayti, and his letters, written in a flowing and luxuriant 
 style, as a son of the tropics should write, giving an ac- 
 count of his observations and inquiries in that interesting 
 island, were published extensively in England, and have 
 been copied into the Anti-Slavery Journals of America. 
 His journal will be given to the public as soon as his 
 official duties will permit him to prepare it. He is at the 
 head of the special magistrates, of which there are sixty in 
 the island ; and all the correspondence between them and 
 
 ^/ 
 
% €x\hk far Wjt Jftgra. 
 
 557 
 
 the Governor is carried on through him. The station he 
 holds is a very important one, and the business connected 
 with it is of a character and an extent that, were he not a 
 man of superior abilities, he could not sustain. He is 
 highly respected by the government in the island and at 
 home, and possesses the esteem of his fellow-citizens of all 
 colours. He associates with persons of the highest rank, 
 dining and attending parties at the Government house with 
 all the aristocracy of Jamaica. We had the pleasure of 
 spending an evening with him at the Solicitor-General's. 
 Though an African sun has burnt a deep tinge on him, he 
 is truly one of nature's noblemen. His demeanour is 
 such — so dignified, yet bland and amiable — that no one can 
 help respecting him." 
 
 Richard Hill is undoubtedly a man of uncommon en- 
 dowments of mind, and of noble personal bearing. He 
 fills the office of Secretary to the Governor, and was 
 the main spring of the government during the best parts 
 of the administrations of Lord Sligo and Sir Lionel Smith. 
 His information as a naturalist is very extensive, and he 
 has recently contributed to ornithological literature in a 
 valuable work published by him, in connexion with another 
 gentleman, entitled " The Birds of Jamaica." 
 
 LONDON BOURNE. 
 
 After what has already been said to try the patience and 
 irritate the nerves of the prejudiced, if there should be such 
 among our readers, they will doubtless deem it quite in- 
 tolerable, to be introduced to a family in whose faces the 
 lineaments and complexion of the White man are not pre- 
 sent to relieve the ebon hue ; — even to a household of genu- 
 ine unadulterated Negroes. "Having had a previous intro- 
 duction to Mr. London Bourne," write Thome and Kim- 
 ball, " we cordially accepted an invitation to breakfast with 
 him. If the reader's horror of amalgamation does not 
 
 n 
 
 (IL 
 
 
 
 i 
 
 G) 
 
 'C£;,<r 
 
% €nhk fur % Jfpgrn. 
 
 allow him to join us at the table, perhaps he will consent 
 to retire to the parlour, and seat himself on the elegant 
 sofa, whence, without fear of contamination, he may safely 
 view us through the folding doors, and note down our 
 several positions around the board. At the head of the 
 table presides, with much dignity, Mrs. Bourne ; at the 
 end opposite, sits Mr. Bourne — both of the glossiest jet ; 
 the thick matted hair of Mr. B. slightly frosted with age. 
 He has an affable, open countenance, in which the radi- 
 ance of an amiable spirit, and the lustre of a sprightly in- 
 tellect, happily commingle, and illuminate the sable covering. 
 On either hand of Mr. B. we sit, occupying the posts of 
 honour. On the right and left of Mrs. B. and at the op- 
 posite corner from us, sit two other guests, one a Coloured 
 merchant, and the other a young son-in-law of Mr. B., 
 whose face is the very double extract of blackness ; for 
 which, his intelligence, and the elegance of his manners, 
 can make, to be sure, but slight atonement ! The middle 
 seats are filled on the one side by an unmarried daughter 
 of Mr. B., and on the other side by a promising son, of 
 eleven, who is to start on the morrow for Edinburgh, 
 where he is to remain until he has received the honours of 
 Scotland's far-famed university. 
 
 " We shall doubtless be thought by some of our readers 
 to glory in our shame. Be it so. We did glory in join- 
 ing the company which we have just described. On the 
 present occasion, we had a fair opportunity of testing the 
 merits of an unmixed Negro party, and of determining how 
 far the various excellencies of the gentlemen and ladies 
 previously noticed were attributable to the admixture of 
 English blood. We are compelled in candour to say, that 
 the company of Blacks did not fall a whit below those of 
 the mixed race, in any respect. We conversed on the 
 same general topics, which, of course, were introduced 
 wherever we went. The gentlemen showed an intimate 
 acquaintance with the state of the Colony, with the merits 
 
y?j 
 
 OT 
 
 m 
 
 
 h. 
 
 % Crihb fur ttjB Urgrn. 
 
 559 
 
 of the apprenticeship s} r stem, and with the movements of 
 the colonial government. As for Mrs. B., she presided at 
 the table with great ease, dignity, self-possession, and 
 grace. Her occasional remarks, made with genuine 
 modesty, indicated good sense and discrimination. Among 
 other topics of conversation, prejudice against Colour was 
 not forgotten. The company were inquisitive as to the ex- 
 tent of it in the United States. We informed them that 
 it appeared to be strongest in those States which held no 
 Slaves, that it prevailed among professing Christians, and 
 that it was most manifestly seen in the house of God. We 
 also intimated, in as delicate a manner as possible, that in 
 almost any part of the United States such a table scene, as 
 we then presented, would be reprobated and denounced, if 
 indeed it escaped the summary vengeance of the mob. The 
 surprise which these statements occasioned in the company 
 was very great. They had not words to express their 
 sense of the injustice and impiety of the Americans. 
 
 " We were highly gratified with their views of the proper 
 way for the Coloured people to act in respect to prejudice. 
 They said that they were persuaded that their policy was 
 to wait patiently for the operation of those influences 
 which were now at work for the removal of prejudice. It 
 was for them, they said, to maintain an upright, dignified 
 course, to be uniformly courteous, to seek the cultivation 
 of their minds, and strive zealously for substantial worth ; 
 by such means alone, they could aid in overcoming pre- 
 judice. 
 
 "Mr. Bourne was a Slave until he was twenty-three years 
 old. He was purchased by his father, a Free Negro, who 
 gave 500 dollars for him. His mother and four brothers 
 were bought at the same time, for the sum of 2500 dollars. 
 Since Mr. B. obtained his freedom, he has been striving to 
 make himself and his family respectable and comfortable. 
 By industry, honesty, and close attention to business, he 
 has now become a wealthy merchant. He owns three 
 
 3 
 
560 
 
 % $ritafc for tire Jfrgrn. 
 
 bs? 
 
 stores in Bridgetown, lives in very genteel style in his own 
 house, and is worth from 20 to 30,000 dollars. One of his 
 stores is on the wharf, in a public, business part of the 
 city, amid the stores of the White merchants. He is 
 highly respected for his integrity and business talents. By 
 what means he has acquired so much general information, 
 we are at a loss to conjecture. Although we did not our- 
 selves need the evidence of his possessing extraordinary 
 talents, industry, and perseverance, yet we are happy to 
 present our readers with such tangible proofs — proofs 
 which are read in every language, and which pass current 
 in every nation." 
 
 Such, then, are examples of what the Negro race may at- 
 tain to, and individuals and families of equal merit are by 
 no means rare among the same people in others of the 
 West India Islands. Many names might be mentioned 
 which deservedly rank as high as those already specified. 
 One of the wealthiest merchants of Bridgetown is a 
 Coloured gentleman, and he has his mercantile agents in 
 England, English clerks under his employ, a branch 
 establishment in the city, and superintends the concerns of 
 an extensive and complicated business with distinguished 
 ability and success. A large portion, if not a majority, of 
 the merchants of Bridgetown, are Coloured. Some of the 
 most popular instructors are Coloured (males and females), 
 and one of them ranks high as a teacher of the ancient 
 and modern languages. The most efficient and enterprising 
 mechanics of the city are Coloured and Black men ; indeed 
 there is scarcely any line of business which is not either 
 shared or wholly engrossed by Coloured persons. 
 
 It is pleasing to find the descendants of native Africans, 
 with skins of the darkest hue, some of them born and 
 brought up in Slavery, whose mental and moral culture 
 have been totally and wilfully neglected, thus, by the 
 efforts of that native genius which the Creator has not 
 
 ^ 
 
1 (Erilratj for tjp Urgrn. 
 
 Lie 
 
 limited to any particular race of men, shining forth among 
 their fellows, and in their lives and conduct often affording 
 an example even to their more favoured brethren of a 
 lighter hue. 
 
 That so many amongst this despised people should have 
 obtained wealth and education, is matter of astonishment, 
 when we consider the numerous obstacles they have to con- 
 tend against, and the discouragements with which they 
 have ever been doomed to struggle. Their coming in con- 
 tact with a race on whom have dawned loftier ideas, and 
 who boast a constitutional superiority, has been as victims 
 and not as pupils. Rum, gunpowder, the horrors of 
 Slavery, the unblushing knavery of trade, these have been 
 their teachers ! And because these have failed to produce 
 a high degree of moral and intellectual cultivation, it is 
 coolly declared that the Negroes are made for Slaves — that 
 they cannot be civilized ; and that when they come in con- 
 tact with White men, they must either consent to be their 
 beasts of burden, or be driven to the wall, and perish. 
 
 Even where they are permitted, in some degree, to enjoy 
 the rights of freedom, they are regarded as an inferior order 
 of beings, and the full benefits of citizenship are withheld 
 from them. The path of political distinction is barred 
 against them by an arbitrary denial of the right of suffrage, 
 and consequent eligibility to office. Thus, a large and 
 powerful class of incitements to mental effort, which have 
 been operating continually upon the Whites, have never 
 once stirred the sensibilities nor waked the ambition of the 
 Coloured community. The depressing influence of preju- 
 dice, too, has always weighed upon them. Parents, however 
 wealthy, have had little or no inducement to educate their 
 sons for the learned professions, since no force of talent 
 nor extent of acquirement could hope to break down the 
 granite walls and iron bars which prejudice has erected 
 around the pulpit, the bar, and the bench. From the same 
 cause there has been very little encouragement to acquire 
 
 W^) 
 
 4 c 
 
Vv( 
 
 562 
 
 % €xiMt for % Jljgtn, 
 
 TUT 
 
 property, to seek education, to labour for the graces of 
 elevated manners, or even to aspire to ordinary respecta- 
 bility, since not even the poor favour of social intercourse 
 with the Whites, of participating in the civilities and cour- 
 tesies of every day life, has been granted them. 
 
 /'But in the onward progress of events which indicate the 
 approach of better times, it is obvious that the deep-rooted 
 and unchristian prejudice against the Coloured race is 
 gradually passing away. Genius, talent, and virtue, will 
 be honoured, whether clad in rags or in broad-cloth, and 
 the nobility of a manly nature will not always continue to 
 be estimated according to the colour of the skin. 
 
 It is consoling to believe, that the blessed time is not far 
 distant, when men of every clime and of every colour shall 
 be united by common feelings and kindred affections, and 
 when they shall fully rejoice together in the blessings of a 
 common salvation. Should the present effort be effectual in 
 hastening this glorious era, in eradicating that gigantic 
 and accursed tree which for ages has nourished beneath 
 its shade, lamentations, mourning, and woe, the labour 
 bestowed will be abundantly repaid. Under the Divine 
 blessing, may it be instrumental, in some degree, in rescuing 
 Africa from the abyss of misery and wretchedness into 
 which she has so long been plunged. 
 
 When we contemplate the depth of this abyss, well, 
 indeed, may we exclaim, — " O ! Africa, how vast, how 
 overwhelming thy burthen ! How numberless thy wrongs, 
 — the prey of fiendish men, — the world's great mart of 
 rapine, bondage, blood, and murder ! On no part of the 
 earth's surface, in no state or condition of mankind, can 
 we find a parallel to thy woes ! Thy skies have been ob- 
 scured with the smoke of towns in flames ! — thy lovely 
 landscapes and sunny groves transformed into lions' dens ! 
 — thy burning deserts bedewed with the agonizing tears of 
 bereaved mothers ! — and thy winds have re-echoed back to 
 thy blood-stained soil the orphan's cry — the widow's wail ! 
 
H* 
 
 % €x\h\t for tjre ftgrn. 
 
 563 
 
 What an accumulated amount of misery and of wrong have 
 been inflicted upon thee by the nations of Christendom, 
 who still annually rob thee of 400,000 of thy children. 
 
 How long will the professors of a religion of love and 
 good-will continue to be the undisguised supporters and per- 
 petrators of such atrocities ? Let past deeds of darkness suf- 
 fice, and let us endeavour to compensate the enormous debt 
 we owe to the race of Africa, for having robbed her of her 
 children under every aggravated form of cruelty, to in- 
 crease our comforts, to augment our private wealth, and add 
 to our public revenues, by toils, imposing a daily stretch 
 upon their sinews ; — tasks, having no termination but in 
 death. Let us imitate the example of Zaccheus, who, if he 
 had done any man wrong, restored unto him four-fold. Let 
 us bring into operation all the machinery we possess to 
 ameliorate her wretched condition. Let us apply a remedy 
 to heal her bleeding wounds. We on whom the lamp of 
 life has shone forth resplendently — let us disperse the 
 darkness of her almost unbounded plains. Let us freely 
 disseminate amongst her people those rich and abundant 
 blessings which have been entrusted to us. Let mission- 
 aries and schoolmasters — the spade and the plough — go 
 together. Agriculture will then flourish, the avenues of 
 legitimate commerce will be opened, confidence between 
 man and man will be inspired, and civilization will ad- 
 vance, as the natural effect ; — Christianity operating as 
 the proximate cause of the happy change. 
 
 Then, melancholy as the past history of Africa has been, 
 we are fully warranted in anticipating that the innumerable 
 tribes of that immense continent will, ere long, present a 
 scene, in the intelligence, holiness, and happiness of its 
 regenerated millions, which will far exceed the most san- 
 guine expectations of those who have laboured, and are 
 still labouring, on behalf of her afflicted children. 
 
 But it is to the everlasting Gospel that we must look, 
 as the chief instrument to chase away the mass of darkness 
 
 w$ 
 
% €tlMt hi % Jfogrn. 
 
 brooding on her bosom. Her unknown regions must be 
 explored by the messengers of the churches, and her vast 
 moral wastes must be watered by the streams of life. The 
 truth of God is the grand engine by which the demon of 
 Slavery must be repelled from her shores, and her Sable 
 sons and daughters made to sit under their own vine and 
 under their own fig tree. Then shall her ransomed millions 
 reiterate, from shore to shore, her jubilee ! 
 
 "Yes, even now thy beams 
 Suffuse the twilight of the nations. Light 
 Wakes in regions where gross darkness veiled 
 The people. They who in death's shadow sat. 
 Shall hail that glorious rising ; for the shade 
 Prophetic, shrinks before the dawning ray, 
 That cast it : forms of earth, that interposed, 
 Shall vanish, scattered like the dusky clouds 
 Before the exultant morn ; and central day, 
 All shadowless, even to the poles shall reign. 
 Volume of God ! thou art that eastern star 
 Which leads to Christ ; soon shall thy circuit reach 
 Round earth's circumference, — in every tongue 
 Revealing to all nations — what the heavens 
 But shadow forth — the glory of the Lord." * 
 
 * Josiah Conder. 
 
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 THE PEASANTRY of ENGLAND; an Appeal on be- 
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NEW MEDICAL WORKS 
 
 IN THE PEESS. 
 
 THE BRITISH RECORD OF OBSTETRIC MEDI- 
 CINE and SURGERY, and Diseases of Women and Children, 
 &c, &c, &c. Demy 8vo. Illustrated with Engravings. 
 Issued in parts on the 1st and 15th of each month. Price 9d. 
 Edited by Dr. Clay, Licentiate of the Royal College of Phy- 
 sicians, London ; Member of the Royal College of Surgeons, 
 &c; Honorary Member of the Institut. D'Afrique, Paris ; 
 Author of " Peritoneal Sections for Diseased Ovaria," &c, &c. 
 With the assistance of many eminent Medical Men, British 
 and Foreign. 
 
 THE RESULTS of ALL THE OPERATIONS for 
 the EXTIRPATION OF DISEASED OVARIA, by the 
 LARGE INCISION, from September 12th, 1842, to the pre- 
 sent time. To which is appended, An Essay on the Diagno- 
 sis, Prognosis, and Treatment of Ovarian Diseases. By 
 Charles Clay, M.D. 
 
 ENCYCLOPEDIA OBSTETRICA ; or, a Theoretical, 
 Practical, Historical, Biographical, and Critical Dictionary of 
 Obstetrics. Beautifully printed on fine paper, Eemy 8vo., 
 illustrated with Engravings. To be completed in about 1000 
 pages. Issued in Monthly Parts, price Is. 3d. Edited by 
 Dr. Clay. Part I. now ready. 
 Professional Notices. — I am much pleased with your Cydopadia, and 
 
 sincerely wish you every success. Believe me to be yours truly, Titos. R. 
 
 Mitchell, M.D. Master South-Eastern Lying-in Hospital, Dublin. 
 
 Your Cydopcedia will he a great acquisition, and if I can render you any 
 
 assistance with regard to it, I shall be glad to have the opportunity of doing 
 
 so. — E. Copeman, M.D., Norwich. 
 
 I can assure you that nothing which the scandalous or illiberal portion of 
 
 the medical press can do, will c\er deter me from contributing my humble ex- 
 ertions in aid of your very useful work.— J". M. Coley, M.D., Chester-square, 
 
 London. 
 
 It is not usual for us to notice works of a character so exclusively profes- 
 sional as this is, but we are induced to depart from our general rule, in this 
 instance, from the fact that the work before us is the production of a towns- 
 man, and that its beautiful typography also proceeds from the Manchester 
 press. Dr. Clay having, for thirty years, practised extensively that branch of 
 
WOEKS IN THE PEESS. 
 
 the profession of which this Encyclopaedia treats; having been the first prac- 
 titioner in England who attempted the performance of a class of operations of 
 extreme delicacy and difficulty; and being also the inventor of several instru- 
 ments of great value to his profession, possesses peculiar aptitude for supplying 
 a desideratum, which, it seems, has been long felt in medical literature — a 
 comprehensive cyclopaedia of obstetrics. The author's object has been to 
 produce a work "compiled with the greatest care and impartiality from the 
 best ancient and modern authorities of different countries, including every 
 improvement which time and matured experience have suggested." In car- 
 rying out his plan, Dr. Clay has endeavoured " to render to every practitioner 
 perfect justice respecting priority of invention or application, and to assign to 
 each every merit for what is really his own in scientific research, whilst no 
 person shall be wilfully injured or neglected." In arranging the vast amount 
 of information collected for the work, it is intended that each article that re- 
 quires it will have its usual term, derivation, definition, and mode of expres- 
 sion, in English, Greek, Latin, French, and German, and that a full list of 
 the principal authorities on every point will be referred to. There will also 
 be interspersed, in alphabetical order, a complete biography of authors who 
 have written on the subject matter of the work. 
 
 The above remarks will explain the nature of this laborious undertaking; 
 in the prosecution of which the compiler has, we understand, the advantage 
 of one of the most extensive libraries of obstetric literature in the kingdom. 
 Dr. Clay concludes his preface with the following disinterested statement of 
 his views as to carrying forward the work to completion: — " Having shown to 
 the medical public a specimen of the plan proposed, it remains to be seen if 
 the profession will afford commensurate support to enable the author to con- 
 tinue the undertaking to its completion, assuring his supporters that the want 
 of profit will not induce him to relinquish it, however acceptable it might be 
 to him; but that the work will be continued to its close, if only a bare repay- 
 ment of the expenses be realised — thus trusting to the future for a reward in 
 proportion to the merit evinced." 
 
 It gives us much pleasure to speak in terms of commendation of the beau- 
 tiful typography of this specimen number, which is quite equal to the very 
 best work emanating from the large metropolitan establishments. The pub- 
 lication is issued from the printing establishment of Mr. William Irwin, of 
 Oldham-street. — Manchester Examiner. 
 
 < 
 
 PE1NTED AND PUBLISHED BY WM. IEWIN, 39, OLDHAM-ST. 
 
 LONDONi-H. RENSHAW.' 
 
 And may be ordered through any respectable Bookseller. 
 
 CK- 
 
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 1953