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directors themselves must be the first to acknowledge that the public are not, up to this hour, in possession of proof that the experiment has anywhere been carried to a successful issue. We all know, indeed, that such an experiment, on a large scale, and under proper superintendance, is now in progress within the territories of Sierra Leone; and IF it should be found to answer there, that is to say, IF the emancipated negroes, when duly instructed by persons from the West Indies, will submit to the labour that is required in the cultivation of sugar-for it is this article ir particular, that requires constant and severe labour, and it is this only which constitutes the value of our West Indian Islandsthen, unquestionably, will the gradual abolition of West Indian slavery be divested of those gloomy forebodings with which it is at present contemplated by many of the best informed and the most liberal-minded of our planters.

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Without waiting for the result of this experiment, for it must require years to determine that-and, if that be successful, ageslong and busy ages-to establish the new system in the West Indian islands and on the continent of America,-we conceive that an effectual and immediate check might be given to the slave-trade by the adoption of a measure-which would at least, we are fully convinced, render it not worth pursuing.' It is but too evident that our cruizers capture but a very few even of those slave-ships which, if fallen in with, they are legally authorized to seize. There are so many avenues left open on the extensive coast in which the dealers can assemble their victims, that it would require half the navy to close the whole of them. Commodore Bullen states that he rarely visited a port, in which he did not find these wretched beings lying in chains ready to be embarked, as soon as an opportunity should occur; when once a cargo is thus assembled, it requires only about six hours to put on board 400 or 500 slaves; the traders therefore watch the moment that any of our cruizers leave the part of the coast where the negroes are thus ready to be shipped, slip out of the river, and, when once clear of the land, there is little chance of their voyage being interrupted.

If then we are still to keep up, however disheartening it may hitherto have been, the police establishment of the world for the suppression of the slave-trade, the plan, which indeed we have more than once suggested, and in the propriety of which we are borne out by every officer, without exception, who has visited the spot, is to make the island of Fernando Po the principal station on the coast of Africa; to remove thither the Mixed Commission now resident at Sierra Leone; to have two or three steam-boats of light draught of water, properly armed, to run up the nume

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rous rivers that fall into the bights of Biafra and Bening to sweep their banks of all the traffickers in slaves; and to protect the legitimate trader of all nations, who is at present continually exposed in these regions to insult in his person, and robbery of his property. From this quarter of the coast, we reckon that at least two-thirds of the slaves annually carried away from Africa, are shipped. The remaining third of the traffic, from the more northerly parts of the coast, might, in like manner, be effectually checked, by two other steam-boats, whose rendezvous might be either at Sierra Leone, or the Gambia, or both. The French have already two steam-boats to navigate the Senegal; and we should find them equally useful, even in a mercantile point of view, on the Gambia.

It is of the utmost importance that the slave-ships captured in the Bight of Benin should be brought in for adjudication as speedily as possible. The horrible state in which the poor wretches are found admits of no delay in liberating them from their dungeons of disease and death. The passage to Sierra Leone is from five to twelve weeks, and is frequently attended with great mortality. We will mention but one instance, in the present year. The Seguenda Rosalia, captured by the Athol, lost in her passage up to Sierra Leone eighty-two slaves, all of which, except ten or twelve, died of absolute starvation, the ship being eleven weeks on her passage. Such was their miserable condition that, for upwards of three weeks, their daily subsistence was a handful of farinha and black beans, with half a pint of water, which was served out by spoonfuls. Nothing of this kind could happen on our plan. A day or two at the most, from any situation in the two bights, would be sufficient to carry them to Fernando Po, where they might be employed in cutting down timber, preparing billets of wood for the steam-vessels, and clearing the ground for cultiva tion. In the present state of this island, the savage natives produce the finest yams perhaps in the world, and appear to possess abundance of fowls. A refreshing breeze constantly blows over the island from the Atlantic; it has plenty of good anchorage in more places than one, and abundance of clear running water; and it is so situated, as to overlook and command the whole Bight of Biafra and the numerous rivers that fall into it.

Thus might this beautiful but hitherto neglected island become the rendezvous of our merchant shipping employed in the African trade, and from hence might the rudiments of civilization be carried into the very heart of Africa. At present our merchants engaged in lawful commerce have no safe depôt for their goods; they are obliged to keep them on board ship till disposed of, and are therefore at the mercy of the native dealers; but this fine

island is so situated, as to afford not only a secure but a convenient depôt.

We now know, by the enterprizing exertions of Clapperton, that a road is open to the fertile and populous districts of Central Africa; and who can doubt that commerce will find its way thither, and in its train carry with it those improvements in civilization which have hitherto been its invariable concomitants? The paltry trade at present carried on by the Arabs over the Great Desert would no longer be worth pursuing, and the few thousand negro victims, who are at present dragged across that dreary waste, would thus be annually saved from death and slavery. Though we do not imagine that any of the great rivers which flow into the Bights of Benin and Biafra proceed from Haussa, or that the much talked of Niger crosses the great and continuous chain of mountains which cost Mr. Clapperton five days in passing, but that they take their origin from the southern side of these mountains, yet it is evident that the slaves from the interior, after passing the chain, are marched down to the banks of these rivers for embarkation; and there can be little doubt, from their magnitude, that they are navigable by steam-boats to the very feet of the mountains. By the latest accounts from Clapperton he was at Katunga, on the borders of the Fellata country, situated in lat. 9° 12′ and long. 6° 10′ E., being on the same meridian nearly with Saccatoo, and the same parallel with the scene of Major Denham's disastrous engagement with the Fellatas; he had fallen in with no great river: the Kowarra, however, which was seventy miles west of Saccatoo, was described to him as running about thirty miles east of Katunga; which strengthens the probability of Denham's supposition that it joins the Shary, after skirting the northern feet of the mountains. Even in this case, the Kowarra or Niger might be made a most advantageous conveyance of mercantile commodities through the central and best parts of Africa, when once a communication has been opened between the seacoast and the dominions of Bello.* *

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We have heard, since this was printed, that the undaunted and indefatigable Clapperton had reached the capital of his friend Bello; and also that the consul of Tripoli had reported the safe arrival of Major Laing at Timbuctoo. We have indeed seen a letter from Mr. Houtsen, the merchant who accompanied Clapperton to Katunga, and who had returned to the coast, relating that, before his departure from that city, he had received intelligence that Clapperton, on his approach to the frontiers of Barghoo, which borders upon Bello's dominious, had been met by the sovereign of that country at the head of 500 horsemen, to conduct him to his capital. The letter states that it was highly probable Mr. Dickson, who had proceeded from Dahomey, was already at Saccatoo. We have now, therefore, every reason to hope that the interior of Northern Africa, beyond the Great Desert, will no longer remain a Terra Incognita, and that the information brought back by our intrepid travellers may be turned to the mutual advantage of their native country and of the long-suffering African; but, be the result

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The expense of keeping a squadron constantly employed for the suppression of the slave-trade, the bounty of ten pounds per head paid for every slave captured, and the salaries and other expenses of the Mixed Commission, which, all together, we should imagine, fall not far short of half a million a year; and, above all, the dreadful mortality, and, at the same time, the absolute insuffi-, ciency of an English squadron, to whatever extent it might be thought proper to increase it, for the execution of the object in view, so long as the French persevere in pursuing and encouraging the trade these, taken together, are sufficient grounds, in our opi-, nion, for making the experiment of a change of system; that is to say, for abandoning the attempt to abolish the trade by attacking it on the ocean or at the mouths of the rivers; and, in place of this, ascending the rivers into the interior, by armed steam-boats of a light draft of water, and thus cutting off all communication between the slave-hunters and the slave-factors.

We have before us a manuscript account of a transaction between Spain and Portugal respecting Fernando Po, which shows that neither of these powers has any claim to the possession of that island; and, consequently, that it is open to any. power to negociate with the natives for a settlement upon it.

In the year 1778 the Portugueze ceded the islands of Annabon and Fernando Po by treaty to Spain; and in the same year the Spaniards sent out an expedition to take possession of them. The men, ere they reached these regions, were sorely worn down by disease, occasioned by delay, and by want of provisions and medicines; a party were landed in a debilitated state on Fernando Po, and the rest proceeded to Annabon, where, being well received by the natives, the Spanish flag was hoisted, Te Deum sung, and mass said. Here, however, as soon as the natives discovered that the Spaniards were come as lords and masters, not simply as visitors and friends, they, by the advice of a black priest, refused, in the most positive terms, to allow the strangers, to take possession of the island. The commander of the Portugueze frigate, which accompanied the expedition, wished them to land troops and compel the natives to submit; but this the Spanish commander would not allow, as he had the positive orders of his sovereign only to accept of their voluntary submission, and to avoid all contest; they therefore re-embarked and set sail for the island of St. Thomas; and from thence proceeded to Fernando Po, where it had been resolved to form a settlement in

what it may, the various expeditions that have been sent forth with the view of gaining intelligence and promoting the interests of humanity, will form lasting evidence of the enlightened and disinterested spirit of the British government under the colonial administration of the Earl Bathurst.

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the Bay of Conception, on the southern side of the island, as both the anchorage and soil were there most promising. Here they found some huts, with natives of both sexes, to whom they distributed looking-glasses, knives, and other trifles. The next day they erected a cross, hoisted the Spanish flag, prepared to pitch their tents, and build a temporary hospital; but the natives had disappeared. A severe sickness soon spread through the garrison, so that one half of them had died in the course of five months, and the remainder were incapable of carrying on the works. They sent a schooner to St. Thomas's to bring them assistance in men and provisions, but she was found in so defective a state as to be unable to return. In the mean time the poor remainder of the Spaniards-for they had been reduced to fifty-five -mutinied against the commander. They said it never could have been the intention of the king of Spain that they should remain on the island until this miserable remnant should also perish. They therefore took the opportunity of a Spanish ship from the Canaries to embark, one and all, and to abandon an island which had been so fatal to their companions. Of 547 men, who originally embarked, 67 only returned to Spain.-The cause of this mortality was not entirely owing to want of provisions and medicines, but partly also to the bad choice of a situation on the island, being to leeward, and to the uncleared state of the country.

Since this abandonment of Fernando Po, neither Spaniards nor Portugueze have made any attempts to occupy it. The Spanish commander complains that the Portugueze practised a fraud upon his government; denies, in short, that this nation ever had had any connection with Fernando Po, or even landed upon it. The Count of Argelejos, the commander of the expedition, in his remonstrance against this fraudulent transaction, thus rea

sons:

For the lawful transfer of a dominion, one of two titles is indispensable, either a right of property, or actual possession. No person can pretend to deliver over as his own that which belongs to another. Under these suppositions we ask, how could the crown of Portugal lawfully give to the crown of Spain the island of Fernando Po without having either property in it or possession of it? It was only seen in the reign of Alphonso V, by a gentleman of the name of Fernando Po, and without further conquest, either temporal or spiritual, this nation asserts its claim of direct sovereignty. How easy would it be for many needy wretches, now struggling with poverty, to make conquests in this manner, if whatever they see with their eyes they could claim as their property! The commissioner, therefore, who was named by the court of Portugal in 1778, ought rather to have invited the Spaniards to undertake the conquest of the island of Fernando Po, either by force of arms or by fraud and cunning, than pretend to make a delivery and solemn

cession

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