INTRODUCTION.

No one possessing any knowledge of, or anxiety on the subject of the Negro race can fail to deplore the present state of Africa.

Desirous to ascertain why it is, that all our gigantic efforts and costly sacrifices for the suppression of the Slave Trade have proved unavailing, I have employed some leisure time in surveying this whole subject, and in tracing out, as far as I have been able, the true cause of our failure. My original impression was, that, in increased efforts at sea, and in reducing Portugal to the necessity of executing her engagements with us, the effective remedy was to be found, and that little more than these would be required for the gratification of the ardent de. sire felt by the British nation for the abolition of the Slave Trade. But a closer scrutiny into the facts of the case has conducted me to a different conclusion. There are, I now think, reasonable grounds for believing, that we should still be disappointed, although we were to double our naval force engaged in that branch of service, and although it were resolved to take the most peremptory measures with Portugal.

I do not underrate the value of our maritime exertions. I think it may be good policy, and, in the long run, true economy, to multiply the number of our vessels, to do at once and by a blow all that can be done in this way; to increase our expenses for a few years, in order to escape the necessity of incurring cost, not materially less, for an indefinite period. Neither do I wish that our government should address Portugal in any terms short of a declaration, that our cruisers will have orders to seize, after a fixed and an early day, every vessel under Portuguese colors engaged in the slave-traffic, to bring the crew to trial as pirates, and inflict upon them the severest secondary punishment which our law allows. Decisive measures of this kind would, there is no doubt, facilitate our success, by removing some of the great impediments which stand in the way of other remedial measures; nevertheless, I am compelled, by the various evidence which it has been my province to examine, to place my main reliance, not on the employment of force, but on the encouragement which we may be able to give to the legitimate commerce and the agricultural cultivation of Africa.

We attempt to put down the Slave Trade " by the strong hand" alone; and this is, I apprehend, the cause of our failure. Our system, in many respects too feeble, is in one sense too bold. The African has acquired a taste for the productions of the civilized world. They have become essential to him. The parent,-debased and brutalized as he is, barters his child; the chief his subject; each individual looks with an evil eye on his neighbor, and lays snares to catch him, because the sale of children, subjects, and neighbors, is the only means as yet afforded, by European commerce, for the supply of those wants which that commerce has created. To say that the African, under present circumstances, shall not deal in man, is to say that he shall long in vain for his accustomed gratifications. The tide, thus pent up, will break its way over every barrier. In order effectually to divert the stream from the direction which it has hitherto taken, we must open another, a safer, and a more convenient channel. When we shall have experimentally convinced the African that it is in his power to obtain his supplies in more than their usual abundance, by honest means, then, and not till then, we may expect that he will be reconciled to the abolition of the Slave Trade

To a description of the extent and horrors of the Slave Trade, the failure of our efforts for its suppression, and an account of the African superstitions and cruelties, I have added some practical suggestions for calling forth the latent energies of that quarter of the globe, and for exhibiting to its inhabitants where their true interest lies.

The principles of my suggestions are comprised in the following propositions :

1. That the present staple export of Africa renders to her inhabitants, at infinite cost, a miserable return of profit.

2. That the cultivation of her soil, and the barter of its productions, would yield an abundant harvest, and a copious supply of those articles which Africa requires.

3. That it is practicable to convince the African, experimentally, of the truth of these propositions, and thus to make him our confederate in the suppression of the Slave Trade.

I despair of being able to put down a traffic in which a vast continent is engaged, by the few ships we can afford to employ : as auxiliaries they are of great value, but alone they are insufficient. I do not dream of attempting to persuade the African, by appealing merely to his reason or his conscience, to renounce gainful guilt, and to forego those inhuman pursuits which gratify his cupidity, and supply his wants. But when the appeal we make is to his interest, and when his passions are enlisted on our side, there is nothing chimerical in the hope that he may be brought to exchange slender profits, with danger, for abundant gain, with security and peace.

If these views can be carried into effect, they have at least thus much to recommend them.

They will not plunge the country into hostility with any por tion of the civilized world, for they involve no violation of international law. We may cultivate intercourse and innocent commerce with the natives of Africa, without abridging the rights or damaging the honest interests of any rival power.

They require no monopoly of trade; if other nations choose to send their merchantmen to carry on legitimate traffic in Africa, they will but advance our object, and lend their aid in extinguishing that which we are resolved to put down.

They involve no schemes of conquest; our ambition is of another order. Africa is now torn to pieces. She is the victim of the most iron despotism that the world ever saw: inveterate cruelty reigns over her broad territory. We desire to usurp nothing, and to conquer nothing, but the Slave Trade.

Finally, we ask of the Government only that which subjects have a right to expect from their rulers, namely, protection to person and property in their lawful pursuits.

Here I must pause; for I feel bound to confess, much as it may tend to shake the whole fabric of my views, that there is a great danger to which we shall be exposed, unless it be most carefully guarded against at the outset: the discovery of the fact that man as a laborer on the soil is superior in value to man as an article of merchandise may induce the continuance, if not the increase, of that internal slavery which now exists in Africa.

I hope that we shall never be so deluded as to give the slightest toleration to anything like constrained labor. We must not put down one iniquity by abetting another. I believe implicitly that free labor will beat all other labor; that slavery, besides being a great crime, is a gross blunder; and that the most refined and sagacious policy we can pursue is, common honesty and undeviating justice. Let it then be held as a most sacred principle that, wherever our authority prevails, slavery shall cease; and that whatever influence we may obtain shall be employed in the same direction.

I have thus noticed several of the negative advantages which attach to these views, and I have frankly stated the danger which, as I conceive, attends them. I shall now briefly allude to one point, which, I own, weighs with me beyond all the other considerations, mighty as they are, which this great question involves.

Grievous, and this almost beyond expression, as are the physical evils endured by Africa, there is yet a more lamentable feature in her present condition. Bound in the chains of the grossest ignorance, she is a prey to the most savage superstition. Christianity has made but feeble inroads on this kingdom of darkness, nor can she hope to gain an entrance where the traffic in man pre-occupies the ground. But were this obstacle removed, Africa would present the finest field for the labors of Christian Missionaries which the world has yet seen opened to