The remark which closes the preceding chapter was made in 1856. An opportunity is now offered for recording the results of the movements of Great Britain to promote cotton culture in her own possessions between that and 1859. The results will be startling. Few anti-slavery men in the United States expected that Great Britain would so soon be engaged zealously in establishing slave labor in Africa, or that Lord Palmerston should publicly commend the measure. The question is one of so much importance as to demand a full examination. The extracts are taken, mainly, from the London Economist, a periodical having the highest reputation for candor and fair dealing. On Feb. 12, 1859, the Economist said:

"We are not surprised that the future supply of cotton should have engaged the attention of Parliament on an early night of the Session. It is a question the importance of which can not well be overrated, if we refer only to the commercial interests which it involves, or to the social comfort or happiness of the millions who are now dependent upon it for their support. But it has an aspect far loftier and even more important. At its root lies the ultimate success of a policy for which England has made great struggles and great sacrifices—the maintaining of existing treaties, and perhaps the peace of the world. Every year as it passes, proves more and more that the question of slavery, and even of the slave trade, is destined to be materially affected, if not ultimately governed, by considerations arising out of the cultivation of this plant. It is impossible to observe the tendency of public opinion throughout America, not even excepting the Free States, with relation to the slave trade, without feeling conscious that it is drifting into indifference, and even laxity. In every light, then, in which this great subject can be viewed, it is one which well deserves the careful attention equally of the philanthropist and the statesman.

"It has been said, that in the case of cotton we have found an exception to the great commercial principle of supply and demand. Is this so? We doubt it. We doubt if, on the contrary, we shall not find, upon investigation, that it presents one of the strongest examples of the struggle of that principle to maintain its conclusions. No doubt the conditions of its production have made that struggle a severe one; but, nevertheless, it has not been altogether unsuccessful. Eighteen years ago, (in 1840) the total supply of cotton imported into this country was 592,488,000 lbs.: with temporary fluctuations, it had steadily grown until it had reached, in the last three years, upwards of 900,000,000 lbs., showing an increase of more than fifty per cent. Nevertheless, the demand had been constantly pressing upon the supply, the consumption has always shown a tendency to exceed the production, and the consequent result of a high price has, during a majority of those years, acted as a powerful stimulant to cultivation. But, practically speaking, we possess but two sources of supply, and both present such powerful obstacles to extended cultivation, that we are not surprised at the habitual uneasiness of those whose interests demand a continually increasing quantity. Those two sources are the United States and British India. It is true that Brazil, Egypt, the West Indies, and some other countries, furnish small quantities of cotton; but when we state that of the 931,847,000 lbs., imported into the United Kingdom in 1858, the proportion furnished by America and India was 870,656,000 lbs., leaving for all other places put together, a supply of only 61,191,000 lbs., notwithstanding the many laudable efforts, both on the part of Government, and of the mercantile community, to encourage its growth in new countries, it will be admitted that, as an immediate and practical question, it is confined to those two sources. They are not only the sources from whence the largest supplies are received, but they are also those where the chief increase has taken place.

"In 1840 the supply received from the United States was 487,856,000 lbs. Since that time, with some considerable fluctuations, it has steadily increased, until in 1858 it rose to 732,403,000 lbs.—the maximum quantity having reached in 1856, 780,040,000 lbs. Yet, great as this increase has been, it appears that it has not been equal to the increased demand, if we may judge from the price, at the two periods.[36] The large supplies of the last three years have commanded prices at least sixteen per cent. higher than the smaller supplies from 1840 to 1842. Every encouragement, therefore, which high and remunerative prices could give to increased cultivation has been liberally afforded to the cotton-growing States of America.

"But whatever the price, there is a condition which places an absolute limit upon the growth. Land in every way suited for the purpose, is abundant and cheap. Means of transport is of the cheapest and best kind, and is without limit. The limit lies in the necessary ingredient of labor. If cotton had been the produce of free labor, no doubt the principle of supply and demand would have solved the difficulty. The surplus of the Old World would have steadily maintained the balance between the two in the New World. Ireland, Germany, Switzerland, the Southern parts of France, and Portugal, would have sent their surplus labor to the best market. As it is, the two kinds of labor—that of the freeman and that of the slave—can not be united in the same cultivation. The slave States of America are, therefore, dependent for any increase of labor only upon themselves. The consuming States can draw supplies only from the breeding States. It is, therefore, exactly in proportion as the slave population increases that the cotton crop becomes larger. Taking the average of three or four years at any period of the history of the United States for the last forty years, it will be found that the growth of cotton is equal to one bale for each person of the slave population. The calculation is well known. When the slave population was two millions, the average produce of cotton was two millions of bales:—as the one rose the other increased. The slave population is now about three millions and a half; the cotton crop of the present year is computed at from 3,500,000 to 3,700,000 bales. The high price of cotton, and the great profit attached to its cultivation, have no doubt furnished the greatest stimulant to an increase of that part of the population. In the competition for more labor, the price of slaves was enormously increased. Some years ago the price of a slave was about £100; now they are worth from £200 to £400. But what must be the tendency of this fearful competition for a limited supply of human labor—limited as long as the slave trade is prohibited—unlimited as soon as the slave trade is legalized? What is the actual condition of the Southern States at this moment? There is on the ground and being secured, according to computation, the largest cotton crop ever known. The last estimates vary from 3,550,000 bales to 3,700,000 bales. A very few years ago it was calculated that cotton at any thing above four cents the pound for "middling quality" on the spot was a profitable crop. Now, the price for the same quality on the spot is fully ten cents the pound;—and it has been about the same or higher for a long time. What is the consequence? A correspondent writing by the last mail says: 'The people of this section of the country feel made of gold, and every thing here is, of course, going at full cry—every planter wants to open more land and buy more negroes.' What do these facts suggest? Do they furnish no explanation of the strong desire in the Southern States to possess Cuba? Do they furnish no explanation of the exaggerated irritation got up last year in respect to the West India squadron, and the demand of the American Government, we fear too successfully made, that the right of search in the mitigated form in which it existed should be altogether abandoned? A people familiarized not only with slavery, but also with the slave trade as between one class of States and another, can hardly be expected to entertain a very strong repugnance to a slave trade from beyond the seas. That cargoes of imported slaves have recently been landed in the United States is not denied:—that vessels fitted out as slavers have recently been seized in American ports, we know upon official authority. The same correspondent whom we have already quoted, says there are two great questions which occupy the Southern States at this moment. The one is the acquisition of Cuba. 'The other,' he says, 'is one which has been presented to me forcibly during my sojourn in the South, and that is the increase of slave population. You must have noticed an illicit importation of negroes from Africa landed in Georgia. This has undoubtedly been done, and I doubt not also that other negroes have been landed. It is of course the desire of every honest man that the whole force of the government should be used to put down such a trade, and punish the offenders; but I fear the profits of the trade are so enormous that it will be carried on in the face of all opposition. Negroes are now worth here from 1,000 to 2,000 dollars a-piece. The subject of their being introduced is being openly discussed, and the propriety of the trade being again legalized. It is plain this discussion will by and by take shape. Will not the government be obliged to listen to it, and what will be the result? When labor is so profitable it will be obtained. How? I confess to looking upon this subject with great anxiety. The feeling with regard to slavery both in the North and South has undergone a material change in the last four years. It is now looked upon with far less abhorrence.' Is it possible to separate the danger which is here presented so forcibly from the question of the high price of cotton? We know by experience the influence which the Southern States can exercise upon the election of a President....... If the free States are indifferent, we know that, at whatever risk, the slave States will have their own way; and with them it is plain that much must depend upon the price of cotton and the motives which it furnishes to 'open more land and buy more negroes.'

"But with what an enormous interest does this view of the case invest the cultivation of cotton in India. It is the only real obstacle that we can interpose to the growing feeling in favor of slavery, to the diminishing abhorrence of the slave trade in the United States. It is the only field, competition with which can, for many years to come, redress the undue stimulant which high prices are giving to slave labor in America. Nor do the facts as regard the past discourage the hope that it may be successfully used for that purpose. In 1840 the supply of cotton from India was 77,011,000 lbs.;—in 1858 it had risen to 138,253,000 lbs.: having been in the immediately preceding year no less than 250,338,000 lbs. The average importation for four years from 1840 to 1843 amounted to 83,300,000 lbs.:—the average importation for the last four years has been 178,000,000 lbs. or somewhat more than double that of the former period. In some important respects the conditions of supply from India differ very much from those which attach to and determine the supply from America. In India there is no limit to the quantity of labor. There may be said to be little or none to the quantity of land. The obstacle is of another kind; it lies almost exclusively in the want of cheap transit. Our supplies of India cotton are not even determined by the quantity produced, but by that which, when produced, can profitably be forwarded to England. It is, therefore, a question of price whether we obtain more or less. A rise in the price of one penny the pound in 1857, suddenly increased the supply from 180,000,000 lbs. in 1856 to 250,000,000 lbs. in 1857. A fall in the price in 1858 again suddenly reduced it to 138,000,000 lbs. It was not that the production of cotton varied in these proportions in those years, but that at given prices it was possible to incur more cost in the transit than at others. The same high price, therefore, which at present renders a large supply possible from India, creates an unusual demand for slaves in the United States. But would not the same corrective consequence be produced if we could diminish the cost of transit in India? Every farthing a pound saved in carriage is equivalent to so much added to the price of cotton. Four-pence the pound in the Liverpool market for good India cotton, with a cost of two-pence from the spot of production, would command just as great a supply as a price of five-pence the pound if the intermediate cost were three-pence. The whole question resolves itself into one of good roads and cheap conveyance. Labor in India is infinitely more abundant than in the United States, and much cheaper; land is at least as cheap; the climate is as good;—but the bullock trains on the miserable roads of Hindostan cannot compete with the steamers and other craft on the Mississippi. No doubt we have new hopes in the district of Scinde, and in the aid of the Indus. We have new hopes in the railways which are being constructed,—not only in cheapening transit, but even more in improving the condition in which native produce will be brought to market. Whatever, therefore, be the financial sacrifice which in the first place must be made for the purpose of opening the interior of India, it should be cheerfully made, as the only means by which we can hope permanently to improve the revenues of India, to increase and cheapen the supply of the most important raw material of our own industry, and to bring in the abundant labor of the millions of our fellow-subjects in India, to redress the deficiency in the slave States of America, and thus to give the best practical check to the growing attractions of slavery and the slave trade."

On March 5, 1859, the editor resumes the subject, and discusses the bearing which the movements making in Africa are likely to have upon these interests.

"We pointed out in a recent number the very close connection between the traditional policy of England in resisting the slave trade, and the efforts which are now making to find other sources of cotton supply besides the United States. We showed that a cry is now arising in the United States, for the renewal of the slave trade—a cry stimulated principally by the high price of cotton. We showed that for every slave in the Southern States there is on the average a bale of cotton produced annually, and that as the demand for cotton, and consequently the price of cotton rises, the demand for slaves and the price of slaves rises with it. In the words of a correspondent whom we then quoted, 'every planter wants to open more land and buy more negroes.' Hence the demand in the South for the recently successful attempt to smuggle slave-cargoes into Georgia. If, then, either in India or any other quarter of the world, it be possible either to cheapen the carriage or facilitate the growth of cotton, so as to bring it into the English markets at a price that can compete successfully with the American cotton, we are conferring a double benefit on mankind—we are increasing the supply of one of the most necessary, and, relatively to the demand, one of the least abundant, articles of commerce, on the steady supply of which the livelihood of millions, and the comfort of almost every civilized nation on the face of the earth, depends, and by means of the increased competition we are diminishing the force of the motive which is now threatening the United States with a renewal of the slave trade. We cannot, therefore, well conceive of stronger considerations than those which are now urging Englishmen to do what may be in their power for the promotion of an increased supply from cotton-growing countries other than the States of America.

"Besides these reasons which apply to the promotion of the cotton-supply in India, or in our own West Indian islands, there is one peculiar to the case of Africa which makes it important that no opportunities of encouraging the cotton-growth of that continent should be neglected. The African supply, if ever it become large, will not only check the rise in the price of cotton, and therefore of slaves in America,—but it will diminish the profits of slave exportation on the coast of Africa. Experience has now sufficiently proved to us, that no one agency has been so effective in paralyzing the slave trade as the growth of any branch of profitable industry which convinces the native African chiefs that they can get a surer and, in the long run, larger profit by employing their subjects in peaceful labor, than they can even get from the large but uncertain gains of the slave trade..... Once let the African chiefs find out, as in many instances they have already found out, that the sale of the laborer can be only a source of profit once, while his labor may be a source of constant and increasing profit, and we shall hear no more of their killing the hen which may lay so many golden eggs, for the sake only of a solitary and final prize."

The American Missionary, of April, 1859, gives a condensed statement of a discussion in the British Parliament, last summer, in which the condition of cotton culture in Africa was brought out, and its encouragement strongly urged as a means of suppressing the slave trade, and of increasing the supplies of that commodity to the manufacturers of England. S. Fitzgerald, Under Secretary of State, said:

"He did not scruple to say that, looking at the papers which he had perused, it was to the West Coast of Africa that we must look for that large increase in our supply of cotton which was now becoming absolutely necessary, and without which he and others who had studied this subject foresaw grave consequences to the most important branch of the manufactures of this country. Our consul at Lagos reported:

"The whole of the Yoruba and other countries south of the Niger, with the Houssa and the Nuffe countries on the north side of that river, have been, from all time, cotton-growing countries; and notwithstanding the civil wars, ravages, disorders and disruptions caused by the slave trade, more than sufficient cotton to clothe their populations has always been cultivated, and their fabrics have found markets and a ready sale in those countries where the cotton plant is not cultivated, and into which the fabrics of Manchester and Glasgow have not yet penetrated. The cultivation of cotton, therefore, in the above-named countries is not new to the inhabitants; all that is required is to offer them a market for the sale of as much as they can cultivate, and by preventing the export of slaves from the seaboard render some security to life, freedom, property, and labor." Another of our consuls, speaking of the trade in the Bight of Benin in 1856, said:

"'The readiness with which the inhabitants of the large town of Abbeokuta have extended their cultivation of the cotton plant merits the favorable notice of the manufacturer and of the philanthropist, as a means of supplanting the slave trade.'"

"It was worthy of notice that while the quantity of cotton obtained from America between 1784 and 1791, the first seven years of the importation into this country was only 74 bales; during the years 1855 and 1856 the town of Abbeokuta alone exported nearly twenty times that quantity. He thought he might fairly say that if we succeed in repressing the slave-trade, as he believed we should, we should in a few years receive a very large supply of this most important article from the West Coast of Africa."

"Mr. J. H. Gurney said he had received from Mr. Thomas Clegg, of Manchester, a few figures, from which it appeared that while in 1852 only 1800 lbs. of cotton had been brought into Great Britain from Africa, in the first five months of the present year it was 94,400 lbs.

"Mr. Buxton said: 'There was no question now, that any required amount of cotton, equal to that of New Orleans in quality, might be obtained. A very short time ago Mr. Clegg, of Manchester, aided by the Rev. H. Venn, and a few other gentlemen, trained and sent out two or three young negroes as agents to Abbeokuta. These young men taught the natives to collect and clean their cotton, and sent it home to England. The result was, that the natives had actually purchased 250 cotton-gins for cleaning their cotton. Mr. Clegg stated that he was in correspondence with seventy-six natives and other African traders, twenty-two of them being chiefs. With one of them Mr. Clegg had a transaction, by which he (the African) received £3500. And the amount of cotton received at Manchester had risen, hand over hand, till it came last year to nearly 100,000 lbs.' Well might Mr. Clegg say, that this was 'a rare instance of the rapid development of a particular trade, and the more so because every ounce of cotton had been collected, all labor performed, and the responsibility borne by native Africans alone.' The fact was, that the West African natives were not mere savages. In trade no men could show more energy and quickness. And a considerable degree of social organization existed. He could give a thousand proofs of this, but he would only quote a word or two from Lieutenant May's despatch to Lord Clarendon, dated the 24th of November, 1857. Lieutenant May crossed overland from the Niger to Lagos, and he says:

"A very pleasing and hopeful part of my report lies in the fact, that certainly three-quarters of the country was under cultivation. Nor was this the only evidence of the industry and peace of the country; in every hut is cotton spinning; in every town is weaving, dyeing; often iron smelting, pottery works, and other useful employments are to be witnessed; while from town to town, for many miles, the entire road presents a continuous file of men, women, and children carrying these articles of their production for sale. I entertain feelings of much increased respect for the industry and intellect of these people, and admiration for their laws and manners."

"Lord Palmerston said: 'I venture to say that you will find on the West Coast of Africa a most valuable supply of cotton, so essential to the manufactures of this country. The cotton districts of Africa are more extensive than those of India. The access to them is more easy than to the Indian cotton district; and I venture to say that your commerce with the Western Coast of Africa, in the article of cotton, will, in a few years, prove to be far more valuable than that of any other portion of the world, the United States alone excepted.'"

The London Anti-Slavery Reporter, as quoted by the American Missionary of March, 1859, says:

"A few days ago, Mr. Consul Campbell addressed us, saying: 'African cotton is no myth. A vessel has just arrived from Lagos with 607 bales on board, on native account. Several hundred bales more have been previously shipped this year.'

"In order to afford our readers some idea of the extraordinary development of this branch of native African industry and commerce, we append a statement which will exhibit it at a single glance. We have only to observe that we are indebted to Mr. Thomas Clegg, of Manchester, for these interesting particulars, and that the quantities ordered have been obtained from Abbeokuta alone. He is about to extend the field of his operations. Four Europeans have gone out, expressly to trade in native cotton; and several London houses, encouraged by the success which has attended Mr. Clegg's experiment, are about to invest largely in the same traffic. The quantity of raw cotton which has already been imported into England, from Abbeokuta, since 1851, is 276,235 lbs., and the trade has developed itself as follows:

"The last importation includes advices from Lagos up to the 1st of last November. Since that time, the presses and other machinery sent out, have been got into full work, and the quantity of the raw staple in stock has rapidly accumulated, the bulk shipped being on 'native account.' Each bag or bale weighs about 120 lbs. Let it be borne in mind that the whole of this quantity has been collected, all the labor performed and the responsibility borne by native Africans; while the cost of production, Mr. Clegg informs us, does not exceed one half-penny a pound in the end. It can be laid down in England at about 4¹/₄d. a pound, and sells at from 7d. to 9d."

The great point of interest in this movement consists in the fact, that in promoting the production of cotton in Africa, Englishmen are giving direct encouragement to the employment of slave labor. It is an undeniable fact, that from eight-tenths to nine-tenths of the population of Africa are held as slaves by the petty kings and chiefs; and that, more especially, the women, under the prevailing system of polygamy, are doomed to out-doors' labor for the support of their indolent and sensual husbands. Hitherto the labor of the women has, in general, been comparatively light, as the preparation of food and clothing limited the extent of effort required of them; but now, the cotton mills of England must be supplied by them, and the hum of the spindles will sound the knell of their days of ease. That we are not alone in this view of the question, will appear from the opinions expressed by the American Missionary, when referring to this subject. It says:

"An encouraging feature in this movement is, that the men engaged in it all feel that the suppression of the slave trade is absolutely essential to its success. The necessity of this is the great burden of all their arguments in its behalf. It thus acts with a double force. There can be no question that the development of the resources of Africa will be an effectual means, in itself, of discouraging the exportation of slaves, while at the same time those who would encourage this development are seeking the overthrow of that infamous traffic as the necessary removal of an obstacle to their success.

"There is, however, one danger connected with all this that can not be obviated by any effort likely to be put forth under the stimulus of commerce, or the spirit of trade. This danger can be averted only by sending the missionaries of a pure gospel, a gospel of equal and impartial love, into Africa, in numbers commensurate with the increase of its agricultural resources and its spirit of general enterprise.

"The danger to which we allude is not merely that of worldliness, such as in a community always accompanies an increase of wealth, but that the slavery now existing there may be strengthened and increased by the rapid rise in the value of labor, and thus become so firmly rooted that the toil of ages may be necessary for it removal. All this might have been prevented if the spirit of Christian enterprise had gone ahead of that of commerce, and thus prepared the way for putting commerce, under the influence of Christianity. For years Africa has been open to the missionary of the cross, to go everywhere preaching love to God and man, with nothing to hinder except the sickliness of the climate. This evil, and the dangers arising from it, business men are willing to risk, and within the next ten years there will be thousands, and tens of thousands, looking to Africa for the means of increasing their riches."

From all this it appears, that the question of slavery is becoming more intimately blended with cotton culture than at any former period; and that the urgent demand for its increased production must establish the system permanently, under the control of Great Britain, in Africa itself. Look at the facts, and especially at the position of Great Britain. The supply of cotton is inadequate to the demands of the manufacturing nations. Great Britain stands far in advance of all others in the quantity consumed. The ratio of increased production in the United States cannot be advanced except by a renewal of the slave trade, or a resort to the scheme of immigration on the plan of England and France. It is thought by English writers, that the renewal of the slave trade by the United States is inevitable, as a consequence of the present high prices of cotton and slaves, unless the slave traders can be shut out from the slave markets of Africa. They assume it as a settled principle, that the immigration system is impracticable wherever slavery exists; and that the American planter can only succeed in securing additional labor by means of the slave trade. Then, according to this theory, to prevent an increased production of cotton in the United States, it is only necessary to make it impracticable for us to renew that traffic.

The supply of cotton from India is not on the increase, nor can be, except when prices rule high in England, or until rail roads shall be constructed into the interior, a work requiring much time and money. The renewal of the slave trade by the United States, on a large scale, would, of course, cheapen cotton in the proportion of the amount of labor supplied. In this view the writers referred to are correct. They are right also in supposing that a reduction below present prices, of a cent or two per pound, would be ruinous to India in the present condition of her inland transportation. They desire, very naturally, therefore, that prices should be kept up for the advantage of India, so that its cotton can bear export. But while high prices benefit India, they also enrich the American planter, and afford him inducements to renew the slave trade.

Here Great Britain is thrown into a dilemma. The slave trade to America must be prevented, in her opinion, or it will ruin the East Indies. To prevent the renewal of this traffic—to keep up the price of cotton as long as may be necessary, for the benefit of India, and prevent a supply of African slaves from reaching the American planter—is a problem that requires more than an ordinary amount of skill to solve. That skill, if it exists any where, is possessed by British statesmen, and they are now employed in the execution of this difficult task. They are convinced that free labor cannot be found, at this moment, any where in the world, to meet the growing demands for cotton. To supply this increasing demand, a new element must be brought into requisition; or rather old elements must be employed anew. Her cotton spindles must not cease to whir, or millions of the people of Great Britain will starve at home, or be forced into emigration, to the weakening of her strength. The old sources of supply being inadequate, a new field of operations must be opened up—new forces must be brought into requisition in the cultivation of cotton. Slave labor and free labor, both combined, are not now able to furnish the quantity needed. Free labor cannot be increased, at present, in this department of production. Slave labor, therefore, is the only means left by which the work can be accomplished—not slave labor to the extent now employed, but to the extent to which it may be increased from the ranks of the scores of millions of the population of Africa.

This is the true state of the case; and the important question now agitated is: Who shall have the advantages of this labor? Two fields, only, present themselves in which this additional labor can be employed—Africa and America. Great Britain is deeply interested in limiting it to Africa, which she can only do by preventing a renewal of the slave trade to America: for she takes it for granted that we will renew the slave trade if we can make money by the operation. South Africa is unavailable for this purpose, as it is under British rule, and slavery abolished within its limits by law. Nothing can be done there, as it is filling up with English emigrants who will not toil, under a burning sun, in the cotton fields; and they can not be permitted to reduce the natives again to slavery. West Africa alone, affords the climate, soil, and population, necessary to success in cotton culture. To this point the attention of Englishmen is now mainly directed. One feature in the civil condition of West Africa must be specially noticed, as adapting it to the purposes to which it is to be devoted. The territory has not been seized by the British crown, as in South Africa, and British law does not bear rule within its limits. The tribes are treated as independent sovereignties, and are governed by their own customs and laws. This is fortunate for the new policy now inaugurating, as the native chiefs and kings hold the population at large as slaves. Heretofore they have sold their slaves at will, as well as their captives taken in war, to the slave traders. Now they are to be taught a different policy by Englishmen; and the African slaveholders are to be convinced that they will make more money by employing their slaves in growing cotton, than in selling them to be carried off to the American planters. This done, and the transportation of laborers to the United States will be prevented. This will put it out of the power of our planters, to increase their production of cotton so as to reduce prices; and this will enable India to complete her rail roads, so as to be able to compete with American cotton at any price whatever.

But this new policy, if successful, will do more than stop the slave trade, to the supposed injury of the American planter. England will thereby have the benefit of the labor of Africa secured to herself. With its scores of millions of population under her direction, she hopes to compete with American slavery in the production of cotton; and not only to compete with it, but to surpass it altogether, and, in time, to render it so profitless as to force emancipation upon us. She will there have access to a population ten fold greater than that of the slave population of the United States; and the only doubt of success exists in the question, as to whether the negro master in Africa can make the slave work as well there as the white master in America has done here.

But how shall England, in this measure, preserve her "traditional policy," in which she pledged herself no longer to cherish slave labor. This will be very easily done. She need not authorize slavery in Western Africa; but as it already exists among all the tribes "by local law," she has only to recognize their independence, and bargain with the chiefs for all the cotton they can force their slaves to produce. This has already been done, by Englishmen, at several points in Africa, and will doubtless be resorted to in many other portions of that country. The moral responsibility of establishing slavery permanently in Africa, will thus be thrown upon the chiefs and kings, as it has heretofore been upon the American planter; and Great Britain can reap all the advantages of the increased production of slave labor cotton, while her moralists can easily satisfy the conscience of the people at home, by declaiming against the system which secures to them their bread.

Here now the policy of British statesmen can be comprehended. They must have cotton. The products of free labor would be preferred, but as it can not be had, in sufficient quantities, they must take that of slave labor. To allow the American planter to supply this want, by renewing the slave trade, would ruin India and benefit America. To save India, and, at the same time, to secure the cotton demanded by the manufacturers, slavery is to be encouraged in Africa; and this is to be done as a means not only of preventing the slave trade, and checking the extension of slavery in America, but of multiplying the fields of cotton cultivation—a policy very essential to the wants of the British nation. Thus, slavery is to be promoted in Africa as an effectual means of checking it in America; it is to be converted into a blessing there, and made instrumental in wiping out its curse here!

And this, now, is the result of England's philanthropic efforts for African freedom. Her economical errors, in West Indian emancipation, are to be repaired by the permanent establishment of slavery in Africa! But what must be the practical moral effect of her policy? What must be the opinion entertained of the negro race, when Great Britain abandons her policy in reference to them? This is not hard to divine. It will wipe out the odium she has managed to cast upon the system; and, so far as her example is concerned, will justify the American planter in refusing to emancipate his slaves. Her conduct is a practical acknowledgment of the Southern theory of the African race—that slavery is their normal condition, otherwise she must have adopted the same policy in West Africa that she has in South Africa.

But before closing this part of our investigations, it may be well to examine the claims of Great Britain in relation to her humanity towards the African, or any of the inferior races doomed to lives of toil—such as the coolies of India and the laborers of China.

The contest for the advantages of supplying the increasing demands for cotton, is between Great Britain operating in India and Africa, and the American planter operating by an increased amount of labor furnished by means of the slave trade. The contest between the parties may be imagined as assuming this form: A portion of the American planters insist, that they should be allowed to manage this matter; but Great Britain says, nay: my subjects can do it better than you can. You Americans are governed by mercenary motives: we Britons by philanthropic intentions. You Americans have made no sacrifices for the cause of humanity: we Britons have emancipated our West India slaves.

Aye, aye, replies the American planter; we understand all about the humanity of which you boast. Your special type of philanthropy is fully displayed in the history of your West Indies. Look at it. The total importation of slaves from Africa into your West Indian Islands, was 1,700,000 persons; of whom and their descendants, in 1833, only 660,000 remained for emancipation; we had less than 400,000 imported Africans, of whom and their descendants there existed among us, in 1850, more than 3,600,000 persons of African descent; that is to say, the number of Africans and their descendants in the United States, is nearly eight or ten to one of those that were imported, whilst in the British West Indies there are not two persons remaining for every five imported.[37] And besides, we have 500,000 free colored persons among us, a number nearly equal to that which your emancipation act set at liberty, and more than the whole number imported. Your slavery seems to have been a system of wholesale slaughter: ours the reverse.

All true, says Britain: but then we have ceased to do evil, and are learning to do well. We found "that slavery was bearing our colonies down to ruin with awful speed; that had it lasted but another half century, they must have sunk beyond recovery."[38]

What! says the planter; sunk beyond recovery! why, we find our slaves rapidly increasing, and ourselves almost "made of gold." Be pleased to explain, why slavery in the hands of Englishmen should be so destructive, while with the American it is not only profitable to the slaveholder himself, but the comfort of the slaves has been so well secured, from the first, that their natural increase has been about equal to that of any other people in the full enjoyment of the necessaries of life.

Certainly, says Britain: having done our duty, we are free to confess, that "what gave the death blow to slavery, in the minds of English statesmen, was the population returns, which showed the fact, 'the appalling fact,' that although only eleven out of the eighteen islands had sent them in, yet in those eleven islands the slaves had decreased in twelve years, by no less than 60,219, namely: from 558,194 to 497,975![39] Had similar returns been procured from the other seven colonies (including Mauritius, Antigua, Barbadoes, and Granada,) the decrease must have been little, if at all, less than 100,000! Now it was plain to every one that if this were really so, the system could not last. The driest economist would allow that it would not pay, to let the working classes be slaughtered. To work the laboring men of our West Indies to death, might bring in a good return for a while, but could not be a profitable enterprise in the long run. Accordingly, this was the main, we had almost said the only, topic of the debates on slavery in 1831 and 1832. Is slavery causing a general massacre of the working classes in our sugar islands, or is it not, was a question worth debating, in the pounds, shillings, and pence view, as well as in the moral one. And debated it was, long and fiercely. The result was the full establishment of the dreadful fact. The slaves, as Mr. Marryatt said, were 'dying like rotten sheep.' Whatever then may be said for West Indian slavery, this damning thing must be said of it, that the slaves were dying of it. Then came emancipation."[40] And in performing this act—in demonstrating to the world the destructive character of slavery—Englishmen expected America to follow their example, and to emancipate her slaves also.

And thereby deceived yourselves, says the planter, into the ruin of your islands, without effecting any good for the Africans at large, and but little for those upon whom your bounties were bestowed. And, then, we cannot see the vastness of your philanthropy, in allowing such destructive cruelties to prevail so long, and in only emancipating your slaves when it was apparent they must soon become extinct under the lash, as applied by the hands of Britons. We know that you claimed that slavery was the same everywhere, and that humane men in our country were deceived into the belief that American slavery was as ruinous to life as British West Indian slavery. We know that the elder Mr. Buxton, in 1831, used this language, "where the blacks are free they increase. But let there be a change in only one circumstance, let the population be the same in every respect, only let them be slaves instead of freemen, and the current is immediately stopped;" and, in support of this, his biographer adds: "This appalling fact was never denied, that at the time of the abolition of the slave trade, the number of slaves in the West Indies was 800,000; in 1830 it was 700,000; that is to say, in twenty-three years it had diminished by 100,000."[41] This assertion, that slavery is always destructive of life, was made by Mr. Buxton, in the face of the fact, that ten distinct sets of our Census tables were then accessible to him, in each one of which he had the evidence that American slavery, instead of reducing the number of our slave population, tended to its rapid increase. From this and kindred acts of that gentleman, we came to the conclusion, that, though he might be very benevolent, he was not very truthful; and was, therefore, a very unsafe guide to follow, as you must now acknowledge; unsafe, because your emancipation on a small scale, before securing a general emancipation by other countries, has thrown you under the necessity of now attempting to establish slavery elsewhere on a large scale; unsafe, because your negro population have not made half the moral progress under freedom, that ours have done under slavery; and because, that, where cultivation has depended upon the emancipated negro alone, with a single exception, the islands have almost gone to ruin.[42]

You misinterpret facts, says Britain: our islands are not ruined; no, by no means. Under slavery they would have been totally ruined; but emancipation has placed them in a position favorable to a full development of all their resources. "It is to be borne in mind that the influx of free labor is exactly one of those advantages of which a land is debarred by slavery. It is a part of the curse of slavery that it repels the freeman. When we are told that to judge of the effect of emancipation we must exclude those colonies that imported coolies, we reply at once that this useful importation has been one of the many blessings that freedom has brought in her train."[43]

I understand your views now, says the planter: but for emancipation, your colonies would have sunk to irretrievable destruction. That measure has prepared the way for the coolie system; and under its operations the prosperity of your islands is on the increase. But what is the character of this coolie system, that is working such wonders? In what does it differ from the slave trade, of which you desire to deprive us? And what must be its effects upon the colored population, which have received their freedom at your hands, and whose moral elevation your Christian missionaries are laboring to promote? On this point I would not multiply testimony. The character of the coolie traffic is but too well understood, and is now believed by all intelligent men to be the slave trade in disguise. A writer, representing the anti-slavery society of Great Britain, makes these statements.[44]

"I am prepared to show, that fraud, misrepresentation, and actual violence are the constituent elements of the immigration system, even as it is now conducted, and that no vigilance on the part of the government which superintends its prosecution can prevent the abuses incidental to it..... In China, especially, this is notoriously the case, and I refer you to Sir John Bowring's despatches on Immigration from China, for the fullest revelations. I need only add, that he designates the Chinese coolie traffic as being in every essential particular 'as bad as the African slave trade,' and that he recommends its entire prohibition..... The mortality during the sea-voyage is so great, that the Emigration Commissioners declare 'these results to be shocking to humanity, and disgraceful to the manner in which the traffic is carried on.' I beg to call your special attention to the term 'traffic,' and to refer you for particulars of the mortality, to the Emigration Commissioners' Report for 1858. They may be briefly summarised. During the season 1856-57 the deaths at sea amounted to 17.²⁶/₁₀₀ per cent. on 4,094 coolies shipped from Calcutta—a rate which, if computed for the whole year, instead of 90 days, the term of the voyage, would average upwards of 70 per cent. The rate of mortality on shipments of Chinese bound to British Guiana, varied from 14 per cent. to 50..... On shipments of Chinese bound to Havanna, on board British vessels, the death-rate fluctuated between 20 per cent. and 60. Yet, sir, immigration is said, by its advocates, to be now conducted on an improved system..... We come now to the treatment of the coolie, as soon as he is discharged from the ship. There is no official evidence, that I am yet aware of, to show what abuses of authority he is subjected to, but the Jamaica Immigration Bill, now awaiting the sanction of Her Majesty's Government, proves that the imported laborer is, during his term of service, subject to conditions quite incompatible with a system of free labor, and the same remark applies to other colonies. That the immigrants are liable to ill usage and neglect, may be gathered from the reports of travelers who have seen them in every stage of destitution and misery; and that they are peculiarly affected by the kind of service they contract to render, and by climate, is sufficiently proved by the awful mortality during industrial residence, which we are assured the Immigration Agent General's returns for Jamaica show to be equal to 50 per cent. Sir E. B. Lytton admits it to be 33 per cent. But if we accept his correction—which I confess I am not prepared to do without knowing upon what evidence he makes it—I maintain that even this death-rate establishes the startling fact, that coolie labor in Jamaica is proportionately more destructive to human life than slave labor in Cuba."

On the question of the influence that the coolie immigration exerts upon the emancipated blacks in the West Indies, the Editor of the London Economist very justly remarks:

"Bringing with them depraved heathen habits, and the detestable traditions of the worst forms of idolatry, and always looking forward to their return as the epoch when they will renew their heathen worship and find themselves again among heathen standards of action,—they are almost proof against the best influences which can be brought to bear upon them, and, what is worse, they are not only proof against the good, but missionaries for evil. They are closely associated in their labor with a race that is just emerging out of barbarism with the fostering care of Christianity, and we need not say that their social influence on such a race is deteriorating in the extreme. The difficulty would be indefinitely diminished, were the new immigrants a permanent addition to the population. By careful regulations for that purpose, they might, in that case, be subdued by the higher influences of their English teachers; but the prospect of speedy restoration to the country and habits of their birth, entirely foils such attempts as these. How far this great difficulty can be overcome; and if it cannot, how far it may more than balance the moral and physical advantages of a fuller labor market,—it requires the most careful inquiry to determine." Here now are four distinct points upon which the testimony shows, conclusively, that the coolie system is worse than ever the slave trade has been represented to be; and that as the slave trade is opposed on the ground of the destruction of human life which attends it, so the coolie system should be abandoned upon the same grounds. The points are these: 1st, the frauds and cruelties incident to the procuring of immigrants; 2d, the mortality during the middle passage; 3d, the mortality in the islands where they are employed; 4th, the influence of the heathen coolies in demoralizing the emancipated blacks among whom they are intermingled. These points demand serious consideration by Britons, as well as Americans—by those who would reopen the slave trade, as well as those who would substitute for that traffic the immigration system.

And now, in conclusion, says the planter, I must beg to demur to Britain's claiming a monopoly of all the philanthropy in the world toward the African race; and upon that claim founding another which, if granted, will secure to her the monopoly of all the labor of Africa itself; and I would beg, further, that myself and my fellow planters may be excused, if we cannot see any thing more in all her movements than a determination to have a full supply of cotton, even at the risk of dooming Africa to become one vast slave plantation.

While a faithful view of the plans and expectations of the British, in relation to the production of cotton in Africa, has been presented, it would be doing injustice to the reader not to give a few facts, in closing, which indicate that their success, after all, may not equal their anticipations. The Rev. T. J. Bowen,[45] says of African cotton generally, that "the staple is good, but the yield can not be more than one-fourth of what it was on similar lands in the Southern States;" and of Yoruba, in particular, he says, that "both upland and sea island cotton are planted; but neither produces very well, owing to the extreme and constant heat of the climate." Of this, Mr. Bowen, who is a native of Georgia, must be regarded as a good judge. He spent six years as a missionary of the Baptist Church in exploring the Abbeokuta and Yoruba country. This cause of short crops in Yoruba is evidently incurable. It does not exist in equal force in Liberia and its vicinity. Mr. Bowen says: "The average in the dry season is about 80 degrees at Ijaye, and 82 at Ogbomoshaw, and a few degrees lower during the rains. I have never known the mercury to rise higher than 93 degrees in the shade, at Ijaye. The highest reading at Ogbomoshaw was 97.5." These places are from 100 to 150 miles inland.[46]

Another remark. The confidence with which it is asserted, that immigration is impracticable as a means of obtaining labor, wherever slavery prevails, will remind the reader of another theory to which Englishmen long tried to make us converts: that slave labor is necessarily unprofitable and should be abandoned on economical grounds. Now they are forced to admit that our planters seem to "be made of gold." Perhaps these same planters can use immigrant labor as successfully as slave labor. If necessary, doubtless, they will make the attempt, notwithstanding the opinions entertained beyond the sea.