We Would Ask Our Countrymen To Believe Us When We Say, As We Conscientiously Can, That It Is Our Deliberate Opinion, From What We Know And Have Seen, That Not One- Fifth Of The Victims Of The Slave-Trade Ever Become Slaves.

Taking the Shire Valley as an average, we should say not even one-tenth arrive at their destination.

As the system, therefore, involves such an awful waste of human life, - or shall we say of human labour? - and moreover tends directly to perpetuate the barbarism of those who remain in the country, the argument for the continuance of this wasteful course because, forsooth, a fraction of the enslaved may find good masters, seems of no great value. This reasoning, if not the result of ignorance, may be of maudlin philanthropy. A small armed steamer on Lake Nyassa could easily, by exercising a control, and furnishing goods in exchange for ivory and other products, break the neck of this infamous traffic in that quarter; for nearly all must cross the Lake or the Upper Shire.

Our exploration of the Lake extended from the 2nd September to the 27th October, 1861; and, having expended or lost most of the goods we had brought, it was necessary to go back to the ship. When near the southern end, on our return, we were told that a very large slave- party had just crossed to the eastern side. We heard the fire of three guns in the evening, and judged by the report that they must be at least six-pounders.

Enter page number Go  Previous Next
Page 336 of 505
Words from 90720 to 90978 of 136856