The immense distance from the seacoast
would render impossible the transport of any merchandise unless of
extreme value, as the expenses would be insupportable.
The natural
productions are nil, excepting ivory. The soil being fertile and the
climate favourable to cultivation, all tropical produce would thrive;
cotton, coffee, and the sugarcane are indigenous; but although both
climate and soil are favourable, the conditions necessary to successful
enterprise are wanting - the population is scanty, and the material of
the very worst; the people vicious and idle. The climate, although
favourable for agriculture, is adverse to the European constitution;
thus colonization would be out of the question. What can be done with so
hopeless a prospect? Where the climate is fatal to Europeans, from
whence shall civilization be imported? The heart of Africa is so
completely secluded from the world, and the means of communication are
so difficult, that although fertile, its geographical position debars
that vast extent of country from improvement: thus shut out from
civilization it has become an area for unbridled atrocities, as
exemplified in the acts of the ivory traders.
Difficult and almost impossible is the task before the Missionary. The
Austrian Mission has failed, and the stations have been forsaken; their
pious labour was hopeless, and the devoted priests died upon their
barren field. What curse lies so heavily upon Africa and bows her down
beneath all other nations? It is the infernal traffic in slaves - a trade
so hideous, that the heart of every slave and owner becomes deformed,
and shrinks like a withered limb incapable of action.
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