CHA P. with the accommodations and diet neceffary to fupport them

I.

Africa hitherto ne

glected.

Caufes of

under their exertions. Such, except in the case of Pennfylvania and one or two others, appears to be a pretty good general sketch of the characters and conduct of the first European colonics. We cannot here be more particular; but, if the intelligent reader will call to mind the various difafters and diftreffes which the original settlers of most of the modern European colonies fuffered, he will not wonder that some of them failed, but that almost any of them succeeded. The liberal spirit of enterprize, however, which then animated the merchants of fome nations, and the governments of others, in many cafes, repaired first miscarriages, overcame every obstacle, and at length founded colonies, fome of which now emulate powerful nations.

2. While fuch fplendid eftablishments have been formed in Afia and America, "it is melancholy to observe that" Africa, a country much more acceffible to European commerce than either Afia or America, and, "which has near 10,000 miles of fea-coaft, and noble, large, deep rivers, should yet have no navigation; ftreams penetrating into the the very centre of the country, but of no benefit to it. In short, Africa, though a full quarter of the globe, stored with an inexhaustible treasure, and capable, under proper improvements, of producing fo many things delightful as well as convenient, seems utterly neglected by those who are civilized themselves*." It may not be amifs briefly to state what appear to me to have been among the causes of the neglect which the respectable author here notices.

3. One grand incitement to European enterprize, in the this neglect. fifteenth century, feems to have been the discovery of a

Poftlethwayt's Dictionary, Article "Africa."

paffage

I.

paffage by fea to the East Indies, which fhould lay open C HA P. to all nations the commerce of that country, then monopolized by the Venetians. In 1492, Columbus, in quest of a westerly passage to the East Indies, was unexpectedly interrupted in his course by the islands of America. In 1497, Vasquez de Gama pursued and accomplished the same object, by doubling the Cape of Good Hope.

trade.

4. Both these events appear to have operated greatly to The Slavethe disadvantage of Africa. The coaft of that continent, after having served as a clue to conduct navigators to the East Indies, was itself comparatively neglected; not on account of any natural inferiority in it's foil, climate, or productions; but because the Africans, not having advanced fo far in the arts as the East Indians, nor having then discovered fuch quantities of the precious metals as the Americans, could not immediately fupply the European demand for those desirable productions, which the commerce of the East afforded. Thus Afia and America became the principal theatres of the ambition and avidity of the Europeans; and happy had it been for Africa if they had fo continued. But it is diftreffing to recollect the rapid progrefs of European iniquity among the fimple and untutored nations inhabiting the other quarters of the world. Their operations in America were deplorably injurious to Africa. was foon found that the aborigines of the former could not endure the toils imposed on them by their new masters. "The natives of Hifpaniola alone were reduced, in fifteen years, from at least one million to about 60,000*." Hence arose the apparent or pretended neceffity (for there never can be any real neceffity to commit villainy) of reforting to

Robertfon's Hiftory of America.

It

II.

CHAP. Africa for a fupply of labourers, in form of flaves. Here commenced the Slave-trade, that scourge of the human race, which has kept down a great part of the Africans in a state of anarchy and blood, and which, while it's nefarious existence is tolerated, will prove the grand obstacle to their improvement and civilization. Early in the fixteenth century, this traffic had affumed an appearance of system; for we find that, in 1517, the Emperor Charles V. granted a patent to certain flave-merchants for the annual fupply of 4000 negroes to the islands of Hifpaniola, Cuba, Jamaica and Porto Rico. It has fince been cherished with as much care, as if the very existence of legitimate commerce depended on it, and as if, in principle and practice, it perfectly accorded with the feelings and fentiments of it's patrons.

The Weft Indies derive

ance from

Africa.

5. Without undervaluing the Weft Indian fugar colotheir import- nies, we may venture to obferve, that their importance, nay, according to the planters themselves, their very existence, depends on Africa. That continent fupplies them with flaves, whom they call by the foft name of "Negro labourers," and who alone confer a value on their property. Some affirm, with much probability, that they also owe to Africa the very object of their labours. Certain it is, that the sugar-cane grows fpontaneously in Africa; but whether it be a native of the Weft Indies, is a controverted point. Be this as it may, was furely fomewhat prepofterous to drag the Africans to the West Indies, there to drudge amidst whips and chains, in cultivating a commodity which, had they been prudently and humanely dealt with, they might have been induced to raise, as an article of commerce, upon their own foil, and that much nearer to the European markets than the nearest of the West Indian

iflands.

I.

iflands*. But the very vicinity of Africa, which fhould CHA P. have recommended it to the Europeans, may have operated to it's disadvantage; for mankind generally set the greatest value on things diftant and difficult to be obtained. Dif tance, like a fog, confuses objects, and lends them a magnitude that does not belong to them; and thus fascinates and misleads men of warm imaginations, often to their injury, fometimes to their ruin.

merchants

6. But the flave-trade, as carried on in Africa, not only Oppofition of impedes the progress of the natives in the arts of industry and planters. and peace; but also now prevents the European merchants concerned in it, or in the sugar colonies, from countenancing the colonization of that continent, from an ill founded apprehension, that such new establishments may interfere with those in the West Indies. It is indeed well known, that the Sierra Leona Company experienced very great op pofition from the selfish and ungenerous African traders, and West Indian merchants and planters. In justice, however, to several of the more liberal individuals of those bodies, we must observe, that, disregarding vulgar prejudices, they saw no cause of alarm from fuch establishments. They probably confidered, that self-interest is always, in the end, best promoted by liberality; and that as all the cotton pro

* Voyages from England to the nearest of the West Indian islands are performed, on an average, in about thirty days; to the moft diftant, in about fix weeks---A voyage to Sierra Leona occupies about twenty days; but Mr. Falconbridge once arrived there from England in feventeen days. Voyages home both from Africa and the Weft Indies, are longer than those to them, from the oppofition of the trade winds; and homeward bound ships from Jamaica, St. Domingo, Cuba, and the Bahamas are farther interrupted by the gulph ftream.---In 1782, a French frigate arrived at Senegal from Breft in thirteen days, and returned in fifteen.---The Chevalier de Boufflers told me that he arrived at Senegal from Havrẻ in twenty days, and that the veffel returned to Havre in the fame time.

I.

CHA P. duced in the British islands is quite inadequate to the demand of the British manufacturers, fo the consumption of fugar being rapidly increasing, in Europe and America, and capable of indefinite extenfion, the time may not be very distant when all the sugar that can be produced on the West Indian plantations already settled, may be equally inadequate to the fupply of the European and American markets. I fay on the West Indian plantations already fettled; for it is the opinion of persons well acquainted with Weft Indian affairs, that those plantations cannot, on the present system, be profitably extended.

Objections against colo

anfwered.

7. Besides the foregoing obstructions to the colonization nizing Africa of Africa, feveral well meaning people have stated some objections which ought to be answered.-First, "They fear that the colonization of Africa would introduce, among the fimple and innocent natives of that continent, the corrupted manners of the Europeans."-I answer, that the flave-trade has already introduced, into thofe parts of Africa where it prevails, the manners of the most corrupted of the Europeans; but that a colony of fober, honest and industrious people from Europe, who will of courfe fix their refidence where there is little or no flave-trade, and who will fupport themselves by agriculture, and not by commerce, need not excite any alarm whatever on this head. "But the Europeans, it may be faid, corrupted the aborigines of North America, though neither party dealt in flaves." This is unfortunately true; but it is equally true that this corruption was the work of European traders, and not of European farmers. The genius of commerce unfortunately prevailed, more than it ought to have done, in the first establishment of the European colonies, in the new world. Of the confequences of this unhappy afcendancy of commerce over agriculture, many

melan