ON SLAVE TRADE (EAST COAST OF AFRICA).
Ill
lost, within a few weeks, four boys, whom he had engaged as servants in his house and Appendix, No. 6.
grounds; another lost three out of four; and from one set of 83, no less than 47 were dead '
in three weeks at the Powder Mills Asylum ; the most affecting circumstance in their
sorrow being that as they lay upon their dying beds the one word which they uttered with
plaintive wailings was the word Mother, mo’h-'r!” Their mothers either being many
thousand miles away, or having been put to death when their children had been stolen from
them. When, at a subsequent period, the cholera attacked the inmates there was a perfect
panic among the Africans ; because while many of the Indian inmates survived, the Africans
almost invariably succumbed to the attack. The extent to which this fearful traffic is
carried on; the depopulation which it causes; and the wide-spread -desolation of fertile
lands, must be wed known to you from other testimony. But there is one point on which
abundant proof has been given me from the rescued Africans in Mauritius, viz., their
bein^ brought from places near to a sea of fresh water, with mountains beyond it, and their
having to travel a very long way before they reached the sea ; a plain corroboration of the
statements of General Rigby and others as to the depopulation and consequent desolation,
caused mainly, if not entirely, to the operations of the slave trade. It is evident that in
the state of utter uncertainty and confusion caused by the raids of the slave dealers any
powerful tribe would have the opportunity of attacking and plundering weaker neighbours
for purposes of its own ; and, though in some cases the depredations committed by such a
tribe may not be directly connected with the s ave trade, yet those who persistently carry
on tha traffic year after after year are responsible for the utterly demoralised and weakened
condition of other tribes which invites such predatory aggression by its inability to withstand
them.
With reference to the measures to be adopted for the benefit of the captured slave, I
can testify from personal observation to tiie humanising, civilising, and Christianising
effeens of the industrial schools established in connection with the Church of England in
Mauritius, and very especially the Powder Mills Asylum, a Government establishment
under that superintendence. Any extension of that system would lead to a proportionate
increase in the numbi r of skilled arlizans, respectable domestic servants, teachers, and
catechists, and to a preparation of men who might return to the Continent of Africa as
some of tht most efficient helpers in the work of civilising the people and stimulating
lawful trade.
The beneficial results obtained by the labours of the Church Missionary Society on the
western coasts supply the strongest encouragement for the application of the same benevolent
principles and methoils of action on the east.
The proportion to make Zanzibar the de¡ 6i is one which I would respectiully bat
earnestly deprecate, for the following reasens. In the fiist place, because of the impracticabiliiy
of upholding an institution containing liberated n groes in the midst of a population
of slaves of the same race, brought in most instances from the same localities.
Secondly, from the difficulty vvhich would be raised in the w iy of all efforts to evangelise
those whose rescue by a Christian nation involves the obligation to endeavour to impart to
them them the knowledge of Christianity, Thirdly, because the establishment of a depot
for free labour at Zanzibar, providing a regular supply of natives to work in Reunion and
elsewhere, would directly had to the very same operations in the interior of Africa, against
which the late Earl of Chirem'on, as Foreign Secretary, remonstrati d so strongly some
years ago. The system of the “ libres engages ” led to most of the bad consequences of
tl.e slave trade in the interior of Africa itself. An Arab chief on being told tliat it was
not slavery but free labour, replied to this effect;
“ All same ting to me. Old time you call it slavery ; now you call it free labour ; 1 go
catch men, sell; you give the money ; all right.” And it surely would be a strange result
of British interference for supplying the slave trade that the plantations should be worked
by labourers procured by us from the hold of slave ships, and then placed beyond the
reach of our piotection.
About 60 natives of the Kingsmill group of islands to the north-east of Sydney, were
disposed of as free labourers in 1857, in Bourbon, realising to the kidnappers about 40 1.
each, for a soi-disant engagement of five or seven years ; but to the best of my knowledge
no trace of them has been obtainable since.
The c( rrespondence <m the subject is most probably at the Foreign Office.
One important item in all consideration of repressive measures is the fact that such
immense profit is made on every slave landed in Arabia. In one case of capture by the
boats of the “ Highflyer,” it was ascertained that the cost of each slave landed at Makedar ,
would be from seven to nine dollars, while the price realised for the sale would be from
60 to 90 dollars. Such a fact proves the necessity of peremptory measures of repression.
I remain, &c.
(signed) Vincent IF. Ryan,
Right Hon. Russell Gurney. Bishop.
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