of the sale of
white captives by the Indians would be productive of good. The natural
result would rather be that the Indians would kill their white
captives at once or torture them to death. At the best the prisoners
would in most cases, if adults become slaves and if young be adopted
into the tribe. There are numerous instances of white captives being
slain because unsaleable while the Negroes escaped death because they
found a ready market. See the story of Thomas Ridout, post, note 37.
The order of Haldimand will be found in the Canadian Archives.

[29] Remembering that Sarah Cole was bought by Campbell from the
Indians at Carleton Island (near Kingston) it seems likely that
Francis Cole was her brother or some other relation. That Adams says
nothing of Sarah is not at all strange.

The Mississagua Indians occupied a great part of the territory now the
Province of Ontario and were always loyal to the British Crown.

[30] In the "Return of Prisoners whoa have requested leave to remain
in the Province made at Quebec, November 3, 1782," appear the names of
"Mich. & Phoebe Roach to remain at Montreal to receive a child with
the Savages and a man at Carleton Island." These were white. The
Report of the Negroes follows. _Canadian Archives_, B. 163, p. 258.

[31] The York Shilling (or shilling in New York currency) was 12-1/2
cents, one eighth of a dollar.

[32] $5.00 for the rum; $3.00 for the Keggs.

[33] _Canadian Archives_, B. 216, pp. 14, sqq.

No proceedings seem to have been taken on this Petition and it is
probable that Mr. Adams had to stand the loss on Francis Cole the said
Yankee Boy as Campbell did on Sarah Cole of Pennsylvania.

Indians were not the only slavers. As soon as the Declaration of
Independence was promulgated, if not before, Boston began to fit out
privateers to prey on British trade. We read of four privateers
reported by Governor Montague as seen in the Straits of Belle Island
in 1776, two off Placentia in 1777 and in 1778 committing daily
depredations on the coast of Newfoundland. They harried the
unprotected fishermen and the farmers of Newfoundland and Labrador but
some at least of them went further. Those who had demanded political
freedom themselves denied even personal freedom to others. They seized
and carried away into slavery some of the unoffending natives, the
Eskimos, who were freemen and whose only crime was their helplessness.
One instance will suffice. The _Minerva_ privat