re be amended for him by a reminder that, in the British
Colonies, it was not Whites as masters, and Blacks as slaves, who were
affected by that momentous measure. In fact, 1838 found in the British
Colonies very nearly as many Negro and Mulatto slave-owners as there
were white. Well then, these black and yellow planters received their
quota, it may be presumed, of [120] the L20,000,000 sterling indemnity.
They were part and parcel of the proprietary body in the Colonies, and
had to meet the crisis like the rest. They were very wealthy, some of
these Ethiopic accomplices of the oppressors of their own race. Their
sons and daughters were sent, like the white planter's children, across
the Atlantic for a European education. These young folk returned to
their various native Colonies as lawyers and doctors. Many of them
were also wealthy planters. The daughters, of course, became in time
the mothers of the new generation of prominent inhabitants. Now, in
America all this was different. No "nigger," however alabaster fair,
was ever allowed the privileges of common citizenship, let alone the
right to hold property in others. If possessed by a weakness to pass
for white men, as very many of them could easily have contrived to do,
woe unto the poor impostors! They were hunted down from city to city
as few felons would be, and finally done to death--"serve them right!"
being the grim commentary regarding their fate for having sought to
usurp the ineffable privilege of whitemanship! All this, Mr. Froude,
was [121] the rule, the practice, in America, with regard to persons of
colour up to twenty-five years ago. Now, sir, what is the phenomenon
which strikes your vision in that mighty Republic to-day, with regard
to those self-same despised, discountenanced, persecuted and harried
descendants of Ham? We shall tell you of the change that has taken
place in their condition, and also some of the reasons of that
beneficent revolution.

The Proclamation of Emancipation on January 1st, 1863, was, by
President Lincoln, frankly admitted to have been a war necessity. No
abstract principle of justice or of morals was of primary consideration
in the matter. The saving of the Union at any cost,--that is, the
stern political emergency forced forth the document which was to be the
social salvation of every descendant of Ham in the United States of
America. Close upon the heels of their emancipation, the
enfranchisement of the Ne