age; when left free, as in
Liberia and in Hayti, he reverts to his original barbarism; while in
subjection to the white man he showed then, and he has shown since, high
capacities of intellect and character. Such is, such was the fact. It
struck Las Casas that if negroes could be introduced into the West
Indian islands, the Indians might be left alone; the negroes themselves
would have a chance to rise out of their wretchedness, could be made
into Christians, and could be saved at worst from the horrid fate which
awaited many of them in their own country.

The black races varied like other animals: some were gentle and timid,
some were ferocious as wolves. The strong tyrannised over the weak, made
slaves of their prisoners, occasionally ate them, and those they did not
eat they sacrificed at what they called their _customs_--offered them up
and cut their throats at the altars of their idols. These customs were
the most sacred traditions of the negro race. They were suspended while
the slave trade gave the prisoners a value. They revived when the slave
trade was abolished. When Lord Wolseley a few years back entered
Ashantee, the altars were coated thick with the blood of hundreds of
miserable beings who had been freshly slaughtered there. Still later
similar horrid scenes were reported from Dahomey. Sir Richard Burton,
who was an old acquaintance of mine, spent two months with the King of
Dahomey, and dilated to me on the benevolence and enlightenment of that
excellent monarch. I asked why, if the King was so benevolent, he did
not alter the customs. Burton looked at me with consternation. 'Alter
the customs!' he said. 'Would you have the Archbishop of Canterbury
alter the Liturgy?' Las Casas and those who thought as he did are not to
be charged with infamous inhumanity if they proposed to buy these poor
creatures from their captors, save them from Mumbo Jumbo, and carry them
to countries where they would be valuable property, and be at least as
well cared for as the mules and horses.

The experiment was tried and seemed to succeed. The negroes who were
rescued from the customs and were carried to the Spanish islands proved
docile and useful. Portuguese and Spanish factories were established on
the coast of Guinea. The black chiefs were glad to make money out of
their wretched victims, and readily sold them. The transport over the
Atlantic became a regular branch of business. Strict laws were made for
the good treatmen