Semi-weekly North-Carolina standard. [volume] (Raleigh, N.C.) 1852-1853, 1853-06-18
A MASKED BRITISH SLAVE TRADE.


We invite attention to the following interesting
article from the Baltimore American, which openly
lays bare the hollow-hearted hypocrisy of the Brit
ish government in its professions of love of liberty
and hatred of African slavery. After having, in
the appropriate language of the Savannah Repub-
lican sacrificed the interests of her planters in the
West Indies and spread desolation over those once
fertile Islands-and after having ground the faces
of her poor subjects at home, by heavy taxation,
to CRAFTY mawkish sympathy for the negro pop
ulatIon there-and while her subjects are still
burthened with pnerous taxes, to keep up an ocean
police" to detect and protect the African Slave
trade-and still further, at this very time when
the fair libeller of her country's name and desc
crater of her country's flag, Mrs. HARRIET BEEcHER
Stowe, is wooed and feasted and fiattered in her
realms by her nobility, on account of her anti
slavery infatuation and folly-at this very time,
and under all these circumstances, that very Gov
ernment-Ves, the British Government, has an eX-
isting contract with her merchants HYDE, HODGE
& Co., to take captive and steal from their homes
and kindred the native Africans, to make slaves of
them upon those very Islands whose prosperity
has been destroyed by her foolish distractions.
True, this traffic in human flesh and blood,
which they affect so much to despise, is called by
another name They call it system of appren-
ticeship" They only induce the natives of Africa
to EMIGRATE to her West India possessions, for
small consideration. Nevertheless, it is slavery in
the end, voluntary or involuntary, and this induce
ment to cmigrate is nothing more nor less than the
g African slave trade" in disguise. If not why
did President Roberts of Liberia issue his procla-
nation in February last, reviving and enforcing
the passport laws in his colony! And with whom
do the agents, Hyde d Co.. of England bargain
for emigrants {? Is it with the emigrants them
selves? No. "Certain refractory chiefs are re-
ported to have engaged with the agents " of Hyde,
Hodge & Co.. British contractors, yea British slave
catchers and slave traders to furnish the British
Government with native Africans, for British slave
ry, to support British avarce and cupidity. After
this, Mrs. Stowe and her CoRTEGE may expect to
accomplish no good for negro slaves in British
hearts. We have never believed that the British
Government was in EARNEST in her opposition to
African slavery, especially in the Southern States
of America. Abolish Southern slavery, and she
must in turn, abolish her manufactures and her
commerce.
These are the pillars of her Government-the
source of wealth to her merchants Her consump-
ton of cotton reaches the vast amount of two and
half million bales per annum. Cotton in its raw
and manufactured states furnishes the means of
half her commerce; and more than fve-sixths of
all the cotton produced in the world, is grown in
the Southern States by slave labor This very year
Great Britain will consume 100000 bales of
Southern cotton, and her factors must have it. or
her commerce must dwindle. How then, can she
90 Wltnout slavery, ana tne oouCn 10 Produce 1t
She cannot do without Southern slavery. She
knows it, and she does not desire its Adjustment
at least, until she finds other resource for her
needed supply. All her admiration of Mrs. Stowe,
and her appreciation of Uncle Toms Cabin-ism
lies behind all this, and is to be found in British
hostility to this country and her institutions in
general, and believe least Of ALL to our South
institutions" 1t is on account of her hostil@
ity to America, that her subjects are procuring tri
umphal marches for Mrs. Stowe through her realms;
and not the least pleasing spectacle to British eyes,
nor triumph to British revenge, was the nntilated
and tattered folds of the American flag that ere
DENTAL of American grandeur and glory the world
over, under which our I" native American and
British enemies reYeIed and rejoiced together, in
contempt Of morals and our free Institutions.