New national era. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1870-1874, 1872-12-12

uInn are computed by the square ~ 4"Ai''i % "e0'
are inserted for less time three months
movement to the old one. If there ia one
c1nV,ction which all Englishmen hold. and
winch may DO said to be the common HERITAGE
OF all classes and conditions. nil norties o5d
sects, 1t is that in which the old ant;-sloverv
agitation so completely educated the mast
generation. During the American civil war
| lhcIe were mere and there some signs that an
OPINION favorable to tho enslayement of the
| number races of men still existed in upex-
pected quarters, but that opinion was based
on some supposed beneficence of the system
us ueVeIoped on some Southern estates. where
all attempt had been made to reconstruct
some vague imitation of patriarchal society.
as IL may have existed in the DAYS of Abrn-
nam and Lot. But even The excitement of
inc CIVIL war never produced n single apolocy
ior the slave trade. Now and then an econo-
ms, liist may nave grudsed the money spent IN
keeping up squadron to hold it in check:
sometimes doubt may have been suggested
whether our course in watching the whole
west coast OF Africa was the best that could
DC ADOPTED; but no person has ever been
Doid enough to propose that we should leave
the trade in slaves to take its course. II ia
one OF those intolerable impurities which all
civilized nations unite in regulating, and
Wnlch Engllshmen agree must be suppressed.
we undertook the duty of sweeping the slave
snip from the seas as part of the responsibility
which our naval empire imposed. Britannia
ruled the waves, and wherever her sceptre
reached the slave was free. The sea is now
the common empire of all maritime nations;
but our naval predonlinanCe our vast COM
mercc, our possessions which border on every
sea, still impose on US in these new times tho
old obligation. 1t will be taken I'D by the
whole nation with as much unanimity Of en-
thusiasm as that with which the resolution
recognizing the national duty was passed at
the Mansion house yesterday.
The object of yesterdays meeting was to
commence new anti-slavery agitation, The
resolutions were practical and direct. To
make the enormties of the East African
slave trade as widely known as possible. and
TO urge tho Government by petitions and
other means to vigorous efforts for it's sup.
preston, are the courses which experience
suggests, and which the meeting resolved to
take. Happily the means of the very fullest
information are close at hand. A Parlia.
mentary Committee, which reported last
year, received evidence from large number
of official witnesses which abundantiy con.
firms all that DR.. Livingstone and Mr.. STAN
ley have said as to the horrors inflicted on
the people OF Africa by the Eastern slave
trade: MIR. Stanley expressed fear yester-
day that he might BIO accused of sensational
ism if he told all that he had seen. He has
only to read the evidence given by grave Of
hclals to Parliamentary Committee, and he
will no longer fear that his own story will
sound like exaggeraton. The case is really
one in which exaggeration is almost impossi-
BILE. The slave trade of Zanzibar is actually
desolating large part of the Eastern shore
OF the African Continent. The little island
OF Zanzibar lies just off the coast, and is adj
mirably placed for developing the trade of the
whole region between the great lakes and
Nile sources and the sea. But unhappily
the most valuable of all the exports which
Africa can send out arc the inhabitants
themselves. All through the idle and lux
urlous East there is perpetual demand for
slaves. In the harems and the bazaars, in
the fields and the cities of the whole Mahom-
medan world, there is an hereditary need for
the services of subject race. Society has
been founded on slavery, and our Western
feeling about it is utterly unknown. This
perpetual demand is almost sure to create a
supply. The old course of the traffic was
down the Nile; we have partly stopped that
route, and it has taken another. Mr.. STAN
ley's description of the Zanzibar trade is
borne out by all the evidence which has been
collected on the subject There are in Zan-
zibar large number Of wealthy Banans who
have probably assembled there for the sake
OF this traffic. They lend money to the adj
venturous Arabs, who form expeditions and
march inwards to capture slaves. They are
absolutely ruthless, and will burn village
and kill half its inhabitants for the sake of
making few captives. They return with
their spoil to the coast, set sail from har-
Dor in which we cannot interfere with them.
run the gauntlet of our cruisers in the open
sea, and then, arrived at Zanzibar, divide
the spoils of their venture with tho Bantam
capitalists. The profits are of course large.
The slaves being stolen, their captors can
afford to lose large part of them in the
transit; the price they fetch leaves a good
profit if only percentage reach the market.
Mr.. Stanley says that Banians make hum
bred per cent. on every dollar they advance.
Zanzibar is, however, an independent State,
and we cannot seize its vessels in its own
waters. We have treaties with it which re-
cognize its own sovereignty; and it is to
those treaties the impunity Of the trade is
due, and as MIR. Otway said yesterday they
must be got rid of. 1t seemed the logical re-
suit of all that had been said when Sir Bartle
Frere told the meeting yesterday that those
treaties are to be revised.
The difficulty of dealing with this Eastern
slave trade is greatly increased by the i'm
possibility OF stopping the demand. In the
West we were at least helped by tho fact
willing to buy slaves, and thus fostered the
trade, were pledged to its suppression. The
right Of search, which our cruisers asserted,
embroiled us with the United States, but the
United States soon followed our example in
declaring the slave trade piracy. But the
whole Eastern world still regards it as
legitimate traffic. Asia has always preyed
on Africa. To stop slavery in the East would
be revolution in the social system Of that
stagnant and unwholesome world. Such
revolution would be one of the greatest ben
etts ever conferred on humanity, but the very
magnitude of the change only shows the diff
fculty Of entirely Graduating the slave traffic.
Can We so Theoretically seal the African coast
that the demand for slaves in the East shall
not be able to draw supply from the tenn
ing multitudes of simple easy, unwarlike
people who fill that continent? The task is
great one, yet not utterly hopeless. The
resolution proposed by Lord Harrowby and
seconded by MIR. Otway pledged tho meeting
OF yesterday to use all constitutional methods
to abolish the traffc-meaning, of course,
means within the bounds of our own Consti-