Mexico, Colombia, New Granada, Venezuela, Ecuador, Uruguay, Buenos Ayres, Chilli, Peru, and Bolivia.

Lord Palmerston, speaking in the House of Lords in 1844, gave some of the reasons which stirred the government to move in this matter. He said:

The negroes destined for the slave-trade are not taken from the neighborhood where they are embarked; a great number come from the interior. Many are captives made in wars excited by thirst for the gain procured by the sale of the prisoners. But the greatest number arise from kidnaping expeditions and an organized system of man-stealing in the interior of Africa.

When the time approaches to set out with the slave caravans for the coast, the kidnaps surround a peaceful village at night, set it on fire, and seize on the inhabitants, killing all who resist. If the village attacked is situated on a mountain offering facilities for flight, and the inhabitants take refuge in the caverns, the kidnapers kindle large fires at the entrance, and those who are sheltered there, placed between death by suffocation and slavery, are forced to give themselves up. If the fugitives take refuge on the heights, the assailants render themselves masters of all the springs and wells, and the unfortunates, devoured by thirst, return to barter liberty for life. The prisoners made, they proceed to the choice. The robust individuals of both sexes, and the children above six or seven years of age, are set aside to form part of the caravan, which is to be driven to the sea-shore. They rid themselves of the children under six years by killing them hunger. The caravan sets out. Men, women, and children traverse the burning sands and rocky defiles of the mountains of Africa barefoot and almost naked. The feeble are stimulated by the whip; the strong are secured by chaining them together or placing them under a yoke; many fall from exhaustion on the road, and die or become the prey of wild beasts. On reaching the sea-shore, they are penned up and crowded together in buildings called barracoons, where they fall a prey to epidemics; death often cruelly thins their ranks before the arrival of a slave-trader. a

Lord Palmerston's general deduction from these and other facts connected with the trade is contained in the same speech. "It is calculated" he says, "that of three negroes seized in the interior of Africa, to be sent into slavery, but one reaches his destination, the two others die in the course of the operations of the slave-trade. Whatever may be the number yearly landed, therefore, we must triple it to obtain the true number of human beings which this detestable traffic annually carries off from Africa." A portion of the facts which form the data of such a calculation remain to be considered-the manner, namely, of stowing and of treating negroes in slave ships, and the mortality thence resulting.

The report of the Lords in Council, from which we have already so copiously quoted, furnishes evidence the most exact and conclusive as to the space commonly allowed to slaves during their passage.

The vessels employed were usually from 100 to 250 or 300 tons burden, averaging in early times little over 100 tons, but toward the end of the eighteenth century being of the capacity of 150 or 200 tons. The universal testimony is, that the average number carried per ton was two persons and upward.

John Anderson, master of slaver, conceives that two slaves to a ton cannot crowd a ship. Sir George Yonge (of the British Navy) says the usual allowance of space is two slaves to a ton, sometimes three. If two were allowed to a ton, he thought there would be room enough.

A bill had been introduced into Parliament which proposed to limit the number for each ton. Evidence was taken as to its effect, resulting as follows:

James Penny had made eleven voyages as captain of slaver. He

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a Speech of Lord Palmerston, delivered in the House of Lords, July 26, 1844.

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