The History of the Rise, Progress and Accomplishment of the Abolition of the African Slave-Trade | Page 5

that if
the ship is empty, they get a hundred pounds: if laden, five thousand?
They know the rules of arithmetic;--they understand the force of
numbers. But, in truth, there is not an individual on all the coast of
Africa who will be misled by such appeals, or suffer all this to divert
them from their purpose of denouncing the system. There are persons
high in rank among the best servants of the crown, who know the facts

from their own observations, and who are ready to bear witness to the
truth, in spite of all the attempts that have been made to silence them.
The other great object of the African Institution regarded the West
Indies. The preparation of the negroes for that freedom which was their
absolute right, and could only be withheld for an hour, on the ground of
their not being prepared for it, and therefore being better without it, was
the first thing to be accomplished. Here the friends of the abolition, all
but Mr. Stephen, suffered a great disappointment. He alone had
uniformly-foretold that the hopes held out, as it seemed very
reasonably, of better treatment resulting from the stoppage of the
supply of hands, were fallacious. All else had supposed that interest
might operate on men whom principle had failed to sway; that they
whom no feelings of compassion for their fellow-creatures could move
to do their duty, might be touched by a feeling of their own advantage,
when interest coincided with duty. The Slave-mart is now closed, it
was said; surely the stock on hand will be saved by all means, and not
wasted when it can no longer be replaced. The argument was purposely
rested on the low ground of regarding human beings as cattle, or even
as inanimate chattels, and it was conceived that human life would be
regarded of as much value as the wear and tear of beasts, of furniture,
or of tools. Hence it was expected that a better system of treatment
would follow, from the law which closed the African market, and
warned every planter that his stock must be spared by better treatment,
and kept up by breeding, since it no longer could be, as it hitherto had
been, maintained by new supplies.
Two considerations were, in these arguments, kept out of view, both of
a practical nature, and both known to Mr. Stephen,--the cultivation of
the Islands by agents having wholly different interests from their
masters, and the gambling spirit of trading and culture which long habit
had implanted in the West Indian nature. The comforts of the slave
depended infinitely more upon the agent on the spot, than the owner
generally resident in the mother country; and though the interest of the
latter might lead to the saving of negro life, and care for negro comforts,
the agent had no such motives to influence his conduct; besides, it was
with the eyes of this agent that the planter must see, and he gave no

credence to any accounts but his. Now the consequence of cruelty is to
make men at war with its objects. No one but a most irritable person
feels angry with his beast, and even the anger of such a person is of a
moment's duration. But towards an inanimate chattel even the most
irritable of sane men can feel nothing like rage. Why? Because in the
one case there is little, in the other no conflict or resistance at all. It is
otherwise with a slave; he is human, and can disobey--can even resist.
This feeling always rankles in his oppressor's bosom, and makes the
tyrannical superior hate, and the more oppress his slave. The agent on
the spot feels thus, and thus acts; nor can the voice of the owner at a
distance be heard, even if interest, clearly proved, were to prompt
another course. But the chief cause of the evil is the spirit of
speculation, and it affects and rules resident owners even more than
absentees. Let sugar rise in price, and all cold calculations of ultimate
loss to the gang are lost in the vehement thirst of great present gain. All,
or nearly all, planters are in distressed circumstances. They look to the
next few years as their time; and if the sun shines they must make hay.
They are in the mine, toiling for a season, with every desire to escape
and realize something to spend elsewhere. Therefore they make haste to
be rich, and care little, should the speculation answer and much sugar
bring in great gain, what becomes of the gang ten years hence. Add to
all this, that any interference of the local legislatures to discourage
sordid or cruel management, to clothe the slaves with rights, to prepare
them for freedom by better