The Journal of Negro History, Volume 2, 1917 | Page 9

journey. Two swarthy-looking men were in charge of them.
The timid little creatures, mute as touching Arabic, for they had not yet
learned to speak in that tongue, were pushed out by their captors from a
horribly dark and noisome dungeon into which they had been thrust the
night before. Then, separately, or two by two, they were paraded up
and down before the public gaze, being stopped now and again by some
of the spectators and examined exactly as a horse dealer would examine
the points of a horse before buying the animal at any of the public
horse-marts in England. The sight was sickening. Some of the girls
were terrified, others were silent and sad. Every movement was
watched by the captives, anxious to know their present fate. My own
face blushed with anger as I stood helpless by and saw those sweet,
dark-skinned, wooly-headed Soudanese sold into slavery.

"Our hearts have ached as we have heard from time to time from the
lips of slaves of the indescribable horrors of the journeys across desert
plains, cramped in pain, parched with thirst, and suffocated in panniers,
their food a handful of maize. Again, we have sickened at the sight of
murdered corpses, left by the wayside to the vulture and the burning
rays of the African sun, and we have prayed, perhaps as never before,
to the God of justice to stop these cruel practices."
Tunis and Algiers have also been great receptacles for the slaves of the
Sudan. Describing the slave market at Tunis, Vincent says that it is a
courtyard surrounded by arcades, the pillars of which are all of the old
Roman fabrication. Around the court are little chambers or cells in
which the slaves are kept, the men below, the women in the story
above.
According to the statement of Barard, in 1906, Negro slavery is still
prevalent throughout Marocco, and Negro women still populate the
harems. "In the towns and plains, the present generations are pretty
strongly colored by their infusion of black blood. But the mountainous
tribes who represent three fourths of a Maroccan population have kept
themselves almost free from mixture; white or blond, they always
resemble, by the color of their skin or texture of hair, the Europeans of
Germany or France rather than the Mediterraneans of Spain and Italy."
In Tunis the open sale of slaves is pretty well suppressed, but in a
modified form the trade continues. Vivian says: "By resorting to
fictitious marriages, and other subterfuges, the owner of a harem may
procure as many slaves as he pleases, and, once he has got them into
his house, no one can possibly interfere to release them. Slaves can, of
course, escape and claim protection from the Consulates, but, as a
matter of fact, they are generally quite contented with their position and
know that such action would only involve them in ruin." In all of the
Barbary States the slave trade is at the present time under prohibition,
although it has not been effectively suppressed in any of them.
According to a recent statement in the Anti-slavery Reporter, "a sale of
slaves among which some white women and children were included,
took place in a Fondak (an enclosure for accommodation of travelers
and animals) in Tangier in April last (1906) and the sale was reported

in a local newspaper, Al Moghreb Al Aksa." In July of the same year it
was reported that a young black girl had been brought to the city and
sold as a slave. The sultan had issued orders to the customs officers and
at the various ports to prevent the transport of slaves by sea, and in
event of any person discovered to be bringing slaves by sea, to punish
him and free the slaves in his possession.
In July, 1906, the Anti-slavery Society of Italy published the particulars
of a Turkish ship which left the port of Bengazi (Tripoli) for
Constantinople with six slaves on board. Through the activity of the
Society's agent the vessel was boarded and the slaves liberated.
Within the last decade the traffic in slaves across the desert has been
limited to routes between the Niger and Marocco, and between Kuka
and Tripoli. At the present time there are probably no regular slave
routes across the desert. Owing to the activity of European consuls in
Northwest Africa caravans have a precarious existence and no safe
markets.
"Only a few years ago," says the Anti-slavery Reporter, "Timbuctu, the
famous trade metropolis of Central Africa, was also the most active
center of the slave trade. French occupation (1894) has put an end to
that traffic, and it is extending the pax Gallica throughout the vast and
fertile territory of the Niger where formerly anarchy and brutality
reigned."[14]
JEROME DOWD,
Professor in