e is sure of making money by doing otherwise!

[Footnote A: Judicial trials by the ordeal of personal combat, in which
the vanquished were always pronounced guilty, occurred as late as the
sixteenth century, both in France and England.]

The king of Dahomy, and other despotic princes, do not scruple to seize
their own people and sell them, without provocation, whenever they
happen to want anything, which slave-ships can furnish. If a chief has
conscience enough to object to such proceedings, he is excited by
presents of gunpowder and brandy. One of these men, who could not resist
the persuasions of the slave-traders while he was intoxicated, was
conscience-stricken when he recovered his senses, and bitterly
reproached his _Christian_ seducers. One negro king, debarred by his
religion from the use of spirituous liquors, and therefore less
dangerously tempted than others, abolished the slave-trade throughout
his dominions and exerted himself to encourage honest industry; but
his people must have been as sheep among wolves.

Relentless bigotry brings its aid to darken the horrors of the scene.
The Mohammedans deem it right to subject the heathen tribes to perpetual
bondage. The Moors and Arabs think Alla and the prophet have given them
an undisputed right to the poor Caffre, his wife, his children, and his
goods. But mark how the slave-trade deepens even the fearful gloom of
bigotry! These Mohammedans are by no means zealous to enlighten their
Pagan neighbors--they do not wish them to come to a knowledge of what
they consider the true religion--lest they should forfeit the only
ground, on which they can even pretend to the right of driving them by
thousands to the markets of Kano and Tripoli.

This is precisely like our own conduct. We say the negroes are so
ignorant that they must be slaves; and we insist upon keeping them
ignorant, lest we spoil them for slaves. The same spirit that
dictates this logic to the Arab, teaches it to the European and the
American:--Call it what you please--it is certainly neither of heaven
nor of earth.

When the slave-ships are lying on the coast of Africa, canoes well armed
are sent into the inland country, and after a few weeks they return with
hundreds of negroes, tied fast with ropes. Sometimes the white men lurk
among the bushes, and seize the wretched beings who incautiously venture
from their homes; sometimes they paint their skins as black as their
hearts, and by this deception