The Slaves In Africa, I Suppose, Are Nearly In The Proportion Of Three To
One To The Freemen.
They claim no reward for their services, except food
and clothing; and are treated with kindness or severity, according to the
good or bad disposition of their masters.
Custom, however, has
established certain rules with regard to the treatment of slaves, which
it is thought dishonourable to violate. Thus, the domestic slaves, or
such as are born in a man's own house, are treated with more lenity than
those which are purchased with money. The authority of the master over
the domestic slave, as I have elsewhere observed, extends only to
reasonable correction; for the master cannot sell his domestic, without
having first brought him to a public trial, before the chief men of the
place.[20] But these restrictions on the power of the master extend not
to the case of prisoners taken in war, nor to that of slaves purchased
with money. All these unfortunate beings are considered as strangers and
foreigners, who have no right to the protection of the law, and may be
treated with severity, or sold to a stranger, according to the pleasure
of their owners. There are, indeed, regular markets, where slaves of this
description are bought and sold; and the value of a slave, in the eye of
an African purchaser, increases in proportion to his distance from his
native kingdom; for when slaves are only a few days' journey from the
place of their nativity, they frequently effect their escape; but when
one or more kingdoms intervene, escape being more difficult, they are
more readily reconciled to their situation. On this account, the unhappy
slave is frequently transferred from one dealer to another, until he has
lost all hopes of returning to his native kingdom. The slaves which are
purchased by the Europeans on the Coast are chiefly of this description;
a few of them are collected in the petty wars, hereafter to be described,
which take place near the Coast; but by far the greater number are
brought down in large caravans from the inland countries, of which many
are unknown, even by name, to the Europeans. The slaves which are thus
brought from the interior may be divided into two distinct classes;
_first_, such as were slaves from their birth having been born of
enslaved mothers: _secondly_, such as were born free, but who afterwards,
by whatever means, became slaves. Those of the first description are by
far the most numerous; for prisoners taken in war (at least such as are
taken in open and declared war, when one kingdom avows hostilities
against another) are generally of this description. The comparatively
small proportion of free people to the enslaved, throughout Africa, has
already been noticed; and it must be observed, that men of free condition
have many advantages over the slaves, even in war time. They are in
general better armed, and well mounted; and can either fight or escape
with some hopes of success:
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