White Slavery in the Barbary States
Date: 2011-02-09T00:00:00+00:00
Keywords: Slavery -- Africa; North

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Title: White Slavery in the Barbary States

Author: Charles Sumner

Illustrator: Hammatt Billings

Release date: February 9, 2011 [eBook #35222]
Most recently updated: January 7, 2021

Language: English

Credits: Produced by the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at
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*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK WHITE SLAVERY IN THE BARBARY STATES ***

White Slavery In The Barbary States. BY CHARLES SUMNER.

——Mutato nomine, de te
Fabula narratur.
HORACE.

And thinkest thou this, O man, that judgest them which do such things, and doest the same, that thou shalt escape the judgment of God?

EPISTLE TO THE ROMANS, Chap. ii. v. 3.

BOSTON:
PUBLISHED BY JOHN P. JEWETT AND COMPANY.

CLEVELAND, OHIO:
JEWETT, PROCTOR, AND WORTHINGTON.

LONDON:
LOW AND COMPANY.
1853.

Entered, according to Act of Congress, in the year 1853, by
JOHN P. JEWETT AND COMPANY,
In the Clerk's Office of the District Court of the District of Massachusetts.

ORIGINAL DESIGNS BY BILLINGS.
ENGRAVED BY BAKER, SMITH, AND ANDREW.

STEREOTYPED AT THE BOSTON STEREOTYPE FOUNDRY.
GEO. C. RAND, PRINTER, CORNHILL.

White Slavery In The Barbary States.

History has been sometimes called a gallery, where, in living forms, are preserved the scenes, the incidents, and the characters of the past. It may also be called the world's great charnel house, where are gathered coffins, dead men's bones, and all the uncleanness of the years that have fled. As we walk among its pictures, radiant with the inspiration of virtue and of freedom, we confess a new impulse to beneficent exertion. As we grope amidst the unsightly shapes that have been left without an epitaph, we may at least derive a fresh aversion to all their living representatives.

In this mighty gallery, amidst a heavenly light, are the images of the benefactors of mankind—the poets who have sung the praise of virtue, the historians who have recorded its achievements, and the good men of all time, who, by word or deed, have striven for the welfare of others. Here are depicted those scenes where the divinity of man has been made manifest in trial and danger. Here also are those grand incidents which attended the establishment of the free institutions of the world; the signing of Magna Charta, with its priceless privileges of freedom, by a reluctant monarch; and the signing of the Declaration of Independence, the annunciation of the inalienable rights of man, by the fathers of our republic.

On the other hand, in ignominious confusion, far down in this dark, dreary charnel house is tumbled all that now remains of the tyrants, the persecutors, the selfish men, under whom mankind have groaned. Here also, in festering, loathsome decay, are the monstrous institutions or customs, which the earth, weary of their infamy and injustice, has refused to sustain—the Helotism of Sparta, the Serfdom of Christian Europe, the Ordeal by Battle, and Algerine Slavery.

From this charnel house let me to-night draw forth one of these. It may not be without profit to dwell on the origin, the history, and the character of a custom, which, after being for a long time a byword and a hissing among the nations, has at last been driven from the world. The easy, instinctive, positive reprobation, which it will receive from all, must necessarily direct our judgment of other institutions, yet tolerated in equal defiance of justice and humanity. I propose to consider the subject of White Slavery in Algiers, or perhaps it might be more appropriately called White Slavery in the Barbary States. As Algiers was its chief seat, it seems to have acquired a current name from that place. This I shall not disturb; though I shall speak of White Slavery, or the Slavery of Christians, throughout the Barbary States.

If this subject should fail in interest, it cannot fail in novelty. I am not aware of any previous attempt to combine its scattered materials in a connected essay.

The territory now known as the Barbary States is memorable in history. Classical inscriptions, broken arches, and ancient tombs—the memorials of various ages—still bear instructive witness to the revolutions which it has encountered.[1] Early Greek legend made it the home of terror and of happiness. Here was the retreat of the Gorgon, with snaky tresses, turning all she looked upon into stone; and here also the garden of the Hesperides, with its apples of gold. It was the scene of adventure and mythology. Here Hercules wrestled with Antæus, and Atlas sustained, with weary shoulders, the overarching sky. Phoenician fugitives early transported the spirit of commerce to its coasts; and Carthage, which these wanderers here planted, became the mistress of the seas, the explorer of distant regions, the rival and the victim of Rome. The energy and subtlety of Jugurtha here baffled for a while the Roman power, till at last the whole country, from Egypt to the Pillars of Hercules, underwent the process of "annexation" to the cormorant republic of ancient times. A thriving population and fertile soil rendered it an immense granary. It was filled with famous cities, one of which was the refuge and the grave of Cato, fleeing from the usurpations of Cæsar. At a later day, Christianity was here preached by some of her most saintly bishops. The torrent of the Vandals, first wasting Italy, next passed over this territory; and the arms of Belisarius here obtained their most signal triumphs. The Saracens, with the Koran and the sword, potent ministers of conversion, next broke from Arabia, as the messengers of a new religion, and, pouring along these shores, diffused the faith and doctrines of Mohammed. Their empire was not confined even by these expansive limits; but, under Musa, entered Spain, and afterwards at Roncesvalles, in "dolorous rout," overthrew the embattled chivalry of the Christian world led by Charlemagne.

The Saracenic power did not long retain its unity or importance; and, as we view this territory, in the dawn of modern history, when the countries of Europe are appearing in their new nationalities, we discern five different communities or states,—Morocco, Algiers, Tunis, Tripoli, and Barca,—the latter of little moment, and often included in Tripoli, the whole constituting what was then, and is still, called the Barbary States. This name has sometimes been referred to the Berbers, or Berebbers, constituting a part of the inhabitants; but I delight to follow the classic authority of Gibbon, who thinks[2] that the term, first applied by Greek pride to all strangers, and finally reserved for those only who were savage or hostile, has justly settled, as a local denomination, along the northern coast of Africa. The Barbary States, then, bear their past character in their name.

They occupy an important space on the earth's surface; on the north, washed by the Mediterranean Sea, furnishing such opportunities of prompt intercourse with Southern Europe, that Cato was able to exhibit in the Roman Senate figs freshly plucked in the gardens of Carthage; bounded on the east by Egypt, on the west by the Atlantic Ocean, and on the south by the vast, indefinite, sandy, flinty wastes of Sahara, separating them from Soudan or Negroland. In the advantages of position they surpass every other part of Africa,—unless we except Egypt,—communicating easily with the Christian nations, and thus, as it were, touching the very hem and border of civilization.

Climate adds its attractions to this region, which is removed from the cold of the north and the burning heats of the tropics, while it is enriched with oranges, citrons, olives, figs, pomegranates, and luxuriant flowers. Its position and character invite a singular and suggestive comparison. It is placed between the twenty-ninth and thirty-eighth degrees of north latitude, occupying nearly the same parallels with the Slave States of our Union. It extends over nearly the same number of degrees of longitude with our Slave States, which seem now, alas! to stretch from the Atlantic Ocean to the Rio Grande. It is supposed to embrace about 700,000 square miles, which cannot be far from the space comprehended by what may be called the Barbary States of America.[3] Nor does the comparison end here. Algiers, for a long time the most obnoxious place in the Barbary States of Africa, the chief seat of Christian slavery, and once branded by an indignant chronicler as "the wall of the barbarian world," is situated near the parallel of 36° 30' north latitude, being the line of what is termed the Missouri Compromise, marking the "wall" of Christian slavery, in our country, west of the Mississippi.

Other less important points of likeness between the two territories may be observed. They are each washed, to the same extent, by ocean and sea; with this difference, that the two regions are thus exposed on directly opposite coasts—the African Barbary being bounded in this way on the north and west, and our American Barbary on the south and east. But there are no two spaces, on the surface of the globe, of equal extent, (and an examination of the map will verify what I am about to state,) which present so many distinctive features of resemblance; whether we consider the parallels of latitude on which they lie, the nature of their boundaries, their productions, their climate, or the "peculiar domestic institution" which has sought shelter in both.

I introduce these comparisons in order to bring home to your minds, as near as possible, the precise position and character of the territory which was the seat of the evil I am about to describe. It might be worthy of inquiry, why Christian slavery, banished at last from Europe, banished also from that part of this hemisphere which corresponds in latitude to Europe, should have intrenched itself, in both hemispheres, between the same parallels of latitude; so that Virginia, Carolina, Mississippi, and Texas should be the American complement to Morocco, Algiers, Tripoli, and Tunis. Perhaps the common peculiarities of climate, breeding indolence, lassitude, and selfishness, may account for the insensibility to the claims of justice and humanity which have characterized both regions.

The revolting custom of White Slavery in the Barbary States was, for many years, the shame of modern civilization. The nations of Europe made constant efforts, continued through successive centuries, to procure its abolition, and also to rescue their subjects from its fearful doom. These may be traced in the diversified pages of history, and in the authentic memoirs of the times. Literature also affords illustrations, which must not be neglected. At one period, the French, the Italians, and the Spaniards borrowed the plots of their stories mostly from this source.[4] The adventures of Robinson Crusoe make our childhood familiar with one of its forms. Among his early trials, he was piratically captured by a rover from Salle, a port of Morocco, on the Atlantic Ocean, and reduced to slavery. "At this surprising change of circumstances," he says, "from a merchant to a miserable slave, I was perfectly overwhelmed; and now I looked back upon my father's prophetic discourse to me, that I should be miserable, and have none to relieve me, which I thought was so effectually brought to pass, that I could not be worse." And Cervantes, in the story of Don Quixote, over which so many generations have shaken with laughter, turns aside from its genial current to give the narrative of a Spanish captive who had escaped from Algiers. The author is supposed to have drawn from his own experience; for during five years and a half he endured the horrors of Algerine slavery, from which he was finally liberated by a ransom of about six hundred dollars.[5] This inconsiderable sum of money—less than the price of an intelligent African slave in our own Southern States—gave to freedom, to his country, and to mankind the author of Don Quixote.

In Cervantes freedom gained a champion whose efforts entitle him to grateful mention, on this threshold of our inquiry. Taught in the school of slavery, he knew how to commiserate the slave. The unhappy condition of his fellow-Christians in chains was ever uppermost in his mind. He lost no opportunity of arousing his countrymen to attempts for their emancipation, and for the overthrow of the "peculiar institution"—pardon this returning phrase!—under which they groaned. He became in Spain what, in our day and country, is sometimes called an "Anti-Slavery Agitator"—not by public meetings and addresses, but, according to the genius of the age, mainly through the instrumentality of the theatre. Not from the platform, but from the stage, did this liberated slave speak to the world. In a drama, entitled El Trato de Argel, or Life in Algiers,—which, though not composed according to the rules of art, yet found much favor, probably from its subject,—he pictured, shortly after his return to Spain, the manifold humiliations, pains, and torments of slavery. This was followed by two others in the same spirit—La Gran Sultana Dona Cattalina de Oviedo, The Great Sultana the Lady Cattalina of Oviedo; and Los Banos de Argel, The Galleys of Algiers. The last act of the latter closes with the statement, calculated to enlist the sympathies of an audience, that this play "is not drawn from the imagination, but was born far from the regions of fiction, in the very heart of truth." Not content with this appeal through the theatre, Cervantes, with constant zeal, takes up the same theme, in the tale of the Captive, in Don Quixote, as we have already seen, and also in that of El Liberal Amante, The Liberal Lover, and in some parts of La Espanola Inglesa, The English Spanishwoman. All these may be regarded, not merely as literary labors, but as charitable endeavors in behalf of human freedom.

And this same cause enlisted also a prolific contemporary genius, called by Cervantes "that prodigy," Lopé de Vega, who commended it in a play entitled Los Cautivos de Argel, The Captives of Algiers. At a later day, Calderon, sometimes exalted as the Shakspeare of the Spanish stage, in one of his most remarkable dramas, El Principe Constante, The Constant Prince, cast a poet's glance at Christian slavery in Morocco. To these works—belonging to what may be called the literature of Anti-Slavery, and shedding upon our subject a grateful light—must be added a curious and learned volume, in Spanish, on the Topography and History of Algiers, by Haedo, a father of the Catholic Church,—Topografia y Historia de Argel por Fra Haedo,—published in 1612; and containing also two copious Dialogues—one on Captivity (de la Captiudad), and the other on the Martyrs of Algiers, (de los Martyres de Argel). These Dialogues, besides embodying authentic sketches of the sufferings in Algiers, form a mine of classical and patristic learning on the origin and character of slavery, with arguments and protestations against its iniquity, which may be explored with profit, even in our day. In view of this gigantic evil, particularly in Algiers, and in the hope of arousing his countrymen to the generous work of emancipation, the good father exclaims,[6] in words which will continue to thrill the soul,—so long as a single fetter binds a single slave,—"Where is charity? Where is the love of God? Where is the zeal for his glory? Where is desire for his service? Where is human pity and the compassion of man for man? Certainly to redeem a captive, to liberate him from wretched slavery, is the highest work of charity, of all that can be done in this world."

Not long after the dark experience of Cervantes, another person, of another country and language, and of a still higher character, St. Vincent de Paul, of France, underwent the same cruel lot. Happily for the world, he escaped from slavery, to commence at home that long career of charity—nobler than any glories of literature—signalized by various Christian efforts, against duels, for peace, for the poor, and in every field of humanity—by which he is placed among the great names of Christendom. Princes and orators have lavished panegyrics upon this fugitive slave; and the Catholic Church, in homage to his extraordinary virtues, has introduced him into the company of saints. Nor is he the only illustrious Frenchman who has felt the yoke of slavery. Almost within our own day, Arago, the astronomer and philosopher,—devoted republican, I may add also,—while engaged, early in life, in those scientific labors, on the coast of the Mediterranean, which made the beginning of his fame, fell a prey to Algerine slave dealers. What science and the world have gained by his emancipation I need not say.

Thus Science, Literature, Freedom, Philanthropy, the Catholic Church, each and all, confess a debt to the liberated Barbary slave. May they, on this occasion, as beneficent heralds, commend the story of his wrongs, his struggles, and his triumphs!

These preliminary remarks properly prepare the way for the subject to which I have invited your attention. In presenting it, I shall naturally be led to touch upon the origin of slavery, and the principles which lie at its foundation, before proceeding to exhibit the efforts for its abolition, and their final success in the Barbary States.

I.

The word slave, suggesting now so much of human abasement, has an origin which speaks of human grandeur. Its parent term, Slava, signifying glory, in the Slavonian dialects, where it first appears, was proudly assumed as the national designation of the races in the north-eastern part of the European continent, who, in the vicissitudes of war, were afterwards degraded from the condition of conquerors to that of servitude. The Slavonian bondman, retaining his national name, was known as a Slave, and this term—passing from a race to a class—was afterwards applied, in the languages of modern Europe, to all in his unhappy lot, without distinction of country or color.[7] It would be difficult to mention any word which has played such opposite parts in history—now beneath the garb of servitude, concealing its early robes of pride. And yet, startling as it may seem, this word may properly be received in its primitive character, in our own day, by those among us who consider slavery essential to democratic institutions, and therefore a part of the true glory of the country!

Slavery was universally recognized by the nations of antiquity. It is said by Pliny, in a bold phrase, that the Lacedæmonians "invented slavery."[8] If this were so, the glory of Lycurgus and Leonidas would not compensate for such a blot upon their character. It is true that they recognized it, and gave it a shape of peculiar hardship. But slavery is older than Sparta. It appears in the tents of Abraham; for the three hundred and eighteen servants born to him were slaves. It appears in the story of Joseph, who was sold by his brothers to the Midianites for twenty pieces of silver.[9] It appears in the poetry of Homer, who stamps it with a reprobation which can never be forgotten, when he says,[10]—

Jove fixed it certain, that whatever day
Makes man a slave takes half his worth away.

In later days it prevailed extensively in Greece, whose haughty people deemed themselves justified in enslaving all who were strangers to their manners and institutions. "The Greek has the right to be the master of the barbarian," was the sentiment of Euripides, one of the first of her poets, which was echoed by Aristotle, the greatest of her intellects.[11] And even Plato, in his imaginary republic, the Utopia of his beautiful genius, sanctions slavery. But, notwithstanding these high names, we learn from Aristotle himself that there were persons in his day—pestilent abolitionists of ancient Athens—who did not hesitate to maintain that liberty was the great law of nature, and to deny any difference between the master and the slave; declaring openly that slavery was founded upon violence, and not upon right, and that the authority of the master was unnatural and unjust.[12] "God sent forth all persons free; nature has made no man a slave," was the protest of one of these dissenting Athenians against this great wrong. I am not in any way authorized to speak for any Anti-slavery society, even if this were a proper occasion; but I presume that this ancient Greek morality substantially embodies the principles which are maintained at their public meetings—so far, at least, as they relate to slavery.

It is true, most true, that slavery stands on force, and not on right. It is one of the hideous results of war, or of that barbarism in which savage war plays a conspicuous part. To the victor, it was supposed, belonged the lives of his captives; and, by consequence, he might bind them in perpetual servitude. This principle, which has been the foundation of slavery in all ages, is adapted only to the rudest conditions of society, and is wholly inconsistent with a period of real refinement, humanity, and justice. It is sad to confess that it was recognized by Greece; but the civilization of this famed land, though brilliant to the external view as the immortal sculptures of the Parthenon, was, like that stately temple, dark and cheerless within.

Slavery extended, with new rigors, under the military dominion of Rome. The spirit of freedom which animated the republic was of that selfish and intolerant character which accumulated privileges upon the Roman citizen, while it heeded little the rights of others. But, unlike the Greeks, the Romans admitted in theory that all men were originally free by the law of nature; and they ascribed the power of masters over slaves not to any alleged diversities in the races of men, but to the will of society.[13] The constant triumphs of their arms were signalized by reducing to captivity large crowds of the subjugated people. Paulus Emilius returned from Macedonia with an uncounted train of slaves, composed of persons in every department of life; and at the camp of Lucullus, in Pontus, slaves were sold for four drachmæ, or seventy-two cents, a head. Terence and Phædrus, Roman slaves, have, however, taught us that genius is not always quenched, even by a degrading captivity; while the writings of Cato the Censor, one of the most virtuous slaveholders in history, show the hardening influence of a system which treats human beings as cattle. "Let the husbandman," says Cato, "sell his old oxen, his sickly cattle, his sickly sheep, his wool, his hides, his old wagon, his old implements, his old slave, and his diseased slave; and if any thing else remains, let him sell it. He should be a seller, rather than a buyer."[14]

The cruelty and inhumanity which flourished in the republic, professing freedom, found a natural home under the emperors—the high priests of despotism. Wealth increased, and with it the multitude of slaves. Some masters are said to have owned as many as ten thousand, while extravagant prices were often paid, according to the fancy or caprice of the purchaser. Martial mentions a handsome youth who cost as much as four hundred sesteria, or sixteen thousand dollars.[15]

It is easy to believe that slavery, which prevailed so largely in Greece and Rome, must have existed in Africa. Here, indeed, it found a peculiar home. If we trace the progress of this unfortunate continent, from those distant days of fable, when Jupiter
did not disdain to grace
The feast of Æthiopia's blameless race,[16]

the merchandise in slaves will be found to have contributed to the abolition of two hateful customs, once universal in Africa—the eating of captives, and their sacrifice to idols. Thus, in the march of civilization, even the barbarism of slavery is an important stage of Human Progress. It is a point in the ascending scale from cannibalism.

In the early periods of modern Europe, slavery was a general custom, which yielded only gradually to the humane influences of Christianity. It prevailed in all the countries of which we have any record. Fair-haired Saxon slaves from distant England arrested the attention of Pope Gregory in the markets of Rome, and were by him hailed as angels. A law of so virtuous a king as Alfred ranks slaves with horses and oxen; and the chronicles of William of Malmesbury show that, in our mother country, there was once a cruel slave trade in whites. As we listen to this story, we shall be grateful again to that civilization which renders such outrages more and more impossible. "Directly opposite," he says,[17] "to the Irish coast, there is a seaport called Bristol, the inhabitants of which frequently sent into Ireland to sell those people whom they had bought up throughout England. They exposed to sale maidens in a state of pregnancy, with whom they made a sort of mock marriage. There you might see with grief, fastened together by ropes, whole rows of wretched beings of both sexes, of elegant forms, and in the very bloom of youth,—a sight sufficient to excite pity even in barbarians,—daily offered for sale to the first purchaser. Accursed deed! infamous disgrace! that men, acting in a manner which brutal instinct alone would have forbidden, should sell into slavery their relations, nay, even their own offspring." From still another chronicler[18] we learn that, when Ireland, in 1172, was afflicted with public calamities, the people, but chiefly the clergy, (præcipue clericorum,) began to reproach themselves, as well they might, believing that these evils were brought upon their country because, contrary to the right of Christian freedom, they had bought as slaves the English boys brought to them by the merchants; wherefore, it is said, the English slaves were allowed to depart in freedom.

As late as the thirteenth century, the custom prevailed on the continent of Europe to treat all captives, taken in war, as slaves. To this, poetry, as well as history, bears its testimony. Old Michael Drayton, in his story of the Battle of Agincourt, says of the French,—

For knots of cord to every town they send,
The captived English that they caught to bind;
For to perpetual slavery they intend
Those that alive they on the field should find.

And Othello, in recounting his perils, exposes this custom, when he speaks

Of being taken by the insolent foe,
And sold to slavery; of my redemption thence.

It was also held lawful to enslave any infidel or person who did not receive the Christian faith. The early common law of England doomed heretics to the stake; the Catholic Inquisition did the same; and the laws of Oleron, the maritime code of the middle ages, treated them "as dogs," to be attacked and despoiled by all true believers. It appears that Philip le Bel of France, the son of St. Louis, in 1296, presented his brother Charles, Count of Valois, with a Jew, and that he paid Pierre de Chambly three hundred livres for another Jew; as if Jews were at the time chattels, to be given away, or bought.[19] And the statutes of Florence, boastful of freedom, as late as 1415, expressly allowed republican citizens to hold slaves who were not of the Christian faith; Qui non sunt Catholicæ fidei et Christianæ.[20] And still further, the comedies of Molière, L'Étourdi, Le Sicilien, L'Avare, depicting Italian usages not remote from his own day, show that, at Naples and Messina, even Christian women continued to be sold as slaves.

This hasty sketch, which brings us down to the period when Algiers became a terror to the Christian nations, renders it no longer astonishing that the barbarous states of Barbary,—a part of Africa, the great womb of slavery,—professing Mohammedanism, which not only recognizes slavery, but expressly ordains "chains and collars" to infidels,[21] should maintain the traffic in slaves, particularly in Christians who denied the faith of the Prophet. In the duty of constant war upon unbelievers, and in the assertion of a right to the services or ransom of their captives, they followed the lessons of Christians themselves.

It is not difficult, then, to account for the origin of the cruel custom now under consideration. Its history forms our next topic.

II.

The Barbary States, after the decline of the Arabian power, were enveloped in darkness, rendered more palpable by the increasing light among the Christian nations. As we behold them in the fifteenth century, in the twilight of European civilization, they appear to be little more than scattered bands of robbers and pirates,—"the land rats and water rats" of Shylock,—leading the lives of Ishmaelites. Algiers is described by an early writer as "a den of sturdy thieves, formed into a body, by which, after a tumultuary sort, they govern;"[22] and by still another writer, contemporary with the monstrosity which he exposes, as "the theatre of all cruelty and sanctuarie of iniquitie, holding captive, in miserable servitude, one hundred and twenty thousand Christians, almost all subjects of the King of Spaine."[23] Their habit of enslaving prisoners, taken in war and in piratical depredations, at last aroused against these states the sacred animosities of Christendom. Ferdinand the Catholic, after the conquest of Granada, and while the boundless discoveries of Columbus, giving to Castile and Aragon a new world, still occupied his mind, found time to direct an expedition into Africa, under the military command of that great ecclesiastic, Cardinal Ximenes. It is recorded that this valiant soldier of the church, on effecting the conquest of Oran, in 1509, had the inexpressible satisfaction of liberating upwards of three hundred Christian slaves.[24]

The progress of the Spanish arms induced the government of Algiers to invoke assistance from abroad. At this time, two brothers, Horuc and Hayradin, the sons of a potter in the Island of Lesbos, had become famous as corsairs. In an age when the sword of the adventurer often carved a higher fortune than could be earned by lawful exertion, they were dreaded for their abilities, their hardihood, and their power. To them Algiers turned for aid. The corsairs left the sea to sway the land; or rather, with amphibious robbery, they took possession of Algiers and Tunis, while they continued to prey upon the sea. The name of Barbarossa, by which they are known to Christians, is terrible in modern history.[25]

With pirate ships they infested the seas, and spread their ravages along the coasts of Spain and Italy, until Charles the Fifth was aroused to undertake their overthrow. The various strength of his broad dominions was rallied in this new crusade. "If the enthusiasm," says Sismondi, "which armed the Christians at an earlier day, was nearly extinct, another sentiment, more rational and legitimate, now united the vows of Europe. The contest was no longer to reconquer the tomb of Christ, but to defend the civilization, the liberty, the lives, of Christians."[26] A stanch body of infantry from Germany, the veterans of Spain and Italy, the flower of the Castilian nobility, the knights of Malta, with a fleet of near five hundred vessels, contributed by Italy, Portugal, and even distant Holland, under the command of Andrew Doria, the great sea officer of the age,—the whole being under the immediate eye of the Emperor himself, with the countenance and benediction of the Pope, and composing one of the most complete armaments which the world had then seen,—were directed upon Tunis. Barbarossa opposed them bravely, but with unequal forces. While slowly yielding to attack from without, his defeat was hastened by unexpected insurrection within. Confined in the citadel were many Christian slaves, who, asserting the rights of freedom, obtained a bloody emancipation, and turned its artillery against their former masters. The place yielded to the Emperor, whose soldiers soon surrendered themselves to the inhuman excesses of war. The blood of thirty thousand innocent inhabitants reddened his victory. Amidst these scenes of horror there was but one spectacle that afforded him any satisfaction. Ten thousand Christian slaves met him, as he entered the town, and falling on their knees, thanked him as their deliverer.[27]

In the treaty of peace which ensued, it was expressly stipulated on the part of Tunis, that all Christian slaves, of whatever nation, should be set at liberty without ransom, and that no subject of the Emperor should for the future be detained in slavery.[28]

The apparent generosity of this undertaking, the magnificence with which it was conducted, and the success with which it was crowned, drew to the Emperor the homage of his age beyond any other event of his reign. Twenty thousand slaves, freed by treaty, or by arms, diffused through Europe the praise of his name. It is probable that, in this expedition, the Emperor was governed by motives little higher than those of vulgar ambition and fame; but the results with which it was crowned, in the emancipation of so many of his fellow-Christians from cruel chains, place him, with Cardinal Ximenes, among the earliest Abolitionists of modern times.

This was in 1535. Only a few short years before, in 1517, he had granted to a Flemish courtier the exclusive privilege of importing four thousand blacks from Africa into the West Indies. It is said that Charles lived long enough to repent what he had thus inconsiderately done.[29] Certain it is, no single concession, recorded in history, of king or emperor, has produced such disastrous far-reaching consequences. The Fleming sold his privilege to a company of Genoese merchants, who organized a systematic traffic in slaves between Africa and America. Thus, while levying a mighty force to check the piracies of Barbarossa, and to procure the abolition of Christian slavery in Tunis, the Emperor, with a wretched inconsistency, laid the corner stone of a new system of slavery in America, in comparison with which the enormity that he sought to suppress was trivial and fugitive.

Elated by the conquest of Tunis, filled also with the ambition of subduing all the Barbary States, and of extirpating the custom of Christian slavery, the Emperor, in 1541, directed an expedition of singular grandeur against Algiers. The Pope again joined his influence to the martial array. But nature proved stronger than the Pope and Emperor. Within sight of Algiers, a sudden storm shattered his proud fleet, and he was obliged to return to Spain, discomfited, bearing none of those trophies of emancipation by which his former expedition had been crowned.[30]

The power of the Barbary States was now at its height. Their corsairs became the scourge of Christendom, while their much-dreaded system of slavery assumed a front of new terrors. Their ravages were not confined to the Mediterranean. They penetrated the ocean, and pressed even to the Straits of Dover and St. George's Channel. From the chalky cliffs of England, and even from the distant western coasts of Ireland, unsuspecting inhabitants were swept into cruel captivity.[31] The English government was aroused to efforts to check these atrocities. In 1620, a fleet of eighteen ships, under the command of Sir Robert Mansel, Vice Admiral of England, was despatched against Algiers. It returned without being able, in the language of the times, "to destroy those hellish pirates," though it obtained the liberation of forty "poor captives, which they pretended was all they had in the towne." "The efforts of the English fleet were aided," says Purchas, "by a Christian captive, which did swim from the towne to the ships."[32] It is not in this respect only that this expedition recalls that of Charles the Fifth, which received important assistance from rebel slaves; we also observe a similar deplorable inconsistency of conduct in the government which directed it. It was in the year 1620,—dear to all the descendants of the Pilgrims of Plymouth Rock as an epoch of freedom,—while an English fleet was seeking the emancipation of Englishmen held in bondage by Algiers, that African slaves were first introduced into the English colonies of North America—thus beginning that dreadful system, whose long catalogue of humiliation and woes is not yet complete.[33]

The expedition against Algiers was followed, in 1637, by another, under the command of Captain Rainsborough, against Sallee, in Morocco. At his approach, the Moors desperately transferred a thousand captives, British subjects, to Tunis and Algiers. "Some Christians, that were slaves ashore, stole away out of the towne, and came swimming aboard."[34] Intestine feud also aided the fleet, and the cause of emancipation speedily triumphed. Two hundred and ninety British captives were surrendered; and a promise was extorted from the government of Sallee to redeem the wretched captives, sold away to Tunis and Algiers. An ambassador from the King of Morocco shortly afterwards visited England, and, on his way through the streets of London, to his audience at court, was attended "by four Barbary horses led along in rich caparisons, and richer saddles, with bridles set with stones; also some hawks; many of the captives whom he brought over going along afoot clad in white."[35]

The importance attached to this achievement may be inferred from the singular joy with which it was hailed in England. Though on a limited scale, it had been a war of liberation. The poet, the ecclesiastic, and the statesman now joined in congratulations on its results. It inspired the muse of Waller to a poem called The Taking of Sallee, in which the submission of the slaveholding enemy is thus described:—

Hither he sends the chief among his peers,
Who in his bark proportioned presents bears,
To the renowned for piety and force
Poor captives manumised, and matchless horse.

It satisfied Laud, and filled with exultation the dark mind of Strafford. "Sallee, the town, is taken," said the Archbishop in a letter to the latter, then in Ireland, "and all the captives at Sallee and Morocco delivered; as many, our merchants say, as, according to the price of the markets, come to ten thousand pounds, at least."[36] Strafford saw in the popularity of this triumph a fresh opportunity to commend the tyrannical designs of his master, Charles the First. "This action of Sallee," he wrote in reply to the Archbishop, "I assure you is full of honor, and should, methinks, help much towards the ready cheerful payment of the shipping moneys."[37]

The coasts of England were now protected; but her subjects at sea continued the prey of Algerine corsairs, who, according to the historian Carte,[38] now "carried their English captives to France, drove them in chains overland to Marseilles, to ship them thence with greater safety for slaves to Algiers." The increasing troubles, which distracted and finally cut short the reign of Charles the First, could not divert attention from the sorrows of Englishmen, victims to Mohammedan slave drivers. At the height of the struggles between the King and Parliament, an earnest voice was raised in behalf of these fellow-Christians in bonds.[39] Waller, who was orator as well as poet, exclaimed in Parliament, "By the many petitions which we receive from the wives of those miserable captives at Algiers, (being between four and five thousand of our countrymen,) it does too evidently appear, that to make us slaves at home is not the way to keep us from being made slaves abroad." Publications pleading their cause, bearing date in 1640, 1642, and 1647, are yet extant.[40] The overthrow of an oppression so justly odious formed a worthy object for the imperial energies of Cromwell; and in 1655,—when, amidst the amazement of Europe, the English sovereignty had already settled upon his Atlantean shoulders,—he directed into the Mediterranean a navy of thirty ships, under the command of Admiral Blake. This was the most powerful English force which had sailed into that sea since the Crusades.[41] Its success was complete. "General Blake," said one of the foreign agents of government, "has ratifyed the articles of peace at Argier, and included therein Scotch, Irish, Jarnsey, and Garnsey-men, and all others the Protector's subjects. He has lykewys redeemed from thence al such as wer captives ther. Several Dutch captives swam aboard the fleet, and so escape theyr captivity."[42] Tunis, as well as Algiers, was humbled; all British captives were set at liberty; and the Protector, in his remarkable speech at the opening of Parliament in the next year, announced peace with the "profane" nations in that region.[43]

To my mind no single circumstance gives a higher impression of the vigilance with which the Protector guarded his subjects than this effort, to which Waller, with the "smooth" line for which he is memorable, aptly alludes, as
telling dreadful news
To all that piracy and rapine use.

His vigorous sway was followed by the effeminate tyranny of Charles the Second, whose restoration was inaugurated by an unsuccessful expedition against Algiers under Lord Sandwich. This was soon followed by another, with a more favorable result, under Admiral Lawson.[44] By a treaty bearing date May 3d, 1662, the piratical government expressly stipulated, "that all subjects of the King of Great Britain, now slaves in Algiers, or any of the territories thereof, be set at liberty, and released, upon paying the price they were first sold for in the market; and for the time to come no subjects of his Majesty shall be bought or sold, or made slaves of, in Algiers or its territories."[45] Other expeditions ensued, and other treaties in 1664, 1672, 1682, and 1686—showing, by their constant recurrence and iteration, the little impression produced upon those barbarians.[46] Insensible to justice and freedom, they naturally held in slight regard the obligations of fidelity to any stipulations in restraint of robbery and slaveholding.

During a long succession of years, complaints of the sufferings of English captives continued to be made. An earnest spirit, in 1748, found expression in these words:—

O, how can Britain's sons regardless hear
The prayers, sighs, groans (immortal infamy!)
Of fellow-Britons, with oppression sunk,
In bitterness of soul demanding aid,
Calling on Britain, their dear native land,
The land of liberty![47]

But during all this time, the slavery of blacks, transported to the colonies under the British flag, still continued.

Meanwhile, France had plied Algiers with embassies and bombardments. In 1635 three hundred and forty-seven Frenchmen were captives there. Monsieur de Sampson was despatched on an unsuccessful mission, to procure their liberation. They were offered to him "for the price they were sold for in the market;" but this he refused to pay.[48] Next came, in 1637, Monsieur de Mantel, who was called "that noble captain, and glory of the French nation," "with fifteen of his king's ships, and a commission to enfranchise the French slaves." But he also returned, leaving his countrymen still in captivity.[49] Treaties followed at a later day, which were hastily concluded, and abruptly broken; till at last Louis the Fourteenth did for France what Cromwell had done for England. In 1684, Algiers, being twice bombarded[50] by his command, sent deputies to sue for peace, and to surrender all her Christian slaves. Tunis and Tripoli made the same submission. Voltaire, with his accustomed point, declares that, by this transaction, the French became respected on the coast of Africa, where they had before been known only as slaves.[51]

An incident is mentioned by the historian, which unhappily shows how little the French at that time, even while engaged in securing the emancipation of their own countrymen, had at heart the cause of general freedom. As an officer of the triumphant fleet received the Christian slaves who were brought to him and liberated, he observed among them many English, who, in the empty pride of nationality, maintained that they were set at liberty out of regard to the King of England. The Frenchman at once summoned the Algerines, and, returning the foolish captives into their hands, said, "These people pretend that they have been delivered in the name of their monarch; mine does not offer them his protection. I return them to you. It is for you to show what you owe to the King of England." The Englishmen were again hurried to prolonged slavery. The power of Charles the Second was impotent in their behalf—as was the sense of justice and humanity in the French officer or in the Algerine government.

Time would fail, even if materials were at hand, to develop the course of other efforts by France against the Barbary States. Nor can I dwell upon the determined conduct of Holland, one of whose greatest naval commanders, Admiral de Ruyter, in 1661, enforced at Algiers the emancipation of several hundred Christian slaves.[52] The inconsistency, which we have so often remarked, occurs also in the conduct of France and Holland. Both these countries, while using their best endeavors for the freedom of their white people, were cruelly engaged in selling blacks into distant American slavery; as if every word of reprobation, which they fastened upon the piratical, slaveholding Algerines, did not return in eternal judgment against themselves.

Thus far I have chiefly followed the history of military expeditions. War has been our melancholy burden. But peaceful measures were also employed to procure the redemption of slaves; and money sometimes accomplished what was vainly attempted by the sword. In furtherance of this object, missions were often sent by the European governments. These sometimes had a formal diplomatic organization; sometimes they consisted of fathers of the church, who held it a sacred office, to which they were especially called, to open the prison doors, and let the captives go free.[53] It was through the intervention of the superiors of the Order of the Holy Trinity, who were despatched to Algiers by Philip the Second of Spain, that Cervantes obtained his freedom by ransom, in 1579.[54] Expeditions of commerce often served to promote similar designs of charity; and the English government, forgetting or distrusting all their sleeping thunder, sometimes condescended to barter articles of merchandise for the liberty of their subjects.[55]

Private efforts often secured the freedom of slaves. Friends at home naturally exerted themselves in their behalf; and many families were straitened by generous contributions to this sacred purpose. The widowed mother of Cervantes sacrificed all the pittance that remained to her, including the dowry of her daughters, to aid in the emancipation of her son. An Englishman, of whose doleful captivity there is a record in the memoirs of his son, obtained redemption through the earnest efforts of his wife at home. "She resolved," says the story, "to use all the means that lay in her power for his freedom, though she left nothing for herself and children to subsist upon. She was forced to put to sale, as she did, some plate, gold rings and bracelets, and some part of her household goods to make up his ransom, which came to about £150 sterling."[56] In 1642, four French brothers were ransomed at the price of six thousand dollars. At this same period, the sum exacted for the poorest Spaniards was "a thousand shillings;" while Genoese, "if under twenty-two years of age, were freed for a hundred pounds sterling."[57] These charitable endeavors were aided by the cooperation of benevolent persons. George Fox interceded in behalf of several Quakers, slaves at Algiers, writing "a book to the Grand Sultan and the King at Algiers, wherein he laid before them their indecent behavior and unreasonable dealings, showing them from their Alcoran that this displeased God, and that Mohammed had given them other directions." Some time elapsed before an opportunity was found to redeem them; "but, in the mean while, they so faithfully served their masters, that they were suffered to go loose through the town, without being chained or fettered."[58]

As early as the thirteenth century, under the sanction of Pope Innocent the Third, an important association was organized to promote the emancipation of Christian slaves. This was known as the Society of the Fathers of Redemption.[59] During many successive generations its blessed labors were continued, amidst the praise and sympathy of generous men. History, undertaking to recount its origin, and filled with a grateful sense of its extraordinary merits, attributed it to the suggestion of an angel in the sky, clothed in resplendent light, holding a Christian captive in his right hand, and a Moor in the left. The pious Spaniard, who narrates the marvel, earnestly declares that this institution of beneficence was the work, not of men, but of the great God alone; and he dwells, with more than the warmth of narrative, on the glory, filling the lives of its associates, as surpassing far that of a Roman triumph; for they share the name as well as the labors of the Redeemer of the world, to whose spirit they are the heirs, and to whose works they are the successors. "Lucullus," he says, "affirmed that it were better to liberate a single Roman from the hands of the enemy than to gain all their wealth; but how much greater the gain, more excellent the glory, and more than human is it to redeem a captive! For whosoever redeems him not only liberates him from one death, but from death in a thousand ways, and those ever present, and also from a thousand afflictions, a thousand miseries, a thousand torments and fearful travails, more cruel than death itself."[60] The genius of Cervantes has left a record of his gratitude to this Anti-Slavery Society[61]—the harbinger of others whose mission is not yet finished. Throughout Spain annual contributions for its sacred objects continued to be taken for many years. Nor in Spain only did it awaken sympathy. In Italy and France also it successfully labored; and as late as 1748, inspired by a similar catholic spirit, if not by its example, a proposition appeared in England "to establish a society to carry on the truly charitable design of emancipating" sixty-four Englishmen, slaves in Morocco.[62]

War and ransom were not the only agents of emancipation. Even if history were silent, it would be impossible to suppose that the slaves of African Barbary endured their lot without struggles for freedom.

Since the first moment they put on my chains,
I've thought on nothing but the weight of them,
And how to throw them off.

These are the words of a slave in the play;[63] but they express the natural inborn sentiments of all who have intelligence sufficient to appreciate the great boon of freedom. "Thanks be to God," says the captive in Don Quixote, "for the great mercies bestowed upon me; for, in my opinion, there is no happiness on earth equal to that of liberty regained."[64] And plain Thomas Phelps—once a slave at Machiness, in Morocco, whence, in 1685, he fortunately escaped—in the narrative of his adventures and sufferings, breaks forth in a similar strain. "Since my escape," he says, "from captivity, and worse than Egyptian bondage, I have, methinks, enjoyed a happiness with which my former life was never acquainted; now that, after a storm and terrible tempest, I have, by miracle, put into a safe and quiet harbor,—after a most miserable slavery to the most unreasonable and barbarous of men, now that I enjoy the immunities and freedom of my native country and the privileges of a subject of England, although my circumstances otherwise are but indifferent, yet I find I am affected with extraordinary emotions and singular transports of joy; now I know what liberty is, and can put a value and make a just estimate of that happiness which before I never well understood. Health can be but slightly esteemed by him who never was acquainted with pain or sickness; and liberty and freedom are the happiness only valuable by a reflection on captivity and slavery."[65]

The history of Algiers abounds in well-authenticated examples of conspiracy against the government by Christian slaves. So strong was the passion for freedom! In 1531 and 1559, two separate plans were matured, which promised for a while entire success. The slaves were numerous; keys to open the prisons had been forged, and arms supplied; but, by the treason of one of their number, the plot was betrayed to the Dey, who sternly doomed the conspirators to the bastinado and the stake. Cervantes, during his captivity, nothing daunted by these disappointed efforts, and the terrible vengeance which awaited them, conceived the plan of a general insurrection of the Christian slaves, to secure their freedom by the overthrow of the Algerine power, and the surrender of the city to the Spanish crown. This was in the spirit of that sentiment, to which he gives utterance in his writings, that "for liberty we ought to risk life itself, slavery being the greatest evil that can fall to the lot of man."[66] As late as 1763, there was a similar insurrection or conspiracy. "Last month," says a journal of high authority,[67] "the Christian slaves at Algiers, to the number of four thousand, rose and killed their guards, and massacred all who came in their way; but after some hours' carnage, during which the streets ran with blood, peace was restored."

But the struggles for freedom could not always assume the shape of conspiracies against the government. They were often efforts to escape, sometimes in numbers, and sometimes singly. The captivity of Cervantes was filled with such, in which, though constantly balked, he persevered with determined courage and skill. On one occasion, he attempted to escape by land to Oran, a Spanish settlement on the coast, but was deserted by his guide, and compelled to return.[68] Another endeavor was favored by a number of his own countrymen, hovering on the coast in a vessel from Majorca, who did not think it wrong to aid in the liberation of slaves! Another was promoted by Christian merchants at Algiers, through whose agency a vessel was actually purchased for this purpose.[69] And still another was supposed to be aided by a Spanish ecclesiastic, Father Olivar, who, being at Algiers to procure the legal emancipation of slaves, could not resist the temptation to lend a generous assistance to the struggles of his fellow-Christians in bonds. If he were sufficiently courageous and devoted to do this, he paid the bitter penalty which similar services to freedom have found elsewhere, and in another age. He was seized by the Dey, and thrown into chains; for it was regarded by the Algerine government as a high offence to further in any way the escape of a slave.[70]

Endeavors for freedom are animating; nor can any honest nature hear of them without a throb of sympathy. As we dwell on the painful narrative of the unequal contest between tyrannical power and the crushed captive or slave, we resolutely enter the lists on the side of freedom; and as we behold the contest waged by a few individuals, or, perhaps, by one alone, our sympathy is given to his weakness as well as to his cause. To him we send the unfaltering succor of our good wishes. For him we invoke vigor of arm to defend, and fleetness of foot to escape. The enactments of human laws are vain to restrain the warm tides of the heart. We pause with rapture on those historic scenes, in which freedom has been attempted or preserved through the magnanimous self-sacrifice of friendship or Christian aid. With palpitating bosom we follow the midnight flight of Mary of Scotland from the custody of her stern jailers; we accompany the escape of Grotius from prison in Holland, so adroitly promoted by his wife; we join with the flight of Lavalette in France, aided also by his wife; and we offer our admiration and gratitude to Huger and Bollman, who, unawed by the arbitrary ordinances of Austria, strove heroically, though vainly, to rescue Lafayette from the dungeons of Olmutz. The laws of Algiers—which sanctioned a cruel slavery, and doomed to condign penalties all endeavors for freedom, and all countenance of such endeavors—can no longer prevent our homage to Cervantes, not less gallant than renowned, who strove so constantly and earnestly to escape his chains; nor our homage to those Christians also who did not fear to aid him, and to the good ecclesiastic who suffered in his cause.

The story of the efforts to escape from slavery in the Barbary States, so far as they can be traced, are full of interest. The following is in the exact words of an early writer:—

"One John Fox, an expert mariner, and a good, approved, and sufficient gunner, was (in the raigne of Queene Elizabeth) taken by the Turkes, and kept eighteen yeeres in most miserable bondage and slavery; at the end of which time, he espied his opportunity (and God assisting him withall) that hee slew his keeper, and fled to the sea's side, where he found a gally with one hundred and fifty captive Christians, which hee speedily waying their anchor, set saile, and fell to work like men, and safely arrived in Spaone; by which meanes he freed himselfe and a number of poor soules from long and intolerable servitude; after which, the said John Fox came into England, and the Queene (being rightly informed of his brave exploit) did graciously entertaine him for her servant, and allowed him a yeerly pension."[71]

There is also, in the same early source, a quaint description of what occurred to a ship from Bristol, captured, in 1621, by an Algerine corsair. The Englishmen were all taken out except four youths, over whom the Turks, as these barbarians were often called by early writers, put thirteen of their own men to conduct the ship as a prize to Algiers; and one of the pirates, a strong, able, stern, and resolute person, was appointed captain. "These four poor youths," so the story proceeds, "being thus fallen into the hands of merciless infidels, began to study and complot all the means they could for the obtayning of their freedom. They considered the lamentable and miserable estates that they were like to be in, as to be debarred forever from seeing their friends and country, to be chained, beaten, made slaves, and to eat the bread of affliction in the galleys, all the remainder of their unfortunate lives, and, which was worst of all, never to be partakers of the heavenly word and sacraments. Thus, being quite hopeless, and, for any thing they knew, forever helpless, they sailed five days and nights under the command of the pirates, when, on the fifth night, God, in his great mercy, showed them a means for their wished-for escape." A sudden wind arose, when, the captain coming to help take in the mainsail, two of the English youths "suddenly took him by the breech and threw him overboard; but, by fortune, he fell into the bunt of the sail, where, quickly catching hold of a rope, he, being a very strong man, had almost gotten into the ship again; which John Cook perceiving, leaped speedily to the pump, and took off the pump brake, or handle, and cast it to William Long, bidding him knock him down, which he was not long in doing, but, lifting up the wooden weapon, he gave him such a palt on the pate, as made his braines forsake the possession of his head, with which his body fell into the sea." The corsair slave dealers were overpowered. The four English youths drove them "from place to place in the ship, and having coursed them from poop to the forecastle, they there valiantly killed two of them, and gave another a dangerous wound or two, who, to escape the further fury of their swords, leaped suddenly overboard to go seek his captain." The other nine Turks ran between decks, where they were securely fastened. The English now directed their course to St. Lucas, in Spain, and "in short time, by God's ayde, happily and safely arrived at the said port, where they sold the nine Turks for galley slaves, for a good summe of money, and as I thinke, a great deal more than they were worth."[72] "He that shall attribute such things as these," says the ancient historian, grateful for this triumph of freedom, "to the arm of flesh and blood, is forgetful, ungrateful, and, in a manner, atheistical."

From the same authority I draw another narrative of singular success in achieving freedom. Several Englishmen, being captured and carried into Algiers, were sold as slaves. These are the words of one of their number: "We were hurried like dogs into the market, where, as men sell hacknies in England, we were tossed up and down to see who would give most for us; and although we had heavy hearts, and looked with sad countenances, yet many came to behold us, sometimes taking us by the hand, sometimes turning us round about, sometimes feeling our brawny and naked armes, and so beholding our prices written in our breasts, they bargained for us accordingly, and at last we were all sold." Shortly afterwards several were put on board an Algerine corsair to serve as slaves. One of them, John Rawlins, who resembled Cervantes in the hardihood of his exertions for freedom,—as, like him, he had lost the use of an arm,—arranged a rising or insurrection on board. "O hellish slavery," he said, "to be thus subject to dogs! O God! strengthen my heart and hand, and something shall be done to ease us of these mischiefs, and deliver us from these cruel Mohammedan dogs. What can be worse? I will either attempt my deliverance at one time or another, or perish in the enterprise." An auspicious moment was seized; and eight English slaves and one French, with the assistance of four Hollanders, freemen, succeeded, after a bloody contest, in overpowering fifty-two Turks. "When all was done," the story proceeds, "and the ship cleared of the dead bodies, Rawlins assembled his men together, and with one consent gave the praise unto God, using the accustomed service on shipboard, and, for want of books, lifted up their voices to God, as he put into their hearts or renewed their memories; then did they sing a psalm, and, last of all, embraced one another for playing the men in such a deliverance, whereby our fear was turned into joy, and trembling hearts exhilarated that we had escaped such inevitable dangers, and especially the slavery and terror of bondage worse than death itself. The same night we washed our ship, put every thing in as good order as we could, repaired the broken quarter, set up the biticle, and bore up the helme for England, where, by God's grace and good guiding, we arrived at Plimouth, February 17th, 1622."[73]

In 1685, Thomas Phelps and Edward Baxter, Englishmen, accomplished their escape from captivity in Machiness, in Morocco. One of them had made a previous unsuccessful attempt, which drew upon him the punishment of the bastinado, disabling him from work for a twelvemonth; "but such was his love of Christian liberty, that he freely declared to his companion, that he would adventure with any fair opportunity." By devious paths, journeying in the darkness of night, and by day sheltering themselves from observation in bushes, or in the branches of fig trees, they at length reached the sea. With imminent risk of discovery, they succeeded in finding a boat, not far from Sallee. This they took without consulting the proprietor, and rowed to a ship at a distance, which, to their great joy, proved to be an English man-of-war. Making known to its commander the exposed situation of the Moorish ships, they formed part of an expedition in boats, which boarded and burned them, in the night. "One Moor," says the account, "we found aboard, who was presently cut in pieces; another was shot in the head, endeavoring to escape upon the cable; we were not long in taking in our shavings and tar barrels, and so set her on fire in several places, she being very apt to receive what we designed; for there were several barrels of tar upon deck, and she was newly tarred, as if on purpose. Whilst we were setting her on fire, we heard a noise of some people in the hold; we opened the scuttles, and thereby saved the lives of four Christians, three Dutchmen and one French, who told us the ship on fire was Admiral, and belonged to Aly-Hackum, and the other, which we soon after served with the same sauce, was the very ship which in October last took me captive." The Englishman, once a captive, who tells this story, says it is "most especially to move pity for the afflictions of Joseph, to excite compassionate regard to those poor countrymen now languishing in misery and irons, to endeavor their releasement."[74]

Even the non-resistance of Quakers, animated by a zeal for freedom, contrived to baffle these slave dealers. A ship in the charge of people of this sect became the prey of the Algerines; and the curious story is told with details, unnecessary to mention here, of the effective manner in which the ship was subsequently recaptured by the crew without loss of life. To complete this triumph, the slave pirates were safely landed on their own shores, and allowed to go their way in peace, acknowledging with astonishment and gratitude this new application of the Christian injunction to do good to them that hate you. Charles the Second, learning from the master, on his return, that "he had been taken by the Turks, and redeemed himself without fighting," and that he had subsequently let his enemies go free, rebuked him, saying, with the spirit of a slave dealer, "You have done like a fool, for you might have had a good gain for them." And to the mate he said, "You should have brought the Turks to me." "I thought it better for them to be in their own country" was the Quaker's reply.[75]

In the current of time other instances occurred. A letter from Algiers, dated August 6, 1772, and preserved in the British Annual Register, furnishes the following story:[76] "A most remarkable escape," it says, "of some Christian prisoners has lately been effected here, which will undoubtedly cause those that have not had that good fortune to be treated with utmost rigor. On the morning of the 27th July, the Dey was informed that all the Christian slaves had escaped the over-night in a galley; this news soon raised him, and, upon inquiry, it was found to have been a preconcerted plan. About ten at night, seventy-four slaves, who had found means to escape from their masters, met in a large square near the gate which opens to the harbor, and, being well armed, they soon forced the guard to submit, and, to prevent their raising the city, confined them all in the powder magazine. They then proceeded to the lower part of the harbor, where they embarked on board a large rowing polacre that was left there for the purpose, and, the tide ebbing out, they fell gently down with it, and passed both the forts. As soon as this was known, three large galleys were ordered out after them, but to no purpose. They returned in three days, with the news of seeing the polacre sail into Barcelona, where the galleys durst not go to attack her."

In the same journal[77] there is a record of another triumph of freedom in a letter from Palma, the capital of Majorca, dated September 3, 1776. "Forty-six captives," it says, "who were employed to draw stones from a quarry some leagues' distance from Algiers, at a place named Genova, resolved, if possible, to recover their liberty, and yesterday took advantage of the idleness and inattention of forty men who were to guard them, and who had laid down their arms, and were rambling about the shore. The captives attacked them with pickaxes and other tools, and made themselves masters of their arms; and, having killed thirty-three of the forty, and eleven of the thirteen sailors who were in the boat which carried the stones, they obliged the rest to jump into the sea. Being then masters of the boat, and armed with twelve muskets, two pistols, and powder, they set sail, and had the good fortune to arrive here this morning, where they are performing quarantine. Sixteen of them are Spaniards, seventeen French, eight Portuguese, three Italian, one a German, and one a Sardinian."

Thus far I have followed the efforts of European nations, and the struggles of Europeans, unhappy victims to White Slavery. I pass now to America, and to our own country. In the name of fellow-countryman there is a charm of peculiar power. The story of his sorrows will come nearer to our hearts, and, perhaps, to the experience of individuals or families among us, than the story of Spaniards, Frenchmen, or Englishmen. Nor are materials wanting.

Even in the early days of the colonies, while they were yet contending with the savage Indians, many American families were compelled to mourn the hapless fate of brothers, fathers, and husbands doomed to slavery in distant African Barbary. Only five short years after the landing of the Pilgrims at Plymouth Rock,[78] it appears from the records of the town, under date of 1625, that "two ships, freighted from Plymouth, were taken by the Turks in the English Channel, and carried into Sallee." A little later, in 1640, "one Austin, a man of good estate," returning discontented to England from Quinipiack, now New Haven, on his way "was taken by the Turks, and his wife and family were carried to Algiers, and sold there as slaves."[79] And, under date of 1671, in the diary of the Rev. John Eliot, the first minister of Roxbury, and the illustrious apostle to the Indians, prefixed to the record of the church in that town, and still preserved in manuscript, these few words tell a story of sorrow: "We heard the sad and heavy tidings concerning the captivity of Captain Foster and his son at Sallee." From further entries in the diary it appears, that, after a bondage of three years, they were redeemed. But the same record shows other victims, for whom the sympathies of the church and neighborhood were enlisted. Here is one: "20 10m. 1674. This Sabbath we had a public collection for Edward Howard of Boston, to redeem him out of his sad Turkish captivity, in which collection was gathered £12 18s. 9d., which, by God's favor, made up the just sum desired." And not long after, at a date left uncertain, it appears that William Bowen "was taken by the Turks;" a contribution was made for his redemption; "and the people went to the public box, young and old, but before the money could answer the end for which the congregation intended it," tidings came of the death of the unhappy captive, and the money was afterwards "improved to build a tomb for the town to inter their ministers."[80]

Instances now thicken. A ship, sailing from Charlestown, in 1678, was taken by a corsair, and carried into Algiers, whence its passengers and crew never returned. They probably died in slavery. Among these was Dr. Daniel Mason, a graduate of Harvard College, and the earliest of that name on the list; also James Ellson, the mate. The latter, in a testamentary letter addressed to his wife, and dated at Algiers, June 30, 1679, desired her to redeem out of captivity two of his companions.[81] At the same period William Harris, a person of consequence in the colony, one of the associates of Roger Williams in the first planting of Providence, and now in the sixty-eighth year of his age, sailing from Boston for England on public business, was also taken by a corsair, and carried into Algiers. On the 23d February, 1679, this veteran,—older than the slaveholder Cato when he learned Greek,—together with all the crew, was sold into slavery. The fate of his companions is unknown; but Mr. Harris, after remaining in this condition more than a year, obtained his freedom at the cost of $1200, called by him "the price of a good farm." The feelings of the people of the colony, touched by these disasters, are concisely expressed in a private letter dated at Boston, New England, November 10, 1680, where it is said, "The Turks have so taken our New England ships richly loaden homeward bound, that it is very dangerous to goe. Many of our neighbors are now in captivity in Argeer. The Lord find out some way for their redemption."[82]

Still later, as we enter the next century, we meet a curious notice of the captivity of a Bostonian. Under date of Tuesday, January 11, 1714, Chief Justice Samuel Sewell, in his journal, after describing a dinner with Mr. Gee, and mentioning the guests, among whom were the famous divines, Increase and Cotton Mather, adds, "It seems it was in remembrance of his landing this day at Boston, after his Algerine captivity. Had a good treat. Dr. Cotton Mather, in returning thanks, very well comprised many weighty things very pertinently."[83] Among the many weighty things very pertinently comprised by this eminent preacher, in returning thanks, it is hoped, was a condemnation of slavery. Surely he could not then have shrunk from giving utterance to that faith which preaches deliverance to the captive.

But leaving the imperfect records of colonial days, I descend at once to that period, almost in the light of these times, when our National Government, justly careful of the liberty of its white citizens, was aroused to put forth all its power in their behalf. The war of the Revolution closed in 1783, by the acknowledgment of the independence of the United States. The new national flag, then freshly unfurled, and hardly known to the world, seemed to have little power to protect persons or property from the outrages of the Barbary States. Within three years, no less than ten American vessels became their prey. At one time an apprehension prevailed, that Dr. Franklin had been captured. "We are waiting," said one of his French correspondents, "with the greatest patience to hear from you. The newspapers have given us anxiety on your account; for some of them insist that you have been taken by the Algerines, while others pretend that you are at Morocco, enduring your slavery with all the patience of a philosopher."[84] The property of our merchants was sacrificed or endangered. Insurance at Lloyd's, in London, could be had only at advanced prices; while it was difficult to obtain freight for American bottoms.[85] The Mediterranean trade seemed closed to our enterprise. To a people filled with the spirit of commerce, and bursting with new life, this in itself was disheartening; but the sufferings of our unhappy fellow-citizens, captives in a distant land, aroused a feeling of a higher strain.

As from time to time the tidings of these things reached America, a voice of horror and indignation swelled through the land. The slave corsairs of African Barbary were branded sometimes as "infernal crews," sometimes as "human harpies."[86] This sentiment acquired new force, when, at two different periods, by the fortunate escape of captives, what seemed an authentic picture of their condition was presented to the world. The story of these fugitives will show at once the hardships of their lot, and the foundation of the appeal which was soon made to the country with so much effect.

The earliest of these escapes was in 1788, by a person originally captured in a vessel from Boston. At Algiers he had been, with the rest of the ship's company, exposed for sale at public auction, whence he was sent to the country house of his master, about two miles from town. Here, for the space of eighteen months, he was chained to the wheelbarrow, and allowed only one pound of bread a day, during all which wretched period he had no opportunity to learn the fate of his companions. From the country he was removed to Algiers, where, in a numerous company of white slaves, he encountered three of his shipmates, and twenty-six other Americans. After remaining for some time crowded together in the slave prison, they were all distributed among the different galleys in the service of the Dey. Our fugitive, with eighteen other white slaves, was put on board a xebec, carrying eight six-pounders and sixty men, which, on the coast of Malta, encountered an armed vessel belonging to Genoa, and, after much bloodshed, was taken sword in hand. Eleven of the unfortunate slaves, compelled to this unwelcome service in the cause of a tyrannical master, were killed in the contest, before the triumph of the Genoese could deliver them from their chains. Our countryman and the few still alive were at once set at liberty, and, it is said, "treated with that humanity which distinguishes the Christian from the barbarian."[87]

His escape was followed in the next year by that of several others, achieved under circumstances widely different. They had entered, about five years before, on board a vessel belonging to Philadelphia, which was captured near the Western Islands, and carried into Algiers. The crew, consisting of twenty persons, were doomed to bondage. Several were sent into the country and chained to work with the mules. Others were put on board a galley and chained to the oars. The latter, tempted by the facilities of their position near the sea, made several attempts to escape, which for some time proved fruitless. At last, the love of freedom triumphing over the suggestions of humanity, they rose upon their overseers; some of whom they killed, and confined others. Then, seizing a small galley of their masters, they set sail for Gibraltar, where in a few hours they landed as freemen.[88] Thus, by killing their keepers and carrying off property not their own, did these fugitive white slaves achieve their liberty.

Such stories could not be recounted without producing a strong effect. The glimpses thus opened into the dread regions of slavery gave a harrowing reality to all that conjecture or imagination had pictured. It was, indeed, true, that our own white brethren, heirs to the freedom newly purchased by precious blood, partakers in the sovereignty of citizenship, belonging to the fellowship of the Christian church, were degraded in unquestioning obedience to an arbitrary taskmaster, sold as beasts of the field, and galled by the manacle and the lash! It was true that they were held at fixed prices; and that their only chance of freedom was to be found in the earnest, energetic, united efforts of their countrymen in their behalf. It is not easy to comprehend the exact condition to which they were reduced. There is no reason to believe that it differed materially from that of other Christian captives in Algiers. The masters of vessels were lodged together, and indulged with a table by themselves, though a small iron ring was attached to one of their legs, to denote that they were slaves. The seamen were taught and obliged to work at the trade of carpenter, blacksmith, and stone mason, from six o'clock in the morning till four o'clock in the afternoon, without intermission, except for half an hour at dinner.[89] Some of the details of their mode of life, as transmitted to us, are doubtless exaggerated. It is, however, sufficient to know that they were slaves; nor is there any other human condition, which, when barely mentioned, even without one word of description, so strongly awakens the sympathies of every just and enlightened lover of his race.

With a view to secure their freedom, informal agencies were soon established under the direction of our minister at Paris; and the Society of Redemption—whose beneficent exertions, commencing so early in modern history, were still continued—offered their aid. Our agents were blandly entertained by that great slave dealer, the Dey of Algiers, who informed them that he was familiar with the exploits of Washington, and, as he never expected to see him, expressed a hope, that, through Congress, he might receive a full-length portrait of this hero of freedom, to be displayed in his palace at Algiers. He, however, still clung to his American slaves, holding them at prices beyond the means of the agents. These, in 1786, were $6000 for a master of a vessel, $4000 for a mate, $4000 for a passenger, and $1400 for a seaman; whereas the agents were authorized to offer only $200 for each captive.[90] In 1790, the tariff of prices seems to have fallen. Meanwhile, one obtained his freedom through private means, others escaped, and others still were liberated by the great liberator Death. The following list, if not interesting from the names of the captives, will at least be curious as evidence of the sums demanded for them in the slave market:[91]—

| | Sequins.
Crew of the Ship Dolphin, of Philadelphia,
captured July 30, 1785.
Richard O'Brien, | master, price demanded, | 2,000
Andrew Montgomery, | mate, | 1,500
Jacob Tessanier, | French passenger, | 2,000
William Patterson, | seaman, (keeps a tavern,) | 1,500
Philip Sloan, | " | 725
Peleg Loring, | " | 725
John Robertson, | " | 725
James Hall, | " | 725
Crew of the Schooner Maria, of Boston,
captured July 25, 1785.
Isaac Stevens, | master, (of Concord, Mass.,) | 2,000
Alexander Forsythe, | mate, | 1,500
James Cathcart, | seaman, (keeps a tavern,) | 900
George Smith, | " (in the Dey's house,) | 725
John Gregory, | " | 725
James Hermit, | " | 725
| | __________ | ____
| | 16,475
Duty on the above sum, ten per cent., | | 1,647 | ½
Sundry gratifications
to officers of the Dey's household, | | 240 | 1/3
| | __________ | ____
| Sequins | 18,362 | 5/6
This sum being equal to $34,792.

In 1793, there were one hundred and fifteen American slaves in Algiers.[92] Their condition excited the fraternal feeling of the whole people, while it occupied the anxious attention of Congress and the prayers of the clergy. A petition dated at Algiers, December 29, 1793, was addressed to the House of Representatives, by these unhappy persons.[93] "Your petitioners," it says, "are at present captives in this city of bondage, employed daily in the most laborious work, without any respect to persons. They pray that you will take their unfortunate situation into consideration, and adopt such measures as will restore the American captives to their country, their friends, families, and connections; and your petitioners will ever pray and be thankful." But the action of Congress was sluggish, compared with the swift desires of all lovers of freedom.

Appeals of a different character, addressed to the country at large, were now commenced. These were efficiently aided by a letter to the American people, dated Lisbon, July 11, 1794, from Colonel Humphreys, the friend and companion of Washington, and at that time our minister to Portugal. Taking advantage of the general interest in lotteries, and particularly of the custom, not then condemned, of resorting to these as a mode of obtaining money for literary or benevolent purposes, he suggested a grand lottery, sanctioned by the United States, or particular lotteries in the individual states, in order to obtain the means required to purchase the freedom of our countrymen. He then asks, "Is there within the limits of these United States an individual who will not cheerfully contribute, in proportion to his means, to carry it into effect? By the peculiar blessings of freedom which you enjoy, by the disinterested sacrifices you made for its attainment, by the patriotic blood of those martyrs of liberty who died to secure your independence, and by all the tender ties of nature, let me conjure you once more to snatch your unfortunate countrymen from fetters, dungeons, and death."

This appeal was followed shortly after by a petition from the American captives in Algiers, addressed to the ministers of the gospel of every denomination throughout the United States, praying their help in the sacred cause of Emancipation. It begins by an allusion to the day of national thanksgiving appointed by President Washington, and proceeds to ask the clergy to set apart the Sunday preceding that day for sermons, to be delivered contemporaneously throughout the country in behalf of their brethren in bonds.[94]

"Reverend and Respected,—

"On Thursday, the 19th of February, 1795, you are enjoined by the President of the United States of America to appear in the various temples of that God who heareth the groaning of the prisoner, and in mercy remembereth those who are appointed to die.

"Nor are ye to assemble alone; for on this, the high day of continental thanksgiving, all the religious societies and denominations throughout the Union, and all persons whomsoever within the limits of the confederated States, are to enter the courts of Jehovah, with their several pastors, and gratefully to render unfeigned thanks to the Ruler of nations for the manifold and signal mercies which distinguish your lot as a people; in a more particular manner, commemorating your exemption from foreign war; being greatly thankful for the preservation of peace at home and abroad; and fervently beseeching the kind Author of all these blessings graciously to prolong them to you, and finally to render the United States of America more and more an asylum for the unfortunate of every clime under heaven.

"Reverend and Respected,—

"Most fervent are our daily prayers, breathed in the sincerity of woes unspeakable; most ardent are the imbittered aspirations of our afflicted spirits, that thus it may be in deed and in truth. Although we are prisoners in a foreign land, although we are far, very far from our native homes, although our harps are hung upon the weeping willows of slavery, nevertheless America is still preferred above our chiefest joy, and the last wish of our departing souls shall be her peace, her prosperity, her liberty forever. On this day, the day of festivity and gladness, remember us, your unfortunate brethren, late members of the family of freedom, now doomed to perpetual confinement. Pray, earnestly pray, that our grievous calamities may have a gracious end. Supplicate the Father of mercies for the most wretched of his offspring. Beseech the God of all consolation to comfort us by the hope of final restoration. Implore the Jesus whom you worship to open the house of the prison. Entreat the Christ whom you adore to let the miserable captives go free.

"Reverend and Respected,—

"It is not your prayers alone, although of much avail, which we beg on the bending knee of sufferance, galled by the corroding fetters of slavery. We conjure you by the bowels of the mercies of the Almighty, we ask you in the name of your Father in heaven, to have compassion on our miseries, to wipe away the crystallized tears of despondence, to hush the heartfelt sigh of distress; and by every possible exertion of godlike charity, to restore us to our wives, to our children, to our friends, to our God and to yours.

"Is it possible that a stimulus can be wanting? Forbid it, the example of a dying, bleeding, crucified Savior! Forbid it, the precepts of a risen, ascended, glorified Immanuel! Do unto us in fetters, in bonds, in dungeons, in danger of the pestilence, as ye yourselves would wish to be done unto. Lift up your voices like a trumpet; cry aloud in the cause of humanity, benevolence, philosophy; eloquence can never be directed to a nobler purpose; religion never employed in a more glorious cause; charity never meditate a more exalted flight. O that a live coal from the burning altar of celestial beneficence might warm the hearts of the sacred order, and impassion the feelings of the attentive hearer!

"Gentlemen of the Clergy in New Hampshire, Rhode Island, Massachusetts, New York, Pennsylvania, and Virginia,—

"Your most zealous exertions, your unremitting assiduities, are pathetically invoked. Those States in which you minister unto the Church of God gave us birth. We are as aliens from the commonwealth of America. We are strangers to the temples of our God. The strong arm of infidelity hath bound us with two chains; the iron one of slavery and the sword of death are entering our very souls. Arise, ye ministers of the Most High, Christians of every denomination, awake unto charity! Let a brief, setting forth our situation, be published throughout the continent. Be it read in every house of worship, on Sunday, the 8th of February. Command a preparatory discourse to be delivered on Sunday, the 15th of February, in all churches whithersoever this petition or the brief may come; and on Thursday, the 19th of February, complete the godlike work. It is a day which assembles a continent to thanksgiving. It is a day which calls an empire to praise. God grant that this may be the day which emancipates the forlorn captive, and may the best blessings of those who are ready to perish be your abiding portion forever! Thus prays a small remnant who are still alive; thus pray your fellow-citizens, chained to the galleys of the impostor Mahomet.

"Signed for and in behalf of his fellow-sufferers, by

"RICHARD O'BRIEN
"In the tenth year of his captivity."

The cause in which this document was written will indispose the candid reader to any criticism of its somewhat exuberant language. Like the drama of Cervantes, setting forth the horrors of the galleys of Algiers, "it was not drawn from the imagination, but was born far from the regions of fiction, in the very heart of truth." Its earnest appeals were calculated to touch the soul, and to make the very name of slavery and slave dealer detestable.

And here I should do injustice to the truth of history, if I did not suspend for one moment the narrative of this Anti-Slavery movement, in order to exhibit the pointed parallels then extensively recognized between Algerine and American slavery. The conscientious man could not plead in behalf of the emancipation of his white fellow-citizens, without confessing in his heart, perhaps to the world, that every consideration, every argument, every appeal urged for the white man, told with equal force in behalf of his wretched colored brother in bonds. Thus the interest awakened for the slave in Algiers embraced also the slave at home. Sometimes they were said to be alike in condition; sometimes, indeed, it was openly declared that the horrors of our American slavery surpassed that of Algiers.

John Wesley, the oracle of Methodism, addressing those engaged in the negro slave trade, said, as early as 1772, "You have carried the survivors into the vilest of slavery, never to end but with life—such slavery as is not found among the Turks at Algiers."[95] And another writer, in 1794, when the sympathy with the American captives was at its height, presses the parallel in pungent terms: "For this practice of buying and selling slaves," he says, "we are not entitled to charge the Algerines with any exclusive degree of barbarity. The Christians of Europe and America carry on this commerce one hundred times more extensively than the Algerines. It has received a recent sanction from the immaculate Divan of Britain. Nobody seems even to be surprised by a diabolical kind of advertisements, which, for some months past, have frequently adorned the newspapers of Philadelphia. The French fugitives from the West Indies have brought with them a crowd of slaves. These most injured people sometimes run off, and their master advertises a reward for apprehending them. At the same time, we are commonly informed that his sacred name is marked in capitals on their breasts; or, in plainer terms, it is stamped on that part of the body with a red-hot iron. Before, therefore, we reprobate the ferocity of the Algerines, we should inquire whether it is not possible to find in some other region of this globe a systematic brutality still more disgraceful."[96]

Not long after the address to the clergy by the captives in Algiers, a publication appeared in New Hampshire, entitled "Tyrannical Libertymen; a Discourse upon Negro Slavery in the United States, composed at —— in New Hampshire on the late Federal Thanksgiving Day,"[97] which does not hesitate to brand American slavery in terms of glowing reprobation. "There was a contribution upon this day," it says, "for the purpose of redeeming those Americans who are in slavery at Algiers—an object worthy of a generous people. Their redemption, we hope, is not far distant. But should any person contribute money for this purpose which he had cudgelled out of a negro slave, he would deserve less applause than an actor in the comedy of Las Casas.... When will Americans show that they are what they affect to be thought—friends to the cause of humanity at large, reverers of the rights of their fellow-creatures? Hitherto we have been oppressors; nay, murderers! for many a negro has died by the whip of his master, and many have lived when death would have been preferable. Surely the curse of God and the reproach of man is against us. Worse than the seven plagues of Egypt will befall us. If Algiers shall be punished sevenfold, truly America seventy and sevenfold."

To the excitement of this discussion we are indebted for the story of "The Algerine Captive;" a work to which, though now forgotten, belongs the honor of being among the earliest literary productions of our country reprinted in London, at a time when few American books were known abroad. It was published anonymously, but is known to have been written by Royall Tyler, afterwards Chief Justice of Vermont. In the form of a narrative of personal adventures, extending through two volumes, as a slave in Algiers, the author depicts the horrors of this condition. In this regard it is not unlike the story of "Archy Moore," in our own day, displaying the horrors of American slavery. The author, while engaged as surgeon on board a ship in the African slave trade, is taken captive by the Algerines. After describing the reception of the poor negroes, he says, "I cannot reflect on this transaction yet without shuddering. I have deplored my conduct with tears of anguish; and I pray a merciful God, the common Parent of the great family of the universe, who hath made of one flesh and one blood all nations of the earth, that the miseries, the insults, and cruel woundings I afterwards received, when a slave myself, may expiate for the inhumanity I was necessitated to exercise towards these my brethren of the human race."[98] And when at length he is himself made captive by the Algerines, he records his meditations and resolves. "Grant me," he says, from the depths of his own misfortune, "once more to taste the freedom of my native country, and every moment of my life shall be dedicated to preaching against this detestable commerce. I will fly to our fellow-citizens in the Southern States; I will, on my knees, conjure them, in the name of humanity, to abolish a traffic which causes it to bleed in every pore. If they are deaf to the pleadings of nature, I will conjure them, for the sake of consistency, to cease to deprive their fellow-creatures of freedom, which their writers, their orators, representatives, senators, and even their constitutions of government, have declared to be the unalienable birthright of man."[99]

But this comparison was presented not merely in the productions of literature, or in fugitive essays. It was distinctly set forth, on an important occasion, in the diplomacy of our country, by one of her most illustrious citizens. Complaint had been made against England for carrying away from New York certain negroes, in alleged violation of the treaty of 1783. In an elaborate paper discussing this matter, John Jay, at that time, under the Confederation, Secretary for Foreign Affairs, says, "Whether men can be so degraded as, under any circumstances, to be with propriety denominated goods and chattels, and, under that idea, capable of becoming booty, is a question on which opinions are unfortunately various, even in countries professing Christianity and respect for the rights of mankind." He then proceeds, in words worthy of special remembrance at this time: "If a war should take place between France and Algiers, and in the course of it France should invite the American slaves there to run away from their masters, and actually receive and protect them in their camp, what would Congress, and indeed the world, think and say of France, if, in making peace with Algiers, she should give up those American slaves to their former Algerine masters? Is there any difference between the two cases than this, viz., that the American slaves at Algiers are WHITE people, whereas the African slaves at New York were BLACK people?" In introducing these sentiments, the Secretary remarks, "He is aware he is about to say unpopular things; but higher motives than personal considerations press him to proceed."[100] Words worthy of John Jay!

The same comparison was also presented by the Abolition Society of Pennsylvania, in an Address, in 1787, to the Convention which framed the Federal Constitution. "Providence," it says, "seems to have ordained the sufferings of our American brethren, groaning in captivity at Algiers, to awaken us to a sentiment of the injustice and cruelty of which we are guilty towards the wretched Africans."[101] Shortly afterwards, it was again brought forward by Dr. Franklin, in an ingenious apologue, marked by his peculiar humor, simplicity, logic, and humanity. As President of the same Abolition Society, which had already addressed the Convention, he signed a memorial to the earliest Congress under the Constitution, praying it "to countenance the restoration of liberty to those unhappy men, who alone, in this land of freedom, are degraded into perpetual bondage; and to step to the very verge of the power vested in them for discouraging every species of traffic in the persons of our fellow-men." In the debates which ensued on the presentation of this memorial,—memorable not only for its intrinsic importance as a guide to the country, but as the final public act of one of the chief founders of our national institutions,—several attempts were made to justify slavery and the slave trade. The last and almost dying energies of Franklin were excited. In a remarkable document, written only twenty-four days before his death, and published in the journals of the time, he gave a parody of a speech actually delivered in the American Congress—transferring the scene to Algiers, and putting the American speech in the mouth of a corsair slave dealer, in the Divan at that place. All the arguments adduced in favor of negro slavery are applied by the Algerine orator with equal force to justify the plunder and enslavement of whites.[102] With this protest against a great wrong, Franklin died.

Most certainly we shall be aided, at least in our appreciation of American slavery, when we know that it was likened, by characters like Wesley, Jay, and Franklin, to the abomination of slavery in Algiers. But whatever may have been the influence of this parallel on the condition of the black slaves, it did not check the rising sentiments of the people against White Slavery.

The country was now aroused. A general contribution was proposed for the emancipation of our brethren. Their cause was pleaded in churches, and not forgotten at the festive board. At all public celebrations, the toasts, "Happiness for all," and "Universal Liberty," were proposed, not less in sympathy with the efforts for freedom in France than with those for our own wretched white fellow-countrymen in bonds. On at least one occasion,[103] they were distinctly remembered in the following toast: "Our brethren in slavery at Algiers. May the measures adopted for their redemption be successful, and may they live to rejoice with their friends in the blessings of liberty."

Meanwhile, the earnest efforts of our government were continued. In his message to Congress, bearing date December 8, 1795, President Washington said, "With peculiar satisfaction I add, that information has been received from an agent deputed on our part to Algiers, importing that the terms of the treaty with the Dey and regency of that country have been adjusted in such a manner as to authorize the expectation of a speedy peace, and the restoration of our unfortunate fellow-citizens from a grievous captivity." This, indeed, had been already effected on the 5th of September, 1795.[104] It was a treaty full of humiliation for the chivalry of our country. Besides securing to the Algerine government a large sum, in consideration of present peace and the liberation of the captives, it stipulated for an annual tribute from the United States of twenty-one thousand dollars. But feelings of pride disappeared in heartfelt satisfaction. It is recorded that a thrill of joy went through the land when it was announced that a vessel had left Algiers, having on board all the Americans who had been in captivity there. Their emancipation was purchased at the cost of upwards of seven hundred thousand dollars. But the largess of money, and even the indignity of tribute, were forgotten in gratulations on their new-found happiness. The President, in a message to Congress, December 7, 1796, presented their "actual liberation" as a special subject of joy "to every feeling heart." Thus did our government construct a Bridge of Gold for freedom.

This act of national generosity was followed by peace with Tripoli, purchased November 4, 1796, for the sum of fifty thousand dollars, under the guaranty of the Dey of Algiers, who was declared to be "the mutual friend of the parties." By an article in this treaty, negotiated by Joel Barlow,—out of tenderness, perhaps, to Mohammedanism, and to save our citizens from the slavery which was regarded as the just doom of "Christian dogs,"—it was expressly declared that "the government of the United States of America is not in any sense founded on the Christian religion."[105] At a later day, by a treaty with Tunis, purchased after some delay, but at a smaller price than that with Tripoli, all danger to our citizens seemed to be averted. In this treaty it was ignominiously provided, that fugitive slaves, taking refuge on board American merchant vessels, and even vessels of war, should be restored to their owners.[106]

As early as 1787, a treaty of a more liberal character had been entered into with Morocco, which was confirmed in 1795,[107] at the price of twenty thousand dollars; while, by a treaty with Spain, in 1799, this slave-trading empire expressly declared its desire that the name of slavery might be effaced from the memory of man.[108]

But these governments were barbarous, faithless, and regardless of the duties of humanity and justice. Treaties with them were evanescent. As in the days of Charles the Second, they seemed made merely to be broken. They were observed only so long as money was derived under their stipulations. Our growing commerce was soon again fatally vexed by the Barbary corsairs, who now compelled even the ships of our navy to submit to peculiar indignities. In 1801, the Bey of Tripoli formally declared war against the United States, and in token thereof "our flagstaff [before the consulate] was chopped down six feet from the ground, and left reclining on the terrace."[109] Our citizens once more became the prize of man-stealers. Colonel Humphreys, now at home in retirement, was aroused. In an address to the public, he called again for united action, saying, "Americans of the United States, your fellow-citizens are in fetters! Can there be but one feeling? Where are the gallant remains of the race who fought for freedom? Where the glorious heirs of their patriotism? Will there never be a truce between political parties? Or must it forever be the fate of Free States, that the soft voice of union should be drowned in the hoarse clamors of discord? No! Let every friend of blessed humanity and sacred freedom entertain a better hope and confidence."[110] Colonel Humphreys was not a statesman only; he was known as a poet also. And in this character he made another appeal to his country. In a poem on "The Future Glory of the United States," he breaks forth into an indignant condemnation of slavery, which, whatever may be the merits of its verse, should not be omitted here.

Teach me curst slavery's cruel woes to paint,
Beneath whose weight our captured freemen faint!
— — — — — — — — — — — —
Where am I! Heavens! what mean these dolorous cries?
And what these horrid scenes that round me rise?
Heard ye the groans, those messengers of pain?
Heard ye the clanking of the captive's chain?
Heard ye your free-born sons their fate deplore,
Pale in their chains and laboring at the oar?
Saw ye the dungeon, in whose blackest cell,
That house of woe, your friends, your children, dwell?—
Or saw ye those who dread the torturing hour,
Crushed by the rigors of a tyrant's power?
Saw ye the shrinking slave, th' uplifted lash,
The frowning butcher, and the reddening gash?
Saw ye the fresh blood where it bubbling broke
From purple scars, beneath the grinding stroke?
Saw ye the naked limbs writhed to and fro,
In wild contortions of convulsing woe?
Felt ye the blood, with pangs alternate rolled,
Thrill through your veins and freeze with deathlike cold,
Or fire, as down the tear of pity stole,
Your manly breasts, and harrow up the soul?[111]

The people and government responded to this voice. And here commenced those early deeds by which our navy became known in Europe. The frigate Philadelphia, through a reverse of shipwreck rather than war, falling into the hands of the Tripolitans, was, by a daring act of Decatur, burned under the guns of the enemy. Other feats of hardihood ensued. A romantic expedition by General Eaton, from Alexandria, in Egypt, across the desert of Libya, captured Derne. Three several times Tripoli was attacked, and, at last, on the 3d of June, 1805, entered into a treaty, by which it was stipulated that the United States should pay sixty thousand dollars for the freedom of two hundred American slaves; and that, in the event of future war between the two countries, prisoners should not be reduced to slavery, but should be exchanged rank for rank; and if there were any deficiency on either side, it should be made up by the payment of five hundred Spanish dollars for each captain, three hundred dollars for each mate and supercargo, and one hundred dollars for each seaman.[112] Thus did our country, after successes not without what is called the glory of arms, again purchase by money the emancipation of her white citizens.

The power of Tripoli was, however, inconsiderable. That of Algiers was more formidable. It is not a little curious that the largest ship of this slave-trading state was the Crescent, of thirty-four guns, built in New Hampshire;[113] though it is hardly to the credit of our sister State that the Algerine power derived such important support from her. The lawlessness of the corsair again broke forth by the seizure, in 1812, of the brig Edwin, of Salem, and the enslavement of her crew. All the energies of the country were at this time enlisted in war with Great Britain; but, even amidst the anxieties of this gigantic contest, the voice of these captives was heard, awakening a corresponding sentiment throughout the land, until the government was prompted to seek their release. Through Mr. Noah, recently appointed consul at Tunis, it offered to purchase their freedom at three thousand dollars a head.[114] The answer of the Dey, repeated on several occasions, was, that "not for two millions of dollars would he sell his American slaves."[115] The timely treaty of Ghent, in 1815, establishing peace with Great Britain, left us at liberty to deal with this enslaver of our countrymen. A naval force was promptly despatched to the Mediterranean, under Commodore Bainbridge and Commodore Decatur. The rapidity of their movements and their striking success had the desired effect. In June, 1815, a treaty was extorted from the Dey of Algiers, by which, after abandoning all claim to tribute in any form, he delivered his American captives, ten in number, without any ransom; and stipulated, that hereafter no Americans should be made slaves or forced to hard labor, and still further, that "any Christians whatever, captives in Algiers," making their escape and taking refuge on board an American ship of war, should be safe from all requisition or reclamation.[116]

It is related of Decatur, that he walked his deck with impatient earnestness, awaiting the promised signature of the treaty. "Is the treaty signed?" he cried to the captain of the port and the Swedish consul, as they reached the Guerriere with a white flag of truce. "It is," replied the Swede; and the treaty was placed in Decatur's hands. "Are the prisoners in the boat?" "They are." "Every one of them?" "Every one, sir." The captive Americans now came forward to greet and bless their deliverer.[117] Surely this moment—when he looked upon his emancipated fellow-countrymen, and thought how much he had contributed to overthrow the relentless system of bondage under which they had groaned—must have been one of the sweetest in the life of that hardy son of the sea. But should I not say, even here, that there is now a citizen of Massachusetts, who, without army or navy, by a simple act of self-renunciation, has given freedom to a larger number of Christian American slaves than was done by the sword of Decatur?

Thus, not by money, but by arms, was emancipation this time secured. The country was grateful for the result; though the poor freedmen, ingulfed in the unknown wastes of ocean, on their glad passage home, were never able to mingle joys with their fellow-citizens. They were lost in the Epervier, of which no trace has ever appeared. Nor did the people feel the melancholy mockery in the conduct of the government, which, having weakly declared that it "was not in any sense founded on the Christian religion," now expressly confined the protecting power of its flag to fugitive "Christians, captives in Algiers," leaving slaves of another faith to be snatched as between the horns of the altar, and returned to the continued horrors of their lot.

The success of the American arms was followed speedily by a more signal triumph of Great Britain, acting generously in behalf of all the Christian powers. Her expedition was debated, perhaps prompted, in the Congress of Vienna, where, after the overthrow of Napoleon, the brilliant representatives of the different states of Europe, in the presence of the monarchs of Austria, Prussia, and Russia, were assembled to consider the evils proper to be remedied by joint action, and to adjust the disordered balance of empire. Among many high concerns, here entertained, was the project of a crusade against the Barbary States, in order to accomplish the complete abolition of Christian slavery there practised. For this purpose, it was proposed to form "a holy league." This was earnestly enforced by a memoir from Sir Sidney Smith, the same who foiled Napoleon at Acre, and who at this time was president of an association called the "Knights Liberators of the White Slaves in Africa,"—in our day it might be called an Abolition Society,—thus adding to the doubtful laurels of war the true glory of striving for the freedom of his fellow-men.[118]

This project, though not adopted by the Congress, awakened a generous echo in the public mind. Various advocates appeared in its behalf; and what the Congress failed to undertake was now especially urged upon Great Britain, by the agents of Spain and Portugal, who insisted, that, because this nation had abolished the negro slave trade, it was her duty to put an end to the slavery of the whites.[119]

A disgraceful impediment seemed at first to interfere. There was a common belief that the obstructions of the Barbary States, in the navigation of the Mediterranean, were advantageous to British commerce, by thwarting and strangling that of other countries; and that therefore Great Britain, ever anxious for commercial supremacy, would rather encourage them than seek their overthrow—the love of trade prevailing over the love of man.[120] This suggestion of a sordid selfishness, which was willing to coin money out of the lives and liberties of fellow-Christians, was soon answered.

At the beginning of the year 1816, Lord Exmouth, who, as Sir Edward Pellew, had already acquired distinction in the British navy, was despatched with a squadron to Algiers. By his general orders, bearing date, Boyne, Port Mahon, March 21, 1816, he announced the object of his expedition as follows:—

"He has been instructed and directed by his Royal Highness, the Prince Regent, to proceed with the fleet to Algiers, and there make certain arrangements for diminishing, at least, the piratical excursions of the Barbary States, by which thousands of our fellow-creatures, innocently following their commercial pursuits, have been dragged into the most wretched and revolting state of slavery.

"The commander-in-chief is confident that this outrageous system of piracy and slavery rouses in common the same spirit of indignation which he himself feels; and should the government of Algiers refuse the reasonable demands he bears from the Prince Regent, he doubts not but the flag will be honorably and zealously supported by every officer and man under his command, in his endeavors to procure the acceptation of them by force; and if force must be resorted to, we have the consolation of knowing that we fight in the sacred cause of humanity, and cannot fail of success."[121]

The moderate object of his mission was readily obtained. "Arrangements for diminishing the piratical excursions of the Barbary States" were established. Certain Ionian slaves, claimed as British subjects, were released, and peace was secured for Naples and Sardinia—the former paying a ransom of five hundred dollars, and the latter of three hundred dollars, a head, for their subjects liberated from bondage. This was at Algiers. Lord Exmouth next proceeded to Tunis and Tripoli, where, acting beyond his instructions, he obtained from both these piratical governments a promise to abolish Christian slavery within their dominions. In one of his letters on this event, he says that, in pressing these concessions, he "acted solely on his own responsibility and without orders, the causes and reasoning on which, upon general principles, may be defensible; but, as applying to our own country, may not be borne out, the old mercantile interest being against it."[122] A similar distrust had been excited in another age by a similar achievement. Admiral Blake, in the time of Cromwell, after his attack upon Tunis, writing to his government at home, said, "And now, seeing it hath pleased God soe signally to justify us herein, I hope his highness will not be offended at it, nor any who regard duly the honor of our nation, although I expect to have the clamors of interested men."[123] Thus, more than once in the history of these efforts to abolish White Slavery, did commerce, the daughter of freedom, fall under the foul suspicion of disloyalty to her parent!

Lord Exmouth did injustice to the moral sense of England. His conduct was sustained and applauded, not only in the House of Commons, but by the public at large. He was soon directed to return to Algiers,—which had failed to make any general renunciation of the custom of enslaving Christians,—to extort by force such a stipulation. This expedition is regarded by British historians with peculiar pride. In all the annals of their triumphant navy, there is none in which the barbarism of war seems so much "to smooth its wrinkled front." With a fleet complete at all points, the Admiral set sail July 25, 1816, on what was deemed a holy war. With five line-of-battle ships, five heavy frigates, four bomb vessels, and five gun brigs, besides a Dutch fleet of five frigates and a corvette, under Admiral Van de Capellan,—who, on learning the object of the expedition, solicited and obtained leave to coöperate,—on the 27th of August he anchored before the formidable fortifications of Algiers. It would not be agreeable or instructive to dwell on the scene of desolation and blood which ensued. Before night the fleet fired, besides shells and rockets, one hundred and eighteen tons of powder, and fifty thousand shot, weighing more than five hundred tons. The citadel and massive batteries of Algiers were shattered and crumbled to ruins. The storehouses, ships, and gun boats were in flames, while the blazing lightnings of battle were answered, in a storm of signal fury, by the lightnings of heaven. The power of the Great Slave Dealer was humbled.

The terms of submission were announced to his fleet by the Admiral in an order, dated, Queen Charlotte, Algiers Bay, August 30, 1816, which may be read with truer pleasure than any in military or naval history.

"The commander-in-chief," he said, "is happy to inform the fleet of the final termination of their strenuous exertions, by the signature of peace, confirmed under a salute of twenty-one guns, on the following conditions, dictated by his Royal Highness, the Prince Regent of England.

"First. THE ABOLITION OF CHRISTIAN SLAVERY FOREVER.

"Second. The delivery to my flag of all slaves in the dominions of the Dey, to whatever nation they may belong, at noon to-morrow.

"Third. To deliver also to my flag all money received by him for the redemption of slaves since the commencement of this year, at noon also to-morrow."

On the next day, twelve hundred slaves were emancipated, making, with those liberated in his earlier expedition, more than three thousand, whom, by address or force, Lord Exmouth had delivered from bondage.[124]

Thus ended White Slavery in the Barbary States. It had already died out in Morocco. It had been quietly renounced by Tripoli and Tunis. Its last retreat was Algiers, whence it was driven amidst the thunder of the British cannon.

Signal honors now awaited the Admiral. He was elevated to a new rank in the peerage, and on his coat of arms was emblazoned a figure never before known in heraldry—a Christian slave holding aloft the cross and dropping his broken fetters.[125] From the officers of the squadron he received a costly service of plate, with an inscription, in testimony of "the memorable victory gained at Algiers, where the great cause of Christian freedom was bravely fought and nobly accomplished."[126] But higher far than honor were the rich personal satisfactions which he derived from contemplating the nature of the cause in which he had been enlisted. In his despatch to the government, describing the battle, and written at the time, he says, in words which may be felt by others, engaged, like him, against slavery, "In all the vicissitudes of a long life of public service, no circumstance has ever produced on my mind such impressions of gratitude as the event of yesterday. To have been one of the humble instruments in the hands of divine Providence for bringing to reason a ferocious government, and destroying forever the insufferable and horrid system of Christian slavery, can never cease to be a source of delight and heartfelt comfort to every individual happy enough to be employed in it."[127]

The reverses of Algiers did not end here. Christian slavery was abolished; but, in 1830, the insolence of this barbarian government aroused the vengeance of France to take military possession of the whole country. Algiers capitulated, the Dey abdicated, and this considerable state became a French colony.

Thus I have endeavored to present what I could glean in various fields on the history of Christian Slavery in the Barbary States. I have often employed the words of others, as they seemed best calculated to convey the exact idea of the scene, incident, or sentiment which I wished to preserve. So doing, I have occupied much time; but I may find my apology in the words of an English chronicler.[128] "Algier," he says, "were altogether unworthy so long a discourse, were not the unworthinesse worthy our consideration. I meane the cruell abuse of the Christian name, which let us for inciting our zeale and exciting our charitie and thankfulness more deeply weigh, to releeve those in miseries, as we may, with our paynes, prayers, purses, and all the best meditations."

III.

It is by a natural transition that I am now conducted to the inquiry into the true character of the evil whose history has been traced. And here I shall be brief.

The slavery of Christians by the Barbary States is regarded as an unquestionable outrage upon humanity and justice. Nobody hesitates in this judgment. Our liveliest sympathies attend these white brethren—torn from their homes, the ties of family and friendship rudely severed, parent separated from child and husband from wife, exposed at public sale like cattle, and dependent, like cattle, upon the uncertain will of an arbitrary taskmaster. We read of a "gentleman" who was compelled to be the valet of the barbarian Emperor of Morocco;[129] and Calderon, the pride of the Spanish stage, has depicted the miserable fate of a Portuguese prince, condemned by infidel Moors to carry water in a garden. But the lowly in condition had their unrecorded sorrows also, whose sum total must swell to a fearful amount. Who can tell how many hearts have been wrung by the pangs of separation, how many crushed by the comfortless despair of interminable bondage? "Speaking as a Christian," says the good Catholic father who has chronicled much of this misery, "if on the earth there can be any condition which, in its character and evils, may represent in any manner the dolorous passion of the Son of God, (which exceeded all evils and torments, because by it the Lord suffered every kind of evil and affliction,) it is, beyond question and doubt, none other than slavery and captivity in Algiers and Barbary, whose infinite evils, terrible torments, miseries without number, afflictions without mitigation, it is impossible to comprehend in a brief span of time."[130] When we consider the author's character, as a father of the Catholic Church, it will be felt that language can no further go.

In nothing are the impiety and blasphemy of this custom more apparent than in the auctions of human beings, where men were sold to the highest bidder. Through the personal experience of a young English merchant, Abraham Brown, afterwards a settler in Massachusetts, we may learn how these were conducted. In 1655, before the liberating power of Cromwell had been acknowledged, he was captured, together with a whole crew, and carried into Sallee. His own words, in his memoirs still preserved, will best tell his story.[131] "On landing," he says, "an exceeding great company of most dismal spectators were led to behold us in our captivated condition. There was liberty for all sorts to come and look on us, that whosoever had a mind to buy any of us on the day appointed for our sale together in the market, might see, as I may say, what they would like to have for their money; whereby we had too many comfortless visitors, both from the town and country, one saying he would buy this man, and the other that. To comfort us, we were told by the Christian slaves already there, if we met with such and such patrons, our usage would not be so bad as we supposed; though, indeed, our men found the usage of the best bad enough. Fresh victuals and bread were supplied, I suppose to feed us up for the market, that we might be in some good plight against the day we were to be sold. And now I come to speak of our being sold into this doleful slavery. It was doleful in respect to the time and manner. As to the time, it was on our Sabbath day, in the morning, about the time the people of God were about to enjoy the liberty of God's house; this was the time our bondage was confirmed. Again, it was sad in respect to the manner of our selling. Being all of us brought into the market-place, we were led about, two or three at a time, in the midst of a great concourse of people, both from the town and country, who had a full sight of us, and if that did not satisfy, they would come and feel of your hand, and look into your mouth to see whether you are sound in health, or to see, by the hardness of your hand, whether you have been a laborer or not. The manner of buying is this: He that bids the greatest price hath you; they bidding one upon another until the highest has you for a slave, whoever he is, or wherever he dwells. As concerning myself, being brought to the market in the weakest condition of any of our men, I was led forth among the cruel multitude to be sold. As yet being undiscovered what I was, I was like to have been sold at a very low rate, not above £15 sterling, whereas our ordinary seamen were sold for £30 and £35 sterling, and two boys were sold for £40 apiece; and being in this sad posture led up and down at least one hour and a half, during which time a Dutchman, that was our carpenter, discovered me to some Jews, they increased from £15 to £75, which was the price my patron gave for me, being 300 ducats; and had I not been so weakened, and in these rags, (indeed, I made myself more so than I was, for sometimes, as they led me, I pretended I could not go, and did often sit down;) I say, had not these things been, in all likelihood I had been sold for as much again in the market, and thus I had been dearer, and the difficulty greater to be redeemed. During the time of my being led up and down the market, I was possessed with the greatest fears, not knowing who my patron might be. I feared it might be one from the country, who would carry me where I could not return, or it might be one in and about Sallee, of which we had sad accounts; and many other distracting thoughts I had. And though I was like to have been sold unto the most cruel man in Sallee, there being but one piece of eight between him and my patron, yet the Lord was pleased to cause him to buy me, of whom I may speak, to the glory of God, as the kindest man in the place."

This is the story of a respectable person, little distinguished in the world. But the slave dealer applied his inexorable system without distinction of persons. The experiences of St. Vincent de Paul did not differ from those of Abraham Brown. That eminent character, admired, beloved and worshipped by large circles of mankind, has also left a record of his sale as a slave.[132] "Their proceedings," he says, "at our sale were as follows: After we had been stripped, they gave to each one of us a pair of drawers, a linen coat, with a cap, and paraded us through the city of Tunis, where they had come expressly to sell us. Having made us make five or six turns through the city, with the chain at our necks, they conducted us back to the boat, that the merchants might come to see who could eat well, and who not; and to show that our wounds were not mortal. This done, they took us to the public square, where the merchants came to visit us, precisely as they do at the purchase of a horse or of cattle, making us open the mouth to see our teeth, feeling our sides, searching our wounds, and making us move our steps, trot and run, then lift burdens, and then wrestle, in order to see the strength of each, and a thousand other sorts of brutalities."

And here we may refer again to Cervantes, whose pen was dipped in his own dark experience. In his Life in Algiers, he has displayed the horrors of the white slave market. The public crier exposes for sale a father and mother with their two children. They are to be sold separately, or, according to the language of our day, "in lots to suit purchasers." The father is resigned, confiding in God; the mother sobs; while the children, ignorant of the inhumanity of men, show an instinctive trust in the constant and wakeful protection of their parents—now, alas! impotent to shield them from dire calamity. A merchant, inclining to purchase one of the "little ones," and wishing to ascertain his bodily condition, causes him to open his mouth. The child, still ignorant of the doom which awaits him, imagines that the inquirer is about to extract a tooth, and, assuring him that it does not ache, begs him to desist. The merchant, in other respects an estimable man, pays one hundred and thirty dollars for the youngest child, and the sale is completed. Thus a human being—one of those children of whom it has been said, "Of such is the kingdom of heaven"—is profanely treated as an article of merchandise, and torn far away from a mother's arms and a father's support. The hardening influence of custom has steeled the merchant into insensibility to this violation of humanity and justice, this laceration of sacred ties, this degradation of the image of God. The unconscious heartlessness of the slave dealer, and the anguish of his victims, are depicted in the dialogue which ensues after the sale.[133]

MERCHANT.
Come hither, child; 'tis time to go to rest.

JUAN.
Signor, I will not leave my mother here,
To go with any one.

MOTHER.
Alas! my child, thou art no longer mine,
But his who bought thee.

JUAN.
What! then, have you, mother,
Forsaken me?

MOTHER.
O Heavens! how cruel are ye!

MERCHANT.
Come, hasten, boy.

JUAN.
Will you go with me, brother?

FRANCISCO.
I cannot, Juan, 'tis not in my power;—
May Heaven protect you, Juan!

MOTHER.
O my child,
My joy and my delight, God won't forget thee!

JUAN.
O father! mother! whither will they bear me
Away from you?

MOTHER.
Permit me, worthy Signor,
To speak a moment in my infant's ear.
Grant me this small contentment; very soon
I shall know nought but grief.

MERCHANT.
What you would say,
Say now; to-night is the last time.

MOTHER.
To-night
Is the first time my heart e'er felt such grief.

JUAN.
Pray keep me with you, mother, for I know not
Whither he'd carry me.

MOTHER.
Alas, poor child!
Fortune forsook thee even at thy birth.
The heavens are overcast, the elements
Are turbid, and the very sea and winds
Are all combined against me. Thou, my child,
Know'st not the dark misfortunes into which
Thou art so early plunged, but happily
Lackest the power to comprehend thy fate.
What I would crave of thee, my life, since I
Must never more be blessed with seeing thee,
Is that thou never, never wilt forget
To say, as thou wert wont, thy Ave Mary;
For that bright queen of goodness, grace, and virtue
Can loosen all thy bonds and give thee freedom.

AYDAR.
Behold the wicked Christian, how she counsels
Her innocent child! You wish, then, that your child
Should, like yourself, continue still in error.

JUAN.
O mother, mother, may I not remain?
And must these Moors, then, carry me away?

MOTHER.
With thee, my child, they rob me of my treasures.

JUAN.
O, I am much afraid!

MOTHER.
'Tis I, my child,
Who ought to fear at seeing thee depart.
Thou wilt forget thy God, me, and thyself.
What else can I expect from thee, abandoned
At such a tender age, amongst a people
Full of deceit and all iniquity?

CRIER.
Silence, you villainous woman! if you would not
Have your head pay for what your tongue has done.

From this scene we gladly avert the countenance, while, from the bottom of our hearts, we send our sympathies to the unhappy sufferers. Fain would we avert their fate; fain would we destroy the system of slavery, that has made them wretched and their masters cruel. And yet we would not judge with harshness an Algerine slave owner. He has been reared in a religion of slavery; he has learned to regard Christians, "guilty of a skin not colored like his own," as lawful prey; and has found sanctions for his conduct in the injunctions of the Koran, in the custom of his country, and in the instinctive dictates of an imagined self-interest. It is, then, the "peculiar institution" which we are aroused to execrate, rather than the Algerine slave masters, who glory in its influence, and,
so perfect is their misery,
Not once perceive their foul disfigurement,
But boast themselves more comely than before.

But there is reason to believe that the sufferings of the white slaves were not often greater than is the natural incident of slavery. There is an important authority which presents this point in an interesting light. It is that of General Eaton, for some time consul of the United States at Tunis, and whose name is not without note in the painful annals of war. In a letter to his wife, dated at Tunis, April 6, 1799, and written amidst opportunities of observation such as few have enjoyed, he briefly describes the condition of this unhappy class, illustrating it by a comparison less flattering to our country than to Barbary. "Many of the Christian slaves," he says, "have died of grief, and the others linger out a life less tolerable than death. Alas! remorse seizes my whole soul, when I reflect that this is, indeed, a copy of the very barbarity which my eyes have seen in my own native country. And yet we boast of liberty and national justice. How frequently have I seen in the Southern States of our own country weeping mothers leading guiltless infants to the sales with as deep anguish as if they led them to the slaughter, and yet felt my bosom tranquil in the view of these aggressions upon defenceless humanity! But when I see the same enormities practised upon beings whose complexion and blood claim kindred with my own, I curse the perpetrators, and weep over the wretched victims of their rapacity. Indeed, truth and justice demand from me the confession that the Christian slaves among the barbarians of Africa are treated with more humanity than the African slaves among the professing Christians of civilized America; and yet here sensibility bleeds at every pore for the wretches whom fate has doomed to slavery."[134]

Such testimony would seem to furnish a decisive standard or measure of comparison by which to determine the character of White Slavery in the Barbary States. But there are other considerations and authorities. One of these is the influence of the religion of these barbarians. Travellers remark the generally kind treatment bestowed by Mohammedans upon slaves.[135] The lash rarely, if ever, lacerates the back of the female; the knife or branding iron is not employed upon any human being to mark him as the property of his fellow-man. Nor is the slave doomed, as in other countries, where the Christian religion is professed, to unconditional and perpetual service, without prospect of redemption. Hope, the last friend of misfortune, may brighten his captivity. He is not so walled around by inhuman institutions as to be inaccessible to freedom. "And unto such of your slaves," says the Koran, in words worthy of adoption in the legislation of Christian countries, "as desire a written instrument, allowing them to redeem themselves on paying a certain sum, write one, if ye know good in them, and give them of the riches of God, which he hath given you."[136] Thus from the Koran, which ordains slavery, come lessons of benignity to the slave; and one of the most touching stories in Mohammedanism is of the generosity of Ali, the companion of the Prophet, who, after fasting for three days, gave his whole provision to a captive not more famished than himself.[137]

Such precepts and examples doubtless had their influence in Algiers. It is evident, from the history of the country, that the prejudice of race did not so far prevail as to stamp upon the slaves and their descendants any indelible mark of exclusion from power and influence. It often happened that they arrived at eminent posts in the state. The seat of the Deys, more than once, was filled by humble Christian captives, who had tugged for years at the oar.[138]

Nor do we feel, from the narratives of captives and of travellers, that the condition of the Christian slave was rigorous beyond the ordinary lot of slavery. "The Captive's Story" in Don Quixote fails to impress the reader with any peculiar horror of the life from which he had escaped. It is often said that the sufferings of Cervantes were among the most severe which even Algiers could inflict.[139] But they did not repress the gayety of his temper; and we learn that in the building where he was confined there was a chapel or oratory, in which mass was celebrated, the sacrament administered, and sermons regularly preached by captive priests.[140] Nor was this all. The pleasures of the theatre were enjoyed by these slaves; and the farces of Lopé de Rueda, a favorite Spanish dramatist of the time, served, in actual representation, to cheer this house of bondage.[141]

The experience of the devoted Portuguese ecclesiastic, Father Thomas, illustrates this lot. A slave in Morocco, he was able to minister to his fellow-slaves, and to compose a work on the Passion of Jesus Christ, which has been admired for its unction, and translated into various tongues. At last liberated through the intervention of the Portuguese ambassador, he chose to remain behind, notwithstanding the solicitations of relatives at home, that he might continue to instruct and console the unhappy men, his late companions in bonds.[142]

Even the story of St. Vincent de Paul, so brutally sold in the public square, is not without its gleams of light. He was bought by a fisherman, who was soon constrained to get rid of him, "having nothing so contrary except the sea." He then passed into the hands of an old man, whom he pleasantly describes as a chemical doctor, a sovereign maker of quintessences, very humane and kind, who had labored for the space of fifty years in search of the philosopher's stone. "He loved me much," says the fugitive slave, "and pleased himself by discoursing to me of alchemy, and then of his religion, to which he made every effort to draw me, promising me riches and all his wisdom." On the death of this master, he passed to a nephew, by whom he was sold to still another person, a renegade from Nice, who took him to the mountains, where the country was extremely hot and desert. A Turkish wife of the renegade becoming interested in him, and curious to know his manner of life at home, visited him daily at his work in the fields, and listened with delight to the slave, away from his country and the churches of his religion, as he sang the psalm of the children of Israel in a foreign land: "By the rivers of Babylon there we sat down; yea, we wept when we remembered Zion."[143]

The kindness of the slave master often appears. The English merchant Abraham Brown, whose sale at Sallee has been already described, makes known, in his memoirs, that, after he had been carried to the house of his master, his wounds were tenderly washed and dressed by his master's wife, and "indeed the whole family gave him comfortable words." He was furnished with a mat to lie on, "and some three or four days after provided with a shirt, such a one as it was, a pair of shoes, and an old doublet." His servile toils troubled him less than "being commanded by a negro man, who had been a long time in his patron's house a freeman, at whose beck and command he was obliged to be obedient for the doing of the least about the house or mill;" and he concludes his lament on this degradation as follows: "Thus I, who had commanded many men in several parts of the world, must now be commanded by a negro, who, with his two countrywomen in the house, scorned to drink out of the water pot I drank of, whereby I was despised of the despised people of the world."[144]

At a later day we are furnished with another authentic picture. Captain Braithwaite, who accompanied the British minister to Morocco in 1727, in order to procure the liberation of the British captives, after describing their comfortable condition, adds, "I am sure we saw several captives who lived much better in Barbary than ever they did in their own country. Whatever money in charity was sent them by their friends in Europe was their own, unless they defrauded one another, which has happened much oftener than by the Moors. Several of them are rich, and many have carried considerable sums out of the country, to the truth of which we are all witnesses. Several captives keep their mules, and some their servants; and yet this is called insupportable slavery among Turks and Moors. But we found this, as well as many other things in this country, strangely misrepresented."[145]

These statements—which, to those who do not place freedom above all price, may seem, at first view, to take the sting even from slavery—are not without support from other sources. Colonel Keatinge, who, as a member of a diplomatic mission from England, visited Morocco in 1785, says of this evil there, that "it is very slightly inflicted, and as to any labor undergone, it does not deserve the name;"[146] while Mr. Lemprière, who was in the same country not long afterwards, adds, "To the disgrace of Europe, the Moors treat their slaves with humanity."[147] In Tripoli, we are told, by a person for ten years a resident, that the same gentleness prevailed. "It is a great alleviation to our feelings," says the writer, speaking of the slaves, "to see them easy and well dressed, and, so far from wearing chains, as captives do in most other places, they are perfectly at liberty."[148] We have already seen the testimony of General Eaton with regard to slavery in Tunis; while Mr. Noah, one of his successors in the consulate of the United States at that place, says, "In Tunis, from my observation, the slaves are not severely treated; they are very useful, and many of them have made money."[149] And Mr. Shaler, describing the chief seat of Christian slavery, says, "In short, there were slaves who left Algiers with regret."[150]

A French writer of more recent date asserts with some vehemence, and with the authority of an eye witness, that the Christian slaves at Algiers were not exposed to the miseries which they represented. I do not know that he vindicates their slavery, but, like Captain Braithwaite, he evidently regards many of them as better off than they would be at home. According to him, they were well clad and well fed, much better than the free Christians there. The youngest and most comely were taken as pages by the Dey. Others were employed in the barracks; others in the galleys; but even here there was a chapel, as in the time of Cervantes, for the free exercise of the Christian religion. Those who happened to be artisans, as carpenters, locksmiths, and calkers, were let to the owners of vessels. Others were employed on the public works; while others still were allowed the privilege of keeping a shop, in which their profits were sometimes so large as to enable them at the end of a year to purchase their ransom. But these were often known to become indifferent to freedom, and to prefer Algiers to their own country. The slaves of private persons were sometimes employed in the family of their master, where their treatment necessarily depended much upon his character. If he were gentle and humane, their lot was fortunate; they were regarded as children of the house. If he were harsh and selfish, then the iron of slavery did, indeed, enter their souls. Many were bought to be sold again for profit into distant parts of the country, where they were doomed to exhausting labor; in which event their condition was most grievous. But special care was bestowed upon all who became ill—not so much, it is admitted, from humanity as through fear of losing them.[151]

But, whatever deductions may be made from the familiar stories of White Slavery in the Barbary States,—admitting that it was mitigated by the genial influence of Mohammedanism,—that the captives were well clad and well fed, much better than the free Christians there,—that they were allowed opportunities of Christian worship,—that they were often treated with lenity and affectionate care,—that they were sometimes advanced to posts of responsibility and honor,—and that they were known, in their contentment or stolidity, to become indifferent to freedom,—still the institution or custom is hardly less hateful in our eyes. Slavery in all its forms, even under the mildest influences, is a wrong and a curse. No accidental gentleness of the master can make it otherwise. Against it reason, experience, the heart of man, all cry out. "Disguise thyself as thou wilt, still, Slavery! thou art a bitter draught! and though thousands in all ages have been made to drink of thee, thou art no less bitter on that account." Algerine Slavery was a violation of the law of nature and of God. It was a usurpation of rights not granted to man.

O execrable son, so to aspire
Above his brethren, to himself assuming
Authority usurped, from God not given!
He gave us only over beast, fish, fowl,
Dominion absolute; that right we hold
By his donation; but man over men
He made not lord, such title to himself
Reserving, human left from human free.[152]

Such a relation, in defiance of God, could not fail to accumulate disastrous consequences upon all in any way parties to it; for injustice and wrong are fatal alike to the doer and the sufferer. It is notorious that, in Algiers, it exerted a most pernicious influence on master as well as slave. The slave was crushed and degraded, his intelligence abased, even his love of freedom extinguished. The master, accustomed from childhood to revolting inequalities of condition, was exalted into a mood of unconscious arrogance and self-confidence, inconsistent with the virtues of a pure and upright character. Unlimited power is apt to stretch towards license; and the wives and daughters of Christian slaves were often pressed to be the concubines of their Algerine masters.[153]

It is well, then, that it has passed away! The Barbary States seem less barbarous, when we no longer discern this cruel oppression!

But the story of slavery there is not yet all told. While the Barbary States received white slaves by sea, stolen by corsairs, they also, from time immemorial, imported black slaves from the south. Over the vast, illimitable sea of sand, in which is absorbed their southern border,—traversed by camels, those "ships of the desert,"—were brought those unfortunate beings, as merchandise, with gold dust and ivory, doomed often to insufferable torments, while cruel thirst parched the lips, and tears vainly moistened the eyes. They also were ravished from their homes, and, like their white brethren from the north, compelled to taste of slavery. In numbers they have far surpassed their Christian peers. But for long years no pen or voice pleaded their cause; nor did the Christian nations—professing a religion which teaches universal humanity, without respect of persons, and sends the precious sympathies of neighborhood to all who suffer, even at the farthest pole—ever interfere in any way in their behalf. The navy of Great Britain, by the throats of their artillery, argued the freedom of all fellow-Christians, without distinction of nation; but they heeded not the slavery of other brethren in bonds—Mohammedans or idolaters, children of the same Father in heaven. Lord Exmouth did but half his work. In confining the stipulation to the abolition of Christian slavery only, this Abolitionist made a discrimination, which, whether founded on religion or color, was selfish and unchristian. Here, again, was the same inconsistency which darkened the conduct of Charles the Fifth, and has constantly recurred throughout the history of this outrage. Forgetful of the Brotherhood of the Race, Christian powers have deemed the slavery of blacks just and proper, while the slavery of whites has been branded as unjust and sinful.

As the British fleet sailed proudly from the harbor of Algiers, bearing its emancipated white slaves, and the express stipulation, that Christian slavery was abolished there forever, it left behind in bondage large numbers of blacks, distributed throughout all the Barbary States. Neglected thus by exclusive and unchristian Christendom, it is pleasant to know that their lot is not always unhappy. In Morocco, negroes are still detained as slaves; but the prejudice of color seems not to prevail there. They have been called "the grand cavaliers of this part of Barbary."[154] They often become the chief magistrates and rulers of cities.[155] They constituted the body guard of several of the emperors, and, on one occasion at least, exercised the prerogative of the Prætorian cohorts, in dethroning their master.[156] If negro slavery still exists in this state, it has little of the degradation connected with it elsewhere. Into Algiers France has already carried the benign principle of law—earlier recognized by her than by the English courts[157]—which secures freedom to all beneath its influence. And now we are cheered anew by the glad tidings recently received, that the Bey of Tunis, "for the glory of God, and to distinguish man from the brute creation," has decreed the total abolition of human slavery throughout his dominions.

Let us, then, with hope and confidence, turn to the Barbary States! The virtues and charities do not come singly. Among them is a common bond, stronger than that of science or knowledge. Let one find admission, and a goodly troop will follow. Nor is it unreasonable to anticipate other improvements in states which have renounced a long-cherished system of White Slavery, while they have done much to abolish or mitigate the slavery of others not white, and to overcome the inhuman prejudice of color. The Christian nations of Europe first declared, and practically enforced, within their own European dominions, the vital truth of freedom, that man cannot hold property in his brother man. Algiers and Tunis, like Saul of Tarsus, have been turned from the path of persecution, and now receive the same faith. Algiers and Tunis now help to plead the cause of Freedom. Such a cause is in sacred fellowship with all those principles which promote the Progress of Man. And who can tell that this despised portion of the globe is not destined to yet another restoration? It was here in Northern Africa that civilization was first nursed, that commerce early spread her white wings, that Christianity was taught by the honeyed lips of Augustine. All these are again returning to their ancient home. Civilization, commerce, and Christianity once more shed their benignant influences upon the land to which they have long been strangers. A new health and vigor now animate its exertions. Like its own giant Antæus,—whose tomb is placed by tradition among the hillsides of Algiers,—it has been often felled to the earth, but it now rises with renewed strength, to gain yet higher victories.

[1] The classical student will be gratified and surprised by the remains of antiquity described by Dr. Shaw, English chaplain at Algiers in the reign of George the First, in his Travels and Observertions relating to Several Parts of Barbary and the Levant, published in 1738.

[2] Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, vol. ix. chap. lvi. p. 465.

[3] Jefferson, without recognizing the general parallel, alludes to Virginia as fast sinking to be "the Barbary of the Union."—Writings, vol. iv. p. 333.

[4] Sismondi's Literature of the South of Europe, vol. iii. chap. 29, p. 492.

[5] The exact amount is left uncertain both by Smollet and Thomas Roscoe in their lives of Cervantes. It appears that it was five hundred gold crowns of Spain, which, according to his Spanish biographer, Navarrete, is 6770 reals, (Vida de Cervantes, p. 371.) The real is supposed to be less than ten cents.

[6] Pp. 140, 141.

[7] Gibbon's Roman Empire, vol. x. chap. 55, p. 190.

[8] Nat. Hist. lib. vii. c. 57.

[9] Genesis xiv. 14; ibid, xxxvii. 28. By these and other texts of the Scriptures, slavery, and even the slave trade, have been vindicated. See Bruce's Travels in Africa, vol. ii. p. 319. After quoting these texts, the complacent traveller says he "cannot think that purchasing slaves is either cruel or unnatural."

[10] Odyssey, book xvii.

[11] Pol. lib. i. c. 1.

[12] Pol. lib. i. c. 3. In like spirit are the words of the good Las Casas, when pleading before Charles the Fifth for the Indian races of America. "The Christian religion," he said, "is equal in its operation, and is accommodated to every nation on the globe. It robs no one of his freedom, violates none of his inherent rights, on the ground that he is a slave by nature, as pretended; and it well becomes your Majesty to banish so monstrous an oppression from your kingdoms in the beginning of your reign, that the Almighty may make it long and glorious."—Prescott's Conquest of Mexico, vol. i. p 379.

[13] Institute i. tit. 2.

[14] Re Rustica, § 2.

[15] Ep. iii. 62.

[16] Iliad, book i.

[17] Book ii. chap. 20, Life of St. Wolston.

[18] Chronica Hiberniæ, or the Annals of Phil. Flatesbury in the Cottonian Library, Domitian A. xviii. 10; quoted in Stephens on West India Slavery, vol. i. p. 6

[19] Encyclopédie Méthodique, (Jurisprudence,) Art. Esclavage.

[20] Biot, De l'Abolition de l'Esclavage Ancien en Occident, p. 440; a work crowned with a gold medal by the Institute of France, but which will be read with some disappointment.

[21] Koran, chap. 76.

[22] Harleian Miscellany, vol. v. p. 522—A Discourse concerning Tangiers.

[23] Purchas's Pilgrims, vol. ii. p. 1565.

[24] Prescott's History of Ferdinand and Isabella, vol. iii. p. 308; Purchas's Pilgrims, vol. ii. p. 813.

[25] Robertson's Charles the Fifth, book v.; Haedo, Historia de Argel, Epitome de los Reyes, de Argel.

[26] Sismondi, Histoire des Français, tom. xvii. p. 102.

[27] Robertson's Charles the Fifth, book v.

[28] Ibid.

[29] Clarkson's History of the Abolition of the Slave Trade, vol. i. p. 38.

[30] Robertson's Charles the Fifth, book vi.; Harleian Miscellany, vol. iv. p. 504;—A lamentable and piteous Treatise, very necessarye for euerye Christen manne to reade, [or the Expedition of Charles the Fifth,] truly and dylygently translated out of Latyn into Frenche, and out of Frenche into English, 1542.

[31] Guizot's History of the English Revolution, vol. i. p. 69, book ii.; Strafford's Letters and Despatches, vol. i p. 68. Sir George Radcliffe, the friend and biographer of the Earl, boasts that the latter "secured the seas from piracies, so as only one ship was lost at his first coming, [as Lord Lieutenant to Ireland,] and no more all his time; whereof every year before, not only several ships and goods were lost by robbery at sea, but also Turkish men-of-war usually landed, and took prey of men to be made slaves."—Ibid. vol ii. p. 434.

[32] "Purchas's Pilgrims, pp. 885, 886; Southey's Naval History of England, vol. v. pp. 60-63. There was a publication especially relating to this expedition, entitled Algiers Voyage, in a Journall or briefe Repertory of all Occurrents hapning in the Fleet of Ships sent out by the Kinge his most excellent Majestie, as well against the Pirates of Algiers as others. London. 1621. 4to.

[33] Bancroft's History of the United States, vol. i. p. 187.

[34] Osborne's Voyages—Journal of the Sallee Fleet, vol. ii. p. 493. See also Mrs. Macaulay's History of England, vol. ii. chap. 4, p. 219.

[35] Strafford's Letter and Despatches, vol. ii. pp. 86, 116, 129.

[36] Strafford's Letters and Despatches, vol. ii. p. 131.

[37] Ibid. p. 138.

[38] Carte's History of England, vol. iv. book xxii. p. 231.

[39] Waller's Works, p. 271.

[40] Compassion towards Captives, urged in Three Sermons, on Heb. xiii. 3, by Charles Fitz-Geoffrey, 1642. Libertas; or Relief to the English Captives in Algiers, by Henry Robinson, London, 1647. Letters relating to the Redemption of the Captive in Algiers, at Tunis, by Edward Cason Laud, 1647. A Relation of Seven Years' Slavery under the Turks of Algiers, suffered by an English Captive Merchant, with a Description of the Sufferings of the Miserable Captives under that Mercilest Tyranny, by Francis Knight, London, 1640. The last publication is preserved in the Collection of Voyages and Travels by Osborne, vol. ii. pp. 465-489.

[41] Hume says, (vol. vii. p. 529, chap, lxi.,) "No English fleet, except during the Crusades, had ever before sailed in those seas." He forgot, or was not aware of the expedition of Sir John Mansel already mentioned, (ante, p. 224,) which was elaborately debated in the Privy Council as early as 1617, three years before it was finally undertaken, and which was the subject of a special work. See Southey's Naval History of England, vol. v. pp. 149-157.

[42] Thurloe's State Papers, vol. iii. p. 527.

[43] 2 Carlyle's Letters and Speeches of Cromwell, vol. ii. p. 235, part ix. speech v.

[44] Rapin's History of England, vol. ii. pp. 858, 864.

[45] Recueil des Traitez de Paix, tom. iv. p. 43.

[46] Ibid. pp. 307, 476, 703, 756.

[47] The Gentleman's Magazine, vol. xviii. p. 531.

[48] Osborne's Voyages, vol. ii. p. 468; Relation of Seven Years' Slavery in Algiers.

[49] Ibid. p. 470.

[50] In the melancholy history of war, this is remarked as the earliest instance of the bombardment of a town. Sismondi, who never fails to regard the past in the light of humanity, says, that "Louis the Fourteenth was the first to put in practice the atrocious method, newly invented, of bombarding towns,—of burning them, not to take them, but to destroy them,—of attacking, not fortifications, but private houses,—not soldiers, but peaceable inhabitants, women and children, and of confounding thousands of private crimes, each one of which would cause horror, in one great public crime, one great disaster, which he regarded only as one of the catastrophes of war." Sismondi, Histoire des Français, tom. xxv. p. 452. How much of this is justly applicable to the recent murder of women and children by the forces of the United States at Vera Cruz! Algiers was bombarded in the cause of freedom; Vera Cruz to extend slavery!

[51] Siècle de Louis XIV. chap. 14.

[52] Gentleman's Magazine, vol. xviii. p. 441.

[53] To the relations of these missions we are indebted for works of interest on the Barbary States, some of which I am able to mention. Busnot, Histoire du Règne de Mouley Ishmael, à Rouen, 1714. This is by a father of the Holy Trinity. Jean de la Faye, Relation, en Forme de Journal, du Voyage pour la Rédemption des Captifs, à Paris, 1725. Voyage to Barbary for the Redemption of Captives in 1720, by the Mathurin-Trinitarian Fathers, London, 1735. The last is a translation from the French. Braithwaite's History of the Revolutions of the Empire of Morocco, London, 1729. This contains a journal of the mission of John Russel, Esq., from the English government to Morocco, to obtain the liberation of slaves. The expedition was thoroughly equipped. "The Moors," says the author, "find plenty of every thing but drink, but for that the English generally take care of themselves; for, besides chairs, tables, knives, forks, plates, table linen, &c., we had two or three mules, loaded with wine, brandy, sugar, and utensils for punch."—P. 82.

[54] Roscoe's Life of Cervantes, p. 43.

[55] "The following goods, designed as a present from his Majesty to the Dey of Algiers, to redeem near one hundred English captives lately taken, were entered at the customhouse, viz.: 20 pieces of broadcloth, 2 pieces of brocade, 2 pieces of silver tabby, 1 piece of green damask, 8 pieces of Holland, 16 pieces of cambric, a gold repeating watch, 4 silver do., 20 pounds of tea, 300 of loaf sugar, 5 fuzees, 5 pair of pistols, an escritoire, 2 clocks, and a box of toys."—Gent. Mag., iv. p. 104, (1734.)

[56] MS. Memoirs of Abraham Brown.

[57] Osborne's Voyages, vol. ii. p. 489; Relation of Seven Years' Slavery in Algiers.

[58] Sewell's History of the Quakers, p. 397.

[59] Biot, De l'Abolition de l'Esclavage Ancien, p. 437.

[60] Haedo, Historia de Argel, pp. 142-144; Dialogo I. de la Captiudad.

[61] Roscoe's Life of Cervantes, p. 50. See his story of Española Inglesa.

[62] Gentleman's Mag. xviii. p. 413.

[63] Oronooko, act iii. sc. i. It is not strange that the anti-slavery character of this play rendered it an unpopular performance at Liverpool, while the prosperous merchants there were concerned in the slave trade.

[64] Don Quixote, part i. book iv. chap. 12.

[65] Osborne's Voyages, vol. ii. p. 500.

[66] Roscoe's Life of Cervantes, pp. 32, 310, 311. In the same spirit Thomas Phelps says: "I looked upon my condition as desperate; my forlorn and languishing state of life, without any hope of redemption, appeared far worse than the terrors of a most cruel death."—Osborne's Voyages, vol. ii. p. 504.

[67] British Annual Register, vol. vi. p. 60.

[68] El Trato de Argel.

[69] Roscoe's Life of Cervantes, pp. 31, 308, 309. I refer to Roscoe as the popular authority. His work appears to be little more than a compilation from Navarrete and Sismondi.

[70] Ibid. p. 33. See also Haedo, Historia de Argel, p. 185.

[71] Purchas's Pilgrims, vol. ii. p. 888.

[72] Purchas's Pilgrims, vol. ii. pp. 882-883.

[73] Purchas's Pilgrims, vol. ii. pp. 889-896.

[74] Osborne's Voyages, vol. ii. pp. 497-510.

[75] Sewell's History of the Quakers, pp. 392-397.

[76] Vol. xv. p. 130.

[77] Vol. xix. p. 176.

[78] Davis's Extracts relating to Plymouth, p. 3.

[79] Winthrop's Journal, vol. ii. p. 11.

[80] MS. Records of First Church in Roxbury, Massachusetts.

[81] Middlesex [Massachusetts] Probate Files in MS.

[82] William Gilbert to Arthur Bridge, MS.

[83] MS. Journal of Chief Justice Samuel Sewell.

[84] Sparks's Works of Franklin, ix. 506, 507; x. 230. M. Le Veillard to Dr. Franklin, October 9, 1785.

[85] Boston Independent Chronicle, April 28, 1785, vol. xvii. No. 866; May 12, 1785, No. 868; Oct. 20, 1785, No. 886; Nov. 3, 1785, No. 888; Nov. 17, 1785, No. 890; March 2, 1786, vol. xviii. No. 908; April 27, 1786, No. 918.

[86] Boston Independent Chronicle, May 18, 1786, xviii. No. 916; Sparks's Franklin, ix. 506, 507.

[87] Boston Independent Chronicle, Oct. 16, 1778, vol. xx. No. 1042; History of the War with Tripoli, p. 59.

[88] History of the War with Tripoli, p. 62. American Museum, vol. viii. Appendix.

[89] History of the War between the United States and Tripoli, p. 52.

[90] Lyman's Diplomacy, vol. ii. p. 353.

[91] Lyman's Diplomacy vol. ii. p. 357; History of the War with Tripoli, p. 64.

[92] Lyman's Diplomacy, vol. ii. p. 359.

[93] Ibid. p. 360.

[94] History of the War with Tripoli, pp. 69-71.

[95] Wesley's Thoughts on Slavery, (1772,) p. 26.

[96] Short Account of Algiers, (Philadelphia, 1794,) p. 18.

[97] From the Eagle Office, Hanover, New Hampshire, 1795.

[98] Chap. xxx.

[99] Chap. xxxii.

[100] Secret Journals of Congress, 1786, vol. iv. pp. 274-280.

[101] Brissot's Travels, vol. i. letter 22.

[102] Sparks's Franklin, vol. ii. p. 517.

[103] At Portsmouth, N. H., at a public entertainment, April 3, 1795, in honor of French successes.—Boston Independent Chronicle, vol. xxvii. No. 1469.

[104] United States Statutes at Large, (Little & Brown's edit.,) Treaties, vol. viii. p. 133; Lyman's Diplomacy, vol. ii. p. 362.

[105] Article 11; Lyman's Diplomacy, vol. ii. pp. 380, 381; United States Statutes at Large, vol. viii. p. 154.

[106] Article 6; United States Statutes at Large, vol. viii. p. 157. This treaty has two dates, August, 1797, and March, 1799. William Eaton and James Leander Cathcart were the agents of the United States at the latter date.

[107] Lyman's Diplomacy, vol. ii. p. 350; United States Statutes at Large, vol. viii. p. 100.

[108] History of the War with Tripoli, p. 80.

[109] Lyman's Diplomacy, vol. ii. p. 384.

[110] Miscellaneous Works of David Humphreys, p. 75.

[111] Miscellaneous Works of David Humphreys, pp. 52, 53.

[112] United States Statutes at Large, vol. viii. p. 214; Lyman's Diplomacy, vol. ii. p. 388.

[113] History of the War between the United States and Tripoli, p. 88.

[114] Noah's Travels, p. 69.

[115] Ibid. p. 144; National Intelligencer of March 7, 1815.

[116] United States Statutes at Large, vol. viii. p. 224; Lyman's Diplomacy, vol. ii. p. 376.

[117] Mackenzie's Life of Decatur, p. 268.

[118] Mémoire sur la Nécessité et les Moyens de faire cesser les Pirateries des Etats Barbaresques. Reçu, considéré, et adopté à Paris en Septembre, à Turin le 14 Octobre, 1814, à Vienne durant le Congrès. Par M. Sidney Smith. See Quarterly Review, vol. xv. p. 140, where this is noticed. Schoell, Histoire des Traités de Paix, tom. xi. p. 402.

[119] Edinburgh Review, vol. xxvi. p. 451; Osler's Life of Exmouth, p. 302; Mackenzie's Life of Decatur, p. 263.

[120] Quarterly Review, vol. xv. p. 145; Edinburgh Review, vol. xxvi. p. 449, noticing "A Letter to a Member of Parliament, on the Slavery of the Christians at Algiers. By Walter Croker, Esq., of the Royal Navy. London, 1816." Schoell, Traités de Paix, tom. xi. p. 402.

[121] Osler's Life of Exmouth, p. 297.

[122] Osler's Life of Exmouth, p. 303.

[123] Thurloe's State Papers, vol. ii. p. 390.

[124] Osler's Life of Exmouth, p. 334; British Annual Register, (1816,) vol. lviii. pp. 97-106; Shaler's Sketches, pp. 279-294.

[125] Osler's Life of Exmouth, p. 340.

[126] Osler's Life of Exmouth, p. 342.

[127] Ibid. 432; Shaler's Sketches of Algiers, p. 382.

[128] Purchas's Pilgrims, vol. ii. p. 1565.

[129] Braithwaite's Revolutions of Morocco, p. 233; Noah's Travels, p. 367.

[130] Haedo, Historia, pp. 139, 140. Besides the illustrations of the hardships of White Slavery already introduced, I refer briefly to the following: Edinburgh Review, vol. xxvi. pp. 452-454; Croker's Letter, pp. 11-13; Quarterly Review, vol. xv. p. 145; Eaton's Life, p. 100; Noah's Travels, p. 366.

[131] MS. Memoirs.

[132] Biographie Universelle, art. Vincent de Paul.

[133] This translation is borrowed from Sismondi's Literature of the South of Europe, by Roscoe, vol. iii. p. 381. There is a letter of "John Dunton, Mariner," addressed to the English Admiralty in 1637, which might furnish the foundation of a similar scene. "For my only son," he says, "is now a slave in Algier, and but ten years of age, and like to be lost forever, without God's great mercy and the King's clemency, which, I hope, may be in some manner obtained."—Osborne's Voyages, vol. ii. p. 492.

[134] Eaton's Life, p. 145.

[135] Wilson's Travels, p. 93; Edinburgh Review, vol. xxxviii. p. 403; Noah's Travels, p. 302; Quarterly Review, vol. xv. p. 168; Shaler's Sketches of Algiers, p. 77.

[136] Sale's Koran, chap. 24, vol. ii. p. 194. The right of redemption was recognized by the Gentoo laws. Halhed's Code, cap. 8, § 1, 2. It was unknown in the British West Indies while slavery existed there. Stephens on West India Slavery, vol. ii. pp. 378-384. It is also unknown in the Slave States of our country.

[137] Sales's Koran, vol. ii. p. 474, note.

[138] Haedo, Historia de Argel, p. 122; Quarterly Review, vol. xv. pp. 169, 172; Shaler's Sketches of Algiers, p. 77; Short Account of Algiers, pp. 22, 25. It seems to have been supposed, that, according to the Koran, the condition of slavery ceased when the party became a Mussulman. Penny Cyclopædia, art. Slavery; Noah's Travels, p. 302; Shaler's Sketches, p. 69. In point of fact, freedom generally followed conversion; but I do not find any injunction on the subject in the Koran.

[139] De los peores que en Argel auia. Haedo, Historia de Argel, p. 85; Navarrete, Vida de Cervantes, p. 361.

[140] Roscoe's life of Cervantes, p. 303.

[141] Baños de Argel.

[142] Biographie Universelle, art. Thomas de Jesus; Digby's Board Stone of Honor, Tancredus, § 9, p. 181.

[143] Biographie Universelle, art. Vincent de Paul.

[144] MS. Memoirs.

[145] Braithwaite's Revolutions in Morocco, p. 353.

[146] Keatinge's Travels, p. 250; Quarterly Review, vol. xv. p. 146. See also Chenier's Present State of Morocco, vol. i. p. 192; ii. p. 369.

[147] Lemprière's Tour, p. 290. See also pp. 3, 147, 190, 279.

[148] Narrative of Ten Years' Residence at Tripoli, p. 241.

[149] Noah's Travels, p. 368.

[150] Shaler's Sketches, p. 77.

[151] Histoire d'Alger: Description de ce Royaume, etc., de ses Forces de Terre et de Mer, Moeurs et Costumes des Habitans, des Mores, des Arabes, des Juifs, des Chrétiens, de ses Lois, etcs. (Paris, 1830,) chap. 27.

[152] Paradise Lost, book xii. 64-71.

[153] Noah's Travels, p. 248, 253; Quarterly Review, vol. xv. p. 168. Among the concubines of a prince of Morocco were two slaves of the age of fifteen, one of English, and the other of French extraction. Lemprière's Tour, p. 147. There is an account of the fate of "one Mrs. Shaw, an Irish woman," in words hardly polite enough to be quoted. She was swept into the harem of Muley Ishmael, who "forced her to turn Moor;" "but soon after, having taken a dislike to her, he gave her to a soldier."—Braithwaite's Morocco, p. 191.

[154] Braithwaite's Morocco, p. 350. See also Quarterly Review, vol. xv. p. 168.

[155] Braithwaite, p. 222.

[156] Ibid. p. 381.

[157] Somersett's case, first declaring this principle, was decided in 1772. M. Schoell says, that "this fine maxim has always obtained" in France.—Histoire Abrégée des Traités de Paix, tom. xi. p. 178. By the royal ordinance 1318, it was declared, that "all men are born free (francs) by nature; and that the kingdom of the French (Francs) should be so in reality as in name." But this "fine maxim" was not recognized in France so completely as M. Schoell asserts. See Encyclopédie, (de Diderot et de D'Alembert,) art. Esclavage.

Transcriber's Note: Delivered as a Lecture before the Boston Mercantile Library Association, February 17, 1847; this illustrated version published in 1853. Spelling varieties as in "stanch" (staunch) have been maintained.

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Table of Contents

- White Slavery In The Barbary States. BY CHARLES SUMNER.

- White Slavery In The Barbary States.

- I.

- II.

- III.

- THE FULL PROJECT GUTENBERG LICENSE