The question is frequently asked what would be done if the slaves were set free. We are told that to dump down on the West Coast of Africa 40,000 penniless slaves originally drawn from homes in the far hinterland, might involve great hardship. We all agree, for we now know that thousands of slaves were obtained for Portuguese colonies from Belgian Congo, through the help of the revolted Congo State soldiery—a body of men numbering according to circumstances, from 1000 to 5000, who only kept up their rebellion by purchasing slaves with arms and ammunition from the Portuguese half-castes and natives. Again, no one can read the thrilling story by Colonel Colin Harding in “Remotest Barotseland” without being convinced that the Portuguese obtained many slaves from British territory. Lake Dilolo, the greatest of all the slave-markets, is but a comparatively short march from Rhodesia, and, in view of local conditions, it is inconceivable that natives of British Rhodesia have not been drawn into the slave-traders’ toils in that region. This feature has recently received an emphatic confirmation from Mr. F. Schindler, a missionary of over twenty years’ experience in Angola. He writes:— “I have seen thousands of slaves coming from the Belgian Congo and Rhodesia being taken westwards by Bihean slave-traders and in some cases by half-caste Portuguese, and both by their tribal mark and by their speech I had no difficulty in recognizing them as belonging to tribes that are not found in Angola.” How many of these slaves were, and are, enslaved on the mainland, and how many ultimately found their destination to be the cocoa islands, it is impossible to say, but we do know that generally it was the hinterland native which the slave-traders shipped to San Thomé and Principe. Moreover, some of us have seen these people of the Batetela and Kasai tribes on the roads and plantations of the islands, the cicatrized arms, legs, chests and backs plainly indicating their origin. The first essential, therefore, is that of determining the countries of origin of the slaves on the islands. To whom can this task be assigned? Obviously not to the planters; it might be entrusted to a disinterested Portuguese Commission, but others have responsibilities and vital interests—Great Britain and Belgium would both possess, if not the right of membership, certainly the right to watch proceedings on behalf of any natives whom they had reason to believe had been obtained originally from British or Belgian colonies. [Sidenote: THE APPEAL FOR LIBERTY]