There seems indeed something peculiarly ingrained in the Portuguese race which makes them take to slave-dealing and slave-hunting as naturally as greyhounds take to chasing hares; and this observation applies not to one section of the race alone, but to Portuguese wherever they are to be found beyond the reach of European law. No modern race can be cited as slave-hunters within measurable distance of the Portuguese. Their exploits in this respect are written in the annals not only of the whole coast of _Brazil_ from _Pará_ to _Uruguay_ and along the _Misiones_ of _Paraguay_, not only on the coast of _Angola_, but throughout the interior of Africa. We may take up the journals of one traveller after another, of Burton, of Livingstone, of Stanley, or of Cameron, and, in whatever respect their accounts and opinions may differ, on one point they are one and all entirely agreed, namely, as to the pestilent and remorseless activity of the ubiquitous Portuguese slave-catcher. Nor does the eminence of the Portuguese race as purveyors to the slave-market end at the dark continent. In India, it is true, their activity in this respect is restrained by the presence of a paramount power; but further east their national character has found ample scope for its development. In the nineteenth century a Christian country of Europe has shown an example to such nations as China and Japan by maintaining at _Macao_ an emporium of coolies destined for _Peru_ and elsewhere, and sent out under conditions differing from those of slavery in name alone, and the records of which traffic are a _pendant_ to those of “the middle passage.” Finally, a branch of the Portuguese race has at this moment the unenviable distinction of possessing the only civilized country in which slavery is acknowledged by law.