Such men would fashion the traffic to suit themselves, and would, doubtless, make their business an exceedingly wicked one. But none of the enormities named, or that could be named, constituted a necessary part of the institution of slavery, or necessarily emanated from it. What enormities have wicked men sometimes committed in the transportation of emigrants from Germany and Ireland? Wicked men, intrusted with power, have, at least sometimes, been found to abuse it. Is it any argument against the institution of marriage, because some women have made their husbands support and educate children not their own? Or, because some men murder, treat with cruelty, or make their wives totally miserable and wretched? None of these things were any part of the institution of marriage, but the reverse of it. Apply this view also to the institution of Christianity, for nothing has been more abused. Already, under its very banners, as it were, have been committed more enormities than would probably attend that of slavery through all time. Yet the institution of Christianity has not been even soiled thereby; but its character and usefulness have become brighter and more visible. In proportion to the importance of a thing is its liability to abuse. A worthless thing is not worth a counterfeit. We have before us the testimony of travellers in regard to the indifference felt by the Africans on being sold as slaves; of their palpable want of love and affection for their country, their relatives, and even for their wives and children. Nor should we forget that a large portion of this race are born slaves to the chieftains, whose wars with each other are mere excursions of robbery and theft. Lander, vol. i. p. 107, speaking of Jenna, says— “It must not be imagined that because the people of this country are almost perpetually engaged in conflicts with their neighbours, the slaughter of human beings is therefore very great. They pursue war, as it is called, partly as an amusement, or to _keep their hands in it_; and partly to benefit themselves by the capture of slaves.” One decrepit old woman was the victim of a hundred engagements, at Cape La Hoo, during a three years’ war. Lander describes those who claim to be free, as _the war men of the path_, who are robbers. He says, p. 145, “they subsist solely by pillage and rapine.” Such is the condition of the poor free negro in Africa. The chieftain often, it is true, has goats, sheep, fields of corn and rice; but we mistake when we suppose that the slaves, the surplus of whom were formerly sent to market, were the proprietors of such property. At Katunqua, p. 179, Lander describes the food to be “such as lizards, rats, locusts, and caterpillars, which the natives roast, grill, bake, and boil.” No people feed on such vermin who possess fields and flocks.