5535. Do you think that it would be desirable to give the negro the option whether he would go to the West Indies or not?--Certainly not; it is never done now, and the Act of Parliament does not even contemplate such an option being given; the negro is taken to Sierra Leone, and located there, without his opinion or wishes being consulted, and in the same way he might be transported to the West Indies. 5536. Mr. _W. Patten_.] Is it obligatory in some of the treaties to take them to Sierra Leone?--The new Spanish treaty requires that they shall be established in a territory of the country to which the cruizer that has made the capture belongs. 5537. _Chairman._] But must not the adjudication be on the coast of Africa?--Not necessarily; Spanish vessels may be condemned at Havannah; and in some cases when Portuguese vessels have been captured in the West Indies, the slaves have been sent to Jamaica, and various other islands in the West Indies; and when the vessel is sent over to Sierra Leone, she comes over to us without the slaves; the slaves having been landed in the first instance, so as to save them a second voyage across the Atlantic; but with regard to vessels seized in the West Indies, which are liable to condemnation under the Spanish treaty, the Havannah court would condemn them, and the slaves would then be sent as Dr. Madden has sent them, to one of our West India colonies. 5538. Do you conceive that foreign powers would entertain, or be justified in entertaining, any objection to such a distribution?--No, they would not entertain it, and I do not think that they would be justified in entertaining it; on the contrary, it was the case in former days that the vessels that were condemned by the court at Havannah had their slaves located in the island of Cuba; but the planters cried out against it very loudly; and it was at their suggestion and their request that we sent away the negroes to our own West India colonies. 5539. By the treaties it is arranged that the captured negroes should be planted within the colonies of the capturing party?--It is stipulated in the seventh Article of the Portuguese treaty and the old Spanish treaty: “As to the slaves, they shall receive from the mixed commission a certificate of emancipation, and shall be delivered over to the government on whose territory the commission which shall have so judged them shall be established to be employed as servants or free labourers.” The Act never contemplates any option whatever being exercised by the persons seized, because it allows of their being drafted into the army or navy, without any reference to their own will.