6773. And you conceived that one of the most effectual means for that purpose would be to prevent other white men, foreigners, from taking advantage of King Siacca’s country as a position from which to carry on a trade which endangered the safety of Her Majesty’s subjects and their free passage into that neighbourhood?--I will state the principle upon which I acted, and the relation in which I considered that we stood towards King Siacca. In the first place, the outrages and inhospitality committed in his waters I considered him responsible for; secondly, I considered him responsible for holding Sierra Leone people in his country as slaves for the purpose of traffic. Upon his declaring that he knew nothing of those acts, I considered it perfectly just that the punishment should be visited upon the persons who had committed those crimes, and who had been the cause of those crimes. 6774. And you felt yourself entitled, if the king professed an inability to prevent others from taking advantage of his territory for purposes injurious to the security of British subjects, to take means yourself for securing such objects?--I entered into a treaty for the purpose of preventing future proceedings of the description that had already occurred, and enabling me to meet such cases if they should recur. 6775. Mr. _Forster_.] Is it not your opinion that it has been owing to the preference given to Spanish slave dealers that British merchants have not sooner established themselves at the Gallinas, and carried on commercial pursuits there?--In my Report to the Governor of Sierra Leone upon the state and prospects of trade in the Gallinas, in page 15 of the Printed Papers, I say, “When the English slave trade was abolished, considerable traffic sprung up and was rapidly increasing when the Spaniards commenced the slave trade in about 1817. From that time legitimate commerce gradually withered, and was at length totally annihilated by the establishment of a permanent slave factory in-shore, about 15 years ago, by Pedro Blanco, at that time mate of a slave vessel. Since then the slave trade has been the only pursuit, and during the long period that has since elapsed, not enough produce has been exported to form the cargo of the smallest coasting vessel.” 6776. Had there been any legitimate trade carried on at the Gallinas previous to your operations there?--A passage in the letter I have just read states my opinion upon that subject, derived from information from the chiefs themselves.