250 SLAVE-MARKET 



protection ; and if he chooses to run the risk of 

 being insulted by going out without him, it is no 

 person's fault but his own. 



A vast deal of pious horror has been vented by 

 travellers, on visiting the slave-market in Con- 

 stantinople; it has been a fine subject for them to 

 talk about, and scarcely a person comes from the 

 East, who does not make his companions at table 

 shudder at his vivid description of scenes which 

 there met his eye. There is something in the 

 composition of human nature, which induces us 

 to listen with intense interest, and I almost would 

 say pleasure, to any narrative that borders on the 

 horrible or marvellous ; consequently, every one 

 who has a word to say about the horrors of the 

 slave-market finds his tale listened to with breath- 

 less attention. Those that have not seen it for- 

 get, in forming a notion of the slave-market, 

 to bear in mind, that the creatures brought 

 there to be sold are at the bottom of the scale 

 of intellectual beings ; that if their animal wants 

 are supplied, they have no other wish, desire, 

 hope, or fear, in the world ; and that they are 

 utterly unconscious of the degradation of being 

 exposed in a market like cattle for sale. The 



