I 



•CURSE OF SLAVERY. 521 



for higher attainments, but in unfavourable external circum- 

 stances, and these are quite sufficient to account for its exis- 

 tence. 



Among the causes which have contributed to retard the 

 march of improvement in Africa, one of the most important is 

 its compact geographical formation and the natural obstacles 

 which render the acce&s to its interior so extremely difficult. 

 Wliile Europe possesses a vast extent of coast line, numerous 

 harbours, large peninsulas, deep gulfs and bays, and broad 

 navigable rivers, Africa is deprived of these physical advantages. 

 Though more than three times larger than Europe, its coasts 

 are not only less extensive by one-fourth, but are also fre- 

 quently bounded, particularly within the tropics, by sandy 

 deserts or unhealthy swamps, which render them in a great 

 measure inaccessible or useless to man. We there see no such 

 peninsulas as Italy or Portugal and Spain, stretching far out 

 into the ocean, and aifording a seat to a numerous maritime 

 population; no such great mediterranean seas as the Baltic, 

 the Adriatic, or the JEgsean ; and while in Europe many rivers 

 carry the tides far into the interior of the land, and extend as 

 it were the domains of ocean into the bosom of the continent, 

 a great number of the streams of Africa are often rendered 

 imnavigable by long-continued droughts, or even cease to flow 

 altogether during a considerable part of the year. But the sea 

 is not only the great highway of commerce, it also, enlarges the 

 sphere of man's ideas, by bringing him into easier contact with 

 other nations ; it not only conveys the productions of every 

 zone from coast to coast, but civilisation is also wafted upon its 

 waves from shore to shore. Thus the vicinity of the sea has 

 been as favourable to tlie development of a great part of 

 Europe as the confinement or isolation of the Negro within the 

 bounds of his native continent has tended to retard his im- 

 provement. 



Even in the interior of Africa itself, communications are ren- 

 dered difficult by many natural obstacles. The fertile regions 

 of the Soudan are separated from the coast lands of the Medi- 

 terranean by the vast deserts of the Sahara, which have always 

 opposed an insurmountable barrier to the spread of European 

 civilisation. Here enormous tracts of arid land, there immense 

 marshes and swampy lake districts, or high mountain ranges 



