SOCIAL CONDITION OF AFRICA. 243 



overcome the obstacles which had hitherto baffled the most 

 strenuous efforts ot individuals. Accordingly, by mutual 

 agreement, concluded on the 8th August, 1§07, and carried 

 into effect on the 1st January following, the settlement was 

 surrendered into the hands of the crown, and placed on the 

 same footing with the other British colonies. 



From this time a new and much more copious source of 

 population was opened. Since the year just mentioned, 

 Britain had prohibited her own subjects from carrying on 

 the slave-trade, and she had afterward obtained an assur- 

 ance from other countries, that they would discontinue it 

 along all the coast northward of the Line. She even re- 

 ceived permission to treat as pirates such of their subjects 

 as within those limits might be found employed in the con- 

 veyance of slaves. In her zeal for the abolition of this 

 odious traffic, she has maintained a number of ships con- 

 stantly watching those seas, and capturing every vessel 

 thus unlawfully laden. The liberated negroes are brought 

 to Sierra Leone, where they are located in the surrounding 

 villages. For some time they receive rations, and are kept 

 in pretty strict subordination ; but, after a certain period, 

 they obtain assignments of ground, from which to earn 

 their own subsistence. On the 31st March, 1827, the 

 slaves thus liberated amounted to 11,878, of which there 

 were 4701 males above and 1875 under fourteen ; 2717 fe- 

 males above and 1517 under that age ; besides 1068 settled in 

 Freetown, or employed on the river in the timber trade. On 

 the 31st December, 1828, the number had been increased by 

 new arrivals to 16,886. Unfortunately, neither their pro- 

 gress in industry and civilization, nor the general prospe- 

 rity of the colony, has answered the sanguine expectations 

 once so fondly cherished. The efficiency of the govern- 

 ment has been much impaired by various errors and unfor- 

 tunate circumstances, and above all by the singularly dele- 

 terious influence of the climate on European constitutions. 

 This, it is supposed, is owing not so much to the mere heat, 

 as to the noxious exhalations arising from an ill-regulated 

 town, and an uncultivated country, covered with such a 

 mass of brush and jungle as to impede the necessary venti- 

 lation. The result is, a remittent fever, so malignant that 

 almost all Europeans are attacked with it, and not one in 

 three recovers These circumstances have oftener than 



