LIEUTENANT CAMERON'S ADDRESS. 839 



gles to die of starvation, and carrying off the women and children. Loaded 

 with plunder, they drive them towards the west, where a fresh caravan is 

 found, which takes them to the Makololo country. Here they are exchanged 

 for ivory, which is afterwards exchanged from the Portuguese ports of the 

 west. 



" "Whilst Africa is unopened to legitimate commerce, these evils will go on 

 and increase day by day. There can be no doubt of this. The only way to coun- 

 teract them is to establish legitimate trade. Mr. Cotterill's project is worthy 

 of the warmest esteem and assistance of every lover of England and every 

 man of honour. It is a scheme in a small way, and it only touches a part of 

 the evil ; but it attacks one of the roots of the slave trade, the greater portion 

 of which is carried on with the greatest barbarity. It has, however, the ad- 

 vantage of a pied-aterre, as Livingstonia has already been formed. A tenta- 

 tive expedition like this will prove what I know, and what those who have 

 thought of it know — that commerce can be carried on in Africa to pay and 

 repay amply the capital invested in a legitimate manner ; and that by the 

 establishment of such commerce the slave trade will in process of time be done 

 away with. 



" But Nyassa is only a small part of that continent. As Mr. Cotterill has 

 said, there is Egypt far away in the north, and Khartoum, which is simply a 

 vast slave depot ; and the slave districts run to the south nearly up to our own 

 colonies. There is an express determination on the part of the slave-owners 

 of Transvaal that if England presses upon them they will move further into 

 the main country, where every man may do as he likes with his own slaves. 

 From fifteen north latitude to twenty south latitude the cause of the slave 

 trade extends from coast to coast of the Continent of Africa. To establish 

 commerce means of communication must be opened up. The water systems 

 of the Congo and Zambesi are two of the finest, if not the finest, in the world ; 

 and a short canal of twenty or thirty miles wide, as I can say from personal 

 experience, would unite the two. From the Zambesi, one of the heads of the 

 Congo, to Nyassa would be a land journey of about one hundred and fifty or 

 two hundred miles, and I see no reason why tramways should not be laid 

 between the two places. There would be no difficulty about this, for there 

 would be no necessity to lay down a railway like Brunei laid between Lon- 

 don and Beading. All that would be wanted would be a line of rails to run loads 

 upon without employing slaves. It could be done cheaply and easily, and I 

 hope that the time is not far distant when English capital and English mer- 

 chants will be represented in every corner of the vast continent, and that the 

 name of Englishmen will be loved and honoured. In the meantime let us do 

 all honour to Mr. Cotterill, who is throwing up everything here in England 

 for this cause. 



" It is a noble undertaking, though perhaps it lacks some of the romance 



