ALLEGED INJUSTICE TO NATIVES. 31 
that "should they be detected in theft, they 
should on no account, without his previous 
knowledge and consent, be pursued, beaten, or 
even he looked upon with anger:" further, that 
any European "that illuses, beats, or pushes 
any of the natives, be he in the right, or in the 
wrong, shall be punished with fifty lashes:" 
and again, that "every friendship and kindness 
shall be shewn to them." 
That the first contracts, for the conveyance of 
lands, were regularly signed and testified by 
the natives, has already been stated, and with 
the price paid they expressed themselves con- 
tent. No doubt (as is the case in all trans- 
actions of a like nature,) the advantage must 
have been in favour of civilization. The prime 
cost of the articles, delivered by William Penn 
to the North American Indians, most possibly 
bore the same proportion to the value of Penn- 
sylvania in its present improved condition, as 
did the tobacco, beads, buttons, brandy, and 
other trifles, to the value of the land at the 
Cape, now that it is cultivated and built upon. 
The numbers of the aborigines, at the first 
advent of the Dutch, have been stated at 200, 000, 
The colonists are accused of having reduced and 
cut off these, to the present population of 32,000, 
"by a continual system of oppression, which, 
once begun, never slackened." 
