SS7 
CONCLUSION. 
Having now finished my narrative, it re- 
mains for me to fulfil my obligations to the 
reader and the public, by briefly stating the re- 
sult of my experience, not only upon the habits 
and manners of the people of Western Africa, 
but also as to the progress they have made to- 
wards civilization, as to their political institu- 
tions and religious improvement. In doing 
this I shall cautiously abstain from entering into 
abstruse calculations, and religiously confine my- 
self to what my best judgement enables me to 
declare from practical observation. I must 
here however state, that it has been too long 
the custom to set little value on the African 
Negro, to consider him as a being mid-way 
placed between the mere brute and man ; as 
impervious to every ray of intellectual light ; 
and, in a word, as incapable of enjoying the 
blessings of civil or religious liberty. This cus- 
tom is, to say the least of it, erroneous, and the 
notion on which it is founded unjust. The 
Spaniards, after the discovery of South America, 
