404 
THE SLAVE QUESTION. 
ought to have been accomplished with a diminution 
of slight secondary causes? It is useless to waste our 
time on hypothetical cases : — but the question, — 
Wliat has been the probable effect of our abortive 
attempt ? may be advantageously considered. 
In our short intercourse with the most powerful 
chiefs of the interior whom we visited, bright hopes of 
wealth and future prosperity were held out, if they 
would follow our counsels. 
In particular, we assured them, that by employing 
their slaves at home, in the cultivation of the land 
instead of selling them, they would be enriched by the 
produce and consequent trade with white men. In 
furtherance of this, by timely gifts, wc induced them 
to enter into treaties with us for the relinquishment of 
the slave trade, which they had hitherto looked on as 
a legitimate source of revenue. We even enforced 
those treaties, and inflicted the penalties of infraction 
in the case of Ajimba"'^ ; — but we left them to doubt 
our truth or our power. Surely we owe it in justice 
towards our oppressed and abandoned allies, and to the 
dignity of the British nation, to redeem the promises 
solemnly made when publicly invoking Grod’s blessing 
on the treaties. 
They strongly adverted to the performance of our 
stipulations, implying, as it were, that their adherence 
should be contingent on ours. King Obi said, “ If 
* Vol. ii. p. 85. 
