278 HTJMBEE OF NEGEOES CONVEYED EEOJI AEEICa. 
that of the United States, to the sale of 15,000 ? It 
pretty well ascertained that the llnglish islands received in 
the 106 years preceding 1786, more than 2,130,000 negroes, 
forcibly eai’ried from the coast of Africa. At the period of 
the French revolution, the slave-trade furnished (according 
to Mr. Norris) 74,000 slaves annually, of wliich the English 
colonies absorbed 38,000, and the French 20,000. It would 
be easy to prove that the whole of the MIest Indian archi* 
pelago, which now comprises scarcely 2,400,000 negroes and 
mulattoes (free and slaves), received, from 1670 "to 1825, 
nearly 5,000,000 of Africans. These revolting calculations 
respecting the consumption of the human sjiecies, do not 
include the number of unfortunate slaves who have perished 
in the passage, or have been thrown into tlie sea as damaged 
merchandize.* By how many thousands must we have 
augmented the loss, if the two nations most distinguished 
for ardour and intelligence in the development of commerce 
and industry, the English and the inhabitants of the United 
States, had continued, from 1807, to carry on the trade as 
freely as some other nations of Europe ? Sad experience 
has proved how much the treaties of the 15th July, 1814, 
and of the 22nd J anuary, 1815, by which Spain and Portugal 
reserved to themselvesf “the trade iu blacks” during a 
certain number of years, have been fatal to humanity. 
The local authorities, or rather the rich proprietors, form- 
ing the Ayiintamiento of the Havannah, the Consulado, and 
the Patriotic Society, have on several occasions shown a 
disposition favourable to the amelioration of the condition 
of the slaves.f If the government of the mother-country, 
instead of dreading the least appearance of innovation, had 
• Vol. vii, p. 151. See also the eloquent speech of the Duke de Broslie 
(March 28th, 1822), pp. 40, 43, 96. 
+ “ Dicen nuestros Indios del Rio Caura cuandn se confiesan que y» 
entienden que es pecado comer came humana ; pero piden que se les 
permita desacostumbrarse poco a poco ; quieren comer la came humana 
una vez al mes, despues cada tres meses, hasta que sin sentirlo pierdan la 
costurabre. ' Cartas de las Itev. Padres Ot/servantes, No. 7 M-S- 
I Our negroes of the River Caura say, when they confess, that they 
know it is sinful to eat human flesh ; they beg to be permitted to break 
themselves of the custom, little by little : they wish to eat human flesh 
once a month, and afterwards once every three months, until they feel 
they have cured themselvea of the practice.] 
