40 
MADAGASCAR. 
man stolen in the first place from his home, 
bought and sold in the public market, with no 
power of acquiring anything, and possessing no¬ 
thing he can call his own, not even his body or 
his will. He is wholly and solely the property 
of another. His master eats the produce of his 
labour, sells his children, separates him from his 
wife, and, as often happens, ships him off to lands 
from which he can never hope to return. The 
influence of the English Government has been 
brought to bear upon the Sultan Abdullah of 
late, however, and there is now an active consul 
in residence at Johanna; so that we may hope 
soon to see a right view of this traffic in sorrow 
and death adopted by the more intelligent mem¬ 
bers of the community of planters and chiefs 
in the Comoros. The details furnished to the 
House of Commons in 1871, of the condition of 
the slave-trade on the East African seaboard, are 
more than sufficient to convince the most scepti¬ 
cal mind that the efforts, great as they have been, 
for the destruction of this hateful commerce, still 
need to be followed up by energetic and sustained 
action if the trade is to be in the end and for 
ever abolished. 
Much depends upon a proper treatment of 
this moral plague, which hangs over the people 
of the Mozambique like a thick cloud, crushing 
out every hope and energy, and destroying the 
