In the eyes of every African, the value of a slave increases in the ratio of his distance from the land of his nativity, the chance of his absconding being reduced in the same proportion. The usual prices in the Shoan market are from ten to twenty German crowns; but females possessing superior personal attractions often fetch from fifty to eighty, which outlay is returned three-fold in Arabia. The profits accruing from the trade are thus obviously large; and notwithstanding the murders which are annually perpetrated by freebooters on the road to the sea-coast, the mortality can scarcely be said to exceed that under the ordinary circumstances of African life.
The hebdomadal sale of human flesh which takes place in the public market at Abd el Russool, the disgusting parade of victims, and the sensuality of the savage purchasers, are sufficient to draw forth every sentiment of indignation, and to elicit every feeling of sympathy; but it must be confessed that slavery in this portion of Africa, excepting as regards the powers pertaining to it, is in fact little more than servitude. The newly-captured become soon reconciled to their lot and condition, their previous domestic life having too often been one of actual bondage, although not nominally so. And even in the sultry plains of the Adaïel, few individuals of the long droves that are daily to be seen on their weary march to the coast with Danákil caravans, afford indications of being tortured with regret at the loss of their freedom, and of their native land, or with recollections of the verdant plains whence avarice and cruelty have torn them.
From the governor to the humblest peasant, every house in Shoa possesses slaves of both sexes, in proportion to the wealth of the proprietor; and in so far as an opinion may be formed upon appearances, their condition, with occasional, but rare exceptions, is one of comfort and ease. Mild in its character, their bondage is tinctured with none of the horrors of West Indian slavery. The servitude imposed is calculated to create neither suffering nor exhaustion. There is no merciless taskmaster to goad the victim to excessive exertion—no “white man’s scorn” to be endured; and, although severed from home, from country, and from all the scenes with which his childhood had been familiar, his lot is not unfrequently improved. Naturalised in the house of his master, he is invariably treated with lenity—usually with indulgence—often with favour; and under a despotic sovereign, to whom servile instruments are uniformly the most agreeable, the caprices of fortune may prefer the exile to posts of confidence and emolument, and may even exalt him to the highest dignities.
Volume Three—Chapter Thirty Six.
Introduction of Slavery into Abyssinia.
Although the history of North-eastern Africa is very imperfectly recorded, it is certain that Carthage, Egypt, and Ethiopia, early acquired and long maintained a prevailing influence therein. The Carthaginians possessed themselves of nearly the whole of the northern portion, whilst the Egyptians and Ethiopians occupied the east to the very centre. The extension of these great empires tended considerably to limit the trade in human flesh, and the world being in feud in every quarter, needed not to be supplied with slaves from Africa.
But this aspect of affairs was materially altered so soon as these three empires, losing their power, became subdivided into sundry governments, the diffusion of Christianity and civilisation in Europe and Asia meanwhile restricting the slave-trade to the African continent. Although not generally representing the character which their name implies, the Christians of the Occident and Orient had at least given up the system amongst themselves; and by the former especially it was very little practised until after the discovery of America, when it was revived and encouraged by the Spaniards; and the Negro being considered better fitted for hard labour than the aborigines of the New World, Africa began to be regarded as the slave-mart for the whole universe. About the same period Ethiopia was first invaded by numberless hordes of Pagan Galla, migrating from the south; and not long afterwards Graan, the fanatic Mohammadan enemy, commenced the overthrow of this then powerful empire, which was speedily dismembered, and has never since been able to regain its former limits.
The heathen intruders soon relaxing in their united efforts against the Christians, those Galla tribes which had settled on Abyssinian ground began to contest among themselves for the supremacy over the newly-acquired territory, and to enslave each other. The Mohammadans, who had meanwhile gained a footing in the disturbed country, being slave-dealers by profession, greedily availed themselves of the opportunity afforded by these intestine divisions to trade in Pagan prisoners, females especially, who possess the recommendation of superior personal attractions to the generality of “Afric’s dark daughters”—and thus the traffic spread rapidly around Abyssinia. Partly from fear of then enemies, and partly from being less interested in slavery than the Moslems, the Christians no longer ventured beyond the frontiers of the country they retained, and the avenues to the sea-coast, as well as those through the Galla tribes in the interior, thus fell together with the whole commerce into the hands of the bigoted disciples of the Prophet. They devoted their lives to the purchase and sale of human flesh, a trade with which they connected the propagation of their faith, and their market was ever supplied by the out-pouring of innumerable prisoners of war from the distant nations of the interior.