Our teachers, wise and Christ-like in their spirit, are directing their efforts to whatever affects the welfare of these poor people, and their condition will constantly improve.
ANGLO-TURKISH CONVENTION FOR THE SUPPRESSION OF THE SLAVE-TRADE.
The Queen of England announced at the opening of the last session of Parliament, Feb. 5th, “That a convention for the suppression of the slave-trade has been concluded between my Government and that of his Imperial Majesty the Sultan.” This was very gratifying to all who had so long waited the signing of the oft-promised and oft-delayed treaty with Turkey. On the 9th of February, it was said by the Under-Secretary of State that the treaty had been signed but not ratified, and would soon be laid upon the table of the House of Commons. In the meantime, what purports to be a copy of the treaty has been published.
An examination of its several articles creates grave fears that astute Turkish diplomacy has been too much for Sir Henry Layard in this matter. It is all very well for English cruisers to have the right to search suspected ships, sailing under the Turkish flag, for slaves; but their officers cannot touch African slave seamen, and it will be easy to so make out a ship’s papers that she can carry many more men than she needs, and she can change her crew every voyage. All slaves seized, another article provides, shall be turned over to Ottoman authorities for the purpose of proclaiming them free, which, we fear, will prove as effectual in accomplishing that result, as throwing the turtle into the water by the simpleton was effectual in drowning it.
When England made treaties with other slave-holding nations for the suppression of the slave-trade, she provided that captured slaves should be tried before a mixed Commission in which British officers sat. In this treaty they take their chances for freedom before an Ottoman Court.
In this connection we regret to announce that Pacha Gordon has resigned, and his resignation has been accepted; and thus Central Africa loses its noble Christian ruler. He went out in 1874 as Governor General of Soudan, “to establish a regular government, to create facilities for commerce, and to destroy the slave-trade in the province entrusted to him,” and his resignation will bring dismay to all who have the cause of humanity at heart. It was at first reported that Ismail Eyoub Pacha had been appointed to take his place, who, while not Gordon Pacha, was, it is said, as good a man for the post as could be found in Egypt. But the Anti-Slavery Reporter now says, “it is officially announced that the actual successor is one Raouf Bey, of evil memory.”
This Raouf Bey is spoken of by Sir Samuel Baker in his “Ismailia” as the bosom friend of Abou Saood, whom he describes “as the incarnation of the slave-trade, and the greatest slave-dealer on the White Nile.” Colonel Gordon thinks it certain that the slave-dealers will at once resume their operations, and will be unmolested by the new Governor. He estimates that at least 30,000 slaves have annually, for the past twelve years, been brought down from the Bahr Gazelle and Darfur; and Vice-Consul Wylde believes that not less than 50,000 annually cross the Red Sea, who are taken to Egypt, Turkey, and other Mohammedan countries. And now, it seems, the Anglo-Turkish Convention provides that slaves captured by the English shall be handed over to the Ottoman authorities to be by them declared free, and a noted slave-hunter displaces the Christian suppressor of that hellish traffic in the governorship of the slave-hunting grounds.