Under such circumstances, the real question to be solved is—Shall Great Britain secure and keep, as she may do, the superiority in Tropical cultivation, commerce, and influence? or, Shall foreign countries be suffered to acquire this supremacy, not only as regards themselves specifically, but even to the extent of supplying British markets with the produce of their fields, their labour, and their capital, to the abandonment and destruction of her own?
This is the true state of the case; and the result is a vital question as regards the future power and resources of Great Britain.
France is already securely placed at the mouth of the Senegal, and at Goree, extending her influence eastward and north-eastward from both places. She has a settlement at Albreda, on the Gambia, a short distance above St Mary’s, and which commands that river. She has just formed a settlement close by Cape Palmas, and another at the mouth of the Gaboon, and a third by this time near the chief mouth of the Niger, in the Bight of Benin. She has fixed herself at Massuah and Buro, on the west shore of the Red Sea, commanding the inlets into Abyssinia. She is endeavouring to fix her flag at Brava and the mouth of the Jub; and she has just taken permanent possession of the important island of Johanna, situated in the centre of the northern outlet of the Mozambique channel, by which she acquires the command of that important channel. Her active agents are placed in Southern Abyssinia, and are traversing the borders of the Great Bahr-el-Abiad; while the northern shores of Africa will speedily be her own.
Spain has planted herself in the island of Fernando Po, which commands all the outlets of the Niger, and the rivers from Cameroons to the equator; and from which she can readily obtain at any time any number of people from the adjacent coasts for her West Indian possessions, either as slaves or freemen.
About six years ago, the government of Portugal appointed a commission to enquire into the state and condition of her once fine and still important colonies in Tropical Africa, and to report upon the best course to adopt to render them beneficial to the mother country. They have reported and wisely recommended, that Portuguese knowledge and capital should, as far as possible, be again sent to Africa, in order to instruct, enlighten, and cultivate these valuable possessions; and instead of allowing, as heretofore, labour in slaves to be abstracted from Africa, that native labourers should be retained and employed in Africa itself; and further, that it should to the utmost be aided and directed by European skill, capital, and labour. Thus, fourteen degrees of latitude on the east coast, and twenty degrees of latitude on the west coast, will, at an early day, be set free from the slave trade. From these points the Brazil markets were chiefly supplied with slaves; but Brazils being now separated from Portugal, the latter has and can have no interest in allowing the former to carry on the slave trade from her African dominions, but quite the reverse.
The discovery of the route to India by the Cape of Good Hope changed the course of eastern commerce. The exertions of Portugal in the manner proposed, will now, and most certainly and severely, affect Tropical productions and commerce in every market. In this case, England ought to encourage and support Portugal, and, by following her footsteps in other eligible parts of Africa, share in the advantages which such a state of things, and the cultivation and improvement of Africa, is certain to produce.
The Iman of Muscat, the sovereign of Zanzibar, has lately put an end to the slave trade in his dominions in Africa, extending northwards from the Portuguese boundary eight degrees of latitude on the eastern coast. His envoy, who was lately in England, was so delighted with the treatment which he received, and with all that he heard and saw here, that he has influenced his master to carry out sincerely the views and objects recommended by England. I have in my possession a most interesting account of the country, extending into the interior of Africa, from the coast opposite Zanzibar all the way to the great lake Maravi. The country is intersected with noble rivers, one especially which issues out of the lake; is generally healthy and well cultivated, especially as the lake is approached. The population are generally of Arabian descent, industrious, and clothed. A wide field, therefore, for commercial operations is open in this quarter.
The powerful sovereign of Dahomey has agreed to abolish the slave trade. Independent of his considerable dominions, his fine country was one of the greatest high-roads for the slave caravans from the interior. He has received, welcomed, and encouraged the Wesleyan missionaries lately sent to that quarter. The missionaries from this society, and also one from the Church Missionary Society, have penetrated to Abekuta, a town containing 40,000 inhabitants, and about 106 miles north-east of Lagos, and north of Benin. The country, immediately after quitting the coast, becomes most fertile, pleasant, and healthy, as all that country to the north of the Formosa is well known to be. The population are eager for instruction; they are comparatively industrious and civilized; they manufacture all their necessary agricultural implements, bits for bridles, hoes, &c., from their own iron; they tan their own leather, and manufacture therefrom saddles, bridles, shoes, &c.
The great sovereign of Ashantee has also received with royal honours, and welcomed, the ministers of the gospel, encouraged them, and listened to them in the most gratifying manner. The Almamy of Teembo—a state which commands the fine districts around the Niger in its early course, and the roads from populous interior parts on the east to the western coast—has lately evinced the strongest desire to extend cultivation and commerce in lieu of the slave trade, and to have a ready communication with Europeans, and especially with the English. In other portions of Africa important movements are also going on, most gratifying to the friends of humanity and religion.
The United States of America, as a nation, is about to incorporate with her dominions the whole coast of Africa on Cape Palmas to the borders of the Gallinas—a fertile and healthy part of that continent, and wherein several settlements have of late years been made by the free people of colour from those states. This effected, there will hardly remain a spot of any consequence in Tropical Africa worth looking after for Great Britain to plant her foot, either for the purpose of obtaining labourers for her West Indian colonies, or to extend agriculture and commerce with Africa. The present British Tropical African possessions have been, and are, very badly selected for any one of the purposes alluded to, or for extending political power and influence in Africa. Still much more may be made of them than has ever hitherto been done.