Search Results - The Complete Work of Charles Darwin Online

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A597.1 Book: Humboldt, Alexander von. 1814-1829. Personal narrative of travels to the equinoctial regions of the New Continent, during the years 1799-1804. By Alexander de Humboldt, and Aimé Bonpland; with maps, plans, &c. written in French by Alexander de Humboldt, and trans. into English by Helen Maria Williams. 7 vols. London: Longman, Hurst, Rees, Orme and Brown. Vol. 1. Text Image

, without a question whether slavery ought to weigh only on men with a black skin and frizzled hair.The archipelago of the Canaries was divided into several small states hostile to each other. Oftentimes the same island was subject to two independent princes, as happens in the islands of the South Sea, and wherever society is not highly advanced. The trading nations, influenced by that hideous policy which they still exercise on the coast of Africa, kept up intestine warfare. One Guanche then

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A597.1 Book: Humboldt, Alexander von. 1814-1829. Personal narrative of travels to the equinoctial regions of the New Continent, during the years 1799-1804. By Alexander de Humboldt, and Aimé Bonpland; with maps, plans, &c. written in French by Alexander de Humboldt, and trans. into English by Helen Maria Williams. 7 vols. London: Longman, Hurst, Rees, Orme and Brown. Vol. 1. Text Image

it's fairest and most majestic forms in the banana and the palm-tree. He who is awake to the charms of nature finds in this delicious island remedies still more potent than the climate. No abode appeared to me more fitted to dissipate melancholy, and restore peace to the perturbed mind, than that of Teneriffe, or Madeira. These advantages are the effect not of the beauty of the site and the purity of the air alone; the moral feeling is no longer harrowed up by the view of slavery, the

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A597.1 Book: Humboldt, Alexander von. 1814-1829. Personal narrative of travels to the equinoctial regions of the New Continent, during the years 1799-1804. By Alexander de Humboldt, and Aimé Bonpland; with maps, plans, &c. written in French by Alexander de Humboldt, and trans. into English by Helen Maria Williams. 7 vols. London: Longman, Hurst, Rees, Orme and Brown. Vol. 1. Text Image

is contained in the narrative of the voyage* of Aloysio Cadamusto, who landed at the Canaries in 1505. This traveler was witness of no eruptions, but he positively affirms, that, like Etna, this mountain burns without interruption, and that the fire has been seen by Christians retained in slavery by the Guanches of Teneriffe. The Peak therefore was not at that time in the state of repose, in which we find it at present; for it is certain, that no navigator or inhabitant of Teneriffe, has been

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A597.7 Book: Humboldt, Alexander von. 1819-1829. Personal narrative of travels to the equinoctial regions of the New Continent, during the years 1799-1804. By Alexander de Humboldt, and Aimé Bonpland; with maps, plans, &c. written in French by Alexander de Humboldt, and trans. into English by Helen Maria Williams. 7 vols. London: Longman, Hurst, Rees, Orme and Brown. Vol. 7. Text Image

The population of the island of Cuba is consequently now very little different from that of all the English islands, and is almost double that of Jamaica. The relation of the divers classes of inhabitants grouped according to their origin, and the state of their civil liberty, furnishes the most striking contrasts in countries where slavery has taken such deep root. The table indicating these relations may give rise to the most serious reflections. [page] 10

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A597.3 Book: Humboldt, Alexander von. 1819-1829. Personal narrative of travels to the equinoctial regions of the New Continent, during the years 1799-1804. By Alexander de Humboldt, and Aimé Bonpland; with maps, plans, &c. written in French by Alexander de Humboldt, and trans. into English by Helen Maria Williams. 7 vols. London: Longman, Hurst, Rees, Orme and Brown. Vol. 3. Text

state of slavery among the christians! The mildness of the Spanish legislation compared with the Black Code of the greater part of other nations that have possessions in either India, cannot be denied. But such is the state of the negroes, dispersed in places scarcely begun to be cultivated, that justice, far from efficaciously protecting them during their lives, cannot even punish acts of barbarity, that have caused their death. If an inquiry be attempted, the death of the slave is attributed to

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A597.3 Book: Humboldt, Alexander von. 1819-1829. Personal narrative of travels to the equinoctial regions of the New Continent, during the years 1799-1804. By Alexander de Humboldt, and Aimé Bonpland; with maps, plans, &c. written in French by Alexander de Humboldt, and trans. into English by Helen Maria Williams. 7 vols. London: Longman, Hurst, Rees, Orme and Brown. Vol. 3. Text

nacing position excited alternately the apprehensions of the opposite parties; and the gradual or instantaneous abolition of slavery has been proclaimed in different regions of Spanish America, less from motives of justice and humanity, than to secure the aid of an intrepid race of men, habituated to privation, and fighting for their own cause. I found in the narrative of the voyage of Girolamo Benzoni a curious passage, which proves of how old a date are the apprehensions caused by the

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A597.6a Book: Humboldt, Alexander von. 1819-1829. Personal narrative of travels to the equinoctial regions of the New Continent, during the years 1799-1804. By Alexander de Humboldt, and Aimé Bonpland; with maps, plans, &c. written in French by Alexander de Humboldt, and trans. into English by Helen Maria Williams. 7 vols. London: Longman, Hurst, Rees, Orme and Brown. Vol. 6, part 1. Text Image

was arbitrarily declared of Caribbee race. The inhabitants of Uriapari (of the peninsula of Paria) were named Caribbees; the Urinacoes (settled on the banks of the Lower Oroonoko, or Urinucu), Guatiaos. All the tribes designated by Figueroa as Caribbees were condemned to slavery; and might at will be sold, or exterminated by war. In these bloody struggles, the Caribbee women, after the death of their husbands, defended themselves with such desperation, that, Anghiera says*, they were taken for

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A597.7 Book: Humboldt, Alexander von. 1819-1829. Personal narrative of travels to the equinoctial regions of the New Continent, during the years 1799-1804. By Alexander de Humboldt, and Aimé Bonpland; with maps, plans, &c. written in French by Alexander de Humboldt, and trans. into English by Helen Maria Williams. 7 vols. London: Longman, Hurst, Rees, Orme and Brown. Vol. 7. Text Image

state of the blacks with that of the serfs of the middle ages, and with that state of oppression under which some classes still groan in the north and east of Europe? Those comparisons, those artifices of language, that disdainful impatience with which even a hope of the gradual abolition of slavery is repulsed as chimerical, are useless arms in the times in which we live. The great revolutions which the continent of America and the Archipelago of the West Indies have undergone since the

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A597.7 Book: Humboldt, Alexander von. 1819-1829. Personal narrative of travels to the equinoctial regions of the New Continent, during the years 1799-1804. By Alexander de Humboldt, and Aimé Bonpland; with maps, plans, &c. written in French by Alexander de Humboldt, and trans. into English by Helen Maria Williams. 7 vols. London: Longman, Hurst, Rees, Orme and Brown. Vol. 7. Text Image

ment of human dignity, and who know that whatever is unjust bears with it a germ of destruction; but this impulse, it is afflicting to add, will be powerless, if the union of the proprietors, if the colonial assemblies or legislatures, fail to adopt the same views, and to act by a well concerted plan, of which the ultimate aim is the cessation of slavery in the West Indies. Till then, it will be in vain to register the strokes of the whip, diminish the number that can be inflicted at any one

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A597.7 Book: Humboldt, Alexander von. 1819-1829. Personal narrative of travels to the equinoctial regions of the New Continent, during the years 1799-1804. By Alexander de Humboldt, and Aimé Bonpland; with maps, plans, &c. written in French by Alexander de Humboldt, and trans. into English by Helen Maria Williams. 7 vols. London: Longman, Hurst, Rees, Orme and Brown. Vol. 7. Text Image

those western regions, where, by the effect of an imprudent and fatal law*, slavery and its iniquities have passed the chain of the Alleghanys and the banks of the Mississipi; let us hope that the force of public opinion, the progress of knowledge, the softening of manners, the legislation of the new continental republics, and the great and happy event of the recognition of Hayti by the French government, will exert either by motives of prudence and fear, or by more noble and disinterested

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A597.7 Book: Humboldt, Alexander von. 1819-1829. Personal narrative of travels to the equinoctial regions of the New Continent, during the years 1799-1804. By Alexander de Humboldt, and Aimé Bonpland; with maps, plans, &c. written in French by Alexander de Humboldt, and trans. into English by Helen Maria Williams. 7 vols. London: Longman, Hurst, Rees, Orme and Brown. Vol. 7. Text Image

controvertible; that, for instance, without slaves there could be no colonies. We declare, on the contrary, that without slaves, and even without blacks, colonies might have existed, and that the whole difference would have been comprised in more or less profit, by the more or less rapid increase of the products. But, if such is our firm persuasion, we ought also to remind your Majesty, that a social organization into which slavery has been introduced as an element, cannot be changed with

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A597.7 Book: Humboldt, Alexander von. 1819-1829. Personal narrative of travels to the equinoctial regions of the New Continent, during the years 1799-1804. By Alexander de Humboldt, and Aimé Bonpland; with maps, plans, &c. written in French by Alexander de Humboldt, and trans. into English by Helen Maria Williams. 7 vols. London: Longman, Hurst, Rees, Orme and Brown. Vol. 7. Text Image

know, that to produce an essential change in the state of the slaves, to lead them progressively to the enjoyment of liberty, requires a firm will in the local authorities, the concurrence of wealthy and enlightened citizens, and a general plan in which all the chances of disorder, and the means of repression, are calculated. Without this community of actions and efforts, slavery, with its pains and excesses, will maintain itself as it did in ancient Rome*, in * The argument drawn from the

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A597.7 Book: Humboldt, Alexander von. 1819-1829. Personal narrative of travels to the equinoctial regions of the New Continent, during the years 1799-1804. By Alexander de Humboldt, and Aimé Bonpland; with maps, plans, &c. written in French by Alexander de Humboldt, and trans. into English by Helen Maria Williams. 7 vols. London: Longman, Hurst, Rees, Orme and Brown. Vol. 7. Text Image

, and the setting free of the blacks; but what a melancholy spectacle is that of christian and civilized nations, discussing which of them has caused the fewest Africans to perish in three centuries, by reducing them to slavery! I shall not boast of the treatment of the blacks in the southern parts of the United States*; but degrees exist in the sufferings of the human species. The slave who has a hut and a family, is less miserable than he who is purchased, as if he formed part of a flock. The

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A597.4 Book: Humboldt, Alexander von. 1819-1829. Personal narrative of travels to the equinoctial regions of the New Continent, during the years 1799-1804. By Alexander de Humboldt, and Aimé Bonpland; with maps, plans, &c. written in French by Alexander de Humboldt, and trans. into English by Helen Maria Williams. 7 vols. London: Longman, Hurst, Rees, Orme and Brown. Vol. 4. Text

negroes brought back; they were slaves newly purchased. I dreaded having to witness one of those punishments, which, wherever slavery prevails, destroys all the charm of a country life. Happily these blacks were treated with humanity. In this plantation, as in all those of the province of Venezuela, three species of sugar-cane can be distinguished even at a distance by the colour of their leaves; the ancient Creole sugar-cane, the Otaheite cane, and the Batavia cane. The first has a leaf of a

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A597.4 Book: Humboldt, Alexander von. 1819-1829. Personal narrative of travels to the equinoctial regions of the New Continent, during the years 1799-1804. By Alexander de Humboldt, and Aimé Bonpland; with maps, plans, &c. written in French by Alexander de Humboldt, and trans. into English by Helen Maria Williams. 7 vols. London: Longman, Hurst, Rees, Orme and Brown. Vol. 4. Text

chose to apply themselves to the cultivation of cotton. He endeavoured to surround his ample plantations with freemen, who, working as they chose, either in their own land, or in the neighbouring plantations, supplied him with day-labourers at the time of harvest. Nobly occupied on the means best adapted gradually to extinguish the slavery of the Blacks in these provinces, Count Tovar flattered himself with the double hope of rendering slaves less necessary to the landholders, and furnishing

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A597.4 Book: Humboldt, Alexander von. 1819-1829. Personal narrative of travels to the equinoctial regions of the New Continent, during the years 1799-1804. By Alexander de Humboldt, and Aimé Bonpland; with maps, plans, &c. written in French by Alexander de Humboldt, and trans. into English by Helen Maria Williams. 7 vols. London: Longman, Hurst, Rees, Orme and Brown. Vol. 4. Text

worn by the women, who, the missionaries say, have in general a less lively feeling of modesty. A similar observation had been already made by Christopher Columbus. Must we not attribute this indifference, this want of delicacy in women belonging to nations of which the manners are not much depraved, to that rude state of slavery, to which the sex is reduced in South America by the men's injustice and the abuse of power? When we speak in Europe of a native of Guyana, we figure to ourselves a man

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A597.5a Book: Humboldt, Alexander von. 1819-1829. Personal narrative of travels to the equinoctial regions of the New Continent, during the years 1799-1804. By Alexander de Humboldt, and Aimé Bonpland; with maps, plans, &c. written in French by Alexander de Humboldt, and trans. into English by Helen Maria Williams. 7 vols. London: Longman, Hurst, Rees, Orme and Brown. Vol. 5 part I. Text

noko there existed another river, called the river of the Aikeam-benanoes, or the Amazons. What must we conclude from this narration of the ancient missionary of Encaramada? not that there are Amazons on the banks of the Cuchivero, but that women, in different parts of America, wearied of the state of slavery in which they were held by the men, united themselves together, like the fugitive negroes, in a palenque [staccado]; that the desire of preserving their independance rendered them

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A597.5a Book: Humboldt, Alexander von. 1819-1829. Personal narrative of travels to the equinoctial regions of the New Continent, during the years 1799-1804. By Alexander de Humboldt, and Aimé Bonpland; with maps, plans, &c. written in French by Alexander de Humboldt, and trans. into English by Helen Maria Williams. 7 vols. London: Longman, Hurst, Rees, Orme and Brown. Vol. 5 part I. Text

principle somewhat strange, that conscience did not permit Christians to drag into slavery any natives, but such as were to serve as interpreters. Whatever may be thought of this axiom, the noble and courageous protest of the two monks caused the failure of the projected enterprise*. * Acunha, p. 34, 67. [page] 48

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A597.5b Book: Humboldt, Alexander von. 1819-1829. Personal narrative of travels to the equinoctial regions of the New Continent, during the years 1799-1804. By Alexander de Humboldt, and Aimé Bonpland; with maps, plans, &c. written in French by Alexander de Humboldt, and trans. into English by Helen Maria Williams. 7 vols. London: Longman, Hurst, Rees, Orme and Brown. Vol. 5 part II. Text

it is most considerable among the Caribbees, and all the nations that have preserved the custom of carrying off young girls from the neighbouring tribes. How shall we speak of domestic happiness in so unequal an association? The women live in a sort of slavery, as they do in most nations in a state of barbarism. The husbands being in the full enjoyment of absolute power, no complaint is heard in their presence. An apparent tranquillity prevails in the house; the women are eager to anticipate

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A597.6b Book: Humboldt, Alexander von. 1819-1829. Personal narrative of travels to the equinoctial regions of the New Continent, during the years 1799-1804. By Alexander de Humboldt, and Aimé Bonpland; with maps, plans, &c. written in French by Alexander de Humboldt, and trans. into English by Helen Maria Williams. 7 vols. London: Longman, Hurst, Rees, Orme and Brown. Vol. 6, part 2. Text Image

wanting, we can only be guided by general considerations on the value of statistic results. In opinions which are contested with violence, and which affect the greatest interests of humanity, we must distrust the exaggeration of extreme parties, and take the mean between the estimates furnished by the planters, and those of associations formed with the view of diminishing the miseries of slavery. The comparison of the registers of different periods does not always furnish precise ideas of the

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A597.6b Book: Humboldt, Alexander von. 1819-1829. Personal narrative of travels to the equinoctial regions of the New Continent, during the years 1799-1804. By Alexander de Humboldt, and Aimé Bonpland; with maps, plans, &c. written in French by Alexander de Humboldt, and trans. into English by Helen Maria Williams. 7 vols. London: Longman, Hurst, Rees, Orme and Brown. Vol. 6, part 2. Text Image

as resulting from the registers. The distinction of whites, and free coloured population, presents such great difficulties, that at the end of the year 1823, * Adam Hodgson, Letter to M. Say, 1823, p. 37. Debate of the 15th May, 1823, p. 184. Bridges on Manumission and Negro Slavery of the United States and Jamaica, 1823, pp. 51 and 85. [page] 83

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A597.6b Book: Humboldt, Alexander von. 1819-1829. Personal narrative of travels to the equinoctial regions of the New Continent, during the years 1799-1804. By Alexander de Humboldt, and Aimé Bonpland; with maps, plans, &c. written in French by Alexander de Humboldt, and trans. into English by Helen Maria Williams. 7 vols. London: Longman, Hurst, Rees, Orme and Brown. Vol. 6, part 2. Text Image

states, slavery will be extinguished by degrees: the republic of Columbia has given the example of progressive liberation. That measure, at once humane and prudent, is due to the disinterestedness of General Bolivar, whose name is not less illustrious by the virtues of the citizen, and by his moderation in success, than by the splendour of his military glory. DISTRIBUTION OF THE TOTAL POPULATION OF AMERICA, ACCORDING TO THE DIVERSITY OF RELIGIOUS WORSHIP. I. Roman Catholics 22,486,000 a

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A597.7 Book: Humboldt, Alexander von. 1819-1829. Personal narrative of travels to the equinoctial regions of the New Continent, during the years 1799-1804. By Alexander de Humboldt, and Aimé Bonpland; with maps, plans, &c. written in French by Alexander de Humboldt, and trans. into English by Helen Maria Williams. 7 vols. London: Longman, Hurst, Rees, Orme and Brown. Vol. 7. Text Image

measures, she might procure the gradual abolition of slavery. Let us not forget, that since Hayti is become free, there are in the whole archipelago of the West Indies, more free negroes and mulattoes than slaves. The whites, and above all, the free men, whose cause it would be easy to link with that of the whites, take a very rapid numerical increase at Cuba. The [page] 10

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A597.7 Book: Humboldt, Alexander von. 1819-1829. Personal narrative of travels to the equinoctial regions of the New Continent, during the years 1799-1804. By Alexander de Humboldt, and Aimé Bonpland; with maps, plans, &c. written in French by Alexander de Humboldt, and trans. into English by Helen Maria Williams. 7 vols. London: Longman, Hurst, Rees, Orme and Brown. Vol. 7. Text Image

The most important documents which we hitherto possess on the population of the island, were published on occasion of a celebrated proposition made in the assembly of the Cortes, 26th March, 1811, by MM. Alcocer and Arguelles, against the slave-trade in general, and against the perpetuity of slavery among the blacks born in the colonies. These precious documents accompany, as justificatory pieces, the representations* which Don Francisco de Arango, one of the most enlightened and best-informed

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A597.7 Book: Humboldt, Alexander von. 1819-1829. Personal narrative of travels to the equinoctial regions of the New Continent, during the years 1799-1804. By Alexander de Humboldt, and Aimé Bonpland; with maps, plans, &c. written in French by Alexander de Humboldt, and trans. into English by Helen Maria Williams. 7 vols. London: Longman, Hurst, Rees, Orme and Brown. Vol. 7. Text Image

of Filipinas, were found, on a total population of 13,026, nearly 9400 free men, namely: whites, 5871; free men of colour, 3521 (of whom 203 were free bozale negroes); slaves, 3634: the free men were therefore to the whites = 1:1,7. In no part of the world where slavery prevails is emancipation so frequent as in the island of Cuba. The Spanish legislature, far from preventing this, or rendering it difficult, like the English and French legislatures, favors liberty. The right of every slave to

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A597.7 Book: Humboldt, Alexander von. 1819-1829. Personal narrative of travels to the equinoctial regions of the New Continent, during the years 1799-1804. By Alexander de Humboldt, and Aimé Bonpland; with maps, plans, &c. written in French by Alexander de Humboldt, and trans. into English by Helen Maria Williams. 7 vols. London: Longman, Hurst, Rees, Orme and Brown. Vol. 7. Text Image

the sugar, coffee, and tobacco, that issue from its ports; visit those mines of gold so feebly worked in our days; and pronounce if the industry of Brazil requires that 1,960,000 blacks and mulattoes should be held in slavery. More than three-fourths of those Brazilian slaves* are neither occupied in gold washings, nor in the labors of colonial productions, which we are gravely told render the slave-trade a necessary evil, an inevitable political crime! COFFEE. The cultivation of coffee dates

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A597.7 Book: Humboldt, Alexander von. 1819-1829. Personal narrative of travels to the equinoctial regions of the New Continent, during the years 1799-1804. By Alexander de Humboldt, and Aimé Bonpland; with maps, plans, &c. written in French by Alexander de Humboldt, and trans. into English by Helen Maria Williams. 7 vols. London: Longman, Hurst, Rees, Orme and Brown. Vol. 7. Text Image

the blacks in countries where the laws, the religion, and the national habits tend to soften their fate; yet I preserved, on quitting America, the same horror of slavery which I had felt in Europe. It is in vain that writers of ability, in order to veil barbarous institutions by ingenious fictions of language, have invented the terms of negro peasants of the [page] 26

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A597.7 Book: Humboldt, Alexander von. 1819-1829. Personal narrative of travels to the equinoctial regions of the New Continent, during the years 1799-1804. By Alexander de Humboldt, and Aimé Bonpland; with maps, plans, &c. written in French by Alexander de Humboldt, and trans. into English by Helen Maria Williams. 7 vols. London: Longman, Hurst, Rees, Orme and Brown. Vol. 7. Text Image

movements from which it must profit in spite of itself. The Indians, long before the revolution, were poor and free agriculturists; insulated by their language and manners, they lived separated from the whites. If, in contempt of Spanish laws, the cupidity of the corregidores, and the tormenting system of the missionaries, often shackled their liberty, that state of vexatious oppression was far different from personal slavery like that of the vassallage, the blacks, or of the peasants in the

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A597.7 Book: Humboldt, Alexander von. 1819-1829. Personal narrative of travels to the equinoctial regions of the New Continent, during the years 1799-1804. By Alexander de Humboldt, and Aimé Bonpland; with maps, plans, &c. written in French by Alexander de Humboldt, and trans. into English by Helen Maria Williams. 7 vols. London: Longman, Hurst, Rees, Orme and Brown. Vol. 7. Text Image

created, will be exposed to the most imminent dangers. We can never enough praise the wisdom of the legislation in the new republics of Spanish America, which since their birth, has been seriously occupied with the total extinction of slavery. That vast portion of the earth has, in this respect, an immense advantage over the southern part of the United States, where the [page] 27

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A597.7 Book: Humboldt, Alexander von. 1819-1829. Personal narrative of travels to the equinoctial regions of the New Continent, during the years 1799-1804. By Alexander de Humboldt, and Aimé Bonpland; with maps, plans, &c. written in French by Alexander de Humboldt, and trans. into English by Helen Maria Williams. 7 vols. London: Longman, Hurst, Rees, Orme and Brown. Vol. 7. Text Image

in London and at Washington, in 1769, the chamber of representatives of Massachusetts had declared itself against the unnatural and unwarrantable custom of enslaving mankind. (See Walsh, Appeal to the United States, 1819, p. 312.) The Spanish writer, wenda o, is perhaps the first who declaimed forcibly not only against the slave-trade, abhorred even by the Afgangs (Elphinstone, Journ. to the Cabul, p. 245), but against slavery in general, and all the iniquitous sources of colonial wealth

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A597.7 Book: Humboldt, Alexander von. 1819-1829. Personal narrative of travels to the equinoctial regions of the New Continent, during the years 1799-1804. By Alexander de Humboldt, and Aimé Bonpland; with maps, plans, &c. written in French by Alexander de Humboldt, and trans. into English by Helen Maria Williams. 7 vols. London: Longman, Hurst, Rees, Orme and Brown. Vol. 7. Text Image

the secret partisans of slavery assert, the practical impossibility of these beneficent measures, adopted first by Denmark, the United States, and Great Britain, and successively by all the rest of Europe. What passed since 1807, till the moment when France again entered into possession of her ancient colonies, and what passes in our days in nations of which the governments sincerely desire the abolition of the slave-trade and its abominable practices, proves the falsehood of this conclusion

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A597.7 Book: Humboldt, Alexander von. 1819-1829. Personal narrative of travels to the equinoctial regions of the New Continent, during the years 1799-1804. By Alexander de Humboldt, and Aimé Bonpland; with maps, plans, &c. written in French by Alexander de Humboldt, and trans. into English by Helen Maria Williams. 7 vols. London: Longman, Hurst, Rees, Orme and Brown. Vol. 7. Text Image

, time will act simultaneously on the slaves, on the relations between the islands and the inhabitants of the continent, and on events which cannot be controuled, when they have been waited for in the inaction of apathy. Wherever slavery is long established, the increase of civilization solely has less influence on the treatment of slaves than many are disposed to admit. The civilization of a nation seldom extends to a great number of individuals; and does not attain those, who in the fabrics, are

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A597.7 Book: Humboldt, Alexander von. 1819-1829. Personal narrative of travels to the equinoctial regions of the New Continent, during the years 1799-1804. By Alexander de Humboldt, and Aimé Bonpland; with maps, plans, &c. written in French by Alexander de Humboldt, and trans. into English by Helen Maria Williams. 7 vols. London: Longman, Hurst, Rees, Orme and Brown. Vol. 7. Text Image

every amelioration in the state of the captive class? Around that mediterranean of the West Indies, towards the west and towards the south, in Mexico, at Guatimala, and Columbia, new legislations labour with ardour to extinguish slavery. It may be hoped that the union of these imperious circumstances will favor the [page] 33

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A597.7 Book: Humboldt, Alexander von. 1819-1829. Personal narrative of travels to the equinoctial regions of the New Continent, during the years 1799-1804. By Alexander de Humboldt, and Aimé Bonpland; with maps, plans, &c. written in French by Alexander de Humboldt, and trans. into English by Helen Maria Williams. 7 vols. London: Longman, Hurst, Rees, Orme and Brown. Vol. 7. Text Image

vessel. The aspect of a naked man, wandering on an uninhabited beach, without being able to unrivet the chains fastened round his neck and the upper part of his arm, left us the most painful impressions. They could only have been augmented by the ferocious regrets of our mariners, who wanted to return to the shore and seize the fugitives, to sell them secretly at Carthagena. In climates where slavery exists, the mind is familiarized with suffering, and that instinct of pity is stiffled which

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A597.5a Book: Humboldt, Alexander von. 1819-1829. Personal narrative of travels to the equinoctial regions of the New Continent, during the years 1799-1804. By Alexander de Humboldt, and Aimé Bonpland; with maps, plans, &c. written in French by Alexander de Humboldt, and trans. into English by Helen Maria Williams. 7 vols. London: Longman, Hurst, Rees, Orme and Brown. Vol. 5 part I. Text

comparison of those of the Upper Oroonoko. The Indians well know, that the monkeys of some valleys can easily be tamed, while others of the same species, caught elsewhere, will rather die of hunger, than submit to slavery*. The common people in America have framed systems respecting the salubrity of climates and pathological phenomena, no less than the learned of Europe; and their systems, as with us, are diametrically opposite to each other, according to the provinces into which the new

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A597.7 Book: Humboldt, Alexander von. 1819-1829. Personal narrative of travels to the equinoctial regions of the New Continent, during the years 1799-1804. By Alexander de Humboldt, and Aimé Bonpland; with maps, plans, &c. written in French by Alexander de Humboldt, and trans. into English by Helen Maria Williams. 7 vols. London: Longman, Hurst, Rees, Orme and Brown. Vol. 7. Text Image

Slavery is no doubt the greatest of all the evils that afflict humanity, whether we consider the slave torn from his family in his native country, and thrown into the hold of a slave-ship*, or as making part of a flock of black men, parked on the soil of the West Indies; but for individuals there are degrees of suffering and privation. What a distance between a slave who serves in the house of a rich man at the Havannah or Kingston, or who works for himself, giving his master but a daily

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A597.7 Book: Humboldt, Alexander von. 1819-1829. Personal narrative of travels to the equinoctial regions of the New Continent, during the years 1799-1804. By Alexander de Humboldt, and Aimé Bonpland; with maps, plans, &c. written in French by Alexander de Humboldt, and trans. into English by Helen Maria Williams. 7 vols. London: Longman, Hurst, Rees, Orme and Brown. Vol. 7. Text Image

try schools in order to soften the manners of the lower class, and to mitigate slavery in an indirect manner. These propositions had not the desired effect. The court opposed every system of transmigration, and the majority of the proprietors, indulging their ancient illusions of security, would not restrain the slave-trade, when the high price of the produce gave a hope of extraordinary profit. It would, however, be unjust not to signalize, in this struggle between private interests and the

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A597.7 Book: Humboldt, Alexander von. 1819-1829. Personal narrative of travels to the equinoctial regions of the New Continent, during the years 1799-1804. By Alexander de Humboldt, and Aimé Bonpland; with maps, plans, &c. written in French by Alexander de Humboldt, and trans. into English by Helen Maria Williams. 7 vols. London: Longman, Hurst, Rees, Orme and Brown. Vol. 7. Text Image

kind of labour. It ought to be recollected in the interests of humanity, that the evils of slavery weigh on a much greater number of individuals than the agricultural labours require, even admitting, which I am very far from doing, that sugar, coffee, indigo, and cotton, can be cultivated only by slaves. At the island of Cuba, one hundred and fifty blacks are generally reckoned for the fabrication of 1000 cases (184,000 kilog.) of refined sugar; or, in round numbers, a little more than 1200

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A597.7 Book: Humboldt, Alexander von. 1819-1829. Personal narrative of travels to the equinoctial regions of the New Continent, during the years 1799-1804. By Alexander de Humboldt, and Aimé Bonpland; with maps, plans, &c. written in French by Alexander de Humboldt, and trans. into English by Helen Maria Williams. 7 vols. London: Longman, Hurst, Rees, Orme and Brown. Vol. 7. Text Image

humanity of the most ancient Spanish laws concerning slavery, and the traces of barbarity found in every page of the Black Code, and in some of the provincial laws of the English islands! The laws of Barbadoes, made in 1686, and those of Bermuda, in 1730, order, that the master who killed his negro in chastising him, could not be pursued, while the master who killed his slave wilfully, must pay ten pounds sterling to the royal treasury. A law of Saint Christophers, of March 11th, 1784, begins

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A558.2 Book: Hall, Basil. 1824. Extracts from a journal, written on the coasts of Chili, Peru, and Mexico, in the years 1820, 1821, 1822. Edinburgh: Constable. Volume 2. Text Image

PROSPECTS OF SOUTH AMERICA. 263 country, may not be so great a misfortune as it is sometimes supposed. It may contribute eventually to its more tranquil establishment, by giving the inhabitants time to reflect and act deliberately, instead of rushing at once and unprepared, from a state of slavery, into the Ml exercise of civil liberty. [page break

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A560.1 Book: Spix, J. P. von and C. F. P. von Maurtius. 1824. Travels in Brazil, in the years 1817-1820. London: Longman. Volume 1. Text Image

74 TRAVELS IN BRAZIL. slavery is so distinctly marked, as among them. Captivity and birth are the two causes which condemn an individual to slavery. Both of these imply a certain difference of caste, which is maintained with great rigour. The slave or his descendant can never contract a marriage with a free person, because he would profane it by such a union. He is condemned to menial occupations, and is not allowed to accompany his master in war. We were informed that among the Guay-curiis

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A560.2 Book: Spix, J. P von and C. F. P. von Maurtius. 1824. Travels in Brazil, in the years 1817-1820. London: Longman. Volume 2. Text Image

74 TRAVELS IN BRAZIL. slavery is so distinctly marked, as among them. Captivity and birth are the two causes which condemn an individual to slavery. Both of these imply a certain difference of caste, which is maintained with great rigour. The slave or his descendant can never contract a marriage with a free person, because he would profane it by such a union. He is condemned to menial occupations, and is not allowed to accompany his master in war. We were informed that among the Guay-curus

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A558.1 Book: Hall, Basil. 1824. Extracts from a journal, written on the coasts of Chili, Peru, and Mexico, in the years 1820, 1821, 1822. Edinburgh: Constable. Volume 1. Text Image

, ready to proceed, and the army of Chili, united to that of the Andes, is now called upon to redeem the land in which slavery has longest existed, and from whence the latest efforts have been made to oppress the whole Continent. Happy be this day on which the record of the movements and the actions of the expedition commences. The object of this enterprise is to decide, whether or not the time is arrived, when the in- * San Martin, in 1817, at Chacabuco, and in 1818 at Maypo, completely defeated

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A558.1 Book: Hall, Basil. 1824. Extracts from a journal, written on the coasts of Chili, Peru, and Mexico, in the years 1820, 1821, 1822. Edinburgh: Constable. Volume 1. Text Image

102 PSBIT. of our much-talkfed-of neutrality, that any change which would put a stop to such proceedings was greatly to be wished. In every instance in South America, where the cause of independence has succeeded, two measures have been invariably adopted as matters of course: one the abolition of the slave-trade, and as far as possible of slavery; the other, the relinquishment of bullfights. With respect to the slave question, most people think alike; but many hesitate as to the propriety of

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A558.1 Book: Hall, Basil. 1824. Extracts from a journal, written on the coasts of Chili, Peru, and Mexico, in the years 1820, 1821, 1822. Edinburgh: Constable. Volume 1. Text Image

AN MABTIN. 999 at once gave a death-blow to the whole system of slavery. When all was quiet in the capital, I went to Callao, and hearing that San Martin was in the roads, waited on him on board his yacht. I found him possessed of correct information as to all that was passing, but he seemed in no hurry to enter the city, and appeared, above all things, anxious to avoid any appearance of acting die part of a conqueror. w For the last ten years, said he, I have been unremittingly employed

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A560.1 Book: Spix, J. P. von and C. F. P. von Maurtius. 1824. Travels in Brazil, in the years 1817-1820. London: Longman. Volume 1. Text Image

88 TRAVELS IN BRAZIL. famine, the* system of slavery practised with increased cruelty, similar contagious diseases returning from time to time, and the destructive germs of other disorders, which came in the train of the foreign settlers, were powerful causes to extirpate the population of thepe countries, which was never considerable. Excursions against the Indians, who roam about in the north-western part of the capi-tania, to make slaves of them for the service of the fazendas are now

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A560.1 Book: Spix, J. P. von and C. F. P. von Maurtius. 1824. Travels in Brazil, in the years 1817-1820. London: Longman. Volume 1. Text Image

* exempt from slavery, and free citizens, the director-general, as well as the respective directors, are commissioned to secure the Indians against the frequent hateful encroachments of the neighbouring colonists; and, in general, to take care that they enjoy the protection of the law as free citizens; but that, on the other hand, their faults be noticed and punished by the magistrates. Though positive laws secure to the directors a certain share of the gain of the Indiana, those in Minas Geraes get

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A560.2 Book: Spix, J. P von and C. F. P. von Maurtius. 1824. Travels in Brazil, in the years 1817-1820. London: Longman. Volume 2. Text Image

88 TRAVELS IN BRAZIL. famine, the system of slavery practised with increased cruelty, similar contagious diseases returning from time to time, and the destructive germs of other disorders, which came in the train of the foreign settlers, were powerful causes to extirpate the population of these countries, which was never considerable. Excursions against the Indians, who roam about in the north-western part of the capi-tania, to make slaves of them for the service of the fazendas are now

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A560.2 Book: Spix, J. P von and C. F. P. von Maurtius. 1824. Travels in Brazil, in the years 1817-1820. London: Longman. Volume 2. Text Image

exempt from slavery, and free citizens, the director-general, as well a$ the respective directors, are commissioned to secure the Indians against the frequent hateful encroachments of the neighbouring colonists; and, ht general, to take care tjiat they enjoy the protection of the law as free citizens; but that, on the other hand, their faults be noticed and punished by the magistrates. Though positive laws secure to the (Erectors a certain share of the gain of the Indians; those in Minas Gferaes

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A332.1 Book: Caldcleugh, Alexander. 1825. Travels in South America, during the years 1819 - 20 - 21: containing an account of the present state of Brazil, Buenos Ayres, and Chile. 2 vols. London: John Murray. Volume 1 Text Image

comparing the different accounts I could collect, I think the truth is somewhere about what has been stated above. The amount of Indian population it is not so easy to ascertain, from the wandering nature of the tribes, their hostility, to the Portuguese, the fear of taxation or slavery, and the hidden nature of their retreats. As late as 1821,. twa new tribes were discovered to the north-east of the Minas Novas, speaking a language perfectly distinct and unknown to the others. The population of the