negro slavery.
375
attaches itself to the Portuguese, who, as early as 1481, built a castle on the Gold coast, and from thence ravaged the country, and carried off the inhabitants to Portugal, where they were sold into bondage.[1] In 1503 slaves were
first taken from the Portuguese settlements in Africa to the Spanish possessions in America; and from that time to 1511, large numbers were exported to the colonies of
- ↑ "Guinea supplied black slaves to the Moors of Africa, to redeem their countrymen made prisoners by Alfonso V of Portugal: this first originated the slave trade in 1442. Commences in West Indies, 1517; in Virginia, 1620; first effort for its abolition made by Granville Sharpe, 1772; petition of the London Common Council against it, Feb. 1, 1788; resolution of the Commons to take it into consideration in the next session, May 9, 1788; motion of Wilberforce against it lost, March 17, 1791; its gradual abolition voted, April 26, 1792; motion of Wilberforce negatived, April 3, 1798; Canning's attempt to prohibit it in Trinidad fails, May 27, 1802; the act for its abolition
receives the royal assent, March 25, 1807."—Bosse's Index of Dates, Bonn's Library, Articles, "Guinea," and "Slave Trade." "To the honor of Denmark be it spoken, the slave trade was abolished by her five years before England performed that act of tardy justice to humanity."—Twelve Months' Resid. in W. Indies, by R. R. Madden, M.D., vol. ii., 128.
"At length, in the year 1279, Magnus became King of Sweden, and the eleven years of his reign, with thirteen of that of his son—during which the government, on account of his minority, was conducted by an able minister—formed the period of the greatest improvement in its earlier history * * * His son Birger being but eleven years old when he succeeded to the throne, the government was administered by a regent, during thirteen years, with wisdom and vigor; and in the interval it was enacted,* among other legislative reforms, that no man should thenceforward be bought or sold." Miller's Philosophy of History, vol. ii., 355, Bohn's edition.—Editor.
- "The influence of Christianity in producing this ordinance appears from the reason assigned in the law, that it was not just that one Christian should sell another, since Jesus Christ had purchased all with his blood."—Puffend., p. 109.
