Page:Dick Sands the Boy Captain.djvu/350

 322 DICK SANDS, THE BOY CAPTAIN. that Mrs. Wcldon, Jack, and Cousîn Bencdicthad not been allowcd to corne with tlîcm,but had been carried offîn some otiîcr direction, lie began to think it probable that the two rascals had some scheme to carry out with regard to them clscwhcrc. The caravan consisted of nearly eîght hundred, including about fivc hundred slaves of both sexes, two hundred soldicrs and frccbooters, and a considérable number of havildars and drivers, over whom the agents acted as super ior officcrs. Thèse agents are usually of Portuguese or Arab extrac- tion; and the cruclties they inflict upon the misérable captives are almost beyond conception; they beat them tontinually, and if any unfortunate slave sinks from exhaus- tion, or in any way becomes unfit for the market, he is forlluvith citlicr stabbcd or shot. As the rcsult of thîs brutalily it rarcly happons that fifty pcr cent, of the slaves rcacli thcir destination; some fcw may contrive to escape, and many arc Icft as skclctons along the line of route. Suclî of tlic agents as are Portuguese are (as it may well be imagincd) of the vcry lowest drcgs of society, outlaws, escapcd criminals, and mcn of the most desperate character; of this stamp wcre the associâtes of Negoro and Harris, now in the cmploy of José Antonio Alvez, one of the most notorious of ail the slave- dealers of Central Africa, and of whom Commander Camcron has given some curions in- formation. Most frcqucntly the soldîers who escort the captives arc natives hircd ])y the dealers, but they do not possess the entire mono])oly of the forays made for the purpose of se- curing slaves; tlic native ncgro kings make war upon each otlîcr v» ith this express design, and sell their vanquîshcd antagonists, men, womcn, and children, to the traders for calico, guns, gunpowder and red beads; or in times of famine, according to Livingstone, even for a few grains of maize. The escort of old Alvez* caravan was an average spécimen of thèse African soldicrs. It was simply a horde of half- naked banditti, carrying old flint-locked muskets, thebarrels of which Vvcre décora ted with copper rings. The agents