Page:The American Slave Trade (Spears).djvu/67

. There was nothing under sail that could equal her in her day. She landed over eight hundred slaves on her first voyage, with a net profit not far from three hundred dollars per head.

A few steamers were known in the trade. The Providencia in four voyages landed 4,500 slaves in Brazil. Another one called the Cacique is better known. She was originally the Tigress, belonging to a Captain Sanford, and was plying between New York and Stonington. Sanford sold her to a Brazilian merchant named Sexias for $11,500. Sexias spent $13,500 in repairs and alterations. "In these transactions Mr. Gardner, an American resident in that city [New York], appears to have acted as agent, and he was looked upon then and afterward, by the Americans belonging to the vessel, as the consignee, and there is reason to believe he engaged in fitting out other steam vessels for the same purpose."

The Cacique took on 1,000 slaves at Cabenda and could have made a safe voyage with these, but Sexias waited for the local agents to collect five hundred more and was captured by a British cruiser in consequence.

The old whaler became a favorite slaver type, because her try-pots could cook yams and rice as well as try oil, and her barrels carry either oil or water.

One of the last and undoubtedly the most noted of the whaler-slavers was the bark Augusta, of New York. Gilbert H. Cooper testified, after the Augusta was seized, that he "purchased portions of the same vessel at the rate of $2,000 for the whole," and that he sold her to Appleton Oaksmith for $4,900, including $1,800 worth of outfittings for the voyage, or $3,100 for the