Page:The History of Slavery and the Slave Trade.djvu/85

 the offspring of a janizary and a Christian slave was recognized as one of the dominant race. The janizaries were in number about 12,000; their ranks were annually recruited by renegades ami adventurous Turks from the Levant; they served by sea as well as by land, and were employed in controlling the tributary native chief's of the interior, and sailing in the piratical cruisers. Piracy being the basis of this system, the whole foreign policy of the Algerines consisted in claiming the right of maintaining constant war with all Christian nations that did not conciliate them by tribute and treaties. When a European consul arrived at Algiers, he always carried a large present to the dey, and as the latter would, in a short time, quarrel with and send away the consul, in expectation of receiving the usual present with his successor, it was found more convenient to make an occasional present, than incur the trouble and risk of a continual change of consuls. In course of time, these occasional presents became a tribute of 17,000 dollars, regularly paid every two years.

The miseries of Algerine bondage have long been proverbial over all the Christian world, yet they appear light when calmly examined and contrasted with other systems of slavery. Most travelers in Mohammedan countries have remarked "the general kindness with which slaves are treated. General Eaton, consul of the United States at Tunis in 1799, writes thus: "Truth and justice demand from me the confession, that the Christian slaves among the barbarians of Africa are treated with more humanity than the African slaves among the Christians of civilized America." John Wesley, when addressing those connected with the negro slave-trade, said: "You have carried them into the vilest slavery, never to end but with life — such slavery as is not to be found with the Turks at Algiers." In fact, the creed of Islam, not recognizing perpetual and unconditional bondage, gave the slave a right of redemption by purchase, according to a precept of the Koran. This right of redemption was daily claimed and acknowledged in Barbary; and though it was only the richer class that could immediately benefit by it, yet it was a great alleviation to the general hardship of the system; and numbers of the poorer captives, by exercise of their various trades and professions, realized money, and were in a short time able to redeem themselves. Again, no prejudice of race existed in the mind of the master against his unhappy bondsman. The meanest Christian slave, on becoming a Mohammedan, was free, and enrolled as a janizary, having superior privileges even to the native Moor or Morisco, and he and his descendants were eligible to the highest offices in the state. Ladies, when captured, were invariably treated with respect, and, till ransomed, lodged in a building set apart for that purpose, under the charge of a high officer, similar to our mayor. The most perfect toleration was extended to the exercise of the Christian religion; the four great festivals of the Roman Church — Christmas, Easter, and the nativities of St. John and the Virgin — were recognized as holidays for the slaves. We read of a large slaveholder purchasing a priest expressly for the spiritual comfort of his bondsmen; and of other masters who regularly, once a week, marched their slaves off to confession. The Algerines