Page:The Homes of the New World- Vol. II.djvu/437

Rh must before that time undergo a metamorphosis—must become more African.

If I had time and money enough, I would go over to Liberia for twelve months. But where would I not go to, and what would I not see, which is significant in nature or in popular life over the whole world? I would make the whole earth my own. Why is life so short!

I yesterday celebrated here Thanksgiving Day, one of the few national festivals of the New World,—a festival whick ought to be observed by all nations as one of the most worthy of a noble and clear-eyed humanity. The festival was celebrated on a week-day, and converted it into a sabbath. I attended in the forenoon in a Baptist Church. The minister, a man of talent, took as the subject of his discourse, after thanksgiving for both public and private benefits which were enumerated, the subject of slavery in the United States. He had been upbraided as timid in expressing himself on this subject, he now therefore wished to clear himself from suspicion, and to show that he had no fear. He condemned slavery and lamented its introduction into America, but he condemned also the proceedings of the abolitionists. They had involved the affair, they had rendered emancipation impossible in America. The preacher considered that slavery in America had never less prospect of abolition than at the present time. “Never had the Southern States grasped the chain of slavery with a firmer hand. Threats and defiance have been the offspring of threats and defiance.” The hope of the speaker lay in the devotion of the African people to America, and in the colonisation of Christianised Negro Slaves on the coast of Africa, and these he considered to be the only available means for the gradual abolition of slavery. After some interesting statements regarding the