Page:The future of Africa.djvu/153

Rh freed black man of America is, I feel assured, a superior man, in the points I have mentioned, to the Russian, to the Polander, to the Hungarian, to the Italian. Notwithstanding our trials and burdens, we have been enabled to reach a clearer knowledge of free government than they, and to secure a nobler fitness for its requirements, duties, and guarantees. I speak from the facts which have fallen under my observation, among my brethren in Africa. And hence I feel desirous that those enterprising and Christian men here, who are looking abroad for new homes, and other fields of labor, should join us in Africa, for the regeneration of that continent. My own desire, moreover, is that instead of scattering ourselves thousands of miles apart along the coast, we should rather concentrate our parties and our powers. Of course, I cannot say a word in the abstract, against the mission which draws many men, and some of my own personal friends, to Abbeokuta. But I do regard it a mistake in policy. I have the impression that providence points out all that field to the freed and cultivated men who have been raised up and prepared by the English at Sierra Leone; and who, especially by blood and language, seem to me God's chosen messengers to the valley of the Niger and its far interior. And I have the conviction that we of the United States, with our peculiar training, and with our democratic tendencies, will find ourselves out of place, as well as in an uncongenial element, in the strong governments of interior Africa. And therefore I have thought that in every way, it would be far better for men leaving this country for Africa to join their fortunes with us in Liberia. Our