last year the natives have been very quiet and friendly.  The colonists can bring into the field, if necessary, about 500 troops, which are considered a match for ten times the number of natives.  Many tribes of these natives hold slaves, which are treated with much cruelty, and it is doubtful if even their masters are so well off or so happy as the slaves in our southern states.  They are much less civilized and more ignorant.

“The people there called Kroomen, reside in the country.  They come down to the sea-shore and pitch their tents, and launch their canoes, and, sailing all along the coast, they become pilots to the traders; and these are the men with whom the Spaniards trade for slaves.  These Kroomen keep no slaves themselves, neither do they allow any of their own tribe to be sold as slaves; and they become of so much importance to the slave-dealers on the coast, acting as a sort of brokers, negotiating among the tribes for slaves, that they themselves, knowing their own consequence, do not hesitate to board a slave-vessel, and there is no instance of their ever being kidnapped.”

The history of this little colony, which I have endeavoured to sketch from the information furnished by Mr. Ashmun, appears to me to afford matter for serious reflection.  The principle involved in colonization is, I am aware, liable to some objections, and I am not indifferent to the arguments to which it has given occasion.  But the strength of truth and reason seems to be altogether in its favour.  The dogmas of Malthus maybe right or wrong, the statistical propositions of Mr. Sadler, and the philosophical deductions he derives from them may be right or wrong:  with these querulous rhetoricians, I have nothing to do.  But one thing is certain, that while the fertile earth, in any of its endless divisions, affords the means of sustenance, no human being ought to be suffered to want, because the notion of emigration does not square with certain opinions of a despotic school.  That some countries are overpopulated in reference to the resources of their superficies is, I take it for granted, a fact above impeachment.  That there is room enough on the surface of the earth for all the population it contains, is another truth which very few persons will be hardy enough to contest.  The principles of Providence in the economy of space appear, therefore, to be that the superabundant population of one place, shall seek in the uncultivated and scantily peopled regions of other countries, for those means of existence which are denied to them by the pressure of the demand on the soil at home.  The immutable law of benevolence, drawn from the institutes of Christianity, ordains the earth for the sustenance of man.  But that law is perverted by those who resist emigration under the circumstances to which I have alluded.  What is to become of the surplus population, if it be not allowed a space wherein to fertilize the virgin soil, and supply its wants?  If its own land denies it the means of life, must it die, that some philosopher may triumph in his doctrines?