could indeed tolerate for a day the continuance of
such a practice. The question which remains for
consideration is whether the efforts of the Portuguese
Government, in the sincerity of which there can be
no doubt, have been successful or the reverse.
Has the cessation of the traffic been real and complete
or, as the Anti-Slavery Society appear disposed to
think, only partial and “nominal”?
On this point the evidence is somewhat conflicting.
On the one hand, M. Ramaix, writing on behalf of the
Belgian Government on May 1, 1912, says, “It
is well known that the slave trade is still carried
on to a certain extent in the neighbourhood of the
sources of the Zambesi and Kasai, in a region which
extends over the frontiers of the Congo, Angola, and
North-Western Rhodesia,” and on June 8, 1912,
Baron Lalaing, the Belgian Minister in London, said,
“At the instigation of the traders the population
living on the two slopes of the watershed, from Lake
Dilolo to the meridian of Kayoyo, are actively engaged
in smuggling, arms traffic, and slave trade.”
On the other hand, Mr. Wallace, writing from Livingstone,
in Northern Rhodesia, on June 25, 1912, says that
“active slave-trading does not now exist along
our borders.” On December 6 of the same
year he confirmed this statement, but added, “occasional
cases may occur, for the status of slave exists, but
they cannot be many.” Looking to all the
circumstances of the case—to the great
extent and, in some cases, to the remoteness of the
Portuguese dominions, the ruthless character of the
slave-traders, the pecuniary inducements which exist
for engaging in a very lucrative traffic, the helplessness
of the slaves themselves, and the fact that traffic
in slaves is apparently a common inter-tribal practice
in Central Africa, it would be unreasonable to expect
that the Portuguese Government should be able at once
to put a complete stop to these infamous proceedings.
It may well be that, in spite of every effort, the
slave trade may still linger on for a while. All
that can be reasonably expected is that the Portuguese
authorities should do their utmost to stop it.
That they are doing a good deal cannot be doubted,
but it is somewhat of a shock to read (Africa,
No. 2 of 1912, p. 59) that Senhor Vasconcellos rather
prided himself on the fact that certain “Europeans
who were found guilty of acts of slave traffic”
had merely been “immediately expelled from the
region,” and were “not allowed to return
to the colonies.” Surely, considering the
nature of the offence, a punishment of this sort errs
somewhat on the side of leniency. Had these men
been residing in Egypt or the Soudan they would have
been condemned to penal servitude for a term of years.
It is more satisfactory to learn, on the authority
of Colonel Freire d’Andrade, that the convicts
to whom allusion has already been made are “no
longer permitted to roam at large about the colony,
but are, save a very few who are allowed to live outside
on giving a security, kept in the forts of Loanda.”