Part 1

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WHITE SLAVERY

IN

THE BARBARY STATES.

BY

CHARLES SUMNER.

----Mutato nomine, de te Fabula narratur.

HORACE

And thinkest thou this, O man, that judgest them which do such things, and doest the same, that thou shalt escape the judgment of God?

EPISTLE TO THE ROMANS, Chap. ii. v. 3.

BOSTON: PUBLISHED BY JOHN P. JEWETT AND COMPANY.

CLEVELAND, OHIO: JEWETT, PROCTOR, AND WORTHINGTON.

LONDON: LOW AND COMPANY.

1853.

Entered, according to Act of Congress, in the year 1853, by

JOHN P. JEWETT AND COMPANY,

In the Clerk's Office of the District Court

of the District of Massachusetts.

ORIGINAL DESIGNS BY BILLINGS.

ENGRAVED BY BAKER, SMITH, AND ANDREW.

STEREOTYPED AT THE

BOSTON STEREOTYPE FOUNDRY.

GEO. C. RAND, PRINTER, CORNHILL.

WHITE SLAVERY

in the

BARBARY STATES.

History has been sometimes called a gallery, where, in living forms, are preserved the scenes, the incidents, and the characters of the past. It may also be called the world's great charnel house, where are gathered coffins, dead men's bones, and all the uncleanness of the years that have fled. As we walk among its pictures, radiant with the inspiration of virtue and of freedom, we confess a new impulse to beneficent exertion. As we grope amidst the unsightly shapes that have been left without an epitaph, we may at least derive a fresh aversion to all their living representatives.

In this mighty gallery, amidst a heavenly light, are the images of the benefactors of mankind--the poets who have sung the praise of virtue, the historians who have recorded its achievements, and the good men of all time, who, by word or deed, have striven for the welfare of others. Here are depicted those scenes where the divinity of man has been made manifest in trial and danger. Here also are those grand incidents which attended the establishment of the free institutions of the world; the signing of Magna Charta, with its priceless privileges of freedom, by a reluctant monarch; and the signing of the Declaration of Independence, the annunciation of the inalienable rights of man, by the fathers of our republic.

On the other hand, in ignominious confusion, far down in this dark, dreary charnel house is tumbled all that now remains of the tyrants, the persecutors, the selfish men, under whom mankind have groaned. Here also, in festering, loathsome decay, are the monstrous institutions or customs, which the earth, weary of their infamy and injustice, has refused to sustain--the Helotism of Sparta, the Serfdom of Christian Europe, the Ordeal by Battle, and Algerine Slavery.

From this charnel house let me to-night draw forth one of these. It may not be without profit to dwell on the _origin_, the _history_, and the _character_ of a custom, which, after being for a long time a byword and a hissing among the nations, has at last been driven from the world. The easy, instinctive, positive reprobation, which it will receive from all, must necessarily direct our judgment of other institutions, yet tolerated in equal defiance of justice and humanity. I propose to consider the subject of _White Slavery in Algiers_, or perhaps it might be more appropriately called _White Slavery in the Barbary States_. As Algiers was its chief seat, it seems to have acquired a current name from that place. This I shall not disturb; though I shall speak of White Slavery, or the Slavery of Christians, throughout the Barbary States.

If this subject should fail in interest, it cannot fail in novelty. I am not aware of any previous attempt to combine its scattered materials in a connected essay.

The territory now known as the Barbary States is memorable in history. Classical inscriptions, broken arches, and ancient tombs--the memorials of various ages--still bear instructive witness to the revolutions which it has encountered.[1] Early Greek legend made it the home of terror and of happiness. Here was the retreat of the Gorgon, with snaky tresses, turning all she looked upon into stone; and here also the garden of the Hesperides, with its apples of gold. It was the scene of adventure and mythology. Here Hercules wrestled with Antaeus, and Atlas sustained, with weary shoulders, the overarching sky. Phoenician fugitives early transported the spirit of commerce to its coasts; and Carthage, which these wanderers here planted, became the mistress of the seas, the explorer of distant regions, the rival and the victim of Rome. The energy and subtlety of Jugurtha here baffled for a while the Roman power, till at last the whole country, from Egypt to the Pillars of Hercules, underwent the process of "annexation" to the cormorant republic of ancient times. A thriving population and fertile soil rendered it an immense granary. It was filled with famous cities, one of which was the refuge and the grave of Cato, fleeing from the usurpations of Caesar. At a later day, Christianity was here preached by some of her most saintly bishops. The torrent of the Vandals, first wasting Italy, next passed over this territory; and the arms of Belisarius here obtained their most signal triumphs. The Saracens, with the Koran and the sword, potent ministers of conversion, next broke from Arabia, as the messengers of a new religion, and, pouring along these shores, diffused the faith and doctrines of Mohammed. Their empire was not confined even by these expansive limits; but, under Musa, entered Spain, and afterwards at Roncesvalles, in "dolorous rout," overthrew the embattled chivalry of the Christian world led by Charlemagne.

[Footnote 1: The classical student will be gratified and surprised by the remains of antiquity described by Dr. Shaw, English chaplain at Algiers in the reign of George the First, in his _Travels and Observertions relating to Several Parts of Barbary and the Levant_, published in 1738.]

The Saracenic power did not long retain its unity or importance; and, as we view this territory, in the dawn of modern history, when the countries of Europe are appearing in their new nationalities, we discern five different communities or states,--Morocco, Algiers, Tunis, Tripoli, and Barca,--the latter of little moment, and often included in Tripoli, the whole constituting what was then, and is still, called the Barbary States. This name has sometimes been referred to the Berbers, or Berebbers, constituting a part of the inhabitants; but I delight to follow the classic authority of Gibbon, who thinks[2] that the term, first applied by Greek pride to all strangers, and finally reserved for those only who were savage or hostile, has justly settled, as a local denomination, along the northern coast of Africa. The Barbary States, then, bear their past character in their name.

[Footnote 2: Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, vol. ix. chap. lvi. p. 465.]

They occupy an important space on the earth's surface; on the north, washed by the Mediterranean Sea, furnishing such opportunities of prompt intercourse with Southern Europe, that Cato was able to exhibit in the Roman Senate figs freshly plucked in the gardens of Carthage; bounded on the east by Egypt, on the west by the Atlantic Ocean, and on the south by the vast, indefinite, sandy, flinty wastes of Sahara, separating them from Soudan or Negroland. In the advantages of position they surpass every other part of Africa,--unless we except Egypt,--communicating easily with the Christian nations, and thus, as it were, touching the very hem and border of civilization.

Climate adds its attractions to this region, which is removed from the cold of the north and the burning heats of the tropics, while it is enriched with oranges, citrons, olives, figs, pomegranates, and luxuriant flowers. Its position and character invite a singular and suggestive comparison. It is placed between the twenty-ninth and thirty-eighth degrees of north latitude, occupying nearly the same parallels with the Slave States of our Union. It extends over nearly the same number of degrees of longitude with our Slave States, which seem now, alas! to stretch from the Atlantic Ocean to the Rio Grande. It is supposed to embrace about 700,000 square miles, which cannot be far from the space comprehended by what may be called the _Barbary States of America_.[3] Nor does the comparison end here. Algiers, for a long time the most obnoxious place in the Barbary States of Africa, the chief seat of Christian slavery, and once branded by an indignant chronicler as "the wall of the barbarian world," is situated near the parallel of 36 deg. 30' north latitude, being the line of what is termed the Missouri Compromise, marking the "wall" of Christian slavery, in our country, west of the Mississippi.

[Footnote 3: Jefferson, without recognizing the general parallel, alludes to Virginia as fast sinking to be "the _Barbary_ of the Union."--Writings, vol. iv. p. 333.]

Other less important points of likeness between the two territories may be observed. They are each washed, to the same extent, by ocean and sea; with this difference, that the two regions are thus exposed on directly opposite coasts--the African Barbary being bounded in this way on the north and west, and our American Barbary on the south and east. But there are no two spaces, on the surface of the globe, of equal extent, (and an examination of the map will verify what I am about to state,) which present so many distinctive features of resemblance; whether we consider the parallels of latitude on which they lie, the nature of their boundaries, their productions, their climate, or the "peculiar domestic institution" which has sought shelter in both.

I introduce these comparisons in order to bring home to your minds, as near as possible, the precise position and character of the territory which was the seat of the evil I am about to describe. It might be worthy of inquiry, why Christian slavery, banished at last from Europe, banished also from that part of this hemisphere which corresponds in latitude to Europe, should have intrenched itself, in both hemispheres, between the same parallels of latitude; so that Virginia, Carolina, Mississippi, and Texas should be the American complement to Morocco, Algiers, Tripoli, and Tunis. Perhaps the common peculiarities of climate, breeding indolence, lassitude, and selfishness, may account for the insensibility to the claims of justice and humanity which have characterized both regions.

The revolting custom of White Slavery in the Barbary States was, for many years, the shame of modern civilization. The nations of Europe made constant efforts, continued through successive centuries, to procure its _abolition_, and also to rescue their subjects from its fearful doom. These may be traced in the diversified pages of history, and in the authentic memoirs of the times. Literature also affords illustrations, which must not be neglected. At one period, the French, the Italians, and the Spaniards borrowed the plots of their stories mostly from this source.[4] The adventures of Robinson Crusoe make our childhood familiar with one of its forms. Among his early trials, he was piratically captured by a rover from Salle, a port of Morocco, on the Atlantic Ocean, and reduced to slavery. "At this surprising change of circumstances," he says, "from a merchant to a miserable slave, I was perfectly overwhelmed; and now I looked back upon my father's prophetic discourse to me, that I should be miserable, and have none to relieve me, which I thought was so effectually brought to pass, that I could not be worse." And Cervantes, in the story of Don Quixote, over which so many generations have shaken with laughter, turns aside from its genial current to give the narrative of a Spanish captive who had escaped from Algiers. The author is supposed to have drawn from his own experience; for during five years and a half he endured the horrors of Algerine slavery, from which he was finally liberated by a ransom of about six hundred dollars.[5] This inconsiderable sum of money--less than the price of an intelligent African slave in our own Southern States--gave to freedom, to his country, and to mankind the author of Don Quixote.

[Footnote 4: Sismondi's Literature of the South of Europe, vol. iii. chap. 29, p. 492.]

[Footnote 5: The exact amount is left uncertain both by Smollet and Thomas Roscoe in their lives of Cervantes. It appears that it was five hundred gold crowns of Spain, which, according to his Spanish biographer, Navarrete, is 6770 reals, (_Vida de Cervantes_, p. 371.) The real is supposed to be less than ten cents.]

In Cervantes freedom gained a champion whose efforts entitle him to grateful mention, on this threshold of our inquiry. Taught in the school of slavery, he knew how to commiserate the slave. The unhappy condition of his fellow-Christians in chains was ever uppermost in his mind. He lost no opportunity of arousing his countrymen to attempts for their emancipation, and for the overthrow of the "peculiar institution"--pardon this returning phrase!--under which they groaned. He became in Spain what, in our day and country, is sometimes called an "Anti-Slavery Agitator"--not by public meetings and addresses, but, according to the genius of the age, mainly through the instrumentality of the theatre. Not from the platform, but from the stage, did this liberated slave speak to the world. In a drama, entitled _El Trato de Argel_, or Life in Algiers,--which, though not composed according to the rules of art, yet found much favor, probably from its subject,--he pictured, shortly after his return to Spain, the manifold humiliations, pains, and torments of slavery. This was followed by two others in the same spirit--_La Gran Sultana Dona Cattalina de Oviedo_, The Great Sultana the Lady Cattalina of Oviedo; and _Los Banos de Argel_, The Galleys of Algiers. The last act of the latter closes with the statement, calculated to enlist the sympathies of an audience, that this play "is not drawn from the imagination, but was born far from the regions of fiction, in the very heart of truth." Not content with this appeal through the theatre, Cervantes, with constant zeal, takes up the same theme, in the tale of the Captive, in Don Quixote, as we have already seen, and also in that of _El Liberal Amante_, The Liberal Lover, and in some parts of _La Espanola Inglesa_, The English Spanishwoman. All these may be regarded, not merely as literary labors, but as charitable endeavors in behalf of human freedom.

And this same cause enlisted also a prolific contemporary genius, called by Cervantes "that prodigy," Lope de Vega, who commended it in a play entitled _Los Cautivos de Argel_, The Captives of Algiers. At a later day, Calderon, sometimes exalted as the Shakspeare of the Spanish stage, in one of his most remarkable dramas, _El Principe Constante_, The Constant Prince, cast a poet's glance at Christian slavery in Morocco. To these works--belonging to what may be called the literature of Anti-Slavery, and shedding upon our subject a grateful light--must be added a curious and learned volume, in Spanish, on the Topography and History of Algiers, by Haedo, a father of the Catholic Church,--_Topografia y Historia de Argel por Fra Haedo_,--published in 1612; and containing also two copious Dialogues--one on Captivity (_de la Captiudad_), and the other on the Martyrs of Algiers, (_de los Martyres de Argel_). These Dialogues, besides embodying authentic sketches of the sufferings in Algiers, form a mine of classical and patristic learning on the origin and character of slavery, with arguments and protestations against its iniquity, which may be explored with profit, even in our day. In view of this gigantic evil, particularly in Algiers, and in the hope of arousing his countrymen to the generous work of emancipation, the good father exclaims,[6] in words which will continue to thrill the soul,--so long as a single fetter binds a single slave,--"Where is charity? Where is the love of God? Where is the zeal for his glory? Where is desire for his service? Where is human pity and the compassion of man for man? Certainly to redeem a captive, to liberate him from wretched slavery, is the highest work of charity, of all that can be done in this world."

[Footnote 6: Pp. 140, 141.]

Not long after the dark experience of Cervantes, another person, of another country and language, and of a still higher character, St. Vincent de Paul, of France, underwent the same cruel lot. Happily for the world, he escaped from slavery, to commence at home that long career of charity--nobler than any glories of literature--signalized by various Christian efforts, against duels, for peace, for the poor, and in every field of humanity--by which he is placed among the great names of Christendom. Princes and orators have lavished panegyrics upon this fugitive slave; and the Catholic Church, in homage to his extraordinary virtues, has introduced him into the company of saints. Nor is he the only illustrious Frenchman who has felt the yoke of slavery. Almost within our own day, Arago, the astronomer and philosopher,--devoted republican, I may add also,--while engaged, early in life, in those scientific labors, on the coast of the Mediterranean, which made the beginning of his fame, fell a prey to Algerine slave dealers. What science and the world have gained by his emancipation I need not say.

Thus Science, Literature, Freedom, Philanthropy, the Catholic Church, each and all, confess a debt to the liberated Barbary slave. May they, on this occasion, as beneficent heralds, commend the story of his wrongs, his struggles, and his triumphs!

These preliminary remarks properly prepare the way for the subject to which I have invited your attention. In presenting it, I shall naturally be led to touch upon the _origin of slavery_, and the principles which lie at its foundation, before proceeding to exhibit the efforts for its abolition, and their final success in the Barbary States.

I. The word _slave_, suggesting now so much of human abasement, has an origin which speaks of human grandeur. Its parent term, _Slava_, signifying _glory_, in the Slavonian dialects, where it first appears, was proudly assumed as the national designation of the races in the north-eastern part of the European continent, who, in the vicissitudes of war, were afterwards degraded from the condition of conquerors to that of servitude. The Slavonian bondman, retaining his national name, was known as a _Slave_, and this term--passing from a _race_ to a _class_--was afterwards applied, in the languages of modern Europe, to all in his unhappy lot, without distinction of country or color.[7] It would be difficult to mention any word which has played such opposite parts in history--now beneath the garb of servitude, concealing its early robes of pride. And yet, startling as it may seem, this word may properly be received in its primitive character, in our own day, by those among us who consider slavery essential to democratic institutions, and therefore a part of the true _glory_ of the country!

[Footnote 7: Gibbon's Roman Empire, vol. x. chap. 55, p. 190.]

Slavery was universally recognized by the nations of antiquity. It is said by Pliny, in a bold phrase, that the Lacedaemonians "invented slavery."[8] If this were so, the glory of Lycurgus and Leonidas would not compensate for such a blot upon their character. It is true that they recognized it, and gave it a shape of peculiar hardship. But slavery is older than Sparta. It appears in the tents of Abraham; for the three hundred and eighteen servants born to him were slaves. It appears in the story of Joseph, who was sold by his brothers to the Midianites for twenty pieces of silver.[9] It appears in the poetry of Homer, who stamps it with a reprobation which can never be forgotten, when he says,[10]--

Jove fixed it certain, that whatever day Makes man a slave takes half his worth away.

[Footnote 8: Nat. Hist. lib. vii. c. 57.]

[Footnote 9: Genesis xiv. 14; ibid, xxxvii. 28. By these and other texts of the Scriptures, slavery, and even the _slave trade_, have been vindicated. See Bruce's Travels in Africa, vol. ii. p. 319. After quoting these texts, the complacent traveller says he "cannot think that purchasing slaves is either cruel or unnatural."]

[Footnote 10: Odyssey, book xvii.]

In later days it prevailed extensively in Greece, whose haughty people deemed themselves justified in enslaving all who were strangers to their manners and institutions. "The Greek has the right to be the master of the barbarian," was the sentiment of Euripides, one of the first of her poets, which was echoed by Aristotle, the greatest of her intellects.[11] And even Plato, in his imaginary republic, the Utopia of his beautiful genius, sanctions slavery. But, notwithstanding these high names, we learn from Aristotle himself that there were persons in his day--pestilent abolitionists of ancient Athens--who did not hesitate to maintain that liberty was the great law of nature, and to deny any difference between the master and the slave; declaring openly that slavery was founded upon violence, and not upon right, and that the authority of the master was unnatural and unjust.[12] "God sent forth all persons free; nature has made no man a slave," was the protest of one of these dissenting Athenians against this great wrong. I am not in any way authorized to speak for any Anti-slavery society, even if this were a proper occasion; but I presume that this ancient Greek morality substantially embodies the principles which are maintained at their public meetings--so far, at least, as they relate to slavery.

[Footnote 11: Pol. lib. i. c. 1.]

[Footnote 12: Pol. lib. i. c. 3. In like spirit are the words of the good Las Casas, when pleading before Charles the Fifth for the Indian races of America. "The Christian religion," he said, "is equal in its operation, and is accommodated to every nation on the globe. _It robs no one of his freedom, violates none of his inherent rights, on the ground that he is a slave by nature, as pretended_; and it well becomes your Majesty _to banish_ so monstrous an oppression from your kingdoms in the beginning of your reign, that the Almighty may make it long and glorious."--Prescott's _Conquest of Mexico_, vol. i. p 379.]

It is true, most true, that slavery stands on force, and not on right. It is one of the hideous results of war, or of that barbarism in which savage war plays a conspicuous part. To the victor, it was supposed, belonged the lives of his captives; and, by consequence, he might bind them in perpetual servitude. This principle, which has been the foundation of slavery in all ages, is adapted only to the rudest conditions of society, and is wholly inconsistent with a period of real refinement, humanity, and justice. It is sad to confess that it was recognized by Greece; but the civilization of this famed land, though brilliant to the external view as the immortal sculptures of the Parthenon, was, like that stately temple, dark and cheerless within.