London, Tuesday, May 4, 1...
we nave seen an interesting memorial to Government from the merchants who are endeavouring to establish a competition with the French in the valuable gum-trade of Senegal; of which France hr'., since the peace, enjoved an almost absolute monopoly. It appears that the French traders have employedl slaves exclusively, in aU the labour carried on by them at Seniegal; wliilc the English are by larw compelled to make use of free labourers only; and that the increasing success and prosperity of the French settlements in that quarter are closely connected with an active prosecution of the br-utal slave-trade, whlichl tempts th'e native Chiefs to abandon a traffic in produce, for a traffic in slaves-interrupts incessantly the peace of the inhabitants, and renders hopeless all attempts to civilize and improve- them. Our merchants, therefbre, describe their claims upon the protection of Government, as ow- erflUy enhanced by considerations of a higher cbaricfer than those which belong to tlle immediate benefit of com- merce, and they ask accordingly for some effectual method of s&euririg the bpeiation of the act 3 Gro. IV., c. 43, which gives the exclusive supply of gum Senegal to the British merchant, anld excludes the article shipped from Francc-the law being now evaded by a ship- ment of the gum from France to America in Frenchl vessels, and a re-shipment in British vessels ta the ports of England from America. How far 11nisters may regard this question as affording opportunity for the full application of the principles of free trade, or for a mo- dification of or exception to those principles, wve cannot determine. It is clear that the surrender of benegal to France, or of any other spot upon the coast of Africa once in our possession, was among that myriad of offences against the best interests of England and of humanity, which will, to the end of time, be brought against the me- mory of our incapable and unfortunate negotiator of the peace of 1814 and 181S. It was announced yesterday at Lloyd's, that a letter from Sierra Leonc, dated the t1th of Alarch, had been received at Cork, which makes ilo mention of the fatal expedition of Sir CllARLES M'CART-iY, but exoresses the surprise of the writer at the long delay of his return to the British fort at Accra. This circumstance almost seems to hold out the hope that the accounts of that catastrophe are not to be credited, since a fact known at Acera on the 31st of Ja- nuary could hardly fail to reach Sierra Leone by the 11th of MLarch. WVe should be among the foremost to catch at any reasonable ground for discrediting such a misfortune; lbt it appearS to us only tair to say, that in spite of the notice at Lloyd's, it is more likely that the date assigned to the letter represented to have reached Cork shoul(d be er- roneous,than that the several acconntswhich wvere published yester(lay-one from a naval officer at Cape Coast Castle, the crew of whose frigate were stated by the writer tobe actually preparing to land for its defence-should all be forgeries; more particularly wvhen we find by a Barbadoes letter of the 20th of March, that three British men of war whose niames are given-viz. the Eden, Scout, and Ringdove, wcre to sail immediately for the coast of Africa, in full reliance on the truth of the melancholy narratives from that station. LOANDON, TUESDAY, MAY 4, 1824.