vast nation governed by free institutions, and professing a pure faith, a hand, faintly seen at present, but destined ere long to force itself upon the attention of all, points to the empires of a by-gone civilisation, and shows that they had their periods in which to rise, flourish, and decay, and that slavery was the main cause of that decay. The exasperating reproaches addressed to the Americans, in ignorance of the real difficulties of dealing with the case, have done much harm in inciting that popular clamour which hurries on reckless legislation. The problem one which occupies the attention of thinking and Christian men on both sides of the Atlantic, but still remains a gigantic evil for philanthropists to mourn over, and for politicians to correct.
An unexceptional censure ought not to be pronounced without a more complete knowledge of the subject than can be gained from novels and newspapers; still less ought this censure to extend to America as a whole, for the people of the Northern States are more ardent abolitionists than ourselves—more consistent, in fact, for they have no white slaves, no oppressed factory children, the cry of whose wrongs ascends daily into the ears of an avenging Judge. Still, blame must attach to them for the way in which they place the coloured people in an inferior social position, a rigid system of exclusiveness shutting them out from the usual places of amusement and education. It must not be forgotten that England bequeathed this system to her colonies, though she has nobly blotted it out from those which still own her sway; that it is encouraged by the cotton lords of Preston and Manchester; and that the great measure of negro emancipation was
