CHAPTER XI.
PROGRESS IN CIVILIZATION.
It is a pleasing fact to relate that the last fifty years
have witnessed much advance towards civilization in
Africa; and especially on the west coast. This has
resulted mainly from the successful efforts made to
abolish the slave-trade. To the English first, and to
the Liberians next, the praise must be given for the
suppression of this inhuman and unchristian traffic.
Too much, however, cannot be said in favor of the
missionaries, men and women, who, forgetting native
land, and home-comforts, have given themselves to the
work of teaching these people, and thereby carrying
civilization to a country where each went with his life
in his hands.
Amongst the natives themselves, in several of the nations, much interest is manifested in their own elevation. The invention of an alphabet for writing their language, by the Veys, and this done too by their own ingenuity, shows remarkable advancement with a race hitherto regarded as unequal to such a task.
This progress in civilization is confined more strictly to the Jalofs, the Mandingoes, and the Fulahs, inhabit-
