Note 268b — HISTORY OF LYNN, PART II.

The princess Githa, daughter, or near relation to king Canute, and wife of Earl Goodwin, is said to have made a vast fortune by dealing in slaves; a traffic which then shockingly disgraced this country, as indeed it has done in our own time. Bristol was then, what Liverpool has recently been, the chief port to cherish and carry on this detestable commerce. This northern coast also, from Scotland to the Humber, was distinguished on the same account. We are told, by William of Malmsbury, that the Northumbrians used to sell their nearest relations for their own advantage; and Dr. Henry says, that English Slaves were then, like cattle, exposed to sale in all the markets of Europe. Many of the Slave-merchants of that period were Jews, who found a good market for their English and christian Slaves among the Saracens in Spa in and Africa. At Rome also, we read of English slaves being exposed for sale, as early as the 7th century. It is, moreover, highly probable that Lynn, and other neighbouring ports were long concerned in the same odious employment. Even as late as the reign of king John, the Irish used to import many slaves from Bristol. To add to the brutality of this vile proceeding, the Sellers always took care that the females should be in a condition which might enable them to demand a higher price from the purchasers. What put an end, at last, to this horrid traffick, is said to have been, not the virtue of the English, but the compunction of the Irish, who were shocked at it, under the idea that certain national misfortunes which had befallen them were divine judgments, for having been concerned in so iniquitous a business.—Our unfeeling advocates for the slave trade, who have so long dishonoured this nation, and are still in no small numbers among us, are little aware, that time was, when their own ancestors were in a similar situation with the present inhabitants of Africa; being liable, like them, to be bought and sold into slavery; and that other nations actually traded here for Slaves, as we have so long done in modern times to the coast of Guinea.—If they cannot put themselves in the place of the poor negroes, and feel for them, they ought, at least, to do so in regard to their own ancestors, and so learn some degree of justice and humanity, if nothing else can teach them.