Dhow Chasing in Zanzibar Waters - The Search For Mecca

PORTUGUESE POSSESSIONS. 227
Couducia lias, however, a very large slavemarket,
and this extensive trade is carried on
there, as at Mozambique, by the Portuguese.^
In the recent Report of the Select Committee,
the following passage occurs :— " The slavetrade
in negroes on the East Coast of Africa, is
now almost entirely confined to the dominions
of Zanzibar." And if there were any dependence
to be placed on the fact that Portugal
has nominally abolished slavery, the above
might be true, but, unfortunately, we know
that the trade is not only as extensive on this
part of the coast as ever, but that it will be as
difficult, if not more so, to stop it here, as in
the Zanzibar territory.
* " I have reason to think that the slave-trade in dhows
from the neighbourhood of Mozambique to the island of
Madagascar has very mucli increased during the last year or
so It could not be maintained were it not for the
false and mischievous claim set up by Portugal to the
sovereignty of a line of coast from Quilimane to Cape Del-
•gado, of six hundred miles, on which she does not possess
any territory but the island of Mozambique, and by her
commercial restrictions she has stopped the trade of the
whole coast."
Senior Officer, Capt. Gordon's Report, Blue
Book, I860.