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Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software. The text has not been manually corrected and should not be relied on to be an accurate representation of the item.
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hoon which may be productive of incalculable benefits to the inhabitants of chat continent . " It is of inferior consequence whether the cheap" and popular mode of education be Bell ' s or Lancaster ' s ; but surely the African Institution were not called .
on to decide this point . Was Dr . Bell ' s name thrown in as a sop to the archbishop and the four bishops who stand jn the front of the Report as Vice-Presidents t In the body of the Report is an enumeration of the articles "which Africa
may be expected to furnish as a return % o the British merchant for the goods he jnay send thither ; which appears to . be £ aken , in substance at least , from the * Report delivered by the Court of Directors of the Sierra Leone Company , to the General Court of Proprietors , March zy 1794 , * ' p . 166—175 , The attention of the Committee has been
chiefly drawn to the article of cotton . With the mode of raising - the cottontree , the natives of the western coast of Africa are almost universally acquainted , and from the cotton grown there , is majtuifactured cloth of an excellent fabric , though it is unsuitable to the English market . Soaie packages of cotton-seed
fiave been sent out to Sierra Leone ; others are promised from Georgia and ithe Brazils . And it is proposed to take measures for engaging in America or the West Indies , persons of good character , natives of Africa or the descendants of Africans , who shall instruct the colonists and natives in the cultivation
and manufacture of indigo ; in the best mode of raising and cleaning cotton , rice , and other articles of tropical culture . The following premiums of a piece of plate of the value of fifty guineas , or the same sum in money , at the option of the claimant , are proposed by the Directors , -with a view to encourage in Africa the
cultivation of exportable produce : viz . j . To the person who shall first import J nto this country the largest quantity , not less than a ton , of cotton wool , the production of the Western coast of
Africa , which shall be pronounced , by competent judges , to be fit for the English market . % . To the person who shall iirst import into this country the greatest quantity of manufactured indigo , not less than one hundred weight , the produce of the western coast of Africa , in * marketable state . 3 . To the person
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who shall first import into this country the largest quantity , not less , than tea tons , of white rice , the produce of the Western coast of Africa , in a clean and marketable state . 4 . To the person who before the Erst of January , i 8 io shall plant within the colony of Sierra Leone , the greatest number of acres , not less than ten , with coffee-plants .
The Directors have also resolved to promote the study of the native languages of Africa , by the Europeans and other , resident in Sierra Leone ; and to engage , with that view , proper persons to teach the Arabic and Susoo languages in that colony . The following note contains some interesting information concerning these languages .
" The Arabic language has been extended , by means of the Mahommedans , over a large part of the western coast of Africa . The knowledge of this language by British subjects resident on the coast ,, would greatly tend to facilitate our intercourse with the Jnterior , while it would afford a ready means of
spreading useful knowledge throughout Africa . Tracts printed in Arabic would be eagerly read there , and might be dispersed to the farthest extremity of the continent . It is therefore highly important that the Institution should
encourage the cultivation of Arabic literature at Sierra Leone . The salary of a teacher of Arabic will not be a great burden upon the funds of the Society , as a native , competently qualified for that office , may be obtained at a moderate rate . The business of the teacher will
be to instruct such Europeans and others , in the Arabic tongue , as may he placed under his tuition by persons receiving authority for that purpose from thje Di * rectors ; and the diligence of the scholar * may be quickened by periodical examinations , at which extraordinary pro * ficiency may be distinguished by hono - rary rewards .
*• The Susoo language is spoken very generally on the coast for about one hundred and fifty miles to the northward of Sierra Leone . It is also understood by a gre ^ t pare of Jthe Foulah and Man ~ dingo nations , and is the vernacular tongue of the country of Jalonkadoo , a large king dom ^ in the mountains of which the Niger is represented as taking its rise . Jc would not therefore be too
largo a calculation to . suppose , that it is spoken over a space of eight hundred of a . thousand miles square ; a space co £ -
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IntelHgencc . —African Institution . 623
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Citation
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Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), Nov. 2, 1808, page 623, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2398/page/47/
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