Liberia - The Land of Promise to Free Colored Men #224137

I have now a word to say about the factories. The factories are small houses placed along the coast,_and are established by English, American, French. Or other, houses in Europe, for the purpose of carrying on trade with the natives. Same of the agents will frequently go into the interior for one hundred and fifty or'two hundred miles, to traffic with the natives, and purchase cam-wood and palm-oil. And such is the natives' love of gain, that they will often travel ten, twenty, and even thirty miles, carrying on their backs quantities of produce to sell to the agents. An opinion is generally prevalent, in this country, that the negro is a lazy man; but when you see them at their work — when you see them coming from the interior, a distance of twenty or thirty miles — and bend ing down with the burdens on their backs, which they Wish to sell to the traders. You would soon dismiss that idea from your minds. Give the negro some in centive to labor, and there is not a more plodding or industrious man in the world than the African. (loud applause.)