ABSTRACT
The right of ownership that some men have acquired over others in Guinea has a very ancient origin. It is established everywhere there, with the exception of a few small districts where liberty has found a hidden refuge. However, no owner has the right to sell a man born in the state of slavery. He may dispose only of those slaves he acquires, either in war, in which every prisoner who is not exchanged becomes a slave, or as a compensation for some wrong committed against him, or else those he is given as a recognizance. This law, apparently intended to benefit those people who are born in slavery, enabling them to remain in their families and their own country, is no longer adequate, now that Europeans have introduced luxury to the coasts of Africa. It is circumvented daily by trumped-up quarrels between two slave-owners, each of whom in turn is condemned to pay the other a fine, this being payable in slaves born as such, who may be disposed of freely under the terms of the said law.
