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146 VISITS TO MADAGASCAR. CHAP. VI. CHAP. VI. Domestic Slavery in Madagascar Prices of Slaves. — Modes of Punishment. Numbers of Slaves.—Native Manufactures. — Rofia Cloth Native Bas kets. — Fondness of Natives for Barter. — Conversations with the People Desire after Education. — Historical Notice of the Persecutions of the Chris tians. — Simple Scriptural Character of their Faith. — Testimonies in their Favour. — Scriptural Basis of their Religious Organisations and Observ ances. — Social Gatherings. — Perils to which they have been exposed. — Public Confessions.—Constancy unto Death. — Nature and Severity of their Punishments. — Numbers who have suffered on account of their Re ligion. — Executions in 1849. —Latest Edict against Christian Observances. — Opinions of the Natives which render Christianity peculiarly criminal in the Estimation of the Heathen. — Claims of the Christians to Sympathy and Compassion. In the domestic arrangements of the Malagasy, most of the employments connected with providing and preparing food are performed by slaves. Slavery, in fact, is one of the “ do mestic institutions ” of the country. It involves the buying and selling of men and women, sometimes in the public markets, and at other times, by taking them about from place to place, and offering them like any other goods for sale. I was walking one day on the beach with my companion, when a man approached us, followed by a hoy about eleven or twelve years old. The man stopped, and asked an officer standing near if he wanted a slave, and, pointing to the boy, said he was for sale; the price, he added, was ten dollars. The party appealed to declining to purchase, the man made a sign to the boy and then walked on, the slave following at the distance of a few paces. On another occasion, as I was sitting at breakfast, my servant came to say that some one wished to speak to me, and, on my going out, I found two