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For example, the preliminaries of peace, lately concluded at Aix-la-Chapelle, will be the common subject of most conversations; in which you will take care to ask the proper questions: as, what is the meaning of the Assiento contract for negroes, between England and Spain; what the annual ship; when stipulated; upon what account suspended, etc.
* The assiento contract stipulated that from the first day of May, 1713, to the first of May, 1743, the company should transport into the West Indies one hundred forty-four thousand negroes, at the rate of four thousand eight hundred negroes a year; and pay for each negro thirty-three pieces of eight and one third, in full for all royal duties.
The assiento the treaty giving her exclusive right to supply the West Indian islands with African slaves was actively carried out, and the slave-trade reached enormous proportions; it is estimated that from three to nine millions of Africans were imported into the American and Spanish colonies during the first half of the Eighteenth Century, yielding a revenue for their importation alone of at least four hundred million dollars.
To our statesmen of Queen Anne's time traffic in slaves was so far from being considered discreditable, that the ministry of that reign prided themselves greatly on what was called the Assiento Treaty with Spain, by which they secured for the British merchants and ship-owners the privilege of supplying the West India Islands with several thousand slaves a year.
"The English shall have the Assiento in the same manner the French now enjoy it; and such places in the Spanish West Indies shall be assigned to those concerned in this traffic, for the refreshment and sale of their negroes, as shall be found necessary and convenient.
He excused his non-payment of the ninety-five thousand pounds stipulated in the convention, by affirming that the British court had first contravened the articles of that treaty, by the orders sent to Haddock; by continuing to fortify Georgia; by reinforcing the squadron at Jamaica; and by eluding the payment of the sixty-eight thousand pounds due to Spain from the South-Sea company, on the assiento for negroes.
Negotiations were set on foot, but their only result was the assiento contract, or the privilege of supplying the colonies with negroes for thirty years, and of sending once a year a vessel, limited both as to tonnage and value of cargo, to trade with Mexico, Peru, or Chile.
Although the secretary believed this answer would put an end to such infamous proposals, it fell out otherwise; for shortly after, Mons. Buys applied himself to the treasurer, promising to undertake, "That his masters should give up the article of Spain, provided they might share with us in the Assiento for negroes."
Factors of the Assiento established at Cartagena, Porto Bello and Vera Cruz every year supplied European merchants with detailed news of the nature and quantity of the goods which might be imported with advantage; while the buccaneers, by dominating the whole Caribbean Sea, hindered frequent communication between Spain and her colonies.
The queen had reserved to herself the quarter-part of the assiento contract, which she now gave up to the company, and received the thanks of the upper house; but she would not discover the names of those who advised her to ratify the explanatory articles. On the ninth day of July, she thought proper to put an end to the session with a speech on the usual subjects.
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