The Guinea Company was bound to import only one thousand yearly into
all the French Antilles; but it did not flourish until it became an
_Asiento_ Company, when, during the War of Succession, a Bourbon mounted
the throne of Spain. It was called _Asiento_ because the Spanish
Government _let_, or farmed by _treaty_, the privilege of supplying its
colonies with slaves. The two principal articles of this contract, which
was to expire in 1712, related to the number of negroes and the rent of
the privilege. If the war continued, the French Company was bound to
furnish Spain with thirty-eight thousand negroes during the ten years
of the contract, but in case of peace, with forty-eight thousand. Each
negro that the Company could procure was let to it for 33-1/3 piastres,
in pieces of India. In consequence of this treaty, the ports of Chili
and Peru, and those in the South Sea, from which all other nations
were excluded, stood open to the French, who carried into them vast
quantities of merchandise besides the slaves, and brought home great
sums in coin and bars. The raw gold and silver alone which they imported
for the year 1709 was reckoned at thirty millions of livres.
But at the Peace of Utrecht, Louis XIV., exhausted by an unprofitable
war, relinquished his _asiento_ to the English, who were eager enough
to take it. It was for this advantage that Marlborough had been really
fighting; at least, it was the only one of consequence that Blenheim and
Malplaquet secured to his country.
Pages:
30
31
32
33
34
35
36
37
38
39
40
41
42
43
44
45
46
47
48
49
50
51
52
53
54