manufacture highly ornamented rings. There are also silversmiths among
the Veys, who do good work. The leather industry, too, has been carried
to some perfection.

With all their disadvantages the natives seem to extract a good deal of
enjoyment out of existence. They are very fond of singing and dancing to
the rude strains of a drum and harp, and usually prolong their revelries
far into the night.

Taken as a whole, the native character has many fine traits; and from
the civilization and development of this part of her population, Liberia
has much to hope.




II.

THE COLONIZATION IDEA.


It is always a most interesting part of historic inquiry to search out
the very earliest sources, the first feeble germ of the idea whose
development we are investigating. It is difficult to decide from what
one origin can be traced the continuous development of the idea which
resulted in the birth of Liberia; but toward the close of the last
century there arose a number of projects, widely differing in object and
detail, which bore more or less directly upon it, each of which may be
said to have contributed some special feature to the fully rounded and
developed plan.