Abstract

Books for review should be sent to Dr. Townley Lord, at :Bloomsbury Central Church, Shaftesbury A venue, W.C.2. He especially welcomes books by Baptists, and memorial volumes. British Slave Emancipation, 1838-1849, by W. L. Mathieson. (Longmans, Green and Co., 1932.) 243 pp. 12s. 6d.) In this important and scholarly book Dr. Mathieson carries :a stage further the study which he began in British Slavery and .its Abolition, 1823-1838, published six years ago. The two volumes fill a real gap in our historical literature, and were 'needed to companion the biographies of men like Wilberforce, Buxton, and Sturge, as well as to give the background against which modern slavery problems may be considered. They have a special interest for Baptists because of the part, often now forgotten, played by our missionaries in Jamaica, and by the <denominational leaders at home, in the struggles against both the trade and the system. Dr. Mathieson covers a wide field and has Antigua, the Barbados, Trinidad, Guiana and Mauritius to ·consider as well as Jamaica, but it was there that the contro­ versies were most bitter, protracted and significant. Writing of Knibb and his companions, Dr. Mathie~on says: '"Unlike all the other missionaries, they