The History of the Rise, Progress and Accomplishment of the Abolition Part 22

The second, to the methods of reducing them to slavery. The third, to the manner of bringing them to the s.h.i.+ps, their value, the medium of exchange, and other circ.u.mstances. The fourth, to their transportation.

The fifth, to their treatment in the colonies. The sixth, to the seamen employed in the trade. These tables contained together one hundred and forty-five questions. My idea was that they should be printed on a small sheet of paper, which should be folded up in seven or eight leaves, of the length and breadth of a small almanac, and then be sent in franks to our different correspondents. These, when they had them, might examine persons capable of giving evidence, who might live in their neighbourhoods, or fall in their way, and return us their examinations by letter.

The committee having approved and printed the tables of questions, I began my tour. I had selected the southern counties from Kent to Cornwall for it. I had done this, because these included the great stations of the s.h.i.+ps of war in ordinary; and as these were all under the superintendence of Sir Charles Middleton, as comptroller of the navy, I could get an introduction to those on board them. Secondly, because sea-faring people, when they retire from a marine life, usually settle in some town or village upon the coast.

Of this tour I shall not give the reader any very particular account. I shall mention only those things which are most worthy of his notice in it. At Poole, in Dorsets.h.i.+re, I laid the foundation of a committee, to act in harmony with that of London for the promotion of the cause. Moses Neave, of the respectable society of the Quakers, was the chairman; Thomas Bell, the secretary; and Ellis B. Metford and the Reverend Mr.

Davis and others the committee. This was the third committee which had been inst.i.tuted in the country for this purpose. That at Bristol, under Mr. Joseph Harford as chairman, and Mr. Lunell as secretary, had been the first: and that at Manchester, under Mr. Thomas Walker as chairman, and Mr. Samuel Jackson as secretary, had been the second.

As Poole was a great place for carrying on the trade to Newfoundland, I determined to examine the a.s.sertion of the Earl of Sandwich in the House of Lords, when he said, in the debate on Sir William Dolben's bill, that the Slave Trade was not more fatal to seamen than the Newfoundland and some others. This a.s.sertion I knew at the time to be erroneous, as far as my own researches had been concerned: for out of twenty-four vessels, which had sailed out of the port of Bristol in that employ, only two sailors were upon the dead list. In sixty vessels from Poole, I found but four lost. At Dartmouth, where I went afterwards on purpose, I found almost a similar result. On conversing, however, with Governor Holdsworth, I learnt that the year 1786 had been more fatal than any other in this trade. I learnt that in consequence of extraordinary storms and hurricanes, no less than five sailors had died and twenty-one had been drowned in eighty-three vessels from that port. Upon this statement I determined to look into the muster-rolls of the trade there for two or three years together. I began by accident with the year 1769, and I went on to the end of 1772. About eighty vessels on an average had sailed thence in each of these years. Taking the loss in these years, and compounding it with that in the fatal year, three sailors had been lost; but taking it in these four years by themselves, only two had been lost in twenty-four vessels so employed. On comparison with the Slave Trade, the result would be, that two vessels to Africa would destroy more seamen than eighty-three sailing to Newfoundland. There was this difference also to be noted, that the loss in the one trade was generally by the weather or by accident, but in the other by cruel treatment or disease; and that they who went out in a declining state of health in the one, came home generally recovered; whereas they, who went out robust in the other, came home in a shattered condition.

At Plymouth I laid the foundation of another committee. The late William Cookworthy, the late John Prideaux, and James Fox, all of the society of the Quakers, and Mr. George Leach, Samuel Northcote and John Saunders, had a princ.i.p.al share in forming it. Sir William Ellford was chosen chairman.

From Plymouth I journeyed on to Falmouth, and from thence to Exeter, where having meetings with the late Mr. Samuel Milford, the late Mr.

George Manning, the Reverend James Manning, Thomas Sparkes, and others, a desire became manifest among them of establis.h.i.+ng a committee there.

This was afterwards effected; and Mr. Milford, who at a general meeting of the inhabitants of Exeter, on the 10th of June, on this great subject, had been called by those present to the chair, was appointed the chairman of it.

With respect to evidence, which was the great object of this tour, I found myself often very unpleasantly situated in collecting it. I heard of many persons capable of giving it to our advantage, to whom I could get no introduction. I had to go after these many miles out of my established route. Not knowing me, they received me coldly, and even suspiciously; while I fell in with others, who, considering themselves, on account of their concerns and connexions, as our opponents, treated me in an uncivil manner.

But the difficulties and disappointments in other respects which I experienced in this tour,--even where I had an introduction, and where the parties were not interested in the continuance of the Slave Trade,--were greater than people in general would have imagined. One would have thought, considering the great enthusiasm of the nation on this important subject, that they who could have given satisfactory information upon it, would have rejoiced to do it. But I found it otherwise; and this frequently to my sorrow. There was an aversion in persons to appear before such a tribunal as they conceived the privy council to be. With men of shy or timid character this operated as an insuperable barrier in their way. But it operated more or less upon all.

It was surprising to see what little circ.u.mstances affected many. When I took out my pen and ink to put down the information which a person was giving me, he became evidently embarra.s.sed and frightened. He began to excuse himself from staying, by alleging that he had nothing more to communicate, and he took himself away as quickly as he could with decency. The sight of the pen and ink had lost me so many good evidences, that I was obliged wholly to abandon the use of them, and to betake myself to other means. I was obliged for the future to commit my tables of questions to memory; and endeavour by practice to put down, after the examination of a person, such answers as he had given me to each of them.

Others went off, because it happened that immediately on my interview, I acquainted them with the nature of my errand and solicited their attendance in London. Conceiving that I had no right to ask them such a favour, or terrified at the abruptness and apparent awfulness of my request some of them gave me an immediate denial, which they would never afterwards retract. I began to perceive in time that it was only by the most delicate management that I could get forward on these occasions. I resolved, therefore, for the future, except in particular cases, that when I should be introduced to persons who had a competent knowledge of this trade, I would talk with them upon it as upon any ordinary subject, and then leave them without saying anything about their becoming evidences. I would take care, however, to commit all their conversation to writing when it was over; and I would then try to find out that person among their relations or friends, who could apply to them for this purpose, with the least hazard of a refusal.

There were others, also, who, though they were not so much impressed by the considerations mentioned, yet objected to give their public testimony. Those whose livelihood, or promotion, or expectations, were dependent upon the government of the country, were generally backward on these occasions. Though they thought they discovered in the parliamentary conduct of Mr. Pitt, a bias in favour of the cause, they knew to a certainty that the Lord Chancellor Thurlow was against it.

They conceived, therefore, that the administration was at least divided upon the question, and they were fearful of being called upon, lest they should give offence, and thus injure their prospects in life. This objection was very prevalent in that part of the kingdom which I had selected for my tour.

The reader can hardly conceive how my mind was agitated and distressed on these different accounts. To have travelled more than two months,--to have seen many who could have materially served our cause,--and to have lost most of them,--was very trying. And though it is true that I applied a remedy, I was not driven to the adoption of it, till I had performed more than half my tour. Suffice it to say, that after having travelled upwards of sixteen hundred miles backwards and forwards, and having conversed with forty-seven persons, who were capable of promoting the cause by their evidence, I could only prevail upon nine, by all the interest I could make, to be examined.

On my return to London, whither I had been called up by the committee, to take upon me the superintendence of the evidence, which the privy council was now ready again to hear, I found my brother: he was then a young officer in the navy; and as I knew he felt as warmly as I did in this great cause, I prevailed upon him to go to Havre de Grace, the great slave-port in France, where he might make his observations for two or three months, and then report what he had seen and heard; so that we might have some one to counteract any false statement of things, which might be made relative to the subject in that quarter.

At length the examinations were resumed, and with them the contest, in which our own reputation and the fate of our cause were involved. The committee for the abolition had discovered, one or two willing evidences during my absence; and Mr. Wilberforce, who was now recovered from his severe indisposition, had found one or two others. These, added to my own, made a respectable body; but we had sent no more than four or five of these to the council, when the king's illness unfortunately stopped our career. For nearly five weeks between the middle of November and January, the examinations were interrupted or put off, so that at the latter period we began to fear, that there would be scarcely time to hear the rest; for not only the privy council report was to be printed, but the contest itself was to be decided by the evidence contained in it, in the existing session.

The examinations, however, went on; but they went on only slowly, being still subject to interruption from the same unfortunate cause. Among others I offered my mite of information again. I wished the council to see more of my African productions and manufactures, that they might really know what Africa was capable of affording, instead of the Slave Trade; and that they might make a proper estimate of the genius and talents of the natives. The samples which I had collected, had been obtained by great labour, and at no inconsiderable expense: for whenever I had notice that a vessel had arrived immediately from that continent, I never hesitated to go, unless under the most pressing engagements elsewhere, even as far as Bristol, if I could pick up but a single new article. The lords having consented, I selected several things for their inspection out of my box,--of the contents of which the following account may not be unacceptable to the reader:--

The first division of the box consisted of woods of about four inches square, all polished. Among these were mahogany of five different sorts, tulip-wood, satin-wood, cam-wood, bar-wood, fustic, black and yellow ebony, palm-tree, mangrove, calabash, and date. There were seven woods, of which the native names were remembered; three of these, Tumiah, Samain, and Jimlake, were of a yellow colour; Acajou was of a beautiful deep crimson; Bork and Quelle were apparently fit for cabinet work; and Benten was the wood of which the natives made their canoes. Of the, various other woods the names had been forgotten, nor were they known in England at all. One of them was of a fine purple; and from two others, upon which the privy council had caused experiments to be made, a strong yellow, a deep orange, and a flesh-colour were extracted.

The second, division included ivory and musk; four species of pepper, the long, the black, the Cayenne, and the Malaguetta; three species of gum, namely, Senegal, Copal, and ruber astringens; cinnamon, rice, tobacco, indigo, white and Nankin cotton, Guinea corn, and millet; three species of beans, of which two were used for food, and the other for dyeing orange; two species of tamarinds, one for food, and the other to give whiteness to the teeth; pulse, seeds, and fruits of various kinds, some of the latter of which Dr. Spaarman had p.r.o.nounced; from a trial during his residence in Africa, to be peculiarly valuable as drugs.

The third division contained an African loom, and an African spindle with spun cotton round it; cloths of cotton of various kinds made by the natives, some white, but others dyed by them of different colours, and others in which they had interwoven European silk; cloths and bags made of gra.s.s, and fancifully coloured; ornaments made of the same materials; ropes made from a species of aloes and others, remarkably strong, from gla.s.s and straw; fine string made from the fibres of the roots of trees; soap of two kinds; one of which was formed from an earthy substance; pipe-bowls made of clay, and of a brown red; one of these, which came from the village of Dakard, was beautifully ornamented by black devices burnt in, and was besides highly glazed; another brought from Galam, was made of earth, which was richly impregnated with little particles of gold; trinkets made by the natives from their own gold; knives and daggers made by them from our bar-iron; and various other articles, such as bags, sandals, dagger-cases, quivers, grisgris, all made of leather of their own manufacture, and dyed of various colours, and ingeniously sewed together.

The fourth division consisted of the thumb-screw, speculum oris, and chains and shackles of different kinds, collected at Liverpool. To these were added, iron neck-collars, and other instruments of punishment and confinement used in the West Indies, and collected at other places. The instrument also, by which Charles Horseler was mentioned to have been killed, in a former chapter, was to be seen among these.

We were now advanced far into February, when we were alarmed by the intelligence that the lords of the council were going to prepare their report: At this time we had sent but few persons to them to examine, in comparison with our opponents, and we had yet eighteen to introduce: for answers had come into my tables of questions from several places, and persons had been pointed out to us by our correspondents, who had increased our list of evidences to this number. I wrote therefore to them, at the desire of the committee for the abolition, and gave them the names of the eighteen, and requested also, that they would order, for their own inspection; certain muster-rolls of vessels from Poole and Dartmouth, that they might be convinced that the objection which the Earl of Sandwich had made in the House of Lords, against the abolition of the Slave Trade, had no solid foundation. In reply to my first request they informed me, that it was impossible, in the advanced state of the session, (it being then the middle of March,) that the examinations of so many could be taken; but I was at liberty, in conjunction with the Bishop of London, to select eight for this purpose.

This occasioned me to address them again; and I then found, to my surprise and sorrow, that even this last number was to be diminished; for I was informed in writing, "that the Bishop of London having laid my last letter before their lords.h.i.+ps, they had agreed to meet on the Sat.u.r.day next, and on the Tuesday following, for the purposes of receiving the evidence of some of the gentlemen named in it. And it was their lords.h.i.+ps' desire that I would give notice to any three of them (whose information I might consider the most material) of the above determination, that they might attend the committee accordingly."

This answer, considering the difficulties we had found in collecting a body of evidence, and the critical situation in which we were, was peculiarly distressing; but we had no remedy left us, nor could we reasonably complain. Three therefore were selected, and they were sent to deliver their testimony on their arrival in town.

But before the last of these had left the council room, who should come up to me but Dr. Arnold? He had but lately arrived at Bristol from Africa; and having heard from our friends there that we had been daily looking for him, he had come to us in London. He and Mr. Gardiner were the two surgeons, as mentioned in the former chapter, who had promised me, when I was in Bristol, in the year 1787, that they would keep a journal of facts during the voyages they were then going to perform.

They had both kept this promise. Gardiner, I found, had died upon the coast; and his journal, having been discovered at his death, had been buried with him in great triumph. But Arnold had survived, and he came now to offer us his services in the cause.

As it was a pity that such correct information as that taken down in writing upon the spot should be lost (for all the other evidences, except Dr. Spaarman and Mr. Wadstrom, had spoken from their memory only), I made all the interest I could to procure a hearing for Mr.

Arnold. Pleading now for the examination of him only, and under these particular circ.u.mstances, I was attended to. It was consented, in consequence of the little time which was now left for preparing and printing the report, that I should make out his evidence from his journal under certain heads. This I did. Mr. Arnold swore to the truth of it, when so drawn up, before Edward Montague, Esquire, a master in Chancery. He then delivered the paper in which it was contained to the lords of the council, who, on receiving it, read it throughout, and then questioned him upon it.

At this time, also, my brother returned with accounts and papers relative to the Slave Trade from Havre de Grace; but as I had pledged myself to offer no other person to be examined, his evidence was lost.

Thus, after all the pains we had taken, and in a contest, too, on the success of which our own reputation and the fate of Africa depended, we were obliged to fight the battle with sixteen less than we could have brought into the field; while our opponents, on the other hand, on account of their superior advantages, had mustered all their forces, not having omitted a single man.

I do not know of any period of my life in which I suffered so much, both in body and mind, as from the time of resuming these public inquiries by the privy council, to the time when they were closed. For I had my weekly duty to attend at the committee for the abolition during this interval. I had to take down the examinations of all the evidences who came to London, and to make certain copies of these. I had to summon these to town, and to make provision against all accidents; and here I was often troubled, by means of circ.u.mstances, which unexpectedly occurred, lest, when committees of the council had been purposely appointed to hear them, they should not be forthcoming at the time. I had also a new and extensive correspondence to keep up; for the tables of questions which had been sent down to our correspondents, brought letters almost innumerable on this subject, and they were always addressed to me. These not only required answers of themselves, but as they usually related to persons capable of giving their testimony, and contained the particulars of what they could state, they occasioned fresh letters to be written to others. Hence the writing often of ten or twelve daily became necessary.

But the contents of these letters afforded the circ.u.mstances, which gave birth to so much suffering. They contained usually some affecting tale of woe. At Bristol my feelings had been hara.s.sed by the cruel treatment of the seamen, which had come to my knowledge there: but now I was doomed to see this treatment over again in many other melancholy instances; and, additionally, to take in the various sufferings of the unhappy slaves. These accounts I could seldom get time to read till late in the evening, and sometimes not till midnight, when the letters containing them were to be answered. The effect of these accounts was in some instances to overwhelm me for a time in tears, and in others to produce a vivid indignation, which affected my whole frame. Recovering from these, I walked up and down the room: I felt fresh vigour, and made new determinations of perpetual warfare against this impious trade. I implored strength that I might succeed. I then sat down, and continued my work as long as my wearied eyes would permit me to see. Having been agitated in this manner, I went to bed; but my rest was frequently broken by the visions which floated before me. When I awoke, these renewed themselves to me, and they flitted about with me for the remainder of the day. Thus I was kept continually hara.s.sed: my mind was confined to one gloomy and heart-breaking subject for months. It had no respite, and my health began now materially to suffer.

But the contents of these letters were particularly grievous, on account of the severe labours which they necessarily entailed upon me in other ways than those which have been mentioned. It was my duty, while the privy council examinations went on, not only to attend to all the evidence which was presented to us by our correspondents, but to find out and select the best. The happiness of millions depended upon it.

Hence I was often obliged to travel during these examinations, in order to converse with those who had been pointed out to us as capable of giving their testimony; and, that no time might be lost, to do this in the night. More than two hundred miles in a week were sometimes pa.s.sed over on these occasions.

The disappointments too, which I frequently experienced in journeys, increased the poignancy of the, suffering, which arose from a contemplation of the melancholy cases which I had thus travelled to bring forward to the public view. The reader at present can have no idea of these. I have been sixty miles to visit a person, of whom I had heard, not only as possessing important knowledge, but as espousing our opinions on this subject. I have at length seen him. He has applauded my pursuit at our first interview. He has told me, in the course of our conversation, that neither my own pen, nor that of any other man, could describe adequately the horrors, of the Slave Trade, horrors which he himself had witnessed. He has exhorted me to perseverance in this n.o.ble cause. Could I have wished for a more favourable reception!--But mark the issue. He was the nearest relation of a rich person concerned in the traffic; and if he were to come forward with his evidence publicly, he should ruin all his expectations from that Quarter. In the same week I have visited another at a still greater distance. I have met with similar applause. I have heard him describe scenes of misery which he had witnessed, and on the relation of which he himself almost wept. But mark the issue again.--"I am a surgeon," says he; "through that window you see a s.p.a.cious house; it is occupied by a West Indian. The medical attendance upon his family is of considerable importance to the temporal interests of mine. If I give you my evidence I lose his patronage. At the house above him lives a East Indian. The two families are connected: I fear, if I lose the support of one, I shall lose that of the other also: but I will give you privately all the intelligence in my power."

The reader may now conceive the many miserable hours I must have spent, after such visits, in returning home; and how grievously my heart must have been afflicted by these cruel disappointments, but more particularly where they arose from causes inferior to those which have been now mentioned, or from little frivolous excuses, or idle and unfounded conjectures, unworthy of beings expected to fill a moral station in life. Yes, O man! often in these solitary journeyings have I exclaimed against the baseness of thy nature, when reflecting on the little paltry considerations which have smothered thy benevolence, and hindered thee from succouring an oppressed brother. And yet, on a further view of things, I have reasoned myself into a kinder feeling towards thee. For I have been obliged to consider ultimately, that there were both lights and shades in the human character; and that, if the bad part of our nature was visible on these occasions, the n.o.bler part of it ought not to be forgotten. While I pa.s.sed a censure upon those, who were backward in serving this great cause of humanity and justice, how many did I know, who were toiling in the support of it! I drew also this consolation from my reflections, that I had done my duty; that I had left nothing untried or undone; that amidst all these disappointments I had collected information, which might be useful at a future time; and that such disappointments were almost inseparable from the prosecution of a cause of such magnitude, and where the interests of so many were concerned:--

Having now given a general account of my own proceedings, I shall state those of the committee; or show how they contributed, by fulfilling the duties of their several departments, to promote the cause in the interim.

In the first place they completed the rules, or code of laws, for their own government.

They continued to adopt and circulate books, that they might still enlighten the public mind on the subject, and preserve it interested in favour of their inst.i.tution. They kept the press indeed almost constantly going for this purpose. They printed, within the period mentioned, RAMSAY'S, _Address on the proposed Bill for the Abolition; The Speech of Henry Beaufoy, Esq., on Sir William Dolben's Bill_, of which an extract is given in Chap. xxiii.; _Notes by a Planter on the two Reports from the Committee of the Honourable House of a.s.sembly of Jamaica_; _Observations on the Slave Trade_ by Mr. Wadstrom; and d.i.c.kSON'S _Letters on Slavery._ These were all new publications. To those they added others of less note, with new editions of the old.

They voted their thanks to the Rev. Mr. Clifford, for his excellent Sermon on the Slave Trade; to the pastor and congregation of the Baptist church at Maze Pond, Southwark, for their liberal subscription; and to John Barton, one of their own members, for the services he had rendered them. The latter, having left his residence in town for one in the country, solicited permission to resign, and hence this mark of approbation was given to him. He was continued also as an honorary and corresponding member.

They elected David Hartley and Richard Sharpe, Esqs., into their own body, and Alexander Jaffray, Esq., the Rev. Charles Symmons, of Haverfordwest, and the Rev. T. Burgess (afterwards bishop of Salisbury), as honorary and corresponding members. The latter had written _Considerations on the Abolition of Slavery and the Slave Trade, upon grounds of natural, religious, and political Duty_, which had been of great service to the cause.

Of the new correspondents of the committee within this period I may first mention Henry Taylor, of North s.h.i.+elds; William Proud, of Hull; the Rev. T. Gisborne, of Yoxall Lodge; and William Ellford, Esq., of Plymouth. The latter as chairman of the Plymouth committee, sent up for inspection an engraving of a plan and section of a slave-s.h.i.+p, in which the bodies of the slaves were seen stowed in the proportion of rather less than one to a ton. This happy invention gave all those who saw it a much better idea, than they could otherwise have had, of the horrors of their transportation, and contributed greatly, as will appear, afterwards, to impress the public in favour of our cause.

The next, whom I shall mention, was C.L. Evans, Esq., of West Bromwich; the Rev. T. Clarke, of Hull; S.P. Wolferstan, of Stratford, near Tamworth; Edmund Lodge, Esq., of Halifax; the Rev. Caleb Rotheram, of Kendal; and Mr. Campbell Haliburton, of Edinburgh. The news which Mr.

Haliburton sent was very agreeable. He informed us that, in consequence of the great exertions of Mr. Alison, an inst.i.tution had been formed in Edinburgh, similar to that in London, which would take all Scotland under its care and management, as far as related to this great subject.

He mentioned Lord Gardenston as the chairman; Sir William Forbes as the deputy-chairman; himself as the secretary; and Lord Napier, Professor Andrew Hunter, Professor Greenfield, and William Creech, Adam Rolland, Alexander Ferguson, John d.i.c.kson, John Erskine, John Campbell, Archibald Gibson, Archibald Fletcher, and Horatius Canning, Esqrs., as the committee.

The others were, the Rev. J. Bidlake, of Plymouth; Joseph Storrs, of Chesterfield; William Fothergill, of Carr End, Yorks.h.i.+re; J. Seymour, of Coventry; Moses Neave, of Poole; Joseph Taylor, of Scarborough; Timothy Clark, of Doncaster; Thomas Davis, of Milverton; George Croker Fox, of Falmouth; Benjamin Grubb, of Clonmell in Ireland; Sir William Forbes, of Edinburgh; the Rev. J. Jamieson, of Forfar; and Joseph Gurney, of Norwich; the latter of whom sent up a remittance, and intelligence at the same time, that a committee, under Mr. Leigh, so often before mentioned, had been formed in that city[A].

[Footnote A: On the removal of Mr. Leigh from Norwich, Dr. Pretyman, precentor of Lincoln and a prebend of Norwich, succeeded him.]

But the committee in London, while they were endeavouring to promote the object of their inst.i.tution at home, continued their exertions for the same purpose abroad within this period.

They kept up a communication with the different societies established in America.

They directed their attention also to the continent of Europe. They had already applied, as I mentioned before, to the king of Sweden in favour of their cause, and had received a gracious answer. They now attempted to interest other Potentates in it. For this purpose they bound up in an elegant manner two sets of the _Essays on the Slavery and Commerce of the Human Species, and on the Impolicy of the Slave Trade_, and sent them to the Chevalier de Pinto, in Portugal. They bound up in a similar manner three sets of the same, and sent them to Mr. Eden (afterwards Lord Aukland), at Madrid, to be given to the king of Spain, the Count d'Aranda, and the Marquis del Campomanes.

They kept up their correspondence with the committee at Paris, which had greatly advanced itself in the eyes of the French nation; so that, when the different bailliages sent deputies to the states-general, they instructed them to take the Slave Trade into their consideration as a national object, and with a view to its abolition.

They kept up their correspondence with Dr. Frossard of Lyons. He had already published in France on the subject of the Slave Trade; and now he offered the committee to undertake the task, so long projected by them, of collecting such arguments and facts concerning it, and translating them into different languages, as might be useful in forwarding their views in foreign parts.

They addressed letters also to various individuals, to Monsieur Snetlage, doctor of laws at Halle in Saxony; to Monsieur Ladebat, of Bordeaux; to the Marquis de Feuillade d'Aubusson, at Paris; and to Monsieur Necker. The latter in his answer replied in part as follows: "As this great question," says he, "is not in my department, but in that of the minister for the colonies, I cannot interfere in it directly, but I will give indirectly all the a.s.sistance in my power. I have for a long time taken an interest in the general alarm on this occasion, and in the n.o.ble alliance of the friends of humanity in favour of the injured Africans. Such an attempt throws a new l.u.s.tre over your nation. It is not yet, however, a national object in France; but the moment may perhaps come, and I shall think myself happy in preparing the way for it. You must be aware, however, of the difficulties which we shall have to encounter on our side of the water; for our colonies are much more considerable than yours; so that in the view of political interest we are not on an equal footing. It will therefore be necessary to find some middle line at first, as it cannot be expected that humanity alone will be the governing principle of mankind."

But the day was now drawing near, when it was expected that this great contest would be decided. Mr. Wilberforce, on the 19th of March, rose up in the House of Commons and desired the resolution to be read, by which the house stood pledged to take the Slave Trade into their consideration in the then session; He then moved that the house should resolve itself into a committee of the whole house on Thursday the 23rd of April, for this purpose. This motion was agreed to; after which he moved for certain official doc.u.ments necessary to throw light upon the subject in the course of its discussion.