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+*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 12507 ***
+
+THE
+HISTORY
+OF THE
+RISE, PROGRESS, AND ACCOMPLISHMENT
+OF
+THE ABOLITION
+OF
+THE AFRICAN SLAVE-TRADE
+BY THE
+BRITISH PARLIAMENT.
+
+BY THOMAS CLARKSON, M.A.
+
+1808.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER I.
+
+_Continuation from June 1788 to July 1789--Author travels to collect
+further evidence--great difficulties in obtaining it--forms committees on
+his tour--Privy council resume the examinations--inspect cabinet of African
+productions--obliged to leave many of the witnesses in behalf of the
+abolition unexamined--prepare their report--Labours of the committee in the
+interim--Proceedings of the planters and others--Report laid on the table
+of the House of Commons--Introduction of the question, and debate
+there--twelve propositions deduced from the report and reserved for future
+discussion--day of discussion arrives--opponents refuse to argue from the
+report--require new evidence--this granted and introduced--further
+consideration of the subject deferred to the next session--Renewal of Sir
+William Dolben's bill--Death and character of Ramsay._
+
+
+Matters had now become serious. The gauntlet had been thrown down and
+accepted. The combatants had taken their stations, and the contest was to
+be renewed, which was to be decided soon on the great theatre of the
+nation. The committee by the very act of their institution had pronounced
+the Slave-trade to be criminal. They, on the other hand, who were concerned
+in it, had denied the charge. It became the one to prove, and the other to
+refute it, or to fall in the ensuing session.
+
+The committee, in this perilous situation, were anxious to find out such
+other persons, as might become proper evidences before the privy council.
+They had hitherto sent there only nine or ten, and they had then only
+another, whom they could count upon for this purpose, in their view. The
+proposal of sending persons to Africa, and the West Indies, who might come
+back and report what they had witnessed, had been already negatived. The
+question then was, what they were to do. Upon this they deliberated, and
+the result was an application to me to undertake a journey to different
+parts of the kingdom for this purpose.
+
+When this determination was made I was at Teston, writing a long letter to
+the privy council on the ill usage and mortality of the seamen employed in
+the Slave-trade, which it had been previously agreed should be received as
+evidence there. I thought it proper, however, before I took my departure,
+to form a system of questions upon the general subject. These I divided
+into six tables. The first related to the productions of Africa, and the
+disposition and manners of the natives. The second, to the methods of
+reducing them to slavery. The third, to the manner of bringing them to the
+ships, their value, the medium of exchange, and other circumstances. 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 ships 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 Dorsetshire 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 instituted 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 assertion 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 assertion 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 consequent 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 a 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 principal 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 establishing a committee there. This was
+afterwards effected; and Mr. Milford, who, at a general meeting of the
+inhabitants of Exeter, on the tenth 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
+circumstances affected many. When I took out my pen and ink to put down the
+information, which a person was giving me, he became evidently embarrassed
+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 any thing 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
+Jimlaké, were of a yellow colour; Acajoú was of a beautiful deep crimson;
+Bork and Quellé 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 pronounced, 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
+grass, and fancifully coloured; ornaments made of the same materials; ropes
+made from a species of aloes, and others, remarkably strong, from grass 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 Galàm 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 the former volume, 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 that all of them might be examined. I 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 Lordships, they had agreed to meet on the Saturday next, and
+on the Tuesday following, for the purpose of receiving the evidence of some
+of the gentlemen named in it. And it was their Lordships' desire that I
+would give notice to any three of them (whose information I might consider
+as 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 then 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 Mr. 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 volume, who had promised me, when I was in Bristol,
+in the year 1787, that they would keep a journal of facts for me during the
+voyages they were then going to perform. They had both of them 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 circumstances,
+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
+circumstances, 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 of ten
+or twelve daily became necessary.
+
+But the contents of these letters afforded the circumstances, which gave
+birth to so much suffering. They contained usually some affecting tale of
+woe. At Bristol my feelings had been harassed 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 proceed. 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 harassed: 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 passed over on these occasions.
+
+The disappointments too, which I frequently experienced in these 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 noble 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 spacious 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 an 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
+nobler part of it ought not to be forgotten. While I passed 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 institution. 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, esquire, on Sir William Dolben's Bill, of which an extract was
+given in the first volume; Notes by a Planter on the two Reports from the
+Committee of the honourable House of Assembly of Jamaica; Observations on
+the Slave-trade by Mr. Wadstrom; and Dickson'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 reverend Mr. Gifford, 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, esquires, into their own
+body, and Alexander Jaffray, esquire, the reverend Charles Symmons of
+Haverfordwest, and the reverend T. Burgess (now bishop of St. David's), 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 Shields; William Proud, of Hull; the
+reverend T. Gisborne, of Yoxall Lodge; and William Ellford, esquire, of
+Plymouth. The latter, as chairman of the Plymouth committee, sent up for
+inspection an engraving of a plan and section of a slave-ship, 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, esquire, of West Bromwich;
+the reverend T. Clarke, of Hull; S.P. Wolferstan, esquire, of Stafford near
+Tamworth; Edmund Lodge, esquire, of Halifax; the reverend 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 institution 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 Dickson, John Erskine, John Campbell, Archibald Gibson,
+Archibald Fletcher, and Horatius Canning, esquires, as the committee.
+
+The others were, the reverend J. Bidlake, of Plymouth; Joseph Storrs, of
+Chesterfield; William Fothergill, of Carr End, Yorkshire; 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 reverend 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 institution 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 (now Lord Auckland), 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 Bourdeaux; 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 assistance in my power. I have for a long time taken
+an interest in the general alarm on this occasion, and in the noble
+alliance of the friends of humanity in favour of the injured Africans.
+Such an attempt throws a new lustre 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 nineteenth 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 twenty-third of April, for
+this purpose. This motion was agreed to; after which he moved for certain
+official documents, necessary to throw light upon the subject in the course
+of its discussion.
+
+This motion, by means of which the great day of trial was now fixed, seemed
+to be the signal for the planters, merchants, and other interested persons
+to begin a furious opposition. Meetings were accordingly called by
+advertisement. At these meetings much warmth and virulence were manifested
+in debate, and propositions breathing a spirit of anger were adopted. It
+was suggested there, in the vehemence of passion, that the Islands could
+exist independently of the Mother-country; nor were even threats withheld
+to intimidate government from effecting the abolition.
+
+From this time, also, the public papers began to be filled with such
+statements as were thought most likely to influence the members of the
+House of Commons, previously to the discussion of the question.
+
+The first impression attempted to be made upon them was with respect to the
+slaves themselves. It was contended, and attempted to be shown by the
+revival of the old argument of human sacrifices in Africa, that these were
+better off in the islands than in their own country. It was contended also,
+that they were people of very inferior capacities, and but little removed
+from the brute creation; whence an inference was drawn, that their
+treatment, against which so much clamour had arisen, was adapted to their
+intellect and feelings.
+
+The next attempt was to degrade the abolitionists in the opinion of the
+house, by showing the wildness and absurdity of their schemes. It was again
+insisted upon that emancipation was the real object of the former; so that
+thousands of slaves would be let loose in the islands to rob or perish, and
+who could never be brought back again into habits of useful industry.
+
+An attempt was then made to excite their pity in behalf of the planters.
+The abolition, it was said, would produce insurrections among the slaves.
+But insurrections would produce the massacre of their masters; and, if any
+of these should happily escape from butchery, they would be reserved only
+for ruin.
+
+An appeal was then made to them on the ground of their own interest and of
+that of the people, whom they represented. It was stated that the ruin of
+the islands would be the ruin of themselves and of the country. Its revenue
+would be half annihilated. Its naval strength would decay. Merchants,
+manufacturers and others would come to beggary. But in this deplorable
+situation they would expect to be indemnified for their losses.
+Compensation indeed must follow. It could not be withheld. But what would
+be the amount of it? The country would have no less than from eighty to a
+hundred millions to pay the sufferers; and it would be driven to such
+distress in paying this sum us it had never before experienced.
+
+The last attempt was to show them that a regulation of the trade was all
+that was now wanted. While this would remedy the evils complained of, it
+would prevent the mischief which would assuredly follow the abolition. The
+planters had already done their part. The assemblies of the different
+islands had most of them made wholesome laws upon the subject. The very
+bills passed for this purpose in Jamaica and Grenada had arrived in
+England, and might be seen by the public: the great grievances had
+been redressed: no slave could now be mutilated or wantonly killed
+by his owner; one man could not now maltreat, or bruise, or wound
+the slave of another; the aged could not now be turned off to perish
+by hunger. There were laws also relative to the better feeding and
+clothing of the slaves. It remained only that the trade to Africa
+should be put under as wise and humane regulations as the slavery in
+the islands had undergone.
+
+These different statements, appearing now in the public papers from day to
+day, began, in this early stage of the question, when the subject in all
+its bearings was known but to few, to make a considerable impression upon
+those, who were soon to be called to the decision of it. But that, which
+had the greatest effect upon them, was the enormous amount of the
+compensation, which, it was said, must be made. This statement against the
+abolition was making its way so powerfully, that Archdeacon Paley thought
+it his duty to write, and to send to the committee, a little treatise
+called Arguments against the unjust Pretensions of Slave-dealers and
+Holders, to be indemnified by pecuniary Allowances at the public Expense in
+case the Slave-trade should be abolished. This treatise, when the substance
+of it was detailed in the public papers, had its influence upon several
+members of the House of Commons. But there were others, who had been as it
+were panic-struck by the statement. These in their fright seemed to have
+lost the right use of their eyes, or to have looked through a magnifying
+glass. With these the argument of emancipation, which they would have
+rejected at another time as ridiculous, obtained now easy credit. The
+massacres too and the ruin, though only conjectural, they admitted also.
+Hence some of them deserted our cause wholly, while others, wishing to do
+justice as far as they could to the slaves on the one hand, and to their
+own countrymen on the other, adopted a middle line of conduct, and would go
+no further than the regulation of the trade.
+
+While these preparations were making by our opponents to prejudice the
+minds of those, who were to be the judges in this contest, Mr. Pitt
+presented the privy council report at the bar of the House of Commons; and
+as it was a large folio volume, and contained the evidence upon which the
+question was to be decided, it was necessary that time should be given to
+the members to peruse it. Accordingly the twelfth of May was appointed,
+instead of the twenty-third of April, for the discussion of the question.
+
+This postponement of the discussion of the question gave time to all
+parties to prepare themselves further. The merchants and planters availed
+themselves of it to collect petitions to parliament from interested persons
+against the abolition of the trade, to wait upon members of parliament by
+deputation, in order to solicit their attendance in their favour, and to
+renew their injurious paragraphs in the public papers. The committee for
+the abolition availed themselves of it to reply to these; and here Dr.
+Dickson, who had been secretary to Governor Hey, in Barbadoes, and who had
+offered the committee his Letters on Slavery before mentioned and his
+services also, was of singular use. Many members of parliament availed
+themselves of it to retire into the country to read the report. Among the
+latter were Mr. Wilberforce and Mr. Pitt. In this retirement they
+discovered, notwithstanding the great disadvantages under which we had
+laboured with respect to evidence, that our cause was safe, and that, as
+far as it was to be decided by reason and sound policy, it would triumph.
+It was in this retirement that Mr. Pitt made those able calculations, which
+satisfied him for ever after, as the minister of the country, as to the
+safety of the great measure of the abolition of the Slave-trade; for he had
+clearly proved, that not only the islands could go on in a flourishing
+state without supplies from the coast of Africa, but that they were then in
+a condition to do it.
+
+At length, the twelfth of May arrived. Mr. Wilberforce rose up in the
+Commons, and moved the order of the day for the house to resolve itself
+into a committee of the whole house, to take into consideration the
+petitions, which had been presented against the Slave-trade.
+
+This order having been read, he moved that the report of the committee of
+privy council; that the acts passed in the islands relative to slaves; that
+the evidence adduced last year on the Slave-trade; that the petitions
+offered in the last session against the Slave-trade; and that the accounts
+presented to the house, in the last and present session, relative to the
+exports and imports to Africa, be referred to the same committee.
+
+These motions having been severally agreed to, the house immediately
+resolved itself into a committee of the whole house, and Sir William Dolben
+was put into the chair.
+
+Mr. Wilberforce began by declaring, that, when he considered how much
+discussion the subject, which he was about to explain to the committee, had
+occasioned not only in that house but throughout the kingdom, and
+throughout Europe; and when he considered the extent and importance of it,
+the variety of interests involved in it, and the consequences which might
+arise, he owned he had been filled with apprehensions, lest a subject of
+such magnitude, and a cause of such weight, should suffer from the weakness
+of its advocate; but when he recollected that in the progress of his
+inquiries he had every where been received with candour, that most people
+gave him credit for the purity of his motives, and that, however many of
+these might then differ from him, they were all likely to agree in the end,
+he had dismissed his fears and marched forward with a firmer step in this
+cause of humanity, justice and religion. He could not, however, but lament
+that the subject had excited so much warmth. He feared that too many on
+this account were but ill prepared to consider it with impartiality. He
+entreated all such to endeavour to be calm and composed. A fair and cool
+discussion was essentially necessary. The motion he meant to offer was as
+reconcileable to political expediency as to national humanity. It belonged
+to no party-question. It would in the end be found serviceable to all
+parties; and to the best interests of the country. He did not come forward
+to accuse the West India planter, or the Liverpool merchant, or indeed any
+one concerned in this traffic; but, if blame attached any where, to take
+shame to himself, in common indeed with the whole parliament of Great
+Britain, who, having suffered it to be carried on under their own
+authority, were all of them participators in the guilt.
+
+In endeavouring to explain the great business of the day, he said he should
+call the attention of the house only to the leading features of the
+Slave-trade. Nor should he dwell long upon these. Every one might imagine
+for himself, what must be the natural consequence of such a commerce with
+Africa. Was it not plain that she must suffer from it? that her savage
+manners must be rendered still more ferocious? and that a trade of this
+nature, carried on round her coasts, must extend violence and desolation to
+her very centre? It was well known that the natives of Africa were sold as
+goods, and that numbers of them were continually conveyed away from their
+country by the owners of British vessels. The question then was, which way
+the latter came by them. In answer to this question the privy council
+report, which was then on the table, afforded evidence the most
+satisfactory and conclusive. He had found things in it, which had confirmed
+every proposition he had maintained before, whether this proposition had
+been gathered from living information of the best authority, or from the
+histories he had read. But it was unnecessary either to quote the report,
+or to appeal to history on this occasion. Plain reason and common sense
+would point out how the poor Africans were obtained. Africa was a country
+divided into many kingdoms, which had different governments and laws. In
+many parts the princes were despotic. In others they had a limited rule.
+But in all of them, whatever the nature of the government was, men were
+considered as goods and property, and, as such, subject to plunder in the
+same manner as property in other countries. The persons in power there were
+naturally fond of our commodities; and to obtain them (which could only be
+done by the sale of their countrymen) they waged war on one another, or
+even ravaged their own country, when they could find no pretence for
+quarrelling with their neighbours; in their courts of law many poor
+wretches, who were innocent, were condemned; and, to obtain these
+commodities in greater abundance, thousands were kidnapped and torn from
+their families and sent into slavery. Such transactions, he said, were
+recorded in every history of Africa, and the report on the table confirmed
+them. With respect, however, to these he should make but one or two
+observations. If we looked into the reign of Henry the Eighth, we should
+find a parallel for one of them. We should find that similar convictions
+took place; and that penalties followed conviction.
+
+With respect to wars, the kings of Africa were never induced to engage in
+them by public principles, by national glory, and least of all by the love
+of their people. This had been stated by those most conversant in the
+subject, by Dr. Spaarman and Mr. Wadstrom. They had conversed with these
+princes, and had learned from their own mouths, that to procure slaves was
+the object of their hostilities. Indeed, there was scarcely a single person
+examined before the privy council, who did not prove that the Slave-trade
+was the source of the tragedies acted upon that extensive continent. Some
+had endeavoured to palliate this circumstance; but there was not one who
+did not more or less admit it to be true. By one the Slave-trade was called
+the concurrent cause, by the majority it was acknowledged to be the
+principal motive of the African wars. The same might be said with respect
+to those instances of treachery and injustice, in which individuals were
+concerned. And here he was sorry to observe that our own countrymen were
+often guilty. He would only at present advert to the tragedy at Calabàr,
+where two large African villages, having been for some time at war, made
+peace. This peace was to have been ratified by intermarriages; but some of
+our captains, who were there, seeing their trade would be stopped for a
+while, sowed dissension again between them. They actually set one village
+against the other, took a share in the contest, massacred many of the
+inhabitants, and carried others of them away as slaves. But shocking as
+this transaction might appear, there was not a single history of Africa to
+be read, in which scenes of as atrocious a nature were not related. They,
+he said, who defended this trade, were warped and blinded by their own
+interests, and would not be convinced of the miseries they were daily
+heaping on their fellow-creatures. By the countenance they gave it, they
+had reduced the inhabitants of Africa to a worse state than that of the
+most barbarous nation. They had destroyed what ought to have been the bond
+of union and safety among them: they had introduced discord and anarchy
+among them: they had set kings against their subjects, and subjects against
+each other: they had rendered every private family wretched: they had, in
+short, given birth to scenes of injustice and misery not to be found in any
+other quarter of the globe.
+
+Having said thus much on the subject of procuring slaves in Africa, he
+would now go to that of the transportation of them. And here he had fondly
+hoped, that when men with affections and feelings like our own had been
+torn from their country, and every thing dear to them, he should have found
+some mitigation of their sufferings; but the sad reverse was the case. This
+was the most wretched part of the whole subject. He was incapable of
+impressing the house with what he felt upon it. A description of their
+conveyance was impossible. So much misery condensed in so little room was
+more than the human imagination had ever before conceived. Think only of
+six hundred persons linked together, trying to get rid of each other,
+crammed in a close vessel with every object that was nauseous and
+disgusting, diseased, and struggling with all the varieties of
+wretchedness. It seemed impossible to add any thing more to human misery.
+Yet shocking as this description must be felt to be by every man, the
+transportation had been described by several witnesses from Liverpool to be
+a comfortable conveyance. Mr. Norris had painted the accommodations on
+board a slave-ship in the most glowing colours. He had represented them in
+a manner which would have exceeded his attempts at praise of the most
+luxurious scenes. Their apartments, he said, were fitted up as
+advantageously for them as circumstances could possibly admit: they had
+several meals a day; some, of their own country provisions, with the best
+sauces of African cookery; and, by way of variety, another meal of pulse,
+according to the European taste. After breakfast they had water to wash
+themselves, while their apartments were perfumed with frankincense and
+lime-juice. Before dinner they were amused after the manner of their
+country; instruments of music were introduced: the song and the dance were
+promoted: games of chance were furnished them: the men played and sang,
+while the women and girls made fanciful ornaments from beads, with which
+they were plentifully supplied. They were indulged in all their little
+fancies, and kept in sprightly humour. Another of them had said, when the
+sailors were flogged, it was out of the hearing of the Africans, lest it
+should depress their spirits. He by no means wished to say that such
+descriptions were wilful misrepresentations. If they were not, it proved
+that interest of prejudice was capable of spreading a film over the eyes
+thick enough to occasion total blindness.
+
+Others, however, and these men of the greatest veracity, had given a
+different account. What would the house think, when by the concurring
+testimony of these the true history was laid open? The slaves who had been
+described as rejoicing in their captivity, were so wrung with misery at
+leaving their country, that it was the constant practice to set sail in the
+night, lest they should know the moment of their departure. With respect to
+their accommodation, the right ancle of one was fastened to the left ancle
+of another by an iron fetter; and if they were turbulent, by another on the
+wrists. Instead of the apartments described, they were placed in niches,
+and along the decks, in such a manner, that it was impossible for any one
+to pass among them, however careful he might be, without treading upon
+them. Sir George Yonge had testified, that in a slave-ship, on board of
+which he went, and which had not completed her cargo by two hundred and
+fifty, instead of the scent of frankincense being perceptible to the
+nostrils, the stench was intolerable. The allowance of water was so
+deficient, that the slaves were frequently found gasping for life, and
+almost suffocated. The pulse with which they had been said to be favoured,
+were absolutely English horse-beans. The legislature of Jamaica had stated
+the scantiness both of water and provisions, as a subject which called for
+the interference of parliament. As Mr. Norris had said, the song and the
+dance were promoted, he could not pass over these expressions without
+telling the house what they meant. It would have been much more fair if he
+himself had explained the word _promoted_. The truth was, that, for the
+sake of exercise, these miserable wretches, loaded with chains and
+oppressed with disease, were forced to dance by the terror of the lash, and
+sometimes by the actual use of it. "I," said one of the evidences, "was
+employed to dance the men, while another person danced the women." Such
+then was the meaning of the word _promoted_; and it might also be observed
+with respect to food, that instruments were sometimes carried out, in order
+to force them to eat; which was the same sort of proof, how much they
+enjoyed themselves in this instance also. With respect to their singing, it
+consisted of songs of lamentation for the loss of their country. While they
+sung they were in tears: so that one of the captains, more humane probably
+than the rest, threatened a woman with a flogging because the mournfulness
+of her song was too painful for his feelings. Perhaps he could not give a
+better proof of the sufferings of these injured people during their
+passage, than by stating the mortality which accompanied it. This was a
+species of evidence which was infallible on this occasion. Death was a
+witness which could not deceive them; and the proportion of deaths would
+not only confirm, but, if possible, even aggravate our suspicion of the
+misery of the transit. It would be found, upon an average of all the ships,
+upon which evidence had been given, that, exclusively of such as perished
+before they sailed from Africa, not less than twelve and a half per cent
+died on their passage: besides these, the Jamaica report stated that four
+and a half per cent died while in the harbours, or on shore before the day
+of sale, which was only about the space of twelve or fourteen days after
+their arrival there; and one third more died in the seasoning: and this in
+a climate exactly similar to their own, and where, as some of the witnesses
+pretended, they were healthy and happy. Thus, out of every lot of one
+hundred, shipped from Africa, seventeen died in about nine weeks, and not
+more than fifty lived to become effective labourers in our islands.
+
+Having advanced thus far in his investigation, he felt, he said, the
+wickedness of the Slave-trade to be so enormous, so dreadful, and
+irremediable, that he could stop at no alternative short of its abolition.
+A trade founded on iniquity, and carried on with such circumstances of
+horror, must be abolished, let the policy of it be what it might; and he
+had from this time determined, whatever were the consequences, that he
+would never rest till he had effected that abolition. His mind had indeed
+been harassed by the objections of the West India planters, who had
+asserted, that the ruin of their property must be the consequence of such a
+measure. He could not help, however, distrusting their arguments. He could
+not believe that the Almighty Being, who had forbidden the practice of
+rapine and bloodshed, had made rapine and bloodshed necessary to any part
+of his universe. He felt a confidence in this persuasion, and took the
+resolution to act upon it. Light indeed soon broke in upon him. The
+suspicion of his mind was every day confirmed by increasing information,
+and the evidence he had now to offer upon this point was decisive and
+complete. The principle upon which he founded the necessity of the
+abolition was not policy, but justice: but, though justice were the
+principle of the measure, yet he trusted he should distinctly prove it to
+be reconcileable with our truest political interest.
+
+In the first place, he asserted that the number of the slaves in our West
+India islands might be kept up without the introduction of recruits from
+Africa; and to prove this, he would enumerate the different sources of
+their mortality. The first was the disproportion of the sexes, there being,
+upon an average, about five males imported to three females: but this evil,
+when the Slave-trade was abolished, would cure itself. The second consisted
+in the bad condition in which they were brought to the islands, and the
+methods of preparing them for sale. They arrived frequently in a sickly and
+disordered state, and then they were made up for the market by the
+application of astringents, washes, mercurial ointments, and repelling
+drugs, so that their wounds and diseases might be hid. These artifices were
+not only fraudulent but fatal: but these, it was obvious, would of
+themselves fall with the trade. A third was, excessive labour joined with
+improper food; and a fourth was, the extreme dissoluteness of their
+manners. These also would both of them be counteracted by the impossibility
+of getting further supplies: for owners, now unable to replace those slaves
+whom they might lose, by speedy purchases in the markets, would be more
+careful how they treated them in future, and a better treatment would be
+productive of better morals. And here he would just advert to an argument
+used against those who complained of cruelty in our islands, which was,
+that it was the interest of masters to treat their slaves with humanity:
+but surely it was immediate and present, not future and distant, interest,
+which was the great spring of action in the affairs of mankind. Why did we
+make laws to punish men? It was their interest to be upright and virtuous:
+but there was a present impulse continually breaking in upon their better
+judgment, and an impulse, which was known to be contrary to their permanent
+advantage. It was ridiculous to say that men would be bound by their
+interest, when gain or ardent passion urged them. It might as well be
+asserted that a stone could not be thrown into the air, or a body move from
+place to place, because the principle of gravitation bound them to the
+surface of the earth. If a planter in the West Indies found himself reduced
+in his profits, he did not usually dispose of any part of his slaves; and
+his own gratifications were never given up, so long as there was a
+possibility of making any retrenchment in the allowance of his slaves.--But
+to return to the subject which he had left: He was happy to state, that as
+all the causes of the decrease which he had stated might be remedied, so,
+by the progress of light and reformation, these remedies had been gradually
+coming into practice; and that, as these had increased, the decrease of
+slaves had in an equal proportion been lessened. By the gradual adoption of
+these remedies, he could prove from the report on the table, that the
+decrease of slaves in Jamaica had lessened to such a degree, that from the
+year 1774 to the present it was not quite one in a hundred, and that in
+fact they were at present in a state of increase; for that the births in
+that island, at this moment, exceeded the deaths by one thousand or eleven
+hundred per annum. Barbadoes, Nevis, Antigua, and the Bermudas, were, like
+Jamaica, lessening their decrease, and holding forth an evident and
+reasonable expectation of a speedy state of increase by natural population.
+But allowing the number of negros even to decrease for a time, there were
+methods which would ensure the welfare of the West India islands. The lands
+there might be cultivated by fewer hands, and this to greater advantage to
+the proprietors and to this country, by the produce of cinnamon, coffee,
+and cotton, than by that of sugar. The produce of the plantations might
+also be considerably increased, even in the case of sugar, with less hands
+than were at present employed, if the owners of them would but introduce
+machines of husbandry. Mr. Long himself, long resident as a planter, had
+proved, upon his own estate, that the plough, though so little used in the
+West Indies, did the service of a hundred slaves, and caused the same
+ground to produce three hogsheads of sugar, which, when cultivated by
+slaves, would only produce two. The division of work, which, in free and
+civilized countries, was the grand source of wealth, and the reduction of
+the number of domestic servants, of whom not less than from twenty to forty
+were kept in ordinary families, afforded other resources for this purpose.
+But, granting that all these suppositions should be unfounded, and that
+every one of these substitutes should fail for a time, the planters would
+be indemnified, as is the case in all transactions of commerce, by the
+increased price of their produce in the British market. Thus, by contending
+against the abolition, they were defeated in every part of the argument.
+But he would never give up the point, that the number of the slaves could
+be kept up by natural population, and without any dependence whatever on
+the Slave-trade. He therefore called upon the house again to abolish it as
+a criminal waste of life--it was utterly unnecessary--he had proved it so
+by documents contained in the report. The merchants of Liverpool, indeed,
+had thought otherwise, but he should be cautious how he assented to their
+opinions. They declared last year that it was a losing trade at two slaves
+to a ton, and yet they pursued it when restricted to five slaves to three
+tons. He believed, however, that it was upon the whole a losing concern; in
+the same manner as the lottery would be a losing adventure to any company
+who should buy all the tickets. Here and there an individual gained a large
+prize, but the majority of adventurers gained nothing. The same merchants,
+too, had asserted that the town of Liverpool would be ruined by the
+abolition. But Liverpool did not depend for its consequence upon the
+Slave-trade. The whole export-tonnage from that place amounted to no less
+than 170,000 tons; whereas the export part of it to Africa amounted only to
+13,000. Liverpool, he was sure, owed its greatness to other and very
+different causes; the Slave-trade bearing but a small proportion to its
+other trades.
+
+Having gone through that part of the subject which related to the slaves,
+he would now answer two objections which he had frequently heard started.
+The first of these was, that the abolition of the Slave-trade would operate
+to the total ruin of our navy, and to the increase of that of our rivals.
+For an answer to these assertions, he referred, to what he considered to be
+the most valuable part of the report, and for which the house and the
+country were indebted to the indefatigable exertions of Mr. Clarkson. By
+the report it appeared, that, instead of the Slave-trade being a nursery
+for British seamen, it was their grave. It appeared that more seamen died
+in that trade in one year than in the whole remaining trade of the country
+in two. Out of 910 sailors in it, 216 died in the year, while upon a fair
+average of the same number of men employed in the trades to the East and
+West Indies, Petersburgh, Newfoundland, and Greenland, no more than 87
+died. It appeared also, that out of 3170, who had left Liverpool in the
+slave-ships in the year 1787, only 1428 had returned. And here, while he
+lamented the loss which the country thus annually sustained in her seamen,
+he had additionally to lament the barbarous usage which they experienced,
+and which this trade, by its natural tendency to harden the heart,
+exclusively produced. He would just read an extract of a letter from
+Governor Parrey, of Barbadoes, to Lord Sydney, one of the secretaries of
+state. The Governor declared he could no longer contain himself on account
+of the ill treatment, which the British sailors endured at the hands of
+their savage captains. These were obliged to have their vessels strongly
+manned, not only on account of the unhealthiness of the climate of Africa,
+but of the necessity of guarding the slaves, and preventing and suppressing
+insurrections; and when they arrived in the West Indies, and were out of
+all danger from the latter, they quarrelled with their men on the most
+frivolous pretences, on purpose to discharge them, and thus save the
+payment of supernumerary wages home. Thus many were left in a diseased and
+deplorable state; either to perish by sickness, or to enter into foreign
+service; great numbers of whom were for ever lost to their country. The
+Governor concluded by declaring, that the enormities attendant on this
+trade were so great, as to demand the immediate interference of the
+legislature.
+
+
+The next objection to the abolition was, that if we were to relinquish the
+Slave-trade, our rivals, the French, would take it up; so that, while we
+should suffer by the measure, the evil would still go on, and this even to
+its former extent. This was, indeed, a very weak argument; and, if it would
+defend the continuance of the Slave-trade, might equally be urged in favour
+of robbery, murder, and every species of wickedness, which, if we did not
+practise, others would commit. But suppose, for the sake of argument, that
+they were to take it up. What good would it do them? What advantages, for
+instance, would they derive from this pestilential commerce to their
+marine? Should not we, on the other hand, be benefited by this change?
+Would they not be obliged to come to us, in consequence of the cheapness of
+our manufactures, for what they wanted for the African market? But he would
+not calumniate the French nation so much as to suppose that they would
+carry on the trade if we were to relinquish it. He believed, on the other
+hand, that they would abolish it also. Mr. Necker, the present minister of
+France, was a man of religious principle; and, in his work upon the
+administration of the finances, had recorded his abhorrence of this trade.
+He was happy also to relate an anecdote of the present King of France,
+which proved that he was a friend to the abolition; for, being petitioned
+to dissolve a society, formed at Paris, for the annihilation of the
+Slave-trade, his majesty answered, that he would not, and was happy to hear
+that so humane an association was formed in his dominions. And here, having
+mentioned the society in Paris, he could not help paying a due compliment
+to that established in London for the same purpose, which had laboured with
+the greatest assiduity to make this important subject understood, and which
+had conducted itself with so much judgment and moderation as to have
+interested men of all religions, and to have united them in their cause.
+
+There was another topic which he would submit to the notice of the house
+before he concluded. They were perhaps not aware, that a fair and
+honourable trade might be substituted in the natural productions of Africa,
+so that our connection with that continent in the way of commercial
+advantage need not be lost. The natives had already made some advances in
+it; and if they had not appeared so forward in raising and collecting their
+own produce for sale as in some other countries, it was to be imputed to
+the Slave-trade: but remove the cause, and Africa would soon emerge from
+her present ignorant and indolent state. Civilization would go on with her
+as well as with other nations. Europe three or four centuries ago was in
+many parts as barbarous as Africa at present, and chargeable with as bad
+practices. For, what would be said, if, so late as the middle of the
+thirteenth century, he could find a parallel there for the
+Slave-trade?--Yes. This parallel was to be found even in England. The
+people of Bristol, in the reign of Henry the Seventh, had a regular market
+for children, which were bought by the Irish: but the latter having
+experienced a general calamity, which they imputed as a judgment from
+Heaven on account of this wicked traffic, abolished it. The only thing,
+therefore, which he had to solicit of the house, was to show that they were
+now as enlightened as the Irish were four centuries back, by refusing to
+buy the children of other nations. He hoped they would do it. He hoped,
+too, they would do it in an unqualified manner. Nothing less than a total
+abolition of the trade would do away the evils complained of. The
+legislature of Jamaica, indeed, had thought that regulations might answer
+the purpose. Their report had recommended, that no person should be
+kidnapped, or permitted to be made a slave, contrary to the customs of
+Africa. But might he not be reduced to this state very unjustly, and yet by
+no means contrary to the African laws? Besides, how could we distinguish
+between those who were justly or unjustly reduced to it? Could we discover
+them by their physiognomy?--But if we could, Who would believe that the
+British captains would be influenced by any regulations made in this
+country, to refuse to purchase those who had not been fairly, honestly, and
+uprightly enslaved? They who were offered to us for sale were brought, some
+of them, three or four thousand miles, and exchanged like cattle from one
+hand to another, till they reached the coast. But who could return these to
+their homes, or make them compensation for their sufferings during their
+long journeyings? He would now conclude by begging pardon of the house for
+having detained them so long. He could indeed have expressed his own
+conviction in fewer words. He needed only to have made one or two short
+statements, and to have quoted the commandment, "Thou shalt do no murder."
+But he thought it his duty to lay the whole of the case, and the whole of
+its guilt, before them. They would see now that no mitigations, no
+palliatives, would either be efficient or admissible. Nothing short of an
+absolute abolition could be adopted. This they owed to Africa: they owed
+it, too, to their own moral characters. And he hoped they would follow up
+the principle of one of the repentant African captains, who had gone before
+the committee of privy council as a voluntary witness, and that they would
+make Africa all the atonement in their power for the multifarious injuries
+she had received at the hands of British subjects. With respect to these
+injuries, their enormity and extent, it might be alleged in their excuse,
+that they were not fully acquainted with them till that moment, and
+therefore not answerable for their former existence: but now they could no
+longer plead ignorance concerning them. They had seen them brought directly
+before their eyes, and they must decide for themselves, and must justify to
+the world and their own consciences the facts and principles upon which
+their decision was formed.
+
+Mr. Wilberforce having concluded his speech, which lasted three hours and a
+half, read, and laid on the table of the house, as subjects for their
+future discussion, twelve propositions, which he had deduced from the
+evidence contained in the privy council report, and of which the following
+is the abridged substance:
+
+1. That the number of slaves annually carried from the coast of Africa, in
+British vessels, was about 38,000, of which, on an average, 22,500 were
+carried to the British islands, and that of the latter only 17,500 were
+retained there.
+
+2. That these slaves, according to the evidence on the table, consisted,
+First, of prisoners of war; Secondly, of free persons sold for debt, or on
+account of real or imputed crimes, particularly adultery and witchcraft; in
+which cases they were frequently sold with their whole families, and
+sometimes for the profit of those by whom they were condemned; Thirdly, of
+domestic slaves sold for the profit of their masters, in some places at the
+will of the masters, and in others, on being condemned by them for real or
+imputed crimes; Fourthly, of persons made slaves by various acts of
+oppression, violence, or fraud, committed either by the princes and chiefs
+of those countries on their subjects, or by private individuals on each
+other;--or, lastly, by Europeans engaged in this traffic.
+
+3. That the trade so carried on had necessarily a tendency to occasion
+frequent and cruel wars among the natives; to produce unjust convictions
+and punishments for pretended or aggravated crimes; to encourage acts of
+oppression, violence, and fraud, and to obstruct the natural course of
+civilization and improvement in those countries.
+
+4. That Africa in its present state furnished several valuable articles of
+commerce which were partly peculiar to itself, but that it was adapted to
+the production of others, with which we were now either wholly or in great
+part supplied by foreign nations. That an extensive commerce with Africa
+might be substituted in these commodities, so as to afford a return for as
+many articles as had annually been carried thither in British vessels: and,
+lastly, that such a commerce might reasonably be expected to increase by
+the progress of civilization there.
+
+5. That the Slave-trade was peculiarly destructive to the seamen employed
+in it; and that the mortality there had been much greater than in any
+British vessels employed upon the same coast in any other service or trade.
+
+6. That the mode of transporting the slaves from Africa to the West Indies
+necessarily exposed them to many and grievous sufferings, for which no
+regulations could provide an adequate remedy; and that in consequence
+thereof a large proportion had annually perished during the voyage.
+
+7. That a large proportion had also perished in the harbours in the West
+Indies, from the diseases contracted in the voyage and the treatment of the
+same, previously to their being sold, and that this loss amounted to four
+and a half per cent. of the imported slaves.
+
+8. That the loss of the newly imported slaves, within the three first years
+after their importation, bore a large proportion to the whole number
+imported.
+
+9. That the natural increase of population among the slaves in the islands,
+appeared to have been impeded principally by the following causes:--First,
+By the inequality of the sexes in the importations from Africa. Secondly,
+By the general dissoluteness of manners among the slaves, and the want of
+proper regulations for the encouragement of marriages and of rearing
+children among them. Thirdly, By the particular diseases which were
+prevalent among them, and which were in some instances to be attributed to
+too severe labour, or rigorous treatment, and in others to insufficient or
+improper food. Fourthly, By those diseases, which affected a large
+proportion of negro-children in their infancy, and by those, to which the
+negros newly imported from Africa had been found to be particularly liable.
+
+10. That the whole number of the slaves in the island of Jamaica in 1768
+was about 167,000, in 1774 about 193,000, and in 1787 about 256,000: that
+by comparing these numbers with the numbers imported and retained in the
+said island during all these years, and making proper allowances, the
+annual excess of deaths above births was in the proportion of about
+seven-eighths per cent.; that in the first six years of this period it was
+in the proportion of rather more than one on every hundred; that in the
+last thirteen years of the same it was in the proportion of about
+three-fifths on every hundred; and that a number of slaves, amounting to
+fifteen thousand, perished during the latter period in consequence of
+repeated hurricanes, and of the want of foreign supplies of provisions.
+
+11. That the whole number of slaves in the island of Barbadoes was in the
+year 1764 about 70,706; in 1774 about 74,874; in 1780 about 68,270; in
+1781, after the hurricane, about 63,248, and in 1786 about 62,115: that by
+comparing these numbers with the number imported into this island (not
+allowing for any re-exportation), the annual excess of deaths above births
+in the ten years from 1764 to 1774 was in the proportion of about five on
+every hundred; that in the seven years from 1774 to 1780 it was in the
+proportion of about one and one-third on every hundred; that between the
+year 1780 and 1781 there had been a decrease in the number of slaves of
+about five thousand; that in the six years from 1781 to 1786 the excess of
+deaths was in the proportion of rather less than seven-eighths on every
+hundred; that in the four years from 1783 to 1786 it was in the proportion
+of rather less than one-third on every hundred; and that, during the whole
+period, there was no doubt that some had been exported from the island, but
+considerably more in the first part of this period than in the last.
+
+12. That the accounts from the Leeward Islands, and from Dominica, Grenada,
+and St. Vincent's, did not furnish sufficient grounds for comparing the
+state of population in the said islands at different periods with the
+number of slaves, which had been from time to time imported there and
+exported therefrom; but that from the evidence which had been received
+respecting the present state of these islands, as well as that of Jamaica
+and Barbadoes, and from a consideration of the means of obviating the
+causes, which had hitherto operated to impede the natural increase of the
+slaves, and of lessening the demand for manual labour, without diminishing
+the profit of the planters, no considerable or permanent inconvenience
+would result from discontinuing the further importation of African slaves.
+
+These propositions having been laid upon the table of the house, Lord
+Penrhyn rose in behalf of the planters, and, next after him, Mr. Gascoyne
+(both members for Liverpool) in behalf of the merchants concerned in the
+latter place. They both predicted the ruin and misery, which would
+inevitably follow the abolition of the trade. The former said, that no less
+than seventy millions were mortgaged upon lands in the West Indies, all of
+which would be lost. Mr. Wilberforce therefore should have made a motion to
+pledge the house to the repayment of this sum, before he had brought
+forward his propositions. Compensation ought to have been agreed upon as a
+previously necessary measure. The latter said, that in consequence of the
+bill of last year many ships were laid up and many seamen out of employ.
+His constituents had large capitals engaged in the trade, and, if it were
+to be wholly done away, they would suffer from not knowing where to employ
+them. They both joined in asserting, that Mr. Wilberforce had made so many
+misrepresentations in all the branches of this subject, that no reliance
+whatever was to be placed on the picture, which he had chosen to exhibit.
+They should speak however more fully to this point, when the propositions
+were discussed.
+
+The latter declaration called up Mr. Wilberforce again, who observed, that
+he had no intention of misrepresenting any fact. He did not know that he
+had done it in any one instance; but, if he had, it would be easy to
+convict him out of the report upon the table.
+
+Mr. Burke then rose. He would not, he said, detain the committee long.
+Indeed he was not able, weary and indisposed as he then felt himself, even
+if he had an inclination to do it; but as, on account of his other
+parliamentary duty, he might not have it in his power to attend the
+business now before them in its course, he would take that opportunity of
+stating his opinion upon it.
+
+
+And, first, the house, the nation, and all Europe were under great
+obligations to Mr. Wilberforce for having brought this important subject
+forward. He had done it in a manner the most masterly, impressive, and
+eloquent. He had laid down his principles so admirably, and with so much
+order and force, that his speech had equalled any thing he had ever heard
+in modern oratory, and perhaps it had not been excelled by any thing to be
+found in ancient times. As to the Slave-trade itself, there could not be
+two opinions about it where men were not interested. A trade, begun in
+savage war, prosecuted with unheard-of barbarity, continued during the
+transportation with the most loathsome imprisonment, and ending in
+perpetual exile and slavery, was a trade so horrid in all its
+circumstances, that it was impossible to produce a single argument in its
+favour. On the ground of prudence, nothing could be said in defence of it;
+nor could it be justified by necessity. It was necessity alone, that could
+be brought to justify inhumanity; but no case of necessity could be made
+out strong enough to justify this monstrous traffic. It was therefore the
+duty of the house to put an end to it, and this without further delay. This
+conviction, that it became them to do it immediately, made him regret (and
+it was the only thing he regretted in the admirable speech he had heard)
+that his honourable friend should have introduced propositions on this
+subject. He could have wished that the business had been brought to a
+conclusion at once, without voting the propositions, which had been read to
+them. He was not over fond of abstract propositions. They were seldom
+necessary; and often occasioned great difficulty, embarrassment, and delay.
+There was besides no occasion whatever to assign detailed reasons for a
+vote, which Nature herself dictated, and which Religion enforced. If it
+should happen, that the propositions were not carried in that house or the
+other, such a complication of mischiefs might follow, as might occasion
+them heartily to lament that they were ever introduced. If the ultimate
+resolution should happen to be lost, he was afraid the propositions would
+pass as waste paper, if not be injurious to the cause at a future time.
+
+And now, as the house must bring this matter to an issue, he would beg
+their attention to a particular point. He entreated them to look further
+than the present moment, and to ask themselves, if they had fortified their
+minds sufficiently to bear the consequences, which might arise from the
+abolition of the Slave-trade, supposing they should decide upon it. When
+they abandoned it, other foreign powers might take it up, and clandestinely
+supply our islands with slaves. Had they virtue enough to see another
+country reaping profits, which they themselves had given up; and to abstain
+from that envy natural to rivals, and firmly to adhere to their
+determination? If so, let them thankfully proceed to vote the immediate
+abolition of the Slave-trade. But if they should repent of their virtue
+(and he had known miserable instances of such repentance), all hopes of
+future reformation of this enormous evil would be lost. They would go back
+to a trade they had abandoned with redoubled attachment, and would adhere
+to it with a degree of avidity and shameless ardour, to their own
+humiliation, and to the degradation and disgrace of the nation in the eyes
+of all Europe. These were considerations worth regarding, before they took
+a decisive step in a business, in which they ought not to move with any
+other determination than to abide by the consequences at all hazards. The
+honourable gentleman (who to his eternal honour had introduced this great
+subject to their notice) had in his eloquent oration knocked at every door,
+and appealed to every passion, well knowing that mankind were governed by
+their sympathies. But there were other passions to be regarded. Men were
+always ready to obey their sympathies, when it cost them nothing. But were
+they prepared to pay the price of their virtue on this great occasion? This
+was the question. If they were, they would do themselves immortal honour,
+and would have the satisfaction of having done away a commerce, which,
+while it was productive of misery not to be described, most of all hardened
+the heart, and vitiated the human character.
+
+With respect to the consequences mentioned by the two members for
+Liverpool, he had a word or two to offer upon them. Lord Penrhyn had talked
+of millions to be lost and paid for. But seeing no probability of any loss
+ultimately, he could see no necessity for compensation. He believed, on the
+other hand, that the planters would be great gainers by those wholesome
+regulations, which they would be obliged to make, if the Slave-trade were
+abolished. He did not however flatter them with the idea that this gain
+would be immediate. Perhaps they might experience inconveniences at first,
+and even some loss. But what then? With their loss, their virtue would be
+the greater. And in this light he hoped the house would consider the
+matter; for, if they were called upon to do an act of virtuous energy and
+heroism, they ought to think it right to submit to temporary disadvantages
+for the sake of truth, justice, humanity, and the prospect of greater
+happiness.
+
+The other member, Mr. Gascoyne, had said, that his constituents, if the
+trade were abolished, could not employ their capitals elsewhere. But
+whether they could or not, it was the duty of that house, if they put them
+into a traffic, which was shocking to humanity and disgraceful to the
+nation, to change their application, and not to allow them to be used to a
+barbarous purpose. He believed, however, that the merchants of Liverpool
+would find no difficulty on this head. All capitals required active motion.
+It was in their nature not to remain passive and unemployed. They would
+soon turn them into other channels. This they had done themselves during
+the American war; for the Slave-trade was then almost wholly lost, and
+yet they had their ships employed, either as transports in the service
+of Government, or in other ways.
+
+And as he now called upon the house not to allow any conjectural losses to
+become impediments in the way of the abolition of the Slave-trade, so he
+called upon them to beware how they suffered any representations of the
+happiness of the state of slavery in our islands to influence them against
+so glorious a measure. Admiral Barrington had said in his testimony, that
+he had often envied the condition of the slaves there. But surely, the
+honourable admiral must have meant, that, as he had often toiled like a
+slave in the defence of his country, (as his many gallant actions had
+proved,) so he envied the day, when he was to toil in a similar manner in
+the same cause. If, however, his words to be taken literally, his
+sensations could only be accounted for by his having seen the negros in the
+hour of their sports, when a sense of the misery of their condition was
+neither felt by themselves nor visible to others. But their appearance on
+such occasions did by no means disprove their low and abject state. Nothing
+made a happy slave but a degraded man. In proportion as the mind grows
+callous to its degradation, and all sense of manly pride is lost, the slave
+feels comfort. In fact, he is no longer a man. If he were to define a man,
+he would say with Shakespeare,
+
+  "Man is a being holding large discourse, Looking before and after."
+
+But a slave was incapable of looking before and after. He had no motive to
+do it. He was a mere passive instrument in the hands of others, to be used
+at their discretion. Though living, he was dead as to all voluntary agency.
+Though moving amidst the creation with an erect form, and with the shape
+and semblance of a human being, he was a nullity as a man.
+
+Mr. Pitt thanked his honourable friend Mr. Wilberforce for having at length
+introduced this great and important subject to the consideration of the
+house. He thanked him also for the perspicuous, forcible, and masterly
+manner, in which he had treated it. He was sure that no argument,
+compatible with any idea of justice, could be assigned for the continuation
+of the Slave-trade. And, at the same time that he was willing to listen
+with candour and attention to every thing, that could be urged on the other
+side of the question, he was sure that the principles from which his
+opinion was deduced were unalterable. He had examined the subject with the
+anxiety which became him, where the happiness and interests of so many
+thousands were concerned, and with the minuteness which would be expected
+of him, on account of the responsible situation which he held; and he
+averred, that it was sophistry, obscurity of ideas, and vagueness of
+reasoning, which alone could have hitherto prevented all mankind (those
+immediately interested in the question excepted) from agreeing in one and
+the same opinion upon the subject. With respect to the propriety of
+introducing the individual propositions, which had been offered, he
+differed with Mr. Burke, and he thanked his honourable friend Mr.
+Wilberforce for having chosen the only way, in which it could be made
+obvious to the world, that they were warranted on every ground of reason
+and of fact in coming to that vote, which he trusted would be the end of
+their proceeding. The grounds for the attainment of this end were
+distinctly stated in the propositions. Let the propositions be brought
+before the house, one by one, and argued from the evidence; and it would
+then be seen, that they were such as no one, who was not deaf to the
+language of reason, could deny. Let them be once entered upon the journals
+of that house, and it was almost impossible they should fail. The abolition
+must be voted. As to the mode of it, or how it should be effected, they
+were not at present to discuss it; but he trusted it would be such, as
+would not invite foreign powers to supply our islands with slaves by a
+clandestine trade. After a debt, founded on the immutable principles of
+justice, was found to be due, it was impossible but the country had means
+to cause it to be paid. Should such an illicit proceeding be attempted, the
+only language which it became us to adopt was, that Great Britain had
+resources to enable her to protect her islands, and to prevent that traffic
+from being clandestinely carried on by them, which she had thought fit from
+a regard to her character to abandon. It was highly becoming Great Britain
+to take the lead of other nations in such a virtuous and magnificent
+measure, and he could not but have confidence, that they would be inclined
+to share the honour with us, or be pleased to follow us as their example.
+If we were disposed to set about this glorious work in earnest, they might
+be invited to concur with us by a negotiation to be immediately opened for
+that purpose. He would only now observe, before he sat down, in answer to
+certain ideas thrown out, that he could by no means acquiesce in any
+compensation for losses, which might be sustained by the people of
+Liverpool, or by others in any other part of the kingdom, in the execution
+of this just and necessary undertaking.
+
+Sir William Yonge said, he wanted no inducement to concur with the
+honourable mover of the propositions, provided the latter could be fairly
+established, and no serious mischiefs were to arise from the abolition. But
+he was apprehensive that many evils might follow, in the case of any sudden
+or unlooked-for decrease in the slaves. They might be destroyed by
+hurricanes. They might be swept off by many fatal disorders. In these
+cases, the owners of them would not be able to fill up their places, and
+they who had lent money upon the lands, where the losses had happened,
+would foreclose their mortgages. He was fearful also that a clandestine
+trade would be carried on, and then the sufferings of the Africans, crammed
+up in small vessels, which would be obliged to be hovering about from day
+to day, to watch an opportunity of landing, would be ten times greater than
+any which they now experienced in the legal trade. He was glad, however, as
+the matter was to be discussed, that it had been brought forward in the
+shape of distinct propositions, to be grounded upon the evidence in the
+privy council report.
+
+Mr. Fox observed, that he did not like, where he agreed as to the substance
+of a measure, to differ with respect to the form of it. If, however, he
+differed in any thing in the present case, it was with a view rather to
+forward the business than to injure it, or to throw any thing like an
+obstacle in its way. Nothing like either should come from him. What he
+thought was, that all the propositions were not necessary to be voted
+previously to the ultimate decision, though some of them undoubtedly were.
+He considered them as of two classes: the one, alleging the grounds upon
+which it was proper to proceed to the abolition; such as that the trade was
+productive of inexpressible misery, in various ways, to the innocent
+natives of Africa; that it was the grave of our seamen; and so on: the
+other, merely answering objections which might be started, and where there
+might be a difference of opinion. He was however glad that the propositions
+were likely to be entered upon the journals; since, if from any misfortune
+the business should be deferred, it might succeed another year. Sure he was
+that it could not fail to succeed sooner or later. He highly approved of
+what Mr. Pitt had said, relative to the language it became us to hold out
+to foreign powers in case of a clandestine trade. With respect, however, to
+the assertion of Sir William Yonge, that a clandestine trade in slaves
+would be worse than a legal one, he could not admit it. Such a trade, if it
+existed at all, ought only to be clandestine. A trade in human flesh and
+sinews was so scandalous, that it ought not openly to be carried on by any
+government whatever, and much less by that of a Christian country. With
+regard to the regulation of the Slave-trade, he knew of no such thing as a
+regulation of robbery and murder. There was no medium. The legislature must
+either abolish it, or plead guilty of all the wickedness which had been
+shown to attend it. He would now say a word or two with respect to the
+conduct of foreign nations on this subject. It was possible that these,
+when they heard that the matter had been discussed in that house, might
+follow the example, or they might go before us and set one themselves. If
+this were to happen, though we might be the losers, humanity would be the
+gainer. He himself had been thought sometimes to use expressions relative
+to France, which were too harsh, and as if he could only treat her as the
+enemy of this country. Politically speaking, France was our rival. But he
+well knew the distinction between political enmity and illiberal prejudice.
+If there was any great and enlightened nation in Europe, it was France,
+which was as likely as any country upon the face of the globe to catch a
+spark from the light of our fire, and to act upon the present subject with
+warmth and enthusiasm. France had often been improperly stimulated by her
+ambition; and he had no doubt but that, in the present instance, she would
+readily follow its honourable dictates.
+
+Mr. (now Lord) Grenville would not detain the house by going into a
+question, which had been so ably argued; but he should not do justice to
+his feelings, if he did not express publicly to his honourable friend, Mr.
+Wilberforce, the pleasure he had received from one of the most masterly and
+eloquent speeches he had ever heard,--a speech, which, while it did honour
+to him, entitled him to the thanks of the house, of the people of England,
+of all Europe, and of the latest posterity. He approved of the
+propositions, as the best mode of bringing this great question to a happy
+issue. He was pleased also with the language which had been held out with
+respect to foreign nations, and with our determination to assert our right
+of preventing our colonies from carrying on any trade, which we had thought
+it our duty to abandon.
+
+Aldermen Newnham, Sawbridge, and Watson, though they wished well to the
+cause of humanity, could not, as representatives of the city of London,
+give their concurrence to a measure, which would injure it so essentially
+as that of the abolition of the Slave-trade. This trade might undoubtedly
+be put under wholesome regulations, and made productive of great commercial
+advantages. But, if it were abolished, it would render the city of London
+one scene of bankruptcy and ruin. It became the house to take care, while
+they were giving way to the goodness of their hearts, that they did not
+contribute to the ruin of the mercantile interests of their country.
+
+Mr. Martin stated, that he was so well satisfied with the speech of the
+honourable gentleman, who had introduced the propositions, and with the
+language held out by other distinguished members on this subject, that he
+felt himself more proud than ever of being an Englishman. He hoped and
+believed, that the melancholy predictions of the worthy aldermen would not
+prove true, and that the citizens of London would have too much public
+spirit to wish that a great national object (which comprehended the great
+duties of humanity, and justice) should be set aside, merely out of
+consideration to their own private interests.
+
+Mr. Dempster expected, notwithstanding all he had heard, that the first
+proposition submitted to them, would have been to make good out of the
+public purse all the losses individuals were liable to sustain from an
+abolition of the Slave-trade. This ought to have been, as Lord Penrhyn had
+observed, a preliminary measure. He did not like to be generous out of the
+pockets of others. They were to abolish the trade, it was said, out of a
+principle of humanity. Undoubtedly they owed humanity to all mankind. But
+they also owed justice to those, who were interested in the event of the
+question, and had embarked their fortunes on the faith of parliament. In
+fact, he did not like to see men introducing even their schemes of
+benevolence to the detriment of other people; and much less did he like to
+see them going to the colonies, as it were upon their estates, and
+prescribing rules to them for their management. With respect to his own
+speculative opinion, as it regarded cultivation, he had no objection to
+give it. He was sure that sugar could be raised cheaper by free men than by
+slaves. This the practice in China abundantly proved. But yet neither he
+nor any other person had a right to force a system upon others. As to the
+trade itself, by which the present labourers were supplied, it had been
+considered by that house as so valuable, that they had preferred it to all
+others, and had annually voted a considerable sum towards carrying it on.
+They had hitherto deemed it an essential nursery for our seamen. Had it
+really been such as had been represented, our ancestors would scarcely have
+encouraged it; and therefore, upon these and other considerations, he could
+not help thinking that they would be wanting in their duty, if they
+abolished it altogether.
+
+Mr. William Smith would not detain the house long at that late hour upon
+this important subject; but he could not help testifying the great
+satisfaction he felt at the manner, in which the honourable gentleman who
+opened the debate (if it could be so called) had treated it. He approved of
+the propositions as the best mode of bringing the decision to a happy
+issue. He gave Mr. Fox great credit for the open and manly way, in which he
+had manifested his abhorrence of this trade, and for the support he meant
+to give to the total and unqualified abolition of it; for he was satisfied,
+that the more it was inquired into, the more it would be found that nothing
+short of abolition would cure the evil. With respect to certain assertions
+of the members for Liverpool, and certain melancholy predictions about the
+consequences of such an event, which others had held out, he desired to lay
+in his claim for observation upon them, when the great question should come
+before the house.
+
+Soon after this the house broke up; and the discussion of the propositions,
+which was the next parliamentary measure intended, was postponed to a
+future day, which was sufficiently distant to give all the parties
+concerned time to make the necessary preparations for it.
+
+Of this interval the committee for the abolition availed themselves to
+thank Mr. Wilberforce for the very able and satisfactory manner, in which
+he had stated to the house his propositions for the abolition of the
+Slave-trade, and for the unparalleled assiduity and perseverance, with
+which he had all along endeavoured to accomplish this object, as well as to
+take measures themselves for the further promotion of it. Their opponents
+availed themselves of this interval also. But that, which now embarrassed
+them, was the evidence contained in the privy council report. They had no
+idea, considering the number of witnesses they had sent to be examined,
+that this evidence, when duly weighed, could by right reasoning have given
+birth to the sentiments, which had been displayed in the speeches of the
+most distinguished members of the House of Commons, or to the contents of
+the propositions, which had been laid upon their table. They were
+thunder-struck as it were by their own weakness; and from this time they
+were determined, if possible, to get rid of it as a standard for decision,
+or to interpose every parliamentary delay in their power.
+
+On the twenty-first of May, the subject came again before the attention of
+the house. It was ushered in, as was expected, by petitions collected in
+the interim, and which were expressive of the frightful consequences, which
+would attend the abolition of the Slave-trade. Alderman Newnham presented
+one from certain merchants in London; Alderman Watson another from certain
+merchants, mortgagees, and creditors of the sugar-islands; Lord Maitland
+another from the planters of Antigua; Mr. Blackburne another from certain
+manufacturers of Manchester; Mr. Gascoyne another from the corporation of
+Liverpool; and Lord Penrhyn others from different interested bodies in the
+same town.
+
+Mr. Wilberforce then moved the order of the day, for the house to go into a
+committee of the whole house on the report of the privy council, and the
+several matters of evidence already upon the table relative to the
+Slave-trade.
+
+Mr. Alderman Sawbridge immediately arose, and asked Mr. Wilberforce, if he
+meant to adduce any other evidence, besides that in the privy council
+report, in behalf of his propositions, or to admit other witnesses, if such
+could be found, to invalidate them. Mr. Wilberforce replied, that he was
+quite satisfied with the report on the table. It would establish all his
+propositions. He should call no witnesses himself: as to permission to
+others to call them, that must be determined by the house.
+
+This question and this answer gave birth immediately to great disputes upon
+the subject. Aldermen Sawbridge, Newnham, and Watson; Lords Penrhyn and
+Maitland; Mr. Gascoyne, Marsham, and others spoke against the admission of
+the evidence, which had been laid upon the table. They contended, that it
+was insufficient, defective, and contradictory; that it was _ex parte_
+evidence; that it had been manufactured by ministers; that it was founded
+chiefly on hearsay, and that the greatest part of it was false; that it had
+undergone no cross-examination; that it was unconstitutional; and that, if
+they admitted it, they would establish a dangerous precedent, and abandon
+their rights. It was urged on the other hand by Mr. Courtenay, that it
+could not be _ex parte_ evidence, because it contained testimony on both
+sides of the question. The circumstance also of its being contradictory,
+which had been alleged against it, proved that it was the result of an
+impartial examination. Mr. Fox observed, that it was perfectly admissible.
+He called upon those, who took the other side of the question, to say why,
+if it was really inadmissible, they had not opposed it at first. It had
+now been a long time on the table, and no fault had been found with it.
+The truth was, it did not suit them, and they were determined by a
+side-wind as it were to put an end to the inquiry. Mr. Pitt observed
+that, if parliament had previously resolved to receive no evidence
+on a given subject but from the privy council, such a resolution
+indeed would strike at the root of the privileges of the House of
+Commons; but it was absurd to suppose that the house could upon
+no occasion receive evidence, taken where it was most convenient
+to take it, and subject throughout to new investigation, if any
+one doubted its validity. The report of the privy council consisted, first,
+of calculations and accounts from the public offices, and, next, of written
+documents on the subject; both of which were just as authentic, as if they
+had been laid upon the table of that house. The remaining part of it
+consisted of the testimony of living witnesses, all of whose names were
+published, so that if any one doubted their veracity, it was open to him to
+reexamine all or each of them. It had been said by adversaries that the
+report on the table was a weak and imperfect report, but would not these
+have the advantage of its weakness and imperfection? It was strange, when
+his honourable friend, Mr. Wilberforce, had said, "Weak and imperfect as
+the report may be thought to be, I think it strong enough to bear me out in
+all my propositions," that they, who objected to it, should have no better
+reason to give than this, "We object, because the ground of evidence on
+which you rest is too weak to support your cause." Unless it were meant to
+say (and the meaning seemed to be but thinly disguised) that the house
+ought to abandon the inquiry, he saw no reason whatever for not going
+immediately into a committee; and he wished gentlemen to consider whether
+it became the dignity of their proceedings to obstruct the progress of an
+inquiry, which the house had pledged itself to undertake. Their conduct
+indeed seemed extraordinary on this occasion. It was certainly singular
+that, while the report had been five weeks upon the table, no argument had
+been brought against its sufficiency; but that on the moment when the house
+was expected to come to an ultimate vote upon the subject, it should be
+thought defective, contradictory, unconstitutional, and otherwise
+objectionable. These objections, he was satisfied, neither did nor could
+originate with the country gentlemen; but they were brought forward, for
+purposes not now to be concealed, by the avowed enemies of this noble
+cause.
+
+In the course of the discussion, which arose upon this subject, every
+opportunity was taken to impress the house with the dreadful consequences
+of the abolition. Mr. Henniker read a long letter from the King of Dahomey
+to George the First; which had been found among the papers of James, first
+Duke of Chandos, and which had remained in the family till that time. In
+this, the King of Dahomey boasted of his victory over the King of Ardrah,
+and how he had ornamented the pavement and walls of his palace with the
+heads of the vanquished. These cruelties, Mr. Henniker said, were not
+imputable to the Slave-trade. They showed the Africans to be naturally a
+savage people, and that we did them a great kindness by taking them from
+their country. Alderman Sawbridge maintained that, if the abolition passed,
+the Africans, who could not be sold as slaves, would be butchered at home;
+while those, who had been carried to our islands, would be no longer under
+control. Hence insurrections, and the manifold evils which belonged to
+them. Alderman Newnham was certain that the abolition would be the ruin of
+the trade of the country. It would affect even the landed interest, and the
+funds. It would be impossible to collect money to diminish the national
+debt. Every man in the kingdom would feel the abolition come home to him.
+Alderman Watson maintained the same argument, and pronounced the trade
+under discussion to be a merciful and humane trade.
+
+Compensation was also insisted upon by Mr. Drake, Alderman Newnham, Mr.
+Henniker, Mr. Cruger, and others. This was resisted by Mr. Burke; who said
+that compensation in such a case would be contrary to every principle of
+legislation. Government gave encouragement to any branch of commerce, while
+it was regarded as conducive to the welfare of the community, or compatible
+with humanity and justice. But they were competent to withdraw their
+countenance from it, when it was found to be immoral, and injurious, and
+disgraceful to the state. They, who engaged in it, knew the terms under
+which they were placed, and adopted it with all the risks with which it was
+accompanied; and of consequence it was but just, that they should be
+prepared to abide by the loss which might accrue, when the public should
+think it right no longer to support it. But such a trade as this it was
+impossible any longer to support. Indeed it was not a trade. It was a
+system of robbery. It was a system, too, injurious to the welfare of other
+nations.
+
+How could Africa ever be civilized under it? While we continued to purchase
+the natives, they must remain in a state of barbarism. It was impossible to
+civilize slaves. It was contrary to the system of human nature. There was
+no country placed under such disadvantageous circumstances, into which the
+shadow of improvement had ever been introduced.
+
+Great pains were taken to impress the house with the propriety of
+regulation. Sir Grey Cooper; Aldermen Sawbridge, Watson, and Newnham; Mr.
+Marsham, and Mr. Cruger, contended strenuously for it, instead of
+abolition. It was also stated that the merchants would consent to any
+regulation of the trade, which might be offered them.
+
+In the course of the debate much warmth of temper was manifested on both
+sides. The expression of Mr. Fox in a former debate, "that the Slave-trade
+could not be regulated, because there could be no regulation of robbery and
+murder," was brought up, and construed by planters in the house as a charge
+of these crimes upon themselves. Mr. Fox, however, would not retract the
+expression. He repeated it. He had no notion, however, that any individual
+would have taken it to himself. If it contained any reflection at all, it
+was on the whole parliament, who had sanctioned such a trade. Mr. Molyneux
+rose up, and animadverted severely on the character of Mr. Ramsay, one of
+the evidences in the privy council report, during his residence in the West
+Indies. This called up Sir William Dolben and Sir Charles Middleton in his
+defence, the latter of whom bore honourable testimony to his virtues from
+an intimate acquaintance with him, and a residence in the same village with
+him, for twenty years. Mr. Molyneux spoke also in angry terms of the
+measure of abolition. To annihilate the trade, he said, and to make no
+compensation on account of it, was an act of swindling. Mr. Macnamara
+called the measure hypocritical, fanatic, and methodistical. Mr. Pitt was
+so irritated at the insidious attempt to set aside the privy council
+report, when no complaint had been alleged against it before, that he was
+quite off his guard, and he thought it right afterwards to apologize for
+the warmth into he had been betrayed. The Speaker too was obliged
+frequently to interfere. On this occasion no less than thirty members
+spoke. And there had probably been few seasons, when so much disorder had
+been discoverable in that house.
+
+The result of the debate was, a permission to those interested in the
+continuance of the Slave-trade to bring counsel to the bar on the
+twenty-sixth of May, and then to introduce such witnesses, as might throw
+further light on the propositions in the shortest time: for Mr. Pitt only
+acquiesced in this new measure on a supposition, "that there would be no
+unnecessary delay, as he could, by no means submit to the ultimate
+procrastination of so important a business." He even hoped (and in this
+hope he was joined by Mr. Fox) that those concerned would endeavour to
+bring the whole of the evidence they meant to offer at the first
+examination.
+
+On the day appointed, the house met for the purposes now specified; when
+Alderman Newnham, thinking that such an important question should not be
+decided but in a full assembly of the representatives of the nation, moved
+for a call of the house on that day fortnight. Mr. Wilberforce stated that
+he had no objection to such a measure; believing the greater the number
+present the more favourable it would be to his cause. This motion, however,
+produced a debate and a division, in which it appeared that there were one
+hundred and fifty-eight in favour of it, and twenty-eight against it. The
+business of the day now commenced. The house went into a committee, and Sir
+William Dolben was put into the chair. Mr. Serjeant Le Blanc was then
+called in. He made an able speech in behalf of his clients; and introduced
+John Barnes, esquire, as his first witness, whose examination took up the
+remainder of the day. By this step they, who were interested in the
+continuance of the trade, attained their wishes, for they had now got
+possession of the ground with their evidence; and they knew they could keep
+it, almost as long as they pleased, for the purposes of delay. Thus they,
+who boasted, when the privy council examinations began, that they would
+soon do away all the idle tales, which had been invented against them, and
+who desired the public only to suspend their judgment till the report
+should come out, when they would see the folly and wickedness of all our
+allegations, dared not abide by the evidence, which they themselves had
+taught others to look up to as the standard by which they were desirous of
+being judged: thus they, who had advantages beyond measure in forming a
+body of evidence in their own favour, abandoned that, which they had
+collected. And here it is impossible for me not to make a short comparative
+statement on this subject, if it were only to show how little can be made
+out, with the very best opportunities, against the cause of humanity and
+religion. With respect to ourselves, we had almost all our witnesses to
+seek. We had to travel after them for weeks together. When we found them,
+we had scarcely the power of choice. We were obliged to take them as they
+came. When we found them, too, we had generally to implore them to come
+forward in our behalf. Of those so implored three out of four refused, and
+the plea for this refusal was a fear lest they should injure their own
+interests. The merchants, on the other hand, had their witnesses ready on
+the spot. They had always ships in harbour containing persons, who had a
+knowledge of the subject. They had several also from whom to choose. If one
+man was favourable to their cause in three of the points belonging to it,
+but was unfavourable in the fourth, he could be put aside and replaced.
+When they had thus selected them, they had not to entreat, but to command,
+their attendance. They had no fear, again, when they thus commanded, of a
+refusal on the ground of interest; because these were promoting their
+interest by obliging those who employed them. Viewing these and other
+circumstances, which might be thrown into this comparative statement, it
+was some consolation to us to know, amidst the disappointment which this
+new measure occasioned, and our apparent defeat in the eyes of the public,
+that we had really beaten our opponents at their own weapons, and that, as
+this was a victory in our own private feelings, so it was the presage to us
+of a future triumph.
+
+On the twenty-ninth of May, Mr. Tierney made a motion to divide the
+consideration of the Slave-trade into two heads, by separating the African
+from the West Indian part of the question. This he did for the more clear
+discussion of the propositions, as well as to save time. This motion,
+however, was overruled by Mr. Pitt.
+
+At length, on the ninth of June, by which time it was supposed that new
+light, and this in sufficient quantity, would have been thrown upon the
+propositions, it appeared that only two witnesses had been fully heard. The
+examinations, therefore, were continued, and they went on till the
+twenty-third. On this day, the order for the call of the house, which had
+been prolonged, standing unrepealed, there was a large attendance of
+members. A motion was then made to get rid of the business altogether, but
+it failed. It was now seen, however, that it was impossible to bring the
+question to a final decision in this session, for they, who were interested
+in it, affirmed that they had yet many important witnesses to introduce.
+Alderman Newnham, therefore, by the consent of Mr. Wilberforce, moved, that
+"the further consideration of the subject be deferred to the next session."
+On this occasion, Mr. William Smith remarked, that though the decision on
+the great question was thus to be adjourned, he hoped the examinations, at
+least, would be permitted to go on. He had not heard any good reason, why
+they might not be carried on for some weeks longer. It was known that the
+hearing of evidence was at all times thinly attended. If therefore the few
+members, who did attend, were willing to give up their time a little
+longer, why should other members complain of an inconvenience in the
+suffering of which they took no share? He thought that by this proceeding
+the examination of witnesses on the part of the merchants might be
+finished, and of consequence the business brought into a very desirable
+state of forwardness against the ensuing session. These observations had
+not the desired effect, and the motion of Mr. Alderman Newnham was carried
+without a division. Thus the great question, for the elucidation of which
+all the new evidences were to be heard at the very first examination, in
+order that it might be decided by the ninth of June, was by the intrigue of
+our opponents deferred to another year.
+
+The order of the day for going into the further consideration of the
+Slave-trade having been discharged, Sir William Dolben rose, to state, that
+it was his intention to renew his bill of the former year, relative to the
+conveyance of the unhappy Africans from their own country to the West
+Indies, and to propose certain alterations in it. He made a motion
+accordingly, which was adopted; and he and Mr. Wilberforce were desired to
+prepare the same.
+
+This bill he introduced soon afterwards, and it passed; but not without
+opposition. It was a matter, however, of great pleasure to find that the
+worthy baronet was enabled by the assistance of Captain (afterwards
+Admiral) Macbride, and other naval officers in the house, to carry such
+clauses, as provided in some degree for the comfort of the poor seamen, who
+were seduced into this wicked trade. They could not indeed provide against
+the barbarity of their captains; but they secured them a space under the
+half deck in which to sleep. They prescribed a form of muster-rolls, which
+they were to see and sign in the presence of the clearing officer. They
+regulated their food both as to kind and quantity; and they preserved them
+from many of the impositions, to which they had been before exposed.
+
+From the time when Mr. Wilberforce gave his first notice this session to
+the present, I had been variously employed, but more particularly in the
+composition of a new work. It was soon perceived to be the object of our
+opponents, to impress upon the public the preference of regulation to
+abolition. I attempted therefore to show the fallacy and wickedness of this
+notion. I divided the evils belonging to the Slave-trade into two kinds.
+These I enumerated in their order. With respect to those of the first kind,
+I proved that they were never to be remedied by any acts of the British
+parliament. Thus, for instance, what bill could alter the nature of the
+human passions? What bill could prevent fraud and violence in Africa, while
+the Slave-trade existed there? What bill could prevent the miserable
+victims of the trade from rising, when on board the ships, if they saw an
+opportunity, and felt a keen sense of their oppression? Those of the second
+I stated to admit of a remedy, and, after making accurate calculations on
+the subject of each, I showed that those merchants, who were to do them
+away effectually, would be ruined by their voyages. The work was called An
+Essay on the comparative Efficiency of Regulation or Abolition as applied
+to the Slave-trade.
+
+The committee also in this interval brought out their famous print of the
+plan and section of a slave-ship; which was designed to give the spectator
+an idea of the sufferings of the Africans in the Middle Passage, and this
+so familiarly, that he might instantly pronounce upon the miseries
+experienced there. The committee at Plymouth had been the first to suggest
+the idea; but that in London had now improved it. As this print seemed
+to make an instantaneous impression of horror upon all who saw it, and
+as it was therefore very instrumental, in consequence of the wide
+circulation given it, in serving the cause of the injured Africans,
+I have given the reader a copy of it in the annexed plate, and I will
+now state the ground or basis, upon which it was formed.
+
+[Illustration]
+
+[Illustration]
+
+[Illustration]
+
+It must be obvious that it became the committee to select some one ship,
+which had been engaged in the Slave-trade, with her real dimensions, if
+they meant to make a fair representation of the manner of the
+transportation. When Captain Parrey, of the royal navy, returned from
+Liverpool, to which place Government had sent him, he brought with him the
+admeasurement of several vessels, which had been so employed, and laid them
+on the table of the House of Commons. At the top of his list stood the ship
+Brookes. The committee therefore, in choosing a vessel on this occasion,
+made use of the ship Brookes; and this they did, because they thought it
+less objectionable to take the first that came, than any other. The vessel
+then in the plate is the vessel now mentioned, and the following is her
+admeasurement as given in by Captain Parrey.
+
+                                                          Ft.  In.
+Length of the lower deck, gratings, and bulkheads
+  included at A A,                                       100    0
+Breadth of beam on the lower deck inside, B B,            25    0
+Depth of hold O O O, from ceiling to ceiling,             10    0
+Height between decks from deck to deck,                    5    0
+Length of the men's room, C C, on the lower deck,         46    0
+Breadth of the men's room, C C, on the lower deck,        25    4
+Length of the platform, D D, in the men's room,           46    0
+Breadth of the platform, in the men's room, on
+  each side,                                               6    0
+Length of the boys' room, E E,                            13    0
+Breadth of the boys' room,                                25    0
+Breadth of platform, F F, in boys' room,                   6    0
+Length of women's room, G G,                              28    6
+Breadth of women's room,                                  23    6
+Length of platform, H H, in women's room,                 28    6
+Breadth of platform in women's room,                       6    0
+Length of the gun-room, I I, on the lower deck,           10    6
+Breadth of the gun-room on the lower deck,                12    0
+Length of the quarter deck, K K,                          33    6
+Breadth of the quarter deck,                              19    6
+Length of the cabin, L L,                                 14    0
+Height of the cabin,                                       6    2
+Length of the half deck, M M,                             16    6
+Height of the half deck,                                   6    2
+Length of the platform, N N, on the half deck,            16    6
+Breadth of the platform on the half deck,                  6    0
+Upper deck, P P,
+
+The committee, having proceeded thus far, thought that they should now
+allow certain dimensions for every man, woman, and child; and then see, how
+many persons, upon such dimensions and upon the admeasurements just given,
+could be stowed in this vessel. They allowed, accordingly, to every man
+slave six feet by one foot four inches for room, to every woman five feet
+by one foot four, to every boy five feet by one foot two, and to every girl
+four feet six by one foot. They then stowed them, and found them as in the
+annexed plate, that is, they found (deducting the women stowed in Z of
+figures 6 and 7, which spaces, being half of the half deck, were allowed by
+Sir William Dolben's last bill to the seamen) that only four hundred and
+fifty could be stowed in her; and the reader will find, if he should think
+it worth while to count the figures in the plate, that, on making the
+deduction mentioned, they will amount to this number.
+
+The committee then thought it right to inquire how many slaves, the act of
+Sir William Dolben allowed this vessel to carry, and they found the number
+to be one hundred and fifty-four; that is, they found it allowed her to
+carry four more than could be put in without trespassing upon the room
+allotted to the rest; for we see that the bodies of the slaves, except just
+at the head of the vessel, already touch each other, and that no deduction
+has been made for tubs or stanchions to support the platforms and decks.
+
+Such was the picture, which the committee were obliged to draw, if they
+regarded mathematical accuracy, of the room allotted to the slaves in this
+vessel. By this picture was exhibited the nature of the Elysium, which Mr.
+Norris and others had invented for them during their transportation from
+their own country. By this picture were seen also the advantages of Sir
+William Dolben's bill; for many, on looking at the plate, considered the
+regulation itself as perfect barbarism. The advantages however obtained by
+it were considerable; for the Brookes was now restricted to four hundred
+and fifty slaves, whereas it was proved that she carried six hundred and
+nine in a former voyage.
+
+The committee, at the conclusion of the session of parliament, made a
+suitable report. It will be unnecessary to detail this for obvious reasons.
+There was, however, one thing contained in it, which ought not to be
+omitted. It stated, with appropriate concern, the death of the first
+controversial writer, and of one of the most able and indefatigable
+labourers, in their cause. Mr. Ramsay had been for some time indisposed.
+The climate of the West Indies, during a residence of twenty years, and the
+agitation in which his mind had been kept for the last four years of his
+life, in consequence of the virulent attacks on his word and character by
+those interested in the continuance of the trade, had contributed to
+undermine his constitution. During his whole illness he was cheerful and
+composed; nor did he allow it to hinder him, severe as it was, from taking
+any opportunity which offered of serving those unhappy persons, for whose
+injuries he had so deeply felt. A few days only before he died, I received
+from him probably the last letter he ever wrote, of which the following is
+an extract:
+
+"My health has certainly taken a most alarming turn; and if some
+considerable alteration does not take place for the better in a very little
+time, it will be all over with me; I mean as to the present life. I have
+lost all appetite; and suffer grievously from an almost continual pain in
+my stomach, which leaves me no enjoyment of myself, but such as I can
+collect from my own reflections, and the comforts of religion. I am glad
+the bill for the abolition is in such forwardness. Whether it goes through
+the House or not, the discussion attending it will have a most beneficial
+effect. The whole of this business I think now to be in such a train, as to
+enable me to bid farewell to the present scene with the satisfaction of not
+having lived in vain, and of having done something towards the improvement
+of our common nature; and this at no little expense of time and reputation.
+The little I have now written is my utmost effort; yet yesterday I thought
+it necessary to write an answer to a scurrilous libel in The Diary by one
+Scipio. On my own account he should have remained unnoticed, but our great
+cause must be kept unsullied."
+
+Mr. Ramsay was a man of active habit, of diligence and perseverance in his
+undertakings, and of extraordinary application. He was of mild and humble
+manners. He possessed a strong understanding, with great coolness and
+courage. Patriotism and public spirit were striking traits in his
+character. In domestic life he was amiable: in the ministry, exemplary and
+useful; and he died to the great regret of his parishioners, but most of
+all to that of those, who moved with him in his attempts to bring about the
+important event of the abolition of the Slave-trade.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER II.
+
+_Continuation from July 1789 to July 1790--Author travels to Paris to
+promote the abolition in France--attends the committees of the Friends of
+the Negros--Counter attempts of the committee of White Colonists--An
+account of the deputies of Colour--Meeting at the Duke de la
+Rochefoucauld's--Mirabeau espouses the cause--canvasses the National
+Assembly--Distribution of the section of the slave-ship there--Character of
+Brissot--Author leaves Paris and returns to England--Examination of
+merchants' and planters' evidence resumed in the House of Commons--Author
+travels in search of evidence in favour of the abolition--Opposition to the
+hearing of it--This evidence is at length introduced--Renewal of Sir
+William Dolben's bill--Distribution of the section of the slave-ship in
+England--and of Cowper's Negro's Complaint--and of Wedgewood's Cameos._
+
+
+We usually find, as we give ourselves up to reflection, some little
+mitigation of the afflictions we experience; and yet of the evils which
+come upon us, some are often so heavy as to overpower the sources of
+consolation for a time, and to leave us wretched. This was nearly our
+situation at the close of the last session of parliament. It would be idle
+not to confess that circumstances had occurred, which wounded us deeply.
+Though we had foiled our opponents at their own weapons, and had
+experienced the uninterrupted good wishes and support of the public, we had
+the great mortification to see the enthusiasm of members of parliament
+beginning to cool; to see a question of humanity and justice (for such it
+was, when it was delivered into their hands) verging towards that of
+commercial calculation; and finally to see regulation, as it related to it
+in the way of being substituted for abolition. But most of all were we
+affected, knowing as we did the nature and the extent of the sufferings
+belonging to Slave-trade, that these should be continued to another year.
+This last consideration almost overpowered me. It had fallen to my lot,
+more than to that of any other person, to know these evils, and I seemed
+almost inconsolable at the postponement of the question. I wondered how
+members of parliament, and these Englishmen, could talk as they did on this
+subject; how they could bear for a moment to consider their fellow-man as
+an article of trade; and how they should not count even the delay of an
+hour, which occasioned so much misery to continue, as one of the most
+criminal actions of their lives.
+
+It was in vain, however, to sink under our burthens. Grief could do no
+good; and if our affairs had taken an unfavourable turn, the question was,
+how to restore them. It was sufficiently obvious that, if our opponents
+were left to themselves, or, without any counteracting evidence, they would
+considerably soften down the propositions, if not invalidate them in the
+minds of many. They had such a power of selection of witnesses, that they
+could bring men forward, who might say with truth, that they had seen but
+very few of the evils complained of, and these in an inferior degree. We
+knew also from the example of the Liverpool delegates, how interest and
+prejudice could blind the eyes, and how others might be called upon to give
+their testimony, who would dwell upon the comforts of the Africans, when
+they came into our power; on the sprinkling of their apartments with
+frankincense; on the promotion of music and the dance among them; and on
+the health and festivity of their voyages. It seemed therefore necessary,
+that we should again be looking out for evidence on the part of the
+abolition. Nor did it seem to me to be unreasonable, if our opponents were
+allowed to come forward in a new way, because it was more constitutional,
+that we should be allowed the same privilege. By these means the evidence,
+of which we had now lost the use, might be restored; indifference might be
+fanned into warmth; commercial calculation might be overpowered by justice;
+and abolition, rising above the reach of the cry of regulation, might
+eventually triumph.
+
+I communicated my ideas to the committee, and offered to go round the
+kingdom to accomplish this object. The committee had themselves been
+considering what measures to take, and as each in his own mind had come to
+conclusions similar with my own, my proposal was no sooner made, than
+adopted.
+
+I had not been long upon this journey, when I was called back. Mr.
+Wilberforce, always solicitous for the good of this great cause, was of
+opinion, that, as commotions had taken place in France, which then aimed at
+political reforms, it was possible that the leading persons concerned in
+them might, if an application were made to them judiciously, be induced to
+take the Slave-trade into their consideration, and incorporate it among the
+abuses to be done away. Such a measure, if realized, would not only lessen
+the quantity of human suffering, but annihilate a powerful political
+argument against us. He had a conference therefore with the committee on
+this subject; and, as they accorded with his opinion, they united with him
+in writing a letter to me, to know if I would change my journey, and
+proceed to France.
+
+As I had no object in view but the good of the cause, it was immaterial to
+me where I went, if I could but serve it; and therefore, without any
+further delay, I returned to London.
+
+As accounts had arrived in England of the excesses which had taken place in
+the city of Paris, and of the agitated state of the provinces through which
+I was to pass, I was desired by several of my friends to change my name. To
+this I could not consent; and, on consulting the committee, they were
+decidedly against it.
+
+I was introduced as quickly as possible, on my arrival at Paris, to the
+friends of the cause there, to the Duke de la Rochefoucald, the Marquis de
+Condorcet, Messieurs Petion de Villeneuve, Claviere, and Brissot, and to
+the Marquis de la Fayette. The latter received me with peculiar marks of
+attention. He had long felt for the wrongs of Africa, and had done much to
+prevent them. He had a plantation in Cayenne, and had devised a plan, by
+which the labourers upon it should pass by degrees from slavery to freedom.
+With this view he had there laid it down as a principle, that all crimes
+were equal, whether they were committed by Blacks or Whites, and ought
+equally to be punished. As the human mind is of such a nature, as to be
+acted upon by rewards as well as punishments, he thought it unreasonable,
+that the slaves should have no advantage from a stimulus from the former.
+He laid it down therefore as another principle, that temporal profits
+should follow virtuous action. To this he subjoined a reasonable education
+to be gradually given. By introducing such principles, and by making
+various regulations for the protection and comforts of the slaves, he
+thought he could prove to the planters, that there was no necessity for the
+Slave-trade; that the slaves upon all their estates would increase
+sufficiently by population; that they might be introduced gradually, and
+without detriment, to a state of freedom; and that then the real interests
+of all would be most promoted. This system he had begun to act upon two
+years before I saw him. He had also, when the society was established in
+Paris, which took the name of The Friends of the Negros, enrolled himself a
+member of it.
+
+The first public steps taken after my arrival in Paris were at a committee
+of the Friends of the Negros, which was but thinly attended. None of those
+mentioned, except Brissot, were present. It was resolved there, that the
+committee should solicit an audience of Mr. Necker; and that I should wait
+upon him, accompanied by a deputation consisting of the Marquis de
+Condorcet, Monsieur de Bourge, and Brissot de Warwille; Secondly, that the
+committee should write to the president of the National Assembly, and
+request the favour of him to appoint a day for hearing the cause of the
+Negros; and, Thirdly, that it should be recommended to the committee in
+London to draw up a petition to the National Assembly of France, praying
+for the abolition of the Slave-trade by that country. This petition, it was
+observed, was to be signed by as great a number of the friends to the cause
+in England, as could be procured. It was then to be sent to the committee
+at Paris, who would take it in a body to the place of its destination.
+
+I found great delicacy as a stranger in making my observations upon these
+resolutions, and yet I thought I ought not to pass them over wholly in
+silence, but particularly the last. I therefore rose up, and stated that
+there was one resolution, of which I did not quite see the propriety. But
+this might arise from my ignorance of the customs, as well as of the genius
+and spirit of the French people. It struck me that an application from a
+little committee in England to the National Assembly of France was not a
+dignified measure, nor was it likely to have weight with such a body. It
+was, besides, contrary to all the habits of propriety, in which I had been
+educated. The British Parliament did not usually receive petitions from the
+subjects of other nations. It was this feeling, which had induced me thus
+to speak.
+
+To these observations it was replied, that the National Assembly of France
+would glory in going contrary to the example of other nations in a case of
+generosity and justice, and that the petition in question, if it could be
+obtained, would have an influence there, which the people of England,
+unacquainted with the sentiments of the French nation, would hardly credit.
+
+To this I had only to reply, that I would communicate the measure to the
+committee in London, but that I could not be answerable for the part they
+would take in it.
+
+By an answer received from Mr. Necker, relative to the first of these
+resolutions, it appeared that the desired interview had been obtained: but
+he granted it only for a few minutes, and this principally to show his good
+will to the cause. For he was then so oppressed with business in his own
+department, that he had but little time for any other. He wrote to me
+however the next day, and desired my company to dinner. He then expressed a
+wish to me, that any business relative to the Slave-trade might be managed
+by ourselves as individuals, and that I would take the opportunity of
+dining with him occasionally for this purpose. By this plan, he said, both
+of us would save time. Madame Necker also promised to represent her
+husband, if I should call in his absence, and to receive me, and converse
+with me on all occasions, in which this great cause of humanity and
+religion might be concerned.
+
+With respect to the other resolutions nothing ever came of them; for we
+waited daily for an answer from the president during the whole of his
+presidency, but we never received any; and the committee in London, when
+they had read my letter, desired me unequivocally to say, that they did not
+see the propriety of the petition, which it had been recommended to them to
+obtain.
+
+At the next meeting it was resolved, that a letter should be written to the
+new president for the same purpose as the former. This, it was said, was
+now rendered essentially necessary. For the merchants, planters, and others
+interested in the continuance of the Slave-trade, were so alarmed at the
+enthusiasm of the French people, in favour of the new order of things, and
+of any change recommended to them, which had the appearance of promoting
+the cause of liberty, that they held daily committees to watch and to
+thwart the motions of the Friends of the Negros. It was therefore thought
+proper, that the appeal to the Assembly should be immediate on this
+subject, before the feelings of the people should cool, or, before they,
+who were thus interested, should poison their minds by calculations of loss
+and gain. The silence of the former president was already attributed to the
+intrigues of the planters' committee. No time therefore was to be lost. The
+letter was accordingly written, but as no answer was ever returned to it,
+they attributed this second omission to the same cause.
+
+I do not really know whether interested persons ever did, as was suspected,
+intercept the letters of the committee to the two presidents as now
+surmised; or whether they ever dissuaded them from introducing so important
+a question for discussion when the nation was in such a heated state; but
+certain it is that we had many, and I believe barbarous, enemies to
+encounter. At the very next meeting of the committee, Claviere produced
+anonymous letters, which he had received, and in which it was stated that,
+if the society of the Friends of the Negros did not dissolve itself, he and
+the rest of them would be stabbed. It was said that no less than three
+hundred persons had associated themselves for this purpose. I had received
+similar letters myself; and on producing mine, and comparing the
+hand-writing in both, it appeared that the same persons had written them.
+
+In a few days after this the public prints were filled with the most
+malicious representations of the views of the committee. One of them was,
+that they were going to send twelve thousand muskets to the Negros in St.
+Domingo, in order to promote an insurrection there. This declaration was so
+industriously circulated, that a guard of soldiers was sent to search the
+committee-room; but these were soon satisfied, when they found only two or
+three books and some waste paper. Reports equally unfounded and wicked were
+spread also in the same papers relative to myself. My name was mentioned at
+full length, and the place of my abode hinted at. It was stated at one
+time, that I had proposed such wild and mischievous plans to the committee
+in London relative to the abolition of the Slave-trade, that they had cast
+me out of their own body, and that I had taken refuge in Paris, where I now
+tried to impose equally on the French nation. It was stated at another,
+that I was employed by the British government as a spy, and that it was my
+object to try to undermine the noble constitution, which was then forming
+for France. This latter report at this particular time, when the passions
+of men were so inflamed, and when the stones of Paris had not been long
+purified from the blood of Foulon and Berthier, might have cost me my life;
+and I mentioned it to General la Fayette, and solicited his advice. He
+desired me to make a public reply to it: which I did. He desired me also to
+change my lodging to the Hotel de York, that I might be nearer to him; and
+to send to him if there should be any appearance of a collection of people
+about the hotel, and I should have aid from the military in his quarter. He
+said also, that he would immediately give in my name to the Municipality;
+and that he would pledge himself to them, that my views were strictly
+honourable.
+
+On dining one day at the house of the Marquis de la Fayette, I met the
+deputies of Colour. They had arrived only the preceding day from St.
+Domingo. I was desired to take my seat at dinner in the midst of them. They
+were six in number; of a sallow or swarthy complexion, but yet it was not
+darker than that of some of the natives of the south of France. They were
+already in the uniform of the Parisian National Guards; and one of them
+wore the cross of St. Louis. They were men of genteel appearance and modest
+behaviour. They seemed to be well informed, and of a more solid cast than
+those, whom I was in the habit of seeing daily in this city. The account
+which they gave of themselves was this. The White People of St. Domingo,
+consisting of less than ten thousand persons, had deputies then sitting in
+the National Assembly. The People of Colour in the same island greatly
+exceeded the Whites in number. They amounted to thirty thousand, and were
+generally proprietors of lands. They were equally free by law with the
+former, and paid their taxes to the mother-country in an equal proportion.
+But in consequence of having sprung from slaves they had no legislative
+power, and moreover were treated with great contempt. Believing that the
+mother-country was going to make a change in its political constitution,
+they had called a meeting on the island, and this meeting had deputed them
+to repair to France, and to desire the full rights of citizens, or that the
+free People of Colour might be put upon an equality with the Whites. They
+(the deputies) had come in consequence. They had brought with them a
+present of six millions of livres to the National Assembly, and an
+appointment to General la Fayette to be commander in chief over their
+constituents, as a distinct body. This command, they said, the General had
+accepted, though he had declined similar honours from every town in France,
+except Paris, in order to show that he patronised their cause.
+
+I was now very anxious to know the sentiments which these gentlemen
+entertained on the subject of the Slave-trade. If they were with us, they
+might be very useful to us; not only by their votes in the Assembly, but by
+the knowledge of facts, which they would be able to adduce there in our
+favour. If they were against us, it became me to be upon my guard against
+them, and to take measures accordingly. I therefore stated to them at once
+the nature of my errand to France, and desired their opinion upon it. This
+they gave me without reserve. They broke out into lavish commendations of
+my conduct, and called me their friend. The Slave-trade, they said, was the
+parent of all the miseries in St. Domingo, not only on account of the cruel
+treatment it occasioned to the slaves, but on account of the discord which
+it constantly kept up between the Whites and People of Colour, in
+consequence of the hateful distinctions it introduced. These distinctions
+could never be obliterated while it lasted. Indeed both the trade and the
+slavery must fall before the infamy, now fixed upon a skin of colour, could
+be so done away, that Whites and Blacks could meet cordially, and look with
+respect upon one another. They had it in their instructions, in case they
+should obtain a seat in the Assembly, to propose an immediate abolition of
+the Slave-trade, and an immediate amelioration of the state of slavery
+also, with a view to its final abolition in fifteen years.
+
+But time was flying apace, I had now been nearly seven weeks in Paris; and
+had done nothing. The thought of this made me uneasy, and I saw no
+consoling prospect before me. I found it even difficult to obtain a meeting
+of the Friends of the Negros. The Marquis de la Fayette had no time to
+attend. Those of the committee, who were members of the National Assembly,
+were almost constantly engaged at Versailles. Such of them as belonged to
+the Municipality, had enough to do at the Hotel de Ville. Others were
+employed either in learning the use of arms, or in keeping their daily and
+nightly guards. These circumstances made me almost despair of doing any
+thing for the cause at Paris, at least in any reasonable time. But a new
+circumstance occurred, which distressed me greatly; for I discovered, in
+the most satisfactory manner, that two out of the six at the last committee
+were spies. They had come into the society for no other reason, than to
+watch and report its motions, and they were in direct correspondence with
+the slave-merchants at Havre de Grace. This matter I brought home to them
+afterwards, and I had the pleasure of seeing them excluded from all our
+future meetings.
+
+From this time I thought it expedient to depend less upon the committee and
+more upon my own exertions, and I formed the resolution of going among the
+members of the National Assembly myself, and of learning from their own
+mouths the hope I ought to entertain relative to the decision of our
+question. In the course of my endeavours I obtained a promise from the Duke
+de la Rochefoucauld, the Comte de Mirabeau, the Abbé Syeyes, Monsieur
+Bergasse, and Monsieur Petion de Villeneuve, five of the most approved
+members of the National Assembly, that they would meet me, if I would fix a
+day. I obtained a similar promise from the Marquis de Condorcet, and
+Claviere and Brissot, as members selected from the committee of the Friends
+of the Negros. And Messieurs de Roveray and Du Monde, two Genevese
+gentlemen at Versailles, men of considerable knowledge and interest, and
+who had heard of our intended meeting, were to join us at their own
+request. The place chosen was the house of the Bishop of Chartres at
+Versailles.
+
+I was now in hope that I should soon bring the question to some issue; and
+on the fourth of October I went to dine with the Bishop of Chartres to fix
+the day. We appointed the seventh. But how soon, frequently, do our
+prospects fade! From the conversation which took place at dinner, I began
+to fear that our meeting would not be realized. About three days before,
+the officers of the Guard du Corps had given the memorable banquet,
+recorded in the annals of the revolution, to the officers of the regiment
+of Flanders which then lay at Versailles. This was a topic, on which the
+company present dwelt. They condemned it as a most fatal measure in these
+heated times; and were apprehensive, that something would grow immediately
+out of it, which might endanger the King's safety. In passing afterwards
+through the streets of Versailles my fears increased. I met several of that
+regiment in groups. Some were brandishing their swords. Others were walking
+arm in arm and singing tumultuously. Others were standing and conversing
+earnestly together. Among the latter I heard one declare with great
+vehemence, "that it should not be; that the revolution must go on." On my
+arrival at Paris in the evening the Palais Royale was full of people, and
+there were movements and buzzings among them, as if something was expected
+to happen. The next day, when I went into the streets it was obvious what
+was going to take place. Suffice it to say, that the next evening the King
+and Queen were brought prisoners into Paris. After this, things were in
+such an unsettled state for a few days, and the members of the National
+Assembly were so occupied in the consideration of the event itself, and of
+the consequences which might attend it, that my little meeting, of which it
+had cost me so much time and trouble to procure the appointment, was
+entirely prevented.
+
+I had now to wait patiently till a new opportunity should occur. The Comte
+de Mirabeau, before the departure of the King, had moved and carried the
+resolution that "the Assembly was inseparable from his majesty's person."
+It was expected, therefore, that the National Assembly would immediately
+transfer its sittings to Paris. This took place on the nineteenth. It was
+now more easy for me to bring persons together, than when I had to travel
+backward and forward to Versailles. Accordingly, by watching my
+opportunities, I obtained the promise of another meeting. This was held
+afterward at the Duke de la Rochefoucauld's. The persons before mentioned
+were present; except the Comte de Mirabeau, whose occupations at that
+moment made it utterly impossible for him to attend.
+
+The Duke opened the business in an appropriate manner; and concluded, by
+desiring each person to give his opinion frankly and unequivocally as to
+what might be expected of the National Assembly relative to the great
+measure of the abolition of the Slave-trade.
+
+The Abbé Syeyes rose up, and said, it would probably bring the business
+within a shorter compass, if, instead of discussing this proposition at
+large, I were to put to the meeting my own questions. I accordingly
+accepted this offer; and began by asking those present, "how long it was
+likely that the present National Assembly would sit." After some
+conversation it was replied, that, "it would sit till it had completed the
+constitution, and interwoven such fixed principles into it, that the
+legislature, which should succeed it, might have nothing more to do, than
+to proceed on the ordinary business of the state. Its dissolution would
+probably not take place till the month of March."
+
+I then asked them, "whether it was their opinion, that the National
+Assembly would feel itself authorized to take up such a foreign question
+(if I might be allowed the expression) as that of the abolition of the
+Slave-trade." The answer to this was, "that the object of the National
+Assembly was undoubtedly the formation of a constitution for the French
+people. With respect to foreign possessions, it was very doubtful, whether
+it were the real interest of France to have any colonies at all. But while
+it kept such colonies under its dominion, the Assembly would feel, that it
+had the right to take up this question; and that the question itself would
+naturally spring out of the bill of rights, which had already been adopted
+as the basis of the constitution."
+
+The next question I proposed was, "whether they were of opinion, that the
+National Assembly would do more wisely, in the present situation of things,
+to determine upon the abolition of the Slave-trade now, or to transfer it
+to the legislature, which was to succeed it in the month of March."
+
+This question gave birth to a long discussion; during which much eloquence
+was displayed. But the unanimous answer, with the reasons for it, may be
+conveyed in substance as follows. "It would be most wise, it was said, in
+the present Assembly to introduce the question to the notice of the nation,
+and this as essentially connected with the bill of rights, but to transfer
+the determination of it, in a way the best calculated to ensure success, to
+the succeeding legislature. The revolution was of more importance to
+Frenchmen, than the abolition of the Slave-trade. To secure this was their
+first object, and more particularly, because the other would naturally flow
+from it. But the revolution might be injured by the immediate determination
+of the question. Many persons in the large towns of Bourdeaux, Marseilles,
+Rouen, Nantes, and Havre, who were now friends to it, might be converted
+into enemies. It would also be held up by those, who wished to produce a
+counter-revolution, (and the ignorant and prejudiced might believe it,)
+that the Assembly had made a great sacrifice to England, by thus giving her
+an opportunity of enlarging her trade. The English House of Commons had
+taken up the subject, but had done nothing. And though they, who were then
+present, were convinced of the sincerity of the English minister, who had
+introduced it; and that the trade must ultimately fall in England, yet it
+would not be easy to persuade many bigoted persons in France of these
+truths. It would therefore be most wise in the Assembly only to introduce
+the subject as mentioned; but if extraordinary circumstances should arise,
+such as a decree, that the deputies of Colour should take their seats in
+the Assembly, or that England should have begun this great work, advantage
+might be taken of them, and the abolition of the Slave-trade might be
+resolved upon in the present session."
+
+The last question I proposed was this. "If the determination of this great
+question should be proposed to the next legislature, would it be more
+difficult to carry it then than now."
+
+This question also produced much conversation. But the answer was
+unanimous, "that there would be no greater difficulty in the one than in
+the other case; for that the people would daily, more and more admire their
+constitution; that this constitution would go down to the next legislature,
+from whence would issue solid and fixed principles, which would be resorted
+to as a standard for decision on all occasions. Hence the Slave-trade,
+which would be adjudged by it also, could not possibly stand. Add to which,
+that the most virtuous members in the present would be chosen into the new
+legislature, which, if the constitution were but once fairly established,
+would not regard the murmurs of any town or province." After this, a
+desultory conversation took place, in which some were of opinion that it
+would be proper, on the introduction of the subject into the Assembly, to
+move for a committee of inquiry, which should collect facts and documents
+against the time, when it should be taken up with a view to its final
+discussion.
+
+As it now appeared to me, that nothing material would be done with respect
+to our cause till after the election of the new legislature, I had thoughts
+of returning to England to resume my journey in quest of evidence; but I
+judged it right to communicate first with the Comte de Mirabeau and the
+Marquis de la Fayette, both of whom would have attended the meeting just
+mentioned, if unforeseen circumstances had not prevented them.
+
+On conversing with the first, I found that he differed from those, whom I
+had consulted. He thought that the question, on account of the nature and
+urgency of it, ought to be decided in the present legislature. This was so
+much his opinion, that he had made a determination to introduce it there
+himself; and had been preparing for his motion. He had already drawn up the
+outlines of a speech for the purpose; but was in want of circumstantial
+knowledge to complete it. With this knowledge he desired me to furnish him.
+He then put his speech into my hand; and wished me to take it home and
+peruse it. He wrote down also some questions, and he gave them to me
+directly afterwards, and begged I would answer them at my leisure.
+
+On conversing with the latter, he said, that he believed with those at the
+meeting, that there would be no greater difficulty in carrying the question
+in the succeeding than in the present legislature. But this consideration
+afforded an argument for the immediate discussion of it: for it would make
+a considerable difference to suffering humanity, whether it were to be
+decided now or then. This was the moment to be taken to introduce it; nor
+did he think that they ought to be deterred from doing it, by any supposed
+clamours from some of the towns in France. The great body of the people
+admired the constitution; and would support any decisions, which were made
+in strict conformity to its principles. With respect to any committee of
+inquiry, he deprecated it. The Slave-trade, he said, was not a trade. It
+dishonoured the name of commerce. It was piracy. But if so, the question,
+which it involved, was a question of justice only; and it could not be
+decided with propriety by any other standard. I then informed him, that the
+Comte de Mirabeau had undertaken to introduce it into the Assembly. At this
+he expressed his uneasiness. "Mirabeau," says he, "is a host in himself;
+and I should not be surprised if by his own eloquence and popularity only
+he were to carry it; and yet I regret that he has taken the lead in it. The
+cause is so lovely, that even ambition, abstractedly considered, is too
+impure to take it under its protection, and not to sully it. It should have
+been placed in the hands of the most virtuous man in France. This man is
+the Duc de la Rochefoucauld. But you cannot alter things now. You cannot
+take it out of his hands. I am sure he will be second to no one on this
+occasion."
+
+On my return to my hotel, I perused the outlines of the speech, which the
+Comte de Mirabeau had lent me. It afforded a masterly knowledge of the
+evils of the trade, as drawn from reason only. It was put together in the
+most striking and affecting manner. It contained an almost irresistible
+appeal to his auditors by frequent references to the ancient system of
+things in France, and to their situation and prospects under the new. It
+flowed at first gently like a river in a level country; but it grew
+afterwards into a mountain torrent, and carried every thing before it. On
+looking at the questions, which he had written down for me, I found them
+consist of three. 1. What are the different ways of reducing to slavery the
+inhabitants of that part of Africa, which is under the dominion of France?
+2. What is the state of society there with respect to government, industry,
+and the arts? 3. What are the various evils belonging to the transportation
+of the Africans from their own country?
+
+It was peculiarly agreeable to me to find, on reading the first two
+questions, that I had formed an acquaintance with Monsieur Geoffroy de
+Villeneuve, who had been aide du camp to the Chevalier de Boufflers at
+Goree; but who was then at his father's house in Paris. This gentleman had
+entertained Dr. Spaarman and Mr. Wadstrom; and had accompanied them up the
+Senegal, when under the protection of the French government in Africa. He
+had confirmed to me the testimony, which they had given before the privy
+council. But he had a fund of information on this subject, which went far
+beyond what these possessed, or I had ever yet collected from books or men.
+He had travelled all over the kingdom of Cayor on foot; and had made a map
+of it. His information was so important, that I had been with him for
+almost days together to take it down. I determined therefore to arrange the
+facts, which I had obtained from him, of which I had now a volume, that I
+might answer the two first questions, which had been proposed to me; for it
+was of great importance to the Comte de Mirabeau, that he should be able to
+appeal, in behalf of the statements in his speech to the Assembly, to an
+evidence on the spot.
+
+In the course of my correspondence with the Comte, which continued with but
+little intermission for six weeks, many circumstances took place, which
+were connected with the cause, and which I shall now detail in their order.
+
+On waiting upon Mr. Necker, at his own request, he gave me the pleasing
+intelligence, that the committee of finances, which was then composed of
+members of the National Assembly, had resolved, though they had not yet
+promulgated their resolution, upon a total abolition of all the bounties
+then in existence in favour of the Slave-trade.
+
+The Deputies of Colour now began to visit me at my own hotel. They informed
+me, that they had been admitted, since they had seen me, into the National
+Assembly. On stating their claims, the president assured them, that they
+might take courage; for that the Assembly knew no distinction between
+Blacks and Whites, but considered all men as having equal rights. This
+speech of the president, they said, had roused all the White Colonists in
+Paris. Some of these had openly insulted them. They had held also a meeting
+on the subject of this speech; at which they had worked themselves up so as
+to become quite furious. Nothing but intrigue was now going forward among
+them to put off the consideration of the claims of the free People of
+Colour. They, the deputies, had been flattered by the prospect of a hearing
+no less than six times; and, when the day arrived, something had constantly
+occurred to prevent it.
+
+At a subsequent interview, they appeared to be quite disheartened; and to
+be grievously disappointed as to the object of their mission. They were now
+sure, that they should never be able to make head against the intrigues and
+plots of the White Colonists. Day after day had been fixed as before for
+the hearing of their cause. Day after day it had been deferred in like
+manner. They were now weary with waiting. One of them, Ogé, could not
+contain himself, but broke out with great warmth--"I begin," says he, "not
+to care, whether the National Assembly will admit us or not. But let it
+beware of the consequences. We will no longer continue to be beheld in a
+degraded light. Dispatches shall go directly to St. Domingo; and we will
+soon follow them. We can produce as good soldiers on our estates, as those
+in France. Our own arms shall make us independent and respectable. If we
+are once forced to desperate measures, it will be in vain that thousands
+will be sent across the Atlantic to bring us back to our former state." On
+hearing this, I entreated the deputies to wait with patience. I observed to
+them, that in a great revolution, like that of France, things, but more
+particularly such as might be thought external, could not be discussed
+either so soon or so rapidly as men full of enthusiasm would wish. France
+would first take care of herself. She would then, I had no doubt, extend
+her care to her Colonies. Was not this a reasonable conclusion, when they,
+the deputies, had almost all the first men in the Assembly in their favour?
+I entreated them therefore to wait patiently; as well as upon another
+consideration, which was, that by an imprudent conduct they might not only
+ruin their own cause in France, but bring indescribable misery upon their
+native land.
+
+By this time a large packet, for which I had sent from England, arrived. It
+consisted of above a thousand of the plan and section of a slave-ship, with
+an explanation in French. It contained also about five hundred coloured
+engravings, made from two views, which Mr. Wadstrom had taken in Africa.
+The first of these represented the town of Joal, and the King's military on
+horseback returning to it, after having executed the great pillage, with
+their slaves. The other represented the village of Bain; from whence
+ruffians were forcing a poor woman and her children to sell them to a ship,
+which was then lying in the Roads. Both these scenes Mr. Wadstrom had
+witnessed. I had collected also by this time, one thousand of my Essays on
+the Impolicy of the Slave-trade, which had been translated into the French
+language. These I now wished to distribute, as preparatory to the motion of
+Mirabeau, among the National Assembly. This distribution was afterwards
+undertaken and effected by the Archbishop of Aix, the Bishop of Chartres,
+the Marquis de la Fayette, the Duc de la Rochefoucauld, the Comte de
+Mirabeau, Monsieur Necker, the Marquis de Condorcet, Messieurs Petion de
+Villeneuve, Bergasse, Claviere and Brissot, and by the Marchioness de la
+Fayette, Madame Necker, and Madame de Poivre, the latter of whom was the
+widow of the late Intendant of the Isle of France.
+
+This distribution had not been long begun, before I witnessed its effects.
+The virtuous Abbé Gregoire, and several members of the National Assembly,
+called upon me. The section of the slave-ship, it appeared, had been the
+means of drawing them towards me. They wished for more accurate information
+concerning it. Indeed it made its impression upon all who saw it. The
+Bishop of Chartres once told me, that, when he first espoused our cause, he
+did it at once; for it seemed obvious to him that no one could, under the
+Christian dispensation, hold another as his slave; and it was no less
+obvious where such an unnatural state existed, that there would be great
+abuses; but that, nevertheless, he had not given credit to all the tales
+which had been related of the Slave-trade, till he had seen this plate;
+after which there was nothing so barbarous which might not readily be
+believed. The Archbishop of Aix, when I first showed him the same plate,
+was so struck with horror, that he could scarcely speak: and when Mirabeau
+first saw it, he was so impressed by it, that he ordered a mechanic to make
+a model of it in wood, at a considerable expense. This model he kept
+afterwards in his dining-room. It was a ship in miniature, about a yard
+long, and little wooden men and women, which were painted black to
+represent the slaves, were seen stowed in their proper places.
+
+But while the distribution of these different articles thus contributed to
+make us many friends, it called forth the extraordinary exertions of our
+enemies. The merchants and others interested in the continuance of the
+Slave-trade wrote letters to the Archbishop of Aix, beseeching him not to
+ruin France; which he would inevitably do, if, as then president, he were
+to grant a day for hearing the question of the abolition. Offers of money
+were made to Mirabeau from the same quarter, if he would totally abandon
+his motion. An attempt was made to establish a colonial committee,
+consisting of such planters as were members of the National Assembly; upon
+whom it should devolve to consider and report upon all matters relating to
+the Colonies, before they could be determined there. Books were circulated
+in abundance in opposition to mine. Resort was again had to the public
+papers, as the means of raising a hue and cry against the principles of the
+Friends of the Negros. I was again denounced as a spy; and as one sent by
+the English minister to bribe members in the Assembly to do that in a time
+of public agitation, which in the settled state of France they could never
+have been prevailed upon to accomplish. And as a proof that this was my
+errand, it was requested of every Frenchman to put to himself the following
+question, "How it happened that England, which had considered the subject
+coolly and deliberately for eighteen months, and this in a state of
+internal peace and quietness, had not abolished the Slave-trade?"
+
+The clamour which was now made against the abolition, pervaded all Paris,
+and reached the ears of the King. Mr. Necker had a long conversation with
+him upon it. The latter sent for me immediately. He informed me, that His
+Majesty was desirous of making himself master of the question, and had
+expressed a wish to see my Essay on the Impolicy of the Slave-trade. He
+desired to have two copies of it; one in French, and the other in English;
+and he would then take his choice as to which of them he would read. He
+(Mr. Necker) was to present them. He would take with him also at the same
+time the beautiful specimens of the manufactures of the Africans, which I
+had lent to Madame Necker out of the cabinet of Monsieur Geoffrey de
+Villeneuve and others. As to the section of the slave-ship, he thought it
+would affect His Majesty too much, as he was then indisposed. All these
+articles, except the latter, were at length presented. The King bestowed a
+good deal of time upon the specimens. He admired them; but particularly
+those in gold. He expressed his surprise at the state of some of the arts
+in Africa. He sent them back on the same day on which he had examined them,
+and commissioned Mr. Necker to return me his thanks; and to say that he had
+been highly gratified with what he had seen; and, with respect to the Essay
+on the Impolicy of the Slave-trade, that he would read it with all the
+seriousness, which such a subject deserved.
+
+My correspondence with the Comte de Mirabeau was now drawing near to its
+close. I had sent him a letter every other day for a whole month, which
+contained from sixteen to twenty pages. He usually acknowledged the receipt
+of each. Hence many of his letters came into my possession. These were
+always interesting, on account of the richness of the expressions they
+contained. Mirabeau even in his ordinary discourse was eloquent. It was his
+peculiar talent to use such words, that they who heard them, were almost
+led to believe, that he had taken great pains to cull them for the
+occasion. But this his ordinary language was the language also of his
+letters; and as they show a power of expression, by which the reader may
+judge of the character of the eloquence of one, who was then undoubtedly
+the greatest orator in France, I have thought it not improper to submit one
+of them to his perusal in the annexed note[A]. I could have wished, as far
+as it relates to myself, that it had been less complimentary. It must be
+observed, however, that I had already written to him more than two hundred
+pages with my own hand; and as this was done at no small expense, time and
+trouble, and solely to qualify him for the office of doing good, he could
+not but set some value upon my labours.
+
+[Footnote A: "Je fais toujours mille remercimens plus empressés et plus
+affectueux à Monsieur Clarkson pour la vertueuse profusion de ses lumieres,
+de ses reserches, et de ses travaux. Comme ma motion et tous ses
+developpemens sont entierement prêts, j'attends avec une vive impatience
+ses nouvelles lettres, afin d'achever de classer les faits et les
+raisonnemens de Monsieur Clarkson, et, cette deduction entierement finie,
+de commencer à manoeuvrer en tactique le succès douteux de cette perilleuse
+proposition. J'aurai l'honneur de le recevoir Dimanche depuis onze heures,
+et même dix du matin jusqu'à midi, non seulement avec un vif plaisir, mais
+avec une sensible reconnoissance.
+
+_25 Decembre, 1789_.
+
+LE COMTE DE MIRABEAU."]
+
+When our correspondence was over, I had some conversation with him relative
+to fixing a day for the motion. But he judged it prudent, previously to
+this, to sound some of the members of the Assembly on the subject of it.
+This he did; but he was greatly disappointed at the result. There was not
+one member, out of all those, with whom he conversed, who had not been
+canvassed by the planters' committee. And though most of them had been
+proof against all its intrigues and artifices, yet many of them hesitated
+respecting the abolition at that moment. There was a fear in some that they
+should injure the revolution by adopting it; others, who had no such fears,
+wished for the concurrence of England in the measure, and suggested the
+propriety of a deputation there for that purpose previously to the
+discussion of the question in France. While others maintained, that as
+England had done nothing, after having had it so long under consideration,
+it was fair to presume, that she judged it impolitic to abandon the
+Slave-trade; but if France were to give it up, and England to continue it,
+how would humanity be the gainer?
+
+While the Comte de Mirabeau was continuing his canvass among the members of
+the National Assembly, relative to his motion, attempts were again made in
+the public papers to mislead them. Emancipation was now stated to be the
+object of the Friends of the Negros. This charge I repelled, by addressing
+myself to Monsieur Beauvet. I explained to him the views of the different
+societies, which had taken up the cause of the Africans; and I desired him
+to show my letter to the planters. I was obliged also to answer publicly a
+letter by Monsieur Mosneron de Laung. This writer professed to detail the
+substance of the privy council report. He had the injustice to assert, that
+three things had been distinctly proved there: First, that slavery had
+always existed in Africa; Secondly, that the natives were a bloody people,
+addicted to human sacrifice, and other barbarous customs; and, Thirdly,
+that their soil was incapable of producing any proper articles for
+commerce. From these premises he argued, as if they had been established by
+the unanimous and uncontradicted testimony of the witnesses; and he drew
+the conclusion, that not only had England done nothing in consequence, but
+that she never would do anything, which should affect the existence of this
+trade.
+
+But these letters had only just made their appearance in the public papers,
+when I was summoned to England. Parliament, it appeared, had met; and I was
+immediately to leave Paris. Among those, of whom I had but just time to
+take leave, were the Deputies of Colour. At this, my last conference with
+them, I recommended moderation and forbearance, as the best gifts I could
+leave them; and I entreated them rather to give up their seats in the
+Assembly, than on that account to bring misery on their country; for that
+with patience their cause would ultimately triumph. They replied, that I
+had prescribed to them a most difficult task. They were afraid that neither
+the conduct of the White Colonists nor of the National Assembly could be
+much longer borne. They thanked me, however, for my advice. One of them
+gave me a trinket, by which I might remember him; and as for himself, he
+said, he should never forget one, who had taken such a deep interest in
+the welfare of his mother[A]. I found, however, notwithstanding all I
+said, that there was a spirit of dissatisfaction in them, which nothing
+but a redress of their grievances could subdue; and that, if the planters
+should persevere in their intrigues, and the National Assembly in delay,
+a fire would be lighted up in St. Domingo, which could not easily be
+extinguished. This was afterward realized: for Ogé, in about three months
+from this time, left his companions to report to his constituents in St.
+Domingo the state of their mission; when hearing, on his arrival in that
+island, of the outrageous conduct of the Whites of the committee of Aquin,
+who had begun a persecution of the People of Colour for no other reason
+than that they had dared to seek the common privileges of citizens; and
+of the murder of Ferrand and Labadie, he imprudently armed his slaves.
+With a small but faithful band he rushed upon superior numbers; and was
+defeated. Taking refuge at length in the Spanish part of St. Domingo,
+he was given up; and his enemies, to strike terror into the People of
+Colour, broke him upon the wheel. From this time reconciliation between
+the parties became impossible. A bloody war commenced, and with it all
+those horrors which it has been our lot so frequently to deplore. It must
+be remembered, however, that the Slave-trade, by means of the cruel
+distinctions it occasioned, was the original cause; and though the
+revolution of France afforded the occasion; it was an occasion which
+would have been prevented, if it had not been for the intrigues and
+injustice of the Whites.
+
+[Footnote A: Africa.]
+
+Another, upon whom I had time to call, was the amiable Bishop of Chartres.
+When I left him, the Abbé Syeyes, who was with him, desired to walk with me
+to my hotel. He there presented me with a set of his works, which he sent
+for, while he staid with me; and on parting, he made use of this
+complimentary expression, in allusion, I suppose, to the cause I had
+undertaken,--"I am pleased to have been acquainted with the friend of man."
+
+It was necessary that I should see the Comte de Mirabeau and the Marquis de
+la Fayette, before I left Paris. I had written to each of them to
+communicate the intelligence of my departure, as soon as I received it. The
+Comte, it appeared, had nearly canvassed the Assembly. He could count upon
+three hundred members, who, for the sake of justice, and without any
+consideration of policy or of consequences, would support his motion.
+But alas! what proportion did this number bear to twelve hundred? About
+five hundred more would support him; but only on one condition; which
+was, if England would give an unequivocal proof of her intention to
+abolish the trade. The knowledge of these circumstances, he said, had
+induced him to write a letter to Mr. Pitt. In this he had explained,
+how far he could proceed without his assistance, and how far with it.
+He had frankly developed to him the mind and temper of the Assembly on
+this subject; but his answer must be immediate: for the White Colonists
+were daily gaining such an influence there, that he foresaw it would be
+impossible to carry the measure, if it were long delayed. On taking leave
+of him he desired me to be the bearer of the letter, and to present it
+to Mr. Pitt.
+
+On conversing with the Marquis de la Fayette, he lamented deeply the
+unexpected turn, which the cause of the Negros had lately taken in the
+Assembly. It was entirely owing to the daily intrigues of the White
+Colonists. He feared they would ruin every thing. If the Deputies of Colour
+had been heard on their arrival, their rights would have been acknowledged.
+But now there was little probability that they would obtain them. He
+foresaw nothing but desolation in St. Domingo. With respect to the
+abolition of the Slave-trade, it might be yet carried; but not unless
+England would concur in the measure. On this topic he enlarged with much
+feeling. He hoped the day was near at hand, when two great nations, which
+had been hitherto distinguished only for their hostility, one toward the
+other, would unite in so sublime a measure; and that they would follow up
+their union by another, still more lovely, for the preservation of eternal
+and universal peace. Thus their future rivalships might have the
+extraordinary merit of being rivalships in good. Thus the revolution of
+France, through the mighty aid of England, might become the source of
+civilization, of freedom, and of happiness to the whole world. No other
+nations were sufficiently enlightened for such an union, but all other
+nations might be benefited by it.
+
+The last person whom I saw, was Brissot. He accompanied me to my carriage.
+With him therefore I shall end my French account; and I shall end it in no
+way so satisfactory to myself, as in a very concise vindication of his
+character, from actual knowledge, against the attacks of those who have
+endeavoured to disparage it; but who never knew him. Justice and truth, I
+am convinced, demand some little declaration on this subject at my hands.
+Brissot then was a man of plain and modest appearance. His habits, contrary
+to those of his countrymen in general, were domestic. In his own family he
+set an amiable example, both as a husband and as a father. On all occasions
+he was a faithful friend. He was particularly watchful over his private
+conduct. From the simplicity of his appearance, and the severity of his
+morals, he was called The Quaker; at least in all the circles which I
+frequented. He was a man of deep feeling. He was charitable to the poor as
+far as a slender income permitted him. But his benevolence went beyond the
+usual bounds. He was no patriot in the ordinary acceptation of the word;
+for he took the habitable globe as his country, and wished to consider
+every foreigner as his brother.
+
+I left France, as it maybe easily imagined, much disappointed, that my
+labours, which had been of nearly six months continuance, should have had
+no better success; nor did I see, in looking forward, any circumstances
+that were consoling with respect to the issue of them there; for it was
+impossible that Mr. Pitt, even if he had been inclined to write to
+Mirabeau, circumstanced as matters then were with respect to the hearing of
+evidence, could have given him a promise, at least of a speedy abolition;
+and, unless his answer had been immediate, it would have arrived, seeing
+that the French planters were daily profiting by their intrigues, too late
+to be effectual.
+
+I had but just arrived in England, when Mr. Wilberforce made a new motion
+in the House of Commons on the subject of the, Slave-trade. In referring to
+the transactions of the last sessions, he found that twenty-eight days had
+been allotted to the hearing of witnesses against the abolition, and that
+eleven persons only had been examined in that time. If the examinations
+were to go on in the same manner, they might be made to last for years. He
+resolved therefore to move, that, instead of hearing evidence in future in
+the house at large, members should hear it in an open committee above
+stairs; which committee should sit notwithstanding any adjournment of the
+house itself. This motion he made; and in doing it he took an opportunity
+of correcting an erroneous report; which was, that he had changed his mind
+on this great subject. This was, he said, so far from being the case, that
+the more he contemplated the trade, the more enormous he found it, and the
+more he felt himself compelled to persevere in endeavours for its
+abolition.
+
+One would have thought that a motion, so reasonable and so constitutional,
+would have met with the approbation of all; but it was vehemently opposed
+by Mr. Gascoyne, Alderman Newnham, and others. The plea set up was, that
+there was no precedent for referring a question of such importance to a
+committee. It was now obvious, that the real object of our opponents in
+abandoning decision by the privy council evidence was delay. Unable to meet
+us there, they were glad to fly to any measure, which should enable them to
+put off the evil day. This charge was fixed upon them in unequivocal
+language by Mr. Fox; who observed besides, that if the members of the house
+should then resolve to hear evidence in a committee of the whole house as
+before, it would amount to a resolution, that the question of the abolition
+of the Slave-trade should be put by, or at least that it should never be
+decided by them. After a long debate, the motion of Mr. Wilberforce was
+voted without a division; and the examination of witnesses proceeded in
+behalf of those who were interested in the continuance of the trade.
+
+This measure having been resolved upon, by which dispatch in the
+examinations was promoted, I was alarmed lest we should be called upon for
+our own evidence, before we were fully prepared. The time which I had
+originally allotted for the discovery of new witnesses, had been taken up,
+if not wasted, in France. In looking over the names of the sixteen, who
+were to have been examined by the committee of privy council, if there
+had been time, one had died, and eight, who were sea-faring people,
+were out of the kingdom. It was time therefore to stir immediately
+in this business. Happily, on looking over my letters, which I found
+on my arrival in England, the names of several had been handed to me,
+with the places of their abode, who could give me information on the
+subject of our question. All these I visited with the utmost dispatch.
+I was absent only three weeks. I had travelled a thousand miles in
+this time, had conversed with seventeen persons, and had prevailed
+upon three to be examined.
+
+I had scarcely returned with the addition of these witnesses to my list,
+when I found it necessary to go out again upon the same errand. This second
+journey arose in part from the following circumstances. There was a matter
+in dispute relative to the mode of obtaining slaves in the rivers of
+Calabàr and Bonny. It was usual, when the slave-ships lay there, for a
+number of canoes to go into the inland country. These went in a fleet.
+There might be from thirty to forty armed natives in each of them. Every
+canoe also had a four- or a six-pounder (cannon) fastened to her bow.
+Equipped in this manner they departed; and they were usually absent from
+eight to fourteen days. It was said that they went to fairs, which were
+held on the banks of these rivers, and at which there was a regular show of
+slaves. On their return they usually brought down from eight hundred to a
+thousand of these for the ships. These lay at the bottom of the canoes;
+their arms and legs having been first bound by the ropes of the country.
+Now the question was, how the people, thus going up these rivers, obtained
+their slaves?
+
+It was certainly a very suspicious circumstance, that such a number of
+persons should go out upon these occasions; and that they should be armed
+in such a manner. We presumed therefore, that, though they might buy many
+of the slaves, whom they brought down, at the fairs, which have been
+mentioned, they obtained others by violence, as opportunity offered. This
+inference we pressed upon our opponents; and called upon them to show what
+circumstances made such warlike preparations necessary on these excursions.
+To this they replied readily. The people in the canoes, said they, pass
+through the territories of different petty princes; to each of whom, on
+entering his territory, they pay a tribute or toll. This tribute has been
+long fixed; but attempts frequently have been made to raise it. They who
+follow the trade cannot afford to submit to these unreasonable demands; and
+therefore they arm themselves in case of any determination on the part of
+these petty princes to enforce them.
+
+This answer we never judged to be satisfactory. We tried therefore to throw
+light upon the subject, by inquiring if the natives, who went up on these
+expeditions, usually took with them as many goods, as would amount to the
+number of the slaves they were accustomed to bring back with them. But we
+could get no direct answer, from any actual knowledge, to this question.
+All had seen the canoes go out and return; but no one had seen them loaded,
+or had been on board them. It appeared, however, from circumstantial
+evidence, that, though the natives on these occasions might take some
+articles of trade with them, it was impossible from appearances, that they
+could take them in the proportion mentioned. We maintained then our
+inference as before; but it was still uniformly denied.
+
+How then were we to decide this important question? for it was said, that
+no white man was ever permitted by the natives to go up in these canoes. On
+mentioning accidentally the circumstances of the case, as I have now stated
+them, to a friend, immediately on my return from my last journey, he
+informed me, that he himself had been in company, about a year before, with
+a sailor, a very respectable-looking man, who had been up these rivers. He
+had spent half an hour with him at an inn. He described his person to me.
+But he knew nothing of his name, or of the place of his abode. All he knew
+was, that he was either going, or that he belonged to, some ship of war in
+ordinary; but he could not tell at what port. I might depend upon all these
+circumstances, if the man had not deceived him; and he saw no reason why he
+should.
+
+I felt myself set on fire, as it were, by this intelligence, deficient as
+it was; and I seemed to determine instantly that I would, if it were
+possible, find him out. For if our suspicions were true, that the natives
+frequently were kidnapped in these expeditions, it would be of great
+importance to the cause of the abolition to have them confirmed; for as
+many slaves came annually from these two rivers, as from all the coast of
+Africa besides. But how to proceed on so blind an errand was the question.
+I first thought of trying to trace the man by letter. But this might be
+tedious. The examinations were now going on rapidly. We should soon be
+called upon for evidence ourselves. Besides, I knew nothing of his name. I
+then thought it to be a more effectual way to apply to Sir Charles
+Middleton, as comptroller of the navy, by whose permission I could board
+every ship of war in ordinary in England, and judge for myself. But here
+the undertaking seemed very arduous; and the time it would consume became
+an objection in this respect, that I thought I could not easily forgive
+myself, if I were to fail in it. My inclination, however, preponderated
+this way. At length I determined to follow it; for, on deliberate
+consideration, I found that I could not employ my time more advantageously
+to the cause; for as other witnesses must be found out somewhere, it was
+highly probable that, if I should fail in the discovery of this man, I
+should, by moving among such a number of sea-faring people, find others,
+who could give their testimony in our favour.
+
+I must now inform the reader, that ships of war in ordinary, in one of
+which this man was reported to be, are those, which are out of commission,
+and which are laid up in the different rivers and waters in the
+neighbourhood of the King's dock-yards. Every one of these has a boatswain,
+gunner, carpenter, and assistants on board. They lie usually in divisions
+of ten or twelve; and a master in the navy has a command over every
+division.
+
+At length I began my journey. I boarded all the ships of war lying in
+ordinary at Deptford, and examined the different persons in each. From
+Deptford I proceeded to Woolwich, where I did the same. Thence I hastened
+to Chatham, and then, down the Medway, to Sheerness. I had now boarded
+above a hundred and sixty vessels of war. I had found out two good and
+willing evidences among them. But I could gain no intelligence of him, who
+was the object of my search.
+
+From Chatham, I made the best of my way to Portsmouth-harbour. A very
+formidable task presented itself here. But the masters' boats were ready
+for me; and I continued my pursuit. On boarding the Pegase, on the second
+day, I discovered a very respectable person in the gunner of that ship. His
+name was George Millar. He had been on board the Canterbury slave-ship at
+the dreadful massacre at Calabàr. He was the only disinterested evidence
+living, of whom I had yet heard. He expressed his willingness to give his
+testimony, if his presence should be thought necessary in London. I then
+continued my pursuit for the remainder of the day. On the next day, I
+resumed and finished it for this quarter. I had now examined the different
+persons in more than a hundred vessels in this harbour, but I had not
+discovered the person I had gone to seek.
+
+Matters now began to look rather disheartening, I mean, as far as my grand
+object was concerned. There was but one other port left, and this was
+between two and three hundred miles distant. I determined however to go to
+Plymouth. I had already been more successful in this tour, with respect to
+obtaining general evidence, than in any other of the same length; and the
+probability was, that, as I should continue to move among the same kind of
+people, my success would be in a similar proportion according to the number
+visited. These were great encouragements to me to proceed. At length, I
+arrived at the place of my last hope. On my first day's expedition I
+boarded forty vessels, but found no one in these, who had been on the coast
+of Africa in the Slave-trade. One or two had been there in King's ships;
+but they had never been on shore. Things were now drawing near to a close;
+and, notwithstanding my success as to general evidence in this journey, my
+heart began to beat. I was restless and uneasy during the night. The next
+morning, I felt agitated again between the alternate pressure of hope and
+fear; and in this state I entered my boat. The fifty-seventh vessel, which
+I boarded in this harbour, was the Melampus frigate. One person belonging
+to it, on examining him in the captain's cabin, said he had been two
+voyages to Africa; and I had not long discoursed with him, before I found,
+to my inexpressible joy, that he was the man. I found too, that he
+unravelled the question in dispute precisely as our inferences had
+determined it. He had been two expeditions up the river Calabàr in the
+canoes of the natives. In the first of these, they came within a certain
+distance of a village. They then concealed themselves under the bushes,
+which hung over the water from the banks. In this position they remained
+during day-light. But at night they went up to it armed; and seized all the
+inhabitants, who had not time to make their escape. They obtained
+forty-five persons in this manner. In the second they were out eight or
+nine days; when they made a similar attempt, and with nearly similar
+success. They seized men, women, and children, as they could find them in
+the huts. They then bound their arms, and drove them before them to the
+canoes. The name of the person, thus discovered on board the Melampus, was
+Isaac Parker. On inquiring into his character from the master of the
+division, I found it highly respectable. I found also afterwards, that he
+had sailed with Captain Cook, with great credit to himself, round the
+world. It was also remarkable that my brother, on seeing him in London,
+when he went to deliver his evidence, recognised him as having served on
+board the Monarch man-of-war, and as one of the most exemplary men in that
+ship.
+
+I returned now in triumph. I had been out only three weeks, and I had found
+out this extraordinary person, and five respectable witnesses besides.
+These, added to the three discovered in the last journey, and to those
+provided before, made us more formidable than at any former period; so that
+the delay of our opponents, which we had looked upon as so great an evil,
+proved in the end truly serviceable to our cause.
+
+On going into the committee-room of the House of Commons on my return, I
+found that the examinations were still going on in the behalf of those, who
+were interested in the continuance of the trade; and they went on beyond
+the middle of April, when it was considered that they had closed. Mr.
+Wilberforce moved accordingly on the twenty-third of the same month, that
+Captain Thomas Wilson, of the royal navy, and that Charles Berns Wadstrom
+and Henry Hew Dalrymple, esquires, do attend as witnesses on the behalf of
+the abolition. There was nothing now but clamour from those on the opposite
+side of the question. They knew well, that there were but few members of
+the House of Commons, who had read the privy council report. They knew
+therefore, that, if the question were to be decided by evidence, it must be
+decided by that, which their own witnesses had given before parliament. But
+this was the evidence only on one side. It was certain therefore, if the
+decision were to be made upon this basis, that it must be entirely in their
+favour. Will it then be believed that in an English House of Commons there
+could be found persons, who could move to prevent the hearing of any other
+witnesses on this subject; and, what is more remarkable, that they should
+charge Mr. Wilberforce, because he proposed the hearing of them, with the
+intention solely of delay? Yes. Such persons were found, but, happily, only
+among the friends of the Slave-trade. Mr. Wilberforce, in replying to them,
+could not help observing, that it was rather extraordinary that they, who
+had occasioned the delay of a whole year, should charge him with that, of
+which they themselves had been so conspicuously guilty. He then commented
+for some time on the injustice of their motion. He stated too, that he
+would undertake to remove from disinterested and unprejudiced persons many
+of the impressions, which had been made by the witnesses against the
+abolition; and he appealed to the justice and honour of the house in behalf
+of an injured people; under the hope, that they would not allow a decision
+to be made till they had heard the whole of the case. These observations,
+however, did not satisfy all those, who belonged to the opposite party.
+Lord Penrhyn contended for a decision without a moment's delay. Mr.
+Gascoyne relented; and said, he would allow three weeks to the
+abolitionists, during which their evidence, might be heard. At length the
+debate ended; in the course of which, Mr. Pitt and Mr. Fox powerfully
+supported Mr. Wilberforce; when the motion was negatived without any
+attempt at a division.
+
+The witnesses in behalf of the abolition of the Slave-trade now took
+possession of the ground, which those in favour of it had left. But what
+was our surprise, when only three of them had been heard, to find that Mr.
+Norris should come forward as an evidence! This he did to confirm what he
+had stated to the privy council as to the general question; but he did it
+more particularly, as it appeared afterwards, in the justification of his
+own conduct: for the part, which he had taken at Liverpool, as it related
+to me, had become a subject of conversation with many. It was now well
+known, what assistance he had given me there in my pursuit; how he had even
+furnished me with clauses for a bill for the abolition of the trade; how I
+had written to him, in consequence of his friendly cooperation, to come up
+as an evidence in our favour; and how at that moment he had accepted the
+office of a delegate on the contrary side. The noise, which the relation
+and repetition of these and other circumstances had made, had given him, I
+believe, considerable pain. His friends too had urged some explanation as
+necessary. But how short-sighted are they who do wrong! By coming forward
+in this imprudent manner, he fixed the stain only the more indelibly on
+himself; for he thus imposed upon me the cruel necessity of being examined
+against him; and this necessity was the more afflicting to me, because I
+was to be called upon, not to state facts relative to the trade, but to
+destroy his character as an evidence in its support. I was to be called
+upon, in fact, to explain all those communications, which have been stated
+to have taken place between us on this subject. Glad indeed should I have
+been to have declined this painful interference. But no one would hear of a
+refusal. The Bishop of London, Mr. Pitt, and Mr. Wilberforce, considered my
+appearance on this occasion as an imperious duty to the cause of the
+oppressed. It may be perhaps sufficient to say, that I was examined; that
+Mr. Norris. was present all the time; that I was cross-examined by counsel;
+and that after this time, Mr. Norris seemed to have no ordinary sense of
+his own degradation; for he never afterwards held up his head, or looked
+the abolitionists in the face, or acted with energy as a delegate, as on
+former occasions.
+
+The hearing of evidence continued to go on in behalf of the abolition of
+the trade. No less than twenty-four witnesses, altogether, were heard in
+this session. And here it may not be improper to remark, that, during the
+examination of our own witnesses as well as the cross-examination of those
+of our opponents, no counsel were ever employed. Mr. Wilberforce and Mr.
+William Smith undertook this laborious department; and as they performed it
+with great ability, so they did it with great liberality towards those, who
+were obliged to come under their notice in the course of this fiery ordeal.
+
+The bill of Sir William Dolben was now to be renewed. On this occasion the
+enemies of the abolition became again conspicuous; for on the twenty-sixth
+of May, they availed themselves of a thin house to propose an amendment, by
+which they increased the number of the slaves to the tonnage of the vessel.
+They increased it too, without taking into the account, as had hitherto
+been done, the extent of the superficies of the vessels, which were to
+carry them. This was the third indecorous attempt against what were only
+reasonable and expected proceedings in the present session. But their
+advantage was of no great duration; for, the very next day, the amendment
+was rejected on the report by a majority of ninety-five to sixty-nine, in
+consequence, principally, of the private exertions of Mr. Pitt. Of this
+bill, though it was renewed in other years besides the present, I shall say
+no more in this History; because it has nothing to do with the general
+question. Horrible as it yet left the situation of the poor slaves in their
+transportation, (which the plate has most abundantly shown) it was the best
+bill, which could be then obtained; and it answered to a certain degree the
+benevolent wishes of the worthy baronet, who introduced it: for if we could
+conclude that these voyages were made more comfortable to the injured
+Africans, in proportion as there was less mortality in them, he had
+undoubtedly the pleasure of seeing the end, at least partially, obtained;
+though he must always have felt a great drawback from it, by reflecting
+that the survivors, however their sufferings might have been a little
+diminished, were reserved for slavery.
+
+The session was now near its close; and we had the sorrow to find, though
+we had defeated our opponents in the three instances which have been
+mentioned, that the tide ran decidedly against us, upon the general
+question, in the House of Commons. The same statements, which had struck so
+many members with panic in the former sessions, such as that of
+emancipation, of the ruin and massacre of the planters, and of
+indemnification to the amount of seventy millions, had been industriously
+kept up, and this by a personal canvass among them. But this hostile
+disposition was still unfortunately increased by considerations of another
+sort. For the witnesses of our opponents had taken their ground first. No
+less than eleven of them had been examined in the last sessions. In the
+present, two-thirds of the time had been occupied by others on the same
+side. Hence the impression upon this ground also was against us; and we had
+yet had no adequate opportunity of doing it away. A clamour was also
+raised, where we thought it least likely to have originated. They (the
+planters) it was said, had produced persons in elevated life and of the
+highest character as witnesses; whereas we had been obliged to take up with
+those of the lowest condition. This idea was circulated directly after the
+introduction of Isaac Parker, before mentioned; a simple mariner; and who
+was now contrasted with the admirals on the other side of the question.
+This outcry was not only ungenerous, but unconstitutional. It is the glory
+of the English law, that it has no scale of veracity, which it adapts to
+persons, according to the station, which they may be found to occupy in
+life. In our courts of law the poor are heard as well as the rich; and if
+their reputation be fair, and they stand proof against the
+cross-examinations they undergo, both the judge and the jury must determine
+the matter in dispute by their evidence. But the House of Commons were now
+called upon by our opponents, to adopt the preposterous maxim of attaching
+falsehood to poverty, or of weighing truth by the standard of rank and
+riches.
+
+But though we felt a considerable degree of pain, in finding this adverse
+disposition among so many members of the Lower House, it was some
+consolation to us to know, that our cause had not suffered with their
+constituents, the people. These were still warmly with us. Indeed, their
+hatred of the trade had greatly increased. Many circumstances had occurred
+in this year to promote it. The committee, during my absence in France, had
+circulated the plate of the slave-ship throughout all England. No one saw
+it but he was impressed. It spoke to him in a language, which was at once
+intelligible and irresistible. It brought forth the tear of sympathy in
+behalf of the sufferers, and it fixed their sufferings in his heart. The
+committee too had been particularly vigilant during the whole of the year,
+with respect to the public papers. They had suffered no statement in behalf
+of those interested in the continuance of the trade, to go unanswered. Dr.
+Dickson, the author of the Letters on Slavery before mentioned, had come
+forward again with his services on this occasion, and by his active
+cooperation with a sub-committee appointed for the purpose, the coast was
+so well cleared of our opponents, that, though they were seen the next year
+again, through the medium of the same papers, they appeared only in sudden
+incursions, as it were, during which they darted a few weapons at us; but
+they never afterward ventured upon the plain to dispute the matter, inch by
+inch, or point by point, in an open and manly manner.
+
+But other circumstances occurred to keep up a hatred of the trade among the
+people in this interval, which, trivial as they were, ought not to be
+forgotten. The amiable poet Cowper had frequently made the Slave-trade the
+subject of his contemplation. He had already severely condemned it in his
+valuable poem The Task. But now he had written three little fugitive pieces
+upon it. Of these the most impressive was that, which he called The Negro's
+Complaint, and of which the following is a copy:
+
+  "Forced from home and all its pleasures,
+    Afric's coast I left forlorn,
+  To increase a stranger's treasures,
+    O'er the raging billows borne;
+  Men from England bought and sold me,
+    Paid my price in paltry gold;
+  But, though theirs they have inroll'd me,
+    Minds are never to be sold.
+
+  "Still in thought as free as ever,
+    What are England's rights, I ask.
+  Me from my delights to sever,
+    Me to torture, me to task?
+  Fleecy locks and black complexion
+    Cannot forfeit Nature's claim;
+  Skins may differ, but affection
+    Dwells in black and white the same.
+
+  "Why did all-creating Nature
+    Make the plant, for which we toil?
+  Sighs must fan it, tears must water,
+    Sweat of ours must dress the soil.
+  Think, ye masters, iron-hearted,
+    Lolling at your jovial boards,
+  Think, how many backs have smarted
+    For the sweets your cane affords.
+
+  "Is there, as you sometimes tell us,
+    Is there one, who rules on high;
+  Has he bid you buy and sell us,
+    Speaking from his throne, the sky?
+  Ask him, if your knotted scourges,
+    Fetters, blood-extorting screws,
+  Are the means, which duty urges
+    Agents of his will to use?
+
+  "Hark! he answers. Wild tornadoes,
+    Strewing yonder sea with wrecks,
+  Wasting towns, plantations, meadows,
+    Are the voice with which he speaks.
+  He, foreseeing what vexations
+    Afric's sons should undergo,
+  Fix'd their tyrants' habitations
+    Where his whirlwinds answer--No.
+
+  "By our blood in Afric wasted,
+    Ere our necks received the chain;
+  By the miseries, which we tasted
+    Crossing, in your barks, the main;
+  By our sufferings, since you brought us
+    To the man-degrading mart,
+  All sustain'd by patience, taught us
+    Only by a broken heart.
+
+  "Deem our nation brutes no longer,
+    Till some reason you shall find
+  Worthier of regard, and stronger,
+    Than the colour of our kind.
+  Slaves of gold! whose sordid dealings
+    Tarnish all your boasted powers,
+  Prove that you have human feelings,
+    Ere you proudly question ours."
+
+This little piece, Cowper presented in manuscript to some of his friends in
+London; and these, conceiving it to contain a powerful appeal in behalf of
+the injured Africans, joined in printing it. Having ordered it on the
+finest hot-pressed paper, and folded it up in a small and neat form, they
+gave it the printed title of "A Subject for Conversation at the Tea-table."
+After this, they sent many thousand copies of it in franks into the
+country. From one it spread to another, till it travelled almost over the
+whole island. Falling at length into the hands of the musician, it was set
+to music; and it then found its way into the streets, both of the
+metropolis and of the country, where it was sung as a ballad; and where it
+gave a plain account of the subject, with an appropriate feeling, to those
+who heard it.
+
+Nor was the philanthropy of the late Mr. Wedgwood less instrumental in
+turning the popular feeling in our favour. He made his own manufactory
+contribute to this end. He took the seal of the committee, as exhibited in
+the first volume, for his model; and he produced a beautiful cameo, of a
+less size, of which the ground was a most delicate white, but the Negro,
+who was seen imploring compassion in the middle of it, was in his own
+native colour. Mr. Wedgwood made a liberal donation of these, when
+finished, among his friends. I received from him no less than five hundred
+of them myself. They, to whom they were sent, did not lay them up in their
+cabinets, but gave them away likewise. They were soon, like The Negro's
+Complaint, in different parts of the kingdom. Some had them inlaid in gold
+on the lid of their snuff-boxes. Of the ladies, several wore them in
+bracelets, and others had them fitted up in an ornamental manner as pins
+for their hair. At length, the taste for wearing them became general; and
+thus fashion, which usually confines itself to worthless things, was seen
+for once in the honourable office of promoting the cause of justice,
+humanity, and freedom.
+
+I shall now only state that the committee took as members within its own
+body, in the period of time which is included in this chapter, the Reverend
+Mr. Ormerod, chaplain to the Bishop of London, and Captain James Bowen, of
+the royal navy; that they elected the honourable Nathaniel Curzon (now Lord
+Scarsdale), Dr. Frossard of Lyons, and Benjamin Garlike, esquire, then
+secretary to the English embassy at the Hague, honorary and corresponding
+members; and that they concluded their annual labours with a suitable
+report; in which they noticed the extraordinary efforts of our opponents to
+injure our cause, in the following manner: "In the progress of this
+business a powerful combination of interest has been excited against us.
+The African trader, the planter, and the West India merchant have united
+their forces to defend the fortress, in which their supposed treasures lie.
+Vague calculations and false alarms have been thrown out to the public, in
+order to show, that the constitution and even the existence of this free
+and opulent nation depend on its depriving the inhabitants of a foreign
+country of those rights and of that liberty, which we ourselves so highly
+and so justly prize. Surely in the nature of things and in the order of
+Providence it cannot be so. England existed as a great nation, long before
+the African commerce was known amongst us, and it is not to acts of
+injustice and violence that she owes her present rank in the scale of
+nations."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER III.
+
+_Continuation from July 1790 to July 1791--Author travels again throughout
+the kingdom--Object of his journey--Motion in the House of Commons to
+resume the hearing of evidence in favour of the abolition--List of all
+those examined on this side of the question--Machinations of interested
+persons, and cruel circumstances of the times previously to the day of
+decision--Motion at length made for stopping all further importation of
+Slaves from Africa--debates upon it--motion lost--Resolutions of the
+committee for the Abolition of the Slave-trade--Establishment of the Sierra
+Leone Company._
+
+
+It was a matter of deep affliction to us to think, that the crimes and
+sufferings inseparable from the Slave-trade were to be continued to another
+year. And yet it was our duty, in the present moment, to acquiesce in the
+postponement of the question. This postponement was not now for the purpose
+of delay, but of securing victory. The evidence, on the side of the
+abolition, was, at the end of the last session, but half finished. It was
+impossible, for the sake of Africa, that we could have then closed it. No
+other opportunity might offer in parliament for establishing an indelible
+record in her favour, if we were to neglect the present. It was our duty
+therefore even to wait to complete it, and to procure such a body of
+evidence, as should not only bear us out in the approaching contest, but
+such as, if we were to fail, would bear out our successors also. It was
+possible indeed, if the inhabitants of our islands were to improve in
+civilization, that the poor slaves might experience gradually an improved
+treatment with it; and so far testimony now might not be testimony for
+ever: but it was utterly impossible, while the Slave-trade lasted, and the
+human passions continued to be the same, that there should be any change
+for the better in Africa; or that any modes, less barbarous, should come
+into use for procuring slaves. Evidence therefore, if once collected on
+this subject, would be evidence for posterity. In the midst of these
+thoughts another journey occurred to me as necessary for this purpose; and
+I prayed, that I might have strength to perform it in the most effectual
+manner; and that I might be daily impressed, as I travelled along, with the
+stimulating thought, that the last hope for millions might possibly rest
+upon my own endeavours.
+
+The committee highly approved of this journey. Mr. Wilberforce saw the
+absolute necessity of it also; and had prepared a number of questions, with
+great ingenuity, to be put to such persons, as might have information to
+communicate. These I added to those in the tables, which have been already
+mentioned; and they made together a valuable collection on the subject.
+
+This tour was the most vexatious of any I had yet undertaken; many still
+refused to come forward to be examined, and some on the most frivolous
+pretences; so that I was disgusted, as I journeyed on, to find how little
+men were disposed to make sacrifices for so great a cause. In one part of
+it I went over nearly two thousand miles, receiving repeated refusals. I
+had not secured one witness within this distance. This was truly
+disheartening. I was subject to the whims and the caprice of those, whom I
+solicited on these occasions[A]. To these I was obliged to accommodate
+myself. When at Edinburgh, a person who could have given me material
+information, declined seeing me, though he really wished well to the cause.
+When I had returned southward as far as York, he changed his mind; and he
+would then see me. I went back, that I might not lose him. When I arrived,
+he would give me only private information. Thus I travelled, backwards and
+forwards, four hundred miles to no purpose. At another place a circumstance
+almost similar happened, though with a different issue. I had been for two
+years writing about a person, whose testimony was important. I had passed
+once through the town, in which he lived; but he would not then see me. I
+passed through it now, but no entreaties of his friends could make him
+alter his resolution. He was a man highly respectable as to situation in
+life; but of considerable vanity. I said therefore to my friend, on leaving
+the town, You may tell him that I expect to be at Nottingham in a few days;
+and though it be a hundred and fifty miles distant, I will even come back
+to see him, if he will dine with me on my return. A letter from my friend
+announced to me, when at Nottingham, that his vanity had been so gratified
+by the thought of a person coming expressly to visit him from such a
+distance, that he would meet me according to my appointment. I went back.
+We dined together. He yielded to my request. I was now repaid; and I
+returned towards Nottingham in the night. These circumstances I mention,
+and I feel it right to mention them, that the reader may be properly
+impressed with the great difficulties we found in collecting a body of
+evidence in comparison with our opponents. They ought never to be
+forgotten; for if with the testimony, picked up as it were under all these
+disadvantages, we carried our object against those, who had almost
+numberless witnesses to command, what must have been the merits of our
+cause! No person can indeed judge of the severe labour and trials in these
+journeys. In the present, I was out four months. I was almost over the
+whole island, I intersected it backwards and forwards both in the night and
+in the day. I travelled nearly seven thousand miles in this time, and I was
+able to count upon twenty new and willing evidences.
+
+[Footnote A: Ten or twelve of those, who were examined, much to their
+honour, came forward of their own accord.]
+
+Having now accomplished my object, Mr. Wilberforce moved on the fourth of
+February in the House of Commons, that a committee be appointed to examine
+further witnesses in behalf of the abolition of the Slave-trade. This
+motion was no sooner made, than Mr. Cawthorne rose, to our great surprise,
+to oppose it. He took upon himself to decide, that the house had heard
+evidence enough. This indecent motion was not without its advocates. Mr.
+Wilberforce set forth the injustice of this attempt; and proved, that out
+of eighty-one days, which had been given up to the hearing of evidence, the
+witnesses against the abolition had occupied no less than fifty-seven. He
+was strenuously supported by Mr. Burke, Mr. Martin, and other respectable
+members. At length, the debate ended in favour of the original motion, and
+a committee was appointed accordingly.
+
+The examinations began again on February the seventh, and continued till
+April the fifth, when they were finally closed. In this, as in the former
+session, Mr. Wilberforce and Mr. William Smith principally conducted them;
+and indeed it was necessary that they should have been present at these
+times; for it is perhaps difficult to conceive the illiberal manner, in
+which our witnesses were treated by those on the other side of the
+question. Men, who had left the trade upon principle, and who had come
+forward, against their apparent interest, to serve the cause of humanity
+and justice, were looked upon as mercenaries and culprits, or as men of
+doubtful and suspicious character. They were brow-beaten. Unhandsome
+questions were put to them. Some were kept for four days under examination.
+It was however highly to their honour, that they were found in no one
+instance to prevaricate, nor to waver as to the certainty of their facts.
+
+But this treatment, hard as it was for them to bear, was indeed good for
+the cause; for, coming thus pure out of the fire, they occasioned their own
+testimony, when read, to bear stronger marks of truth than that of the
+generality of our opponents; nor was it less superior, when weighed by
+other considerations. For the witnesses against the abolition were
+principally interested. They who were not, had been hospitably received at
+the planters' tables. The evidence too, which they delivered, was almost
+wholly negative. They had not seen such and such evils. But this was no
+proof that the evils did not exist. The witnesses, on the other hand, who
+came up in favour of the abolition, had no advantage in making their
+several assertions. In some instances they came up against their apparent
+interest; and, to my knowledge, suffered persecution for so doing. The
+evidence also, which they delivered, was of a positive nature. They gave an
+account of specific evils, which had come under their own eyes. These evils
+were never disproved. They stood therefore on a firm basis, as on a tablet
+of brass. Engraved there in affirmative characters; a few of them were of
+more value, than all the negative and airy testimony, which had been
+advanced on the other side of the question.
+
+That the public may judge, in some measure, of the respectability of the
+witnesses in favour of the abolition, and that they may know also to whom
+Africa is so much indebted for her deliverance, I shall subjoin their names
+in the three following lists. The first will contain those, who were
+examined by the privy council only; the second those, who were examined by
+the privy council and the house of commons also; and the third those, who
+were examined by the house of commons only.
+
+
+
+
+LIST I.
+
+Andrew Spaarman, physician, botanist, and successor to Linnaeus, traveller
+  on discovery in Africa for the King of Sweden.
+
+Reverend Isham Baggs, chaplain for two voyages to Africa in H.M. ship,
+  Grampus.
+
+Captain James Bowen, of the royal navy, one voyage to Africa.
+
+Mr. William James, a master in the royal navy, three voyages, as mate of a
+  slave-vessel.
+
+Mr. David Henderson, gunner of H.M. ship Centurion, three voyages to
+  Africa.
+
+Harry Gandy, two voyages to Africa, as captain of a slave-vessel.
+
+Thomas Eldred, two voyages there, as mate.
+
+James Arnold, three voyages there, as surgeon and surgeon's mate.
+
+Thomas Deane, two voyages there, as captain of a wood and ivory ship.
+
+
+
+
+LIST II.
+
+Major-General Rooke, commander of Goree, in Africa.
+
+Henry Hew Dalrymple, esquire, lieutenant of the 75th regiment at Goree, and
+  afterwards in all the West Indian islands.
+
+Thomas Willson, esquire, naval commander at Goree.
+
+John Hills, esquire, captain of H.M. ship Zephyr, on the African station.
+
+Sir George Yonge, two voyages as lieutenant, and two as captain, of a ship
+  of war, on the African station.
+
+Charles Berns Wadstrom, esquire, traveller on discovery in Africa for the
+  King of Sweden.
+
+Reverend John Newton, five voyages to Africa in a slave-vessel, and
+  resident eighteen months there.
+
+Captain John Ashley Hall, in the merchant service, two voyages in a
+  slave-vessel as a mate.
+
+Alexander Falconbridge, four voyages in a slave-vessel as surgeon and
+  surgeon's mate.
+
+Captain John Samuel Smith, of the royal navy, on the West India station.
+
+
+
+
+LIST III.
+
+Anthony Pantaleo How, esquire, employed by Government as a botanist in
+ Africa.
+
+Sir Thomas Bolton Thompson, two voyages as a lieutenant, and two as
+  commander of a ship of war on the African station.
+
+Lieutenant John Simpson, of the marines, two voyages in a ship of war on
+  the African station.
+
+Lieutenant Richard Storey, of the royal navy, four years on the
+  slave-employ all over the coast.
+
+Mr. George Miller, gunner of H.M. ship Pegase, one voyage in a slave-ship.
+
+Mr. James Morley, gunner of H.M. ship Medway, six voyages in a slave-ship.
+
+Mr. Henry Ellison, gunner of H.M. ship Resistance, eleven years in the
+  slave-trade.
+
+Mr. James Towne, carpenter of H.M. ship Syren, two voyages in a slave-ship.
+
+Mr. John Douglas, boatswain of H.M. ship Russel, one voyage in a
+  slave-ship.
+
+Mr. Isaac Parker, shipkeeper of H.M. ship Melampus, two voyages in a
+  slave-ship.
+
+Thomas Trotter, esquire, M.D. one voyage as surgeon of a slave-ship.
+
+Mr. Isaac Wilson, one voyage as surgeon of a slave-ship.
+
+Mr. Ecroyde Claxton, one voyage as surgeon of a slave-ship.
+
+James Kiernan, esquire, resident four years on the banks of the Senegal.
+
+Mr. John Bowman, eleven years in the slave-employ as mate, and as a factor
+  in the interior of Africa.
+
+Mr. William Dove, one voyage for slaves, and afterwards resident in
+  America.
+
+Major-general Tottenham, two years resident in the West Indies.
+
+Captain Giles, 19th regiment, seven years quartered in the West Indies.
+
+Captain Cook, 89th regiment, two years quartered in the West Indies.
+
+Lieutenant Baker Davison, 79th regiment, twelve years quartered in the West
+  Indies.
+
+Captain Hall, of the royal navy, five years on the West India station.
+
+Captain Thomas Lloyd, of the royal navy, one year on the West India
+  station.
+
+Captain Alexander Scott, of the royal navy, one voyage to Africa and the
+  West Indies.
+
+Mr. Ninian Jeffreys, a master in the royal navy, five years mate of a West
+  Indiaman, and for two years afterwards in the Islands in a ship of war.
+
+Reverend Thomas Gwynn Rees, chaplain of H.M. ship Princess Amelia, in the
+  West Indies.
+
+Reverend Robert Boucher Nicholls, dean of Middleham, many years resident in
+  the West Indies.
+
+Hercules Ross, esquire, twenty-one years a merchant in the West Indies.
+
+Mr. Thomas Clappeson, fifteen years in the West Indies as a wharfinger and
+  pilot.
+
+Mr. Mark Cook, sixteen years in the West Indies, first in the planting
+  business; and then as clerk and schoolmaster.
+
+Mr. Henry Coor, a mill-wright for fifteen years in the West Indies.
+
+Reverend Mr. Davies, resident fourteen years in the West Indies.
+
+Mr. William Duncan, four years in the West Indies, first as a clerk and
+  then as an overseer.
+
+Mr. William Fitzmaurice, fifteen years, first as a book-keeper, and then as
+  an overseer, in the West Indies.
+
+Mr. Robert Forster, six years, first in a store, then as second master and
+  pilot of a ship of war in the West Indies.
+
+Mr. Robert Ross, twenty-four years, first as a book-keeper, then as an
+  overseer, and afterwards as a planter, in the West Indies.
+
+Mr. John Terry, fourteen years an overseer or manager in the West Indies.
+
+Mr. Matthew Terry, twelve years resident, first as a book-keeper and
+  overseer, than as a land-surveyor in the King's service, and afterwards,
+  as a colony-surveyor, in the West Indies.
+
+George Woodward, esquire, an owner and mortgagee of property, and
+  occasionally a resident in the West Indies.
+
+Mr. Joseph Woodward, three years resident in the West Indies.
+
+Henry Botham, esquire, a director of sugar-works both in the East and West
+  Indies.
+
+Mr. John Giles, resident twelve years in the West Indies and America.
+
+J. Harrison, esquire, M.D. twenty-three years resident, in the medical
+  line, in the West Indies and America.
+
+Robert Jackson, esquire, M.D. four years resident in the West Indies in the
+  medical line, after which he joined his regiment, in the same profession,
+  in America.
+
+Thomas Woolrich, esquire, twenty years a merchant in the West Indies, but
+  in the interim was twice in America.
+
+Reverend James Stuart, two years in the West Indies, and twenty in America.
+
+George Baillie, esquire, one year in the West Indies, and twenty-five in
+  America.
+
+William Beverley, esquire, eighteen years in America.
+
+John Clapham, esquire, twenty years in America.
+
+Robert Crew, esquire, a native of America, and long resident there.
+
+John Savage, esquire, forty-six years resident in America.
+
+
+
+
+
+The evidence having been delivered on both sides, and then printed, it was
+judged expedient by Mr. Wilberforce, seeing that it filled three folio
+volumes, to abridge it. This abridgement was made by the different friends
+of the cause. William Burgh, esquire, of York; Thomas Babington, esquire,
+of Rothley Temple; the Reverend Thomas Gisborne, of Yoxall Lodge; Mr.
+Campbell Haliburton, of Edinburgh; George Harrison, with one or two others
+of the committee, and myself, were employed upon it. The greater share,
+however, of the labour fell upon Dr. Dickson. That no misrepresentation of
+any person's testimony might be made, Matthew Montagu, esquire, and the
+honourable E.J. Eliott, members of parliament, undertook to compare the
+abridged manuscripts with the original text, and to strike out or correct
+whatever they thought to be erroneous, and to insert whatever they thought
+to have been omitted. The committee, for the abolition, when the work was
+finished, printed it at their own expense. Mr. Wilberforce then presented
+it to the House of Commons, as a faithful abridgement of the whole
+evidence. Having been received as such under the guarantee of Mr. Montagu
+and Mr. Eliott, the committee sent it to every individual member of that
+House.
+
+The book having been thus presented, and a day fixed for the final
+determination of the question, our feelings became almost insupportable:
+for we had the mortification to find, that our cause was going down in
+estimation, where it was then most important that it should have increased
+in favour. Our opponents had taken advantage of the long delay, which the
+examination of evidence had occasioned, to prejudice the minds of many of
+the members of the House of Commons against us. The old arguments of
+emancipation, massacre, ruin, and indemnification, had been kept up; but,
+as the day of final decision approached, they had been increased. Such was
+our situation at this moment; when the current was turned still more
+powerfully against us by the peculiar circumstances of the times. It was
+indeed the misfortune of this great cause to be assailed by every weapon,
+which could be turned against it. At this time Thomas Paine had published
+his Rights of Man. This had been widely circulated. At this time also the
+French revolution had existed nearly two years. The people of England had
+seen, during this interval, a government as it were dissected. They had
+seen an old constitution taken down, and a new one put up, piece by piece,
+in its stead. The revolution, therefore, in conjunction with the book in
+question, had had the effect of producing dissatisfaction among thousands;
+and this dissatisfaction was growing, so as to alarm a great number of
+persons of property in the kingdom, as well as the government itself. Now
+will it be believed that our opponents had the injustice to lay hold of
+these circumstances, at this critical moment, to give a death-blow to the
+cause of the abolition? They represented the committee, though it had
+existed before the French revolution or the Rights of Man were heard of, as
+a nest of Jacobins; and they held up the cause, sacred as it was, and
+though it had the support of the minister, as affording an opportunity of
+meeting for the purpose of overthrowing the state. Their cry succeeded. The
+very book of the abridgment of the evidence was considered by many members
+as poisonous as that of the Rights of Man. It was too profane for many of
+them to touch; and they who discarded it, discarded the cause also.
+
+But these were not the only circumstances which were used as means, at this
+critical moment, to defeat us. News of the revolution, which had commenced
+in St. Domingo in consequence of the disputes between the Whites and the
+People of Colour, had, long before this, arrived in England. The horrible
+scenes which accompanied it, had been frequently published as so many
+arguments against our cause. In January new insurrections were announced as
+having happened in Martinique. The Negros there were described as armed,
+and the planters as having abandoned their estates for fear of massacre.
+Early in the month of March insurrections in the smaller French islands
+were reported. Every effort was then made to represent these as the effects
+of the new principles of liberty, and of the cry for abolition. But what
+should happen, just at this moment, to increase the clamour against us?
+Nothing less than an insurrection in Dominica.--Yes!--An insurrection in a
+British island. This was the very event for our opponents. "All the
+predictions of the planters had now become verified. The horrible massacres
+were now realizing at home." To give this news still greater effect, a
+meeting of our opponents was held at the London Tavern. By a letter read
+there it appeared, that "the ruin of Dominica was now at hand." Resolutions
+were voted, and a memorial presented to government, "immediately to
+dispatch such a military force to the different islands, as might preserve
+the Whites from destruction, and keep the Negros in subjection during the
+present critical state of the slave-bill." This alarm was kept up till the
+seventh of April, when another meeting took place to receive the answer of
+government to the memorial. It was there resolved, that "as it was too late
+to send troops to the islands, the best way of preserving them would be to
+bring the question of the Slave-trade to an immediate issue; and that it
+was the duty of the government, if they regarded the safety of the islands,
+to oppose the abolition of it." Accounts of all these proceedings were
+inserted in the public papers. It is needless to say that they were
+injurious to our cause. Many looked upon the abolitionists as monsters.
+They became also terrified themselves. The idea with these was, that unless
+the discussion on this subject was terminated, all would be lost. Thus,
+under a combination of effects arising from the publication of the Rights
+of Man, the rise and progress of the French revolution, and the
+insurrections of the Negros in the different islands, no one of which
+events had any thing to do with the abolition of the Slave-trade, the
+current was turned against us; and in this unfavourable frame of mind many
+members of parliament went into the House, on the day fixed for the
+discussion, to discharge their duty with respect to this great question.
+
+On the eighteenth of April Mr. Wilberforce made his motion. He began by
+expressing a hope, that the present debate, instead of exciting asperity
+and confirming prejudice, would tend to produce a general conviction of the
+truth of what in fact was incontrovertible; that the abolition of the
+Slave-trade was indispensably required of them, not only by morality and
+religion, but by sound policy. He stated that he should argue the matter
+from evidence. He adverted to the character, situation, and means of
+information of his own witnesses; and having divided his subject into
+parts, the first of which related to the manner of reducing the natives of
+Africa to a state of slavery, he handled it in the following manner.
+
+He would begin, he said, with the first boundary of the trade. Captain
+Wilson and Captain Hills, of His Majesty's navy, and Mr. Dalrymple of the
+land service, had concurred in stating, that in the country contiguous to
+the river Senegal, when slave-ships arrived there, armed parties were
+regularly sent out in the evening, who scoured the country, and brought in
+their prey. The wretched victims were to be seen in the morning bound back
+to back in the huts on shore, whence they were conveyed, tied hand and
+foot, to the slave-ships. The design of these ravages was obvious, because,
+when the Slave-trade was stopped, they ceased. Mr. Kiernan spoke of the
+constant depredations by the Moors to procure slaves. Mr. Wadstrom
+confirmed them. The latter gentleman showed also that they were excited by
+presents of brandy, gunpowder, and such other incentives; and that they
+were not only carried on by one community against another; but that the
+Kings were stimulated to practise them, in their own territories, and on
+their own subjects: and in one instance a chieftain, who, when intoxicated,
+could not resist the demands of the slave-merchants, had expressed, in a
+moment of reason, a due sense of his own crime, and had reproached his
+Christian seducers. Abundant also were the instances of private rapine.
+Individuals were kidnapped, whilst in their fields and gardens. There was
+an universal feeling of distrust and apprehension there. The natives never
+went any distance from home without arms; and when Captain Wilson asked
+them the reason of it, they pointed to a slave-ship then lying within
+sight.
+
+On the windward coast, it appeared from Lieutenant Story and Mr. Bowman,
+that the evils just mentioned existed, if possible, in a still higher
+degree. They had seen the remains of villages, which had been burnt, whilst
+the fields of corn were still standing beside them, and every other trace
+of recent desolation. Here an agent was sent to establish a settlement in
+the country, and to send to the ships such slaves as he might obtain. The
+orders he received from his captain were, that "he was to encourage the
+chieftains by brandy and gunpowder to go to war, to make slaves." This he
+did. The chieftains performed their part in return. The neighbouring
+villages were surrounded and set on fire in the night. The inhabitants were
+seized when making their escape; and, being brought to the agent, were by
+him forwarded to his principal on the coast. Mr. How, a botanist in the
+service of Government, stated, that on the arrival of an order for slaves,
+from Cape Coast Castle, while he was there, a native chief immediately sent
+forth armed parties, who brought in a supply of all descriptions in the
+night.
+
+But he would now mention one or two instances of another sort, and these
+merely on account of the conclusion, which was to be drawn from them. When
+Captain Hills was in the river Gambia, he mentioned accidentally to a Black
+pilot, who was in the boat with him, that he wanted a cabin-boy. It so
+happened that some youths were then on the shore with vegetables to sell.
+The pilot beckoned to them to come on board; at the same time giving
+Captain Hills to understand, that he might take his choice of them; and
+when Captain Hills rejected the proposal with indignation, the pilot seemed
+perfectly at a loss to account for his warmth; and drily observed, that the
+slave-captains would not have been so scrupulous. Again, when General Rooke
+commanded at Goree, a number of the natives, men, women, and children, came
+to pay him a friendly visit. All was gaiety and merriment. It was a scene
+to gladden the saddest, and to soften the hardest heart. But a
+slave-captain was not so soon thrown off his guard. Three English
+barbarians of this description had the audacity jointly to request the
+general, to seize the whole unsuspicious multitude and sell them. For this
+they alleged the precedent of a former governor. Was not this request a
+proof of the frequency of such acts of rapine? for how familiar must such
+have been to slave-captains, when three of them dared to carry to a British
+officer of rank such a flagitious proposal! This would stand in the place
+of a thousand instances. It would give credibility to every other act of
+violence stated in the evidence, however enormous it might appear.
+
+But he would now have recourse for a moment to circumstantial evidence. An
+adverse witness, who had lived on the Gold Coast, had said that the only
+way, in which children could be enslaved, was by whole families being sold
+when the principals had been condemned for witchcraft. But he said at the
+same time, that few were convicted of this crime, and that the younger part
+of a family in these cases was sometimes spared. But if this account were
+true, it would follow that the children in the slave-vessels would be few
+indeed. But it had been proved, that the usual proportion of these was
+never less than a fourth of the whole cargo on that coast, and also, that
+the kidnapping of children was very prevalent there.
+
+All these atrocities, he said, were fully substantiated by the evidence;
+and here he should do injustice to his cause, if he were not to make a
+quotation from the speech of Mr. B. Edwards in the Assembly of Jamaica,
+who, though he was hostile to his propositions, had yet the candour to
+deliver himself in the following manner there. "I am persuaded," says he,
+"that Mr. Wilberforce has been rightly informed as to the manner in which
+slaves are generally procured. The intelligence I have collected from my
+own Negros abundantly confirms his account; and I have not the smallest
+doubt, that in Africa the effects of this trade are precisely such as he
+has represented them. The whole, or the greatest part, of that immense
+continent is a field of warfare and desolation; a wilderness, in which the
+inhabitants are wolves towards each other. That this scene of oppression,
+fraud, treachery, and bloodshed, if not originally occasioned, is in part
+(I will not say wholly) upheld by the Slave-trade, I dare not dispute.
+Every man in the Sugar Islands may be convinced that it is so, who will
+inquire of any African Negros, on their first arrival, concerning the
+circumstances of their captivity. The assertion that it is otherwise, is
+mockery and insult."
+
+But it was not only by acts of outrage that the Africans were brought into
+bondage. The very administration of justice was turned into an engine for
+that end. The smallest offence was punished by a fine equal to the value of
+a slave. Crimes were also fabricated; false accusations were resorted to;
+and persons were sometimes employed to seduce the unwary into practices
+with a view to the conviction and the sale of them.
+
+It was another effect of this trade, that it corrupted the morals of those,
+who carried it on. Every fraud was used to deceive the ignorance of the
+natives by false weights and measures, adulterated commodities, and other
+impositions of a like sort. These frauds were even acknowledged by many,
+who had themselves practised them in obedience to the orders of their
+superiors. For the honour of the mercantile character of the country, such
+a traffic ought immediately to be suppressed.
+
+Yet these things, however clearly proved by positive testimony, by the
+concession of opponents, by particular inference, by general reasoning, by
+the most authentic histories of Africa, by the experience of all countries
+and of all ages,--these things, and (what was still more extraordinary)
+even the possibility of them, were denied by those, who had been brought
+forward on the other side of the question. These, however, were chiefly
+persons, who had been trading governors of forts in Africa; or who had long
+commanded ships in the Slave-trade. As soon as he knew the sort of
+witnesses which was to be called against him, he had been prepared to
+expect much prejudice. But his expectations had been greatly surpassed by
+the testimony they had given. He did not mean to impeach their private
+characters, but they certainly showed themselves under the influence of
+such gross prejudices, as to render them incompetent judges of the subject
+they came to elucidate. They seemed (if he might so say) to be enveloped by
+a certain atmosphere of their own; and to see, as it were, through a kind
+of African medium. Every object, which met their eyes, came distorted and
+turned from its true direction. Even the declarations, which they made on
+other occasions, seemed wholly strange to them. They sometimes not only
+forgot what they had seen, but what they had said; and when to one of them
+his own testimony to the privy council was read, he mistook it for that of
+another, whose evidence he declared to be "the merest burlesque in the
+world."
+
+But the House must be aware that there was not only an African medium, but
+an African logic. It seemed to be an acknowledged axiom in this; that every
+person, who offered a slave for sale, had a right to sell him, however
+fraudulently he might have obtained him. This had been proved by the
+witnesses, who opposed him. "It would have stopped my trade," said one of
+them, "to have asked the broker, how he came by the person he was offering
+me for sale"--"We always suppose," said another, "the broker has a right to
+sell the person he offers us"--"I never heard of such a question being
+asked," said a third; "a man would be thought a fool, who should put such a
+question."--He hoped the House would see the practical utility of this
+logic. It was the key-stone, which held the building together. By means of
+it, slave-captains might traverse the whole coast of Africa, and see
+nothing but equitable practices. They could not, however, be wholly
+absolved, even if they availed themselves of this principle to its fullest
+extent; for they had often committed depredations themselves; especially
+when they were passing by any part of the coast, where they did not mean to
+continue or to go again. Hence it was (as several captains of the navy and
+others had declared on their examination) that the natives, when at sea in
+their canoes, would never come near the men of war, till they knew them to
+be such. But finding this, and that they were not slave-vessels, they laid
+aside their fears, and came and continued on board with unsuspecting
+cheerfulness.
+
+With respect to the miseries of the Middle Passage, he had said so much on
+a former occasion, that he would spare the feelings of the committee as
+much as he could. He would therefore simply state that the evidence, which
+was before them, confirmed all those scenes of wretchedness, which he had
+then described; the same suffering from a state of suffocation by being
+crowded together; the same dancing in fetters; the same melancholy singing;
+the same eating by compulsion; the same despair; the same insanity; and all
+the other abominations which characterized the trade. New instances however
+had occurred, where these wretched men had resolved on death to terminate
+their woes. Some had destroyed themselves by refusing sustenance, in spite
+of threats and punishments. Others had thrown themselves into the sea; and
+more than one, when in the act of drowning, were seen to wave their hands
+in triumph, "exulting" (to use the words of an eye-witness) "that they had
+escaped." Yet these and similar things, when viewed through the African
+medium he had mentioned, took a different shape and colour. Captain Knox,
+an adverse witness, had maintained, that slaves lay during the night in
+tolerable comfort. And yet he confessed, that in a vessel of one hundred
+and twenty tons, in which he had carried two hundred and ninety slaves, the
+latter had not all of them room to lie on their backs. How comfortably then
+must they have lain in his subsequent voyages! for he carried afterwards in
+a vessel of a hundred and eight tons four hundred and fifty and in a vessel
+of one hundred and fifty tons, no less than six hundred slaves. Another
+instance of African deception was to be found in the testimony of Captain
+Frazer, one of the most humane captains in the trade. It had been said of
+him, that he had held hot coals to the mouth of a slave, to compel him to
+eat. He was questioned on this point; but not admitting, in the true spirit
+of African logic, that he who makes another commit a crime, is guilty of it
+himself, he denied the charge indignantly, and defied a proof. But it was
+said to him, "Did you never order such a thing to be done?" His reply was,
+"Being sick in my cabin, I was informed that a man-slave would neither eat,
+drink, nor speak. I desired the mate and surgeon to try to persuade him to
+speak. I desired that the slaves might try also. When I found he was still
+obstinate, not knowing whether it was from sulkiness or insanity, I ordered
+a person to present him with a piece of fire in one hand and a piece of yam
+in the other, and to tell me what effect this had upon him. I learnt that
+he took the yam and began to eat it, but he threw the fire overboard." Such
+was his own account of the matter. This was eating by duresse, if any thing
+could be called so. The captain, however, triumphed in his expedient, and
+concluded by telling the committee, that he sold this very slave at Grenada
+for forty pounds. Mark here the moral of the tale, and learn the nature and
+the cure of sulkiness.
+
+But upon whom did the cruelties, thus arising out of the prosecution of
+this barbarous traffic, fall? Upon a people with feeling and intellect like
+ourselves. One witness had spoken of the acuteness of their understandings;
+another of the extent of their memories; a third of their genius for
+commerce; a fourth of their proficiency in manufactures at home. Many had
+admired their gentle and peaceable disposition; their cheerfulness; and
+their hospitality. Even they, who were nominally slaves in Africa, lived a
+happy life. A witness against the abolition had described them as sitting
+and eating with their masters in the true style of patriarchal simplicity
+and comfort. Were these then a people incapable of civilization? The
+argument that they were an inferior species had been proved to be false.
+
+He would now go to a new part of the subject. An opinion had gone forth
+that the abolition of the trade would be the ruin of the West India
+Islands. He trusted he should prove that the direct contrary was the truth;
+though, had he been unable to do this, it would have made no difference as
+to his own vote. In examining, however, this opinion, he should exclude the
+subject of the cultivation of new lands by fresh importations of slaves.
+The impolicy of this measure, apart from its inhumanity, was indisputably
+clear. Let the committee consider the dreadful mortality, which attended
+it. Let them look to the evidence of Mr. Woolrich, and there see a contrast
+drawn between the slow, but sure progress of cultivation, carried on in the
+natural way, and the attempt to force improvements, which, however
+flattering the prospect at first, soon produced a load of debt, and
+inextricable embarrassments. He might even appeal to the statements of the
+West Indians themselves, who allowed that more than twenty millions were
+owing to the people of this country, to show that no system could involve
+them so deeply as that, on which they had hitherto gone. But he would refer
+them to the accounts of Mr. Irving, as contained in the evidence. Waving
+then the consideration of this part of the subject, the opinion in question
+must have arisen from a notion, that the stock of slaves, now in the
+islands, could not be kept up by propagation; but that it was necessary,
+from time to time, to recruit them with imported Africans. In direct
+refutation of this position he should prove, First, that in the condition
+and treatment of the Negros, there were causes, sufficient to afford us
+reason to expect a considerable decrease, but particularly that their
+increase had not been a serious object of attention; Secondly, that this
+decrease was in fact, notwithstanding, very trifling; or rather, he
+believed, he might declare it had now actually ceased; and, Thirdly, he
+should urge many direct and collateral facts and arguments, constituting on
+the whole an irresistible proof, that even a rapid increase might
+henceforth be expected.
+
+He wished to treat the West Indians with all possible candour; but he was
+obliged to confess, in arguing upon these points, that whatever splendid
+instances there might be of kindness towards their slaves, there were some
+evils of almost universal operation, were necessarily connected with the
+system of slavery. Above all, the state of degradation, to which they were
+reduced, deserved to be noticed; as it produced an utter inattention to
+them as moral agents. They were kept at work under the whip like cattle.
+They were left totally ignorant of morality and religion. There was no
+regular marriage among them. Hence promiscuous intercourse, early
+prostitution, and excessive drinking, were material causes of their
+decrease. With respect to the instruction of the slaves in the principles
+of religion, the happiest effects had resulted, particularly in Antigua,
+where, under the Moravians and Methodists, they had so far profited, that
+the planters themselves confessed their value, as property, had been raised
+one-third by their increased habits of regularity and industry.
+
+Whatever might have been said to the contrary, it was plainly to be
+inferred from the evidence, that the slaves were not protected by law.
+Colonial statutes had indeed been passed; but they were a dead letter;
+since, however ill they were treated, they were not considered as having a
+right to redress. An instance of astonishing cruelty by a Jew had been
+mentioned by Mr. Ross. It was but justice to say, that the man was held in
+detestation for it; but yet no one had ever thought of calling him to a
+legal account. Mr. Ross conceived a master had a right to punish his slave
+in whatever manner he might think proper. The same was declared by
+numberless other witnesses. Some instances, indeed, had lately occurred of
+convictions. A master had wantonly cut the mouth of a child, of six months
+old, almost from ear to ear. But did not the verdict of the jury show, that
+the doctrine of calling masters to an account was entirely novel; as it
+only pronounced him "Guilty, subject to the opinion of the court, if
+immoderate correction of a slave by his master be a crime indictable!" The
+court determined in the affirmative; and what was the punishment of this
+barbarous act?--A fine of forty shillings currency, equivalent to about
+twenty-five shillings sterling.
+
+The slaves were but ill off in point of medical care. Sometimes four or
+five, and even eight or nine thousand of them, were under the care of one
+medical man; which, dispersed on different and distant estates, was a
+greater number than he could possibly attend to.
+
+It was also in evidence, that they were in general under-fed. They were
+supported partly by the produce of their own provision-ground, and partly
+by an allowance of flour and grain from their masters. In one of the
+islands, where provision-ground did not answer one year in three, the
+allowance to a working Negro was but from five to nine pints of grain per
+week: in Dominica, where it never failed, from six to seven quarts: in
+Nevis and St. Christophers, where there was no provision-ground, it was but
+eleven pints. Add to this, that it might be still less, as the
+circumstances of their masters might become embarrassed; and in this case
+both an abridgment of their food, and an increase of their labour, would
+follow.
+
+But the great cause of the decrease of the slaves was in the non-residence
+of the planters. Sir George Yonge, and many others, had said, they had seen
+the slaves treated in a manner, which their owners would have resented, if
+they had known it. Mr. Orde spoke in the strongest terms of the misconduct
+of managers. The fact was, that these in general sought to establish their
+characters by producing large crops at a small immediate expense; too
+little considering how far the slaves might suffer from ill-treatment and
+excessive labour. The pursuit of such a system was a criterion for judging
+of their characters, as both Mr. Long and Mr. Ottley had confessed.
+
+But he must contend, in addition to this, that the object of keeping up the
+stock of slaves by breeding had never been seriously attended to. For this
+he might appeal both to his own witnesses, and to those of his opponents;
+but he would only notice one fact. It was remarkable that, when owners and
+managers were asked about the produce of their estates, they were quite at
+home as to the answer; but when they were asked about the proportion of
+their male and female slaves, and their infants, they knew little about the
+matter. Even medical men were adepts in the art of planting; but when they
+were asked the latter questions, as connected with breeding and rearing,
+they seemed quite amazed; and could give no information upon the subject of
+them.
+
+Persons, however, of great respectability had been called as witnesses, who
+had not seen the treatment of the Negros as he had now described it. He
+knew what was due to their characters; but yet he must enter a general
+protest against their testimony. "I have often," says Mr. Ross, "attended
+both governors and admirals upon tours in the island of Jamaica. But it was
+not likely that these should see much distress upon these occasions. The
+White People and drivers would take care not to harrow up the feelings of
+strangers of distinction by the exercise of the whip, or the infliction of
+punishments, at that particular time; and, even if there were any
+disgusting objects, it was natural to suppose that they would then remove
+them." But in truth these gentlemen had given proofs, that they were under
+the influence of prejudice. Some of them had declared the abolition would
+ruin the West Indies. But this, it was obvious, must depend upon the
+practicability of keeping up the stock without African supplies; and yet,
+when they were questioned upon this point, they knew nothing about it.
+Hence they had formed a conclusion without premises. Their evidence, too,
+extended through a long series of years. They had never seen one instance
+of ill-treatment in the time; and yet, in the same breath, they talked of
+the amended situation of the slaves; and that they were now far better off
+than formerly. One of them, to whom his country owed much, stated that a
+master had been sentenced to death for the murder of his own slave; but his
+recollection must have failed him; for the murder of a slave was not then a
+capital crime. A respectable governor also had delivered an opinion to the
+same effect; but, had he looked into the statute-book of the island, he
+would have found his error.
+
+It had been said that the slaves were in a better state than the peasantry
+of this country. But when the question was put to Mr. Ross, did he not
+answer, "that he would not insult the latter by a comparison?"
+
+It had been said again, that the Negros were happier as slaves, than they
+would be if they were to be made free. But how was this reconcileable with
+facts? If a Negro under extraordinary circumstances had saved money enough,
+did he not always purchase his release from this situation of superior
+happiness by the sacrifice of his last shilling? Was it not also notorious,
+that the greatest reward, which a master thought he could bestow upon his
+slave for long and faithful services, was his freedom?
+
+It had been said again, that Negros, when made free, never returned to
+their own country. But was not the reason obvious? If they could even reach
+their own homes in safety, their kindred and connections might be dead. But
+would they subject themselves to be kidnapped again; to be hurried once
+more on board a slave-ship; and again to endure and survive the horrors of
+the passage? Yet the love of their native country had been proved beyond a
+doubt. Many of the witnesses had heard them talk of it in terms of the
+strongest affection. Acts of suicide too were frequent in the islands,
+under the notion that these afforded them the readiest means of getting
+home. Conformably with this, Captain Wilson had maintained, that the
+funerals, which in Africa were accompanied with lamentations and cries of
+sorrow, were attended, in the West Indies, with every mark of joy.
+
+He had now, he said, made good his first proposition, That in the condition
+of the slaves there were causes, which should lead us to expect, that there
+would be a considerable decrease among them. This decrease in the island of
+Jamaica was but trifling, or, rather, it had ceased some years ago; and if
+there was a decrease, it was only on the imported slaves. It appeared from
+the privy council report, that from 1698 to 1730 the decrease was three and
+a half per cent.; from 1730 to 1755 it was two and a half per cent.; from
+1755 to 1768 it was lessened to one and three quarters; and from 1768 to
+1788 it was not more than one per cent.: this last decrease was not greater
+than could be accounted for from hurricanes and consequent famines, and
+from the number of imported Africans who perished in the seasoning. The
+latter was a cause of mortality, which, it was evident, would cease with
+the importations. This conclusion was confirmed in part by Dr. Anderson,
+who, in his testimony to the Assembly of Jamaica, affirmed, that there was
+a considerable increase on the properties of the island, and particularly
+in the parish in which he resided.
+
+He would now proceed to establish his second proposition, That from
+henceforth a very considerable increase might be expected. This he might
+support by a close reasoning upon the preceding facts. But the testimony of
+his opponents furnished him with sufficient evidence. He could show, that
+wherever the slaves were treated better than ordinary, there was uniformly
+an increase in their number. Look at the estates of Mr. Willock, Mr.
+Ottley, Sir Ralph Payne, and others. In short, he should weary the
+committee, if he were to enumerate the instances of plantations, which were
+stated in the evidence to have kept up their numbers only from a little
+variation in their treatment. A remedy also had been lately found for a
+disorder, by which vast numbers of infants had been formerly swept away.
+Mr. Long also had laid it down, that whenever the slaves should bear a
+certain proportion to the produce, they might be expected to keep up their
+numbers; but this proportion they now exceeded. The Assembly of Jamaica had
+given it also as their opinion, "that when once the sexes should become
+nearly equal in point of number, there was no reason to suppose, that the
+increase of the Negros by generation would fall short of the natural
+increase of the labouring poor in Great Britain." But the inequality, here
+spoken of, could only exist in the case of the African Negros, of whom more
+males were imported than females; and this inequality would be done away
+soon after the trade should cease.
+
+But the increase of the Negros, where their treatment was better than
+ordinary, was confirmed in the evidence by instances in various parts of
+the world. From one end of the continent of America to the other their
+increase had been undeniably established; and this to a prodigious extent,
+though they had to contend with the severe cold of the winter, and in some
+parts with noxious exhalations in the summer. This was the case also in the
+settlement of Bencoolen in the East Indies. It appeared from the evidence
+of Mr. Botham, that a number of Negros, who had been imported there in the
+same disproportion of the sexes as in West India cargoes, and who lived
+under the same disadvantages, as in the Islands, of promiscuous intercourse
+and general prostitution, began, after they had been settled a short time,
+annually to increase.
+
+But to return to the West Indies.--A slave-ship had been many years ago
+wrecked near St. Vincent's. The slaves on board, who escaped to the island,
+were without necessaries; and, besides, were obliged to maintain a war with
+the native Caribbs: yet they soon multiplied to an astonishing number; and,
+according to Mr. Ottley, they were now on the increase. From Sir John
+Dalrymple's evidence it appeared, that the domestic slaves in Jamaica, who
+were less worked than those in the field, increased; and from Mr. Long,
+that the free Blacks and Mulattoes there increased also.
+
+But there was an instance which militated against these facts (and the only
+one in the evidence) which he would now examine. Sir Archibald Campbell had
+heard, that the Maroons in Jamaica in the year 1739 amounted to three
+thousand men fit to carry arms. This supposed their whole number to have
+been about twelve thousand. But in the year 1782, after a real muster by
+himself, he found, to his great astonishment, that the fighting men did not
+then amount to three hundred. Now the fact was, that Sir Archibald
+Campbell's first position was founded upon rumour only; and was not true.
+For according to Mr. Long, the Maroons were actually numbered in 1749; when
+they amounted to about six hundred and sixty in all, having only a hundred
+and fifty men fit to carry arms. Hence, if when mustered by Sir Archibald
+Campbell he found three hundred fighting men, they must from 1749 to 1782
+have actually doubled their population.
+
+Was it possible, after these instances, to suppose that the Negros could
+not keep up their numbers, if their natural increase were made a subject of
+attention? The reverse was proved by sound reasoning. It had been confirmed
+by unquestionable facts. It had been shown, that they had increased In
+every situation, where there was the slightest circumstance in their
+favour. Where there had been any decrease, it was stated to be trifling;
+though no attention appeared to have been paid to the subject. This
+decrease had been gradually lessening; and, whenever a single cause of it
+had been removed (many still remaining), it had altogether ceased. Surely
+these circumstances formed a body of proof, which was irresistible.
+
+He would now speak of the consequences of the abolition of the Slave-trade
+in other points of view; and first, as to its effects upon our marine. An
+abstract of the Bristol and Liverpool muster-rolls had been just laid
+before the House. It appeared from this, that in three hundred and fifty
+slave-vessels, having on board twelve thousand two hundred and sixty-three
+persons, two thousand six hundred and forty-three were lost in twelve
+months; whereas in four hundred and sixty-two West Indiamen, having on
+board seven thousand six hundred and forty persons, one hundred and
+eighteen only were lost in seven months. This rather exceeded the losses
+stated by Mr. Clarkson. For their barbarous usage on board these ships, and
+for their sickly and abject state in the West Indies, he would appeal to
+Governor Parry's letter; to the evidence of Mr. Ross; to the assertion of
+Mr. B. Edwards, an opponent; and to the testimony of Captains Sir George
+Yonge and Thompson, of the Royal Navy. He would appeal also to what Captain
+Hall, of the Navy, had given in evidence. This gentleman, after the action
+of the twelfth of April, impressed thirty hands from a slave-vessel, whom
+he selected with the utmost care from a crew of seventy; and he was
+reprimanded by his admiral, though they could scarcely get men to bring
+home the prizes, for introducing such wretches to communicate disorders to
+the fleet. Captain Smith of the Navy had also declared, that when employed
+to board Guineamen to impress sailors, although he had examined near twenty
+vessels, he never was able to get more than two men, who were fit for
+service; and these turned out such inhuman fellows, although good seamen,
+that he was obliged to dismiss them from the ship.
+
+But he hoped the committee would attend to the latter part of the assertion
+of Captain Smith. Yes:--this trade, while it injured the constitutions of
+our sailors, debased their morals. Of this, indeed, there was a barbarous
+illustration in the evidence. A slaveship had struck on some shoals, called
+the Morant Keys, a few leagues from the east end of Jamaica. The crew
+landed in their boats, with arms and provisions, leaving the slaves on
+board in their irons. This happened in the night. When morning came, it was
+discovered that the Negros had broken their shackles, and were busy in
+making rafts; upon which afterwards they placed the women and children. The
+men attended upon the latter, swimming by their side, whilst they drifted
+to the island where the crew were. But what was the sequel? From an
+apprehension that the Negros would consume the water and provision, which
+had been landed, the crew resolved to destroy them as they approached the
+shore. They killed between three and four hundred. Out of the whole cargo
+only thirty-three were saved, who, on being brought to Kingston, were sold.
+It would, however, be to no purpose, he said, to relieve the Slave-trade
+from this act of barbarity. The story of the Morant Keys was paralleled by
+that of Captain Collingwood; and were you to got rid of these, another, and
+another, would still present itself, to prove the barbarous effects of this
+trade on the moral character.
+
+But of the miseries of the trade there was no end. Whilst he had been
+reading out of the evidence the story of the Morant Keys, his eye had but
+glanced on the opposite page, and it met another circumstance of horror.
+This related to what were called the refuse-slaves. Many people in Kingston
+were accustomed to speculate in the purchase of those, who were left after
+the first day's sale. They then carried them out into the country, and
+retailed them. Mr. Ross declared, that he had seen these landed in a very
+wretched state, sometimes in the agonies of death, and sold as low as for a
+dollar, and that he had known several expire in the piazzas of the
+vendue-master. The bare description superseded the necessity of any remark.
+Yet these were the familiar incidents of the Slave-trade.
+
+But he would go back to the seamen. He would mention another cause of
+mortality, by which many of them lost their lives. In looking over Lloyd's
+list, no less than six vessels were cut off by the irritated natives in one
+year, and the crews massacred. Such instances were not unfrequent. In
+short, the history of this commerce was written throughout in characters of
+blood.
+
+He would next consider the effects of the abolition on those places where
+it was chiefly carried on. But would the committee believe, after all the
+noise which had been made on this subject, that the Slave-trade composed
+but a thirtieth part of the export trade of Liverpool, and that of the
+trade of Bristol it constituted a still less proportion? For the effects of
+the abolition on the general commerce of the kingdom, he would refer them
+to Mr. Irving; from whose evidence it would appear, that the medium value
+of the British manufactures, exported to Africa, amounted only to between
+four and five hundred thousand pounds annually. This was but a trifling
+sum. Surely the superior capital, ingenuity, application, and integrity, of
+the British manufacturer would command new markets for the produce of his
+industry, to an equal amount, when this should be no more. One branch,
+however, of our manufactures, he confessed, would suffer from the
+abolition; and that was the manufacture of gunpowder; of which the nature
+of our connection with Africa drew from us as much as we exported to all
+the rest of the world besides.
+
+He hastened, however, to another part of the argument. Some had said, "We
+wish to put an end to the Slave-trade, but we do not approve of your mode.
+Allow more time. Do not displease the legislatures of the West India
+islands. It is by them that those laws must be passed, and enforced, which
+will secure your object." Now he was directly at issue with these
+gentlemen. He could show, that the abolition was the only certain mode of
+amending the treatment of the slaves, so as to secure their increase; and
+that the mode which had been offered to him, was at once inefficacious and
+unsafe. In the first place, how could any laws, made by these legislatures,
+be effectual, whilst the evidence of Negros was in no case admitted against
+White men? What was the answer from Grenada? Did it not state, "that they
+who were capable of cruelty, would in general be artful enough to prevent
+any but slaves from being witnesses of the fact?" Hence it had arisen, that
+when positive laws had been made, in some of the islands, for the
+protection of the slaves, they had been found almost a dead letter.
+Besides, by what law would you enter into every man's domestic concerns,
+and regulate the interior economy of his house and plantation? This would
+be something more than a general excise. Who would endure such a law? And
+yet on all these and innumerable other minutiae must depend the protection
+of the slaves, their comforts, and the probability of their increase. It
+was universally allowed, that the Code Noir had been utterly neglected in
+the French islands, though there was an officer appointed by the crown to
+see it enforced. The provisions of the Directorio had been but of little
+more avail in the Portuguese settlements, or the institution of a Protector
+of the Indians, in those of the Spaniards. But what degree of protection
+the slaves would enjoy might be inferred from the admission of a gentleman,
+by whom this very plan of regulation had been recommended, and who was
+himself no ordinary person, but a man of discernment and legal resources.
+He had proposed a limitation of the number of lashes to be given by the
+master or overseer for one offence. But, after all, he candidly confessed,
+that his proposal was not likely to be useful, while the evidence of slaves
+continued inadmissible against their masters. But he could even bring
+testimony to the inefficacy of such regulations. A wretch in Barbadoes had
+chained a Negro girl to the floor, and flogged her till she was nearly
+expiring. Captain Cook and Major Fitch, hearing her cries, broke open the
+door and found her. The wretch retreated from their resentment, but cried
+out exultingly, "that he had only given her thirty-nine lashes (the number
+limited by law) at any one time; and that he had only inflicted this number
+three times since the beginning of the night," adding, "that he would
+prosecute them for breaking open his door; and that he would flog her to
+death for all any one, if he pleased; and that he would give her the fourth
+thirty-nine before morning."
+
+But this plan of regulation was not only inefficacious, but unsafe. He
+entered his protest against the fatal consequences, which might result from
+it. The Negros were creatures like ourselves; but they were uninformed, and
+their moral character was debased. Hence they were unfit for civil rights.
+To use these properly they must be gradually restored to that level, from
+which they had been so unjustly degraded. To allow them an appeal to the
+laws, would be to awaken in them a sense of the dignity of their nature.
+The first return of life, after a swoon, was commonly a convulsion,
+dangerous at once to the party himself and to all around him. You should
+first prepare them for the situation, and not bring the situation to them.
+To be under the protection of the law was in fact to be a freeman; and to
+unite slavery and freedom in one condition was impracticable. The
+abolition, on the other hand, was exactly such an agent as the case
+required. All hopes of supplies from the Coast being cut off, breeding
+would henceforth become a serious object of attention; and the care of
+this, as including better clothing and feeding, and milder discipline,
+would extend to innumerable particulars, which an act of assembly could
+neither specify nor enforce. The horrible system, too, which many had gone
+upon, of working out their slaves in a few years, and recruiting their
+gangs with imported Africans, would receive its death-blow from the
+abolition of the trade. The opposite would force itself on the most
+unfeeling heart. Ruin would stare a man in the face, if he were not to
+conform to it. The non-resident owners would then express themselves in the
+terms of Sir Philip Gibbs, "that he should consider it as the fault of his
+manager, if he were not to keep up the number of his slaves." This
+reasoning concerning the different tendencies of the two systems was
+self-evident. But facts were not wanting to confirm it. Mr. Long had
+remarked, that all the insurrections and suicides in Jamaica had been found
+among the imported slaves, who, not having lost the consciousness of civil
+rights, which they had enjoyed in their own country, could not brook the
+indignities to which they were subjected in the West Indies. An instance in
+point was afforded also by what had lately taken place in the island of
+Dominica. The disturbance there had been chiefly occasioned by some runaway
+slaves from the French islands. But what an illustration was it of his own
+doctrine to say, that the slaves of several persons, who had been treated,
+with kindness, were not among the number of the insurgents on that
+occasion!
+
+But when persons coolly talked of putting an end to the Slave-trade through
+the medium of the West India legislatures, and of gradual abolition, by
+means of regulations, they surely forgot the miseries which this horrid
+traffic occasioned in Africa during every moment of its continuance. This
+consideration was conclusive with him, when called upon to decide whether
+the Slave-trade should be tolerated for a while, or immediately abolished.
+The divine law against murder was absolute and unqualified. Whilst we were
+ignorant of all these things, our sanction of them might, in some measure,
+be pardoned. But now, when our eyes were opened, could we tolerate them for
+a moment, unless we were ready at once to determine, that gain should be
+our God, and, like the heathens of old, were prepared to offer up human
+victims at the shrine of our idolatry?
+
+This consideration precluded also the giving heed for an instant to another
+plea, namely, that if we were to abolish the trade it would be
+proportionably taken up by other nations. But, whatever other nations did,
+it became Great Britain, in every point of view, to take a forward part.
+One half of this guilty commerce had been carried on by her subjects. As we
+had been great in our crime, we should be early in our repentance. If
+Providence had showered his blessings upon us in unparalleled abundance, we
+should show ourselves grateful for them by rendering them subservient to
+the purposes for which they were intended. There would be a day of
+retribution, wherein we should have to give an account of all those
+talents, faculties, and opportunities, with which we had been intrusted.
+Let it not then appear, that our superior power had been employed to
+oppress our fellow-creatures, and our superior light to darken the creation
+of God. He could not but look forward with delight to the happy prospects
+which opened themselves to his view in Africa from the abolition of the
+Slave-trade; when a commerce, justly deserving that name, should be
+established with her; not like that, falsely so called, which now
+subsisted, and which all who were interested for the honour of the
+commercial character (though there were no superior principle) should
+hasten to disavow. Had this trade indeed been ever so profitable, his
+decision would have been in no degree affected by that consideration.
+"Here's the smell of blood on the hand still, and all the perfumes of
+Arabia cannot sweeten it."
+
+He doubted, whether it was not almost an act of degrading condescension to
+stoop to discuss the question in the view of commercial interest. On this
+ground, however, he was no less strong than on every other. Africa abounded
+with productions of value, which she would gladly exchange for our
+manufactures, when these were not otherwise to be obtained: and to what an
+extent her demand might then grow exceeded almost the powers of
+computation. One instance already existed of a native king, who being
+debarred by his religion the use of spirituous liquors, and therefore not
+feeling the irresistible temptation to acts of rapine which they afforded
+to his countrymen, had abolished the Slave-trade throughout all his
+dominions, and was encouraging an honest industry.
+
+For his own part, he declared that, interested as he might be supposed to
+be in the final event of the question, he was comparatively indifferent as
+to the present decision of the House upon it. Whatever they might do, the
+people of Great Britain, he was confident, would abolish the Slave-trade
+when, as would then soon happen, its injustice and cruelty should be fairly
+laid before them. It was a nest of serpents, which would never have existed
+so long, but for the darkness in which they lay hid. The light of day would
+now be let in on them, and they would vanish from the sight. For himself,
+he declared he was engaged in a work, which he would never abandon. The
+consciousness of the justice of his cause would carry him forward, though
+he were alone; but he could not but derive encouragement from considering
+with whom he was associated. Let us not, he said, despair. It is a blessed
+cause; and success, ere long, will crown our exertions. Already we have
+gained one victory. We have obtained for these poor creatures the
+recognition of their human nature[A], which, for a while, was most
+shamefully denied them. This is the first fruits of our efforts.
+
+[Footnote A: This point was actually obtained by the evidence before the
+House of Commons; for, after this, we heard no more of them as an inferior
+race.]
+
+Let us persevere, and our triumph will be complete. Never, never, will we
+desist, till we have wiped away this scandal from the Christian name; till
+we have released ourselves from the load of guilt under which we at present
+labour; and till we have extinguished every trace of this bloody traffic,
+which our posterity, looking back to the history of these enlightened
+times, will scarcely believe had been suffered to exist so long, a disgrace
+and a dishonour to our country.
+
+
+He then moved, that the chairman be instructed to move for leave to bring
+in a bill to prevent the further importation of slaves into the British
+colonies in the West Indies.
+
+Colonel Tarleton immediately rose up, and began by giving an historical
+account of the trade from the reign of Elizabeth to the present time. He
+then proceeded to the sanction, which parliament had always given it. Hence
+it could not then be withdrawn without a breach of faith. Hence, also, the
+private property embarked in it was sacred, nor could it be invaded, unless
+an adequate compensation were given in return.
+
+They, who had attempted the abolition of the trade, were led away by a
+mistaken humanity. The Africans themselves had no objection to its
+continuance.
+
+With respect to the Middle Passage, he believed the mortality there to be
+on an average only five in the hundred; whereas in regiments, sent out to
+the West Indies, the average loss in the year was about ten and a half per
+cent.
+
+The Slave-trade was absolutely necessary, if we meant to carry on our West
+India commerce; for many attempts had been made to cultivate the lands in
+the different islands by White labourers; but they had always failed.
+
+It had also the merit of keeping up a number of seamen in readiness for the
+state. Lord Rodney had stated this as one of its advantages on the breaking
+out of a war. Liverpool alone could supply nine hundred and ninety-three
+seamen annually.
+
+He would now advert to the connections dependent upon the African trade. It
+was the duty of the House to protect the planters, whose lives had been,
+and were then, exposed to imminent dangers, and whose property had
+undergone an unmerited depreciation. To what could this depreciation, and
+to what could the late insurrection at Dominica, be imputed, which had been
+saved from horrid carnage and midnight-butchery only by the adventitious
+arrival of two British regiments? They could only be attributed to the long
+delayed question of the abolition of the Slave-trade; and if this question
+were to go much longer unsettled, Jamaica would be endangered also.
+
+To members of landed property he would observe, that the abolition would
+lessen the commerce of the country, and increase the national debt and the
+number of their taxes. The minister, he hoped, who patronized this wild
+scheme, had some new pecuniary resource in store to supply the deficiencies
+it would occasion.
+
+To the mercantile members he would speak thus: "A few ministerial men in
+the house had been gifted with religious inspiration, and this had been
+communicated to other eminent personages in it: these enlightened
+philanthropists had discovered, that it was necessary, for the sake of
+humanity and for the honour of the nation, that the merchants concerned in
+the African trade should be persecuted, notwithstanding the sanction of
+their trade by parliament, and notwithstanding that such persecution must
+aggrandize the rivals of Great Britain." Now how did this language sound?
+It might have done in the twelfth century, when all was bigotry and
+superstition. But let not a mistaken humanity, in these enlightened times,
+furnish a colourable pretext for any injurious attack on property or
+character.
+
+These things being considered, he should certainly oppose the measure in
+contemplation. It would annihilate a trade, whose exports amounted to eight
+hundred thousand pounds annually, and which employed a hundred and sixty
+vessels and more than five thousand seamen. It would destroy also the West
+India trade, which was of the annual value of six millions; and which
+employed one hundred and sixty thousand tons of shipping, and seamen in
+proportion. These were objects of too much importance to the country to be
+hazarded on an unnecessary speculation.
+
+Mr. Grosvenor then rose. He complimented the humanity of Mr. Wilberforce,
+though he differed from him on the subject of his motion. He himself had
+read only the privy council report; and he wished for no other evidence.
+The question had then been delayed two years. Had the abolition been so
+clear a point as it was said to be, it could not have needed either so much
+evidence or time.
+
+He had heard a good deal about kidnapping and other barbarous practices. He
+was sorry for them. But these were the natural consequences of the laws of
+Africa; and it became us as wise men to turn them to our own advantage. The
+Slave-trade was certainly not an amiable trade. Neither was that of a
+butcher; but yet it was a very necessary one.
+
+There was great reason to doubt the propriety of the present motion. He had
+twenty reasons for disapproving it. The first was, that the thing was
+impossible. He needed not therefore to give the rest. Parliament, indeed,
+might relinquish the trade. But to whom? To foreigners, who would continue
+it, and without the humane regulations, which were applied to it by his
+country-men.
+
+He would give advice to the house on this subject in the words, which the
+late Alderman Beckford used on a different occasion: "Meddle not with
+troubled waters: they will be found to be bitter waters, and the waters of
+affliction." He again admitted, that the Slave-trade was not an amiable
+trade; but he would not gratify his humanity at the expense of the
+interests of his country; and he thought we should not too curiously
+inquire into the unpleasant circumstances, which attended it.
+
+Mr. James Martin succeeded Mr. Grosvenor. He said, he had been long aware,
+how much self-interest could pervert the judgment; but he was not apprized
+of the full power of it, till the Slave-trade became a subject of
+discussion. He had always conceived, that the custom of trafficking in
+human beings had been incautiously begun, and without any reflection upon
+it; for he never could believe that any man, under the influence of moral
+principles, could suffer himself knowingly to carry on a trade replete with
+fraud, cruelty, and destruction; with destruction, indeed, of the worst
+kind, because it subjected the sufferers to a lingering death. But he found
+now, that even such a trade as this could be sanctioned.
+
+It was well observed in the petition from the University of Cambridge
+against the Slave-trade, "that a firm belief in the Providence of a
+benevolent Creator assured them that no system, founded on the oppression
+of one part of mankind, could be beneficial to another." He felt much
+concern, that in an assembly of the representatives of a country, boasting
+itself zealous not only for the preservation of its own liberties, but for
+the general rights of mankind, it should be necessary to say a single word
+upon such a subject; but the deceitfulness of the human heart was such, as
+to change the appearances of truth, when it stood in opposition to
+self-interest. And he had to lament that even among those, whose public
+duty it was to cling to the universal and eternal principles of truth,
+justice, and humanity, there were found some, who could defend that which
+was unjust, fraudulent, and cruel.
+
+The doctrines he had heard that evening, ought to have been reserved for
+times the most flagrantly profligate and abandoned. He never expected then
+to learn, that the everlasting laws of righteousness were to give way to
+imaginary, political, and commercial expediency; and that thousands of our
+fellow-creatures were to be reduced to wretchedness, that individuals might
+enjoy opulence, or government a revenue.
+
+He hoped that the house for the sake of its own character would explode
+these doctrines with all the marks of odium they deserved; and that all
+parties would join in giving a death-blow to this execrable trade. The
+royal family would, he expected, from their known benevolence, patronize
+the measure. Both Houses of Parliament were now engaged in the prosecution
+of a gentleman accused of cruelty and oppression in the East. But what were
+these cruelties, even if they could be brought home to him, when compared
+in number and degree to those, which were every day and every hour
+committed in the abominable traffic, which was now under their discussion!
+He considered therefore both Houses of Parliament as pledged upon this
+occasion. Of the support of the bishops he could have no doubt; because
+they were to render Christianity amiable, both by their doctrine and their
+example. Some of the inferior clergy had already manifested a laudable zeal
+in behalf of the injured Africans. The University of Cambridge had
+presented a petition to that house worthy of itself. The Sister-university
+had, by one of her representatives, given sanction to the measure.
+Dissenters of various denominations, but particularly the Quakers, (who to
+their immortal honour had taken the lead in it,) had vied with those of the
+established church in this amiable contest. The first counties, and some of
+the largest trading towns, in the kingdom had espoused the cause. In short,
+there had never been more unanimity in the country, than in this righteous
+attempt.
+
+With such support, and with so good a cause, it would be impossible to
+fail. Let but every man stand forth, who had at any time boasted of himself
+as an Englishman, and success would follow. But if he were to be unhappily
+mistaken as to the result, we must give up the name of Englishmen. Indeed,
+if we retained it, we should be the greatest hypocrites in the world; for
+we boasted of nothing more than of our own liberty; we manifested the
+warmest indignation at the smallest personal insult; we professed liberal
+sentiments towards other nations: but to do these things, and to continue
+such a traffic, would be to deserve the hateful character before mentioned.
+While we could hardly bear the sight of any thing resembling slavery, even
+as a punishment, among ourselves, how could we consistently entail an
+eternal slavery upon others?
+
+It had been frequently, but most disgracefully said, that "we should not be
+too eager in setting the example. Let the French begin it." Such a
+sentiment was a direct libel upon the ancient, noble, and generous
+character of this nation. We ought, on the other hand, under the blessings
+we enjoyed, and under the high sense we entertained of our own dignity as a
+people, to be proudly fearful, lest other nations should anticipate our
+design, and obtain the palm before us. It became us to lead. And if others
+should not follow us, it would belong to them to glory in the shame of
+trampling under foot the laws of reason, humanity, and religion.
+
+This motion, he said, came strongly recommended to them. The honourable
+member, who introduced it, was justly esteemed for his character. He was
+the representative too of a noble county, which had been always ready to
+take the lead in every public measure for the good of the community, or for
+the general benefit of mankind; of a county too, which had had the honour
+of producing a Saville. Had his illustrious predecessor been alive, he
+would have shown the same zeal on the same occasion. The preservation of
+the unalienable rights of all his fellow-creatures was one of the chief
+characteristics of that excellent citizen. Let every member in that house
+imitate him in the purity of their conduct and in the universal rectitude
+of their measures, and they would pay the same tender regard to the rights
+of other countries as to those of their own; and, for his part, he should
+never believe those persons to be sincere, who were loud in their
+professions of love of liberty, if he saw that love confined to the narrow
+circle of one community, which ought to be extended to the natural rights
+of every inhabitant of the globe.
+
+But we should be better able to bring ourselves up to this standard of
+rectitude, if we were to put ourselves into the situation of those, whom we
+oppressed. This was the rule of our religion. What should we think of
+those, who should say, that it was their interest to injure us? But he
+hoped we should not deceive ourselves so grossly as to imagine, that it was
+our real interest to oppress any one. The advantages to be obtained by
+tyranny were imaginary, and deceitful to the tyrant; and the evils they
+caused to the oppressed were grievous, and often insupportable.
+
+Before he sat down, he would apologize, if he had expressed himself too
+warmly on this subject. He did not mean to offend any one. There were
+persons connected with the trade, some of whom he pitied on account of the
+difficulty of their situation. But he should think most contemptibly of
+himself as a man, if he could talk on this traffic without emotion. It
+would be a sign to him of his own moral degradation. He regretted his
+inability to do justice to such a cause; but if, in having attempted to
+forward it, he had shown the weakness of his powers, he must console
+himself with the consideration, that he felt more solid comfort in having
+acted up to sound public principles, than he could have done from the
+exertion of the most splendid talents against the conviction of his
+conscience.
+
+Mr. Burdon rose, and said he was embarrassed to know how to act. Mr.
+Wilberforce had in a great measure met his ideas. Indeed he considered
+himself as much in his hands; but he wished to go gradually to the
+abolition of the trade. He wished to give time to the planters to recruit
+their stocks. He feared the immediate abolition might occasion a monopoly
+among such of them as were rich, to the detriment of the less affluent. We
+ought, like a judicious physician, to follow nature, and to promote a
+gradual recovery.
+
+Mr. Francis rose next. After complimenting Mr. Wilberforce, he stated that
+personal considerations might appear to incline him to go against the side
+which he was about to take, namely, that of strenuously supporting his
+motion. Having himself an interest in the West Indies, he thought that what
+he should submit to the house would have the double effect of evidence and
+argument; and he stated most unequivocally his opinion, that the abolition
+of the Slave-trade would tend materially to the benefit of the West Indies.
+
+The arguments urged by the honourable mover were supported by the facts,
+which he had adduced from the evidence, more strongly than any arguments
+had been supported in any speech be had ever heard. He wished, however,
+that more of these facts had been introduced into the debate; for they were
+apt to have a greater effect upon the mind than mere reasonings, however
+just and powerful. Many had affirmed that the Slave-trade was politic and
+expedient; but it was worthy of remark, that no man had ventured to deny
+that it was criminal. Criminal, however, be declared it to be in the
+highest degree; and he believed it was equally impolitic. Both its
+inexpediency and injustice had been established by the honourable mover. He
+dwelt much on the unhappy situation of the Negros in the West Indies, who
+were without the protection of government or of efficient laws, and subject
+to the mere caprice of men, who were at once the parties, the judges, and
+the executioners.
+
+He instanced an overseer, who, having thrown a Negro into a copper of
+boiling cane-juice for a trifling offence, was punished merely by the loss
+of his place, and by being obliged to pay the value of the slave. He stated
+another instance of a girl of fourteen, who was dreadfully whipped for
+coming too late to her work. She fell down motionless after it; and was
+then dragged along the ground, by the legs, to an hospital; where she died.
+The murderer, though tried, was acquitted by a jury of his peers, upon the
+idea, that it was impossible a master could destroy his own property. This
+was a notorious fact. It was published in the Jamaica Gazette; and it had
+even happened since the question of the abolition had been started.
+
+The only argument used against such cruelties, was the master's interest in
+the slave. But he urged the common cruelty to horses, in which their
+drivers had an actual interest with the drivers of men in the colonies, as
+a proof that this was no security. He had never heard an instance of a
+master being punished for the murder of his slave. The propagation of the
+slaves was so far from being encouraged, that it was purposely checked,
+because it was thought more profitable and less troublesome to buy a full
+grown Negro, than to rear a child. He repeated that his interest might have
+inclined him to the other side of the question; but he did not choose to
+compromise between his interest and his duty; for, if he abandoned his
+duty, he should not be happy in this world; nor should he deserve happiness
+in the next.
+
+Mr. Pitt rose, but he said it was only to move, seeing that justice could
+not be done to the subject this evening, that the further consideration of
+the question might be adjourned to the next.
+
+Mr. Cawthorne and Colonel Tarleton both opposed this motion, and Colonel
+Phipps and Lord Carhampton supported it.
+
+Mr. Fox said, the opposition to the adjournment was uncandid and
+unbecoming. They who opposed it well knew that the trade could not bear
+discussion. Let it be discussed; and, although there were symptoms of
+predetermination in some, the abolition of it must be carried. He would not
+believe that there could be found in the House of Commons men of such hard
+hearts and inaccessible understandings, as to vote an assent to its
+continuance, and then go home to their families, satisfied with their vote,
+after they had been once made acquainted with the subject.
+
+Mr. Pitt agreed with Mr. Fox, that from a full discussion of the subject
+there was every reason to augur, that the abolition would be adopted. Under
+the imputations, with which this trade was loaded, gentlemen should
+remember, they could not do justice to their own characters, unless they
+stood up, and gave their reasons for opposing the abolition of it. It was
+unusual also to force any question of such importance to so hasty a
+decision. For his own part, it was his duty, from the situation in which he
+stood, to state fully his own sentiments on the question; and, however
+exhausted both he and the house might be, he was resolved it should not
+pass without discussion, as long as he had strength to utter a word upon
+it. Every principle, that could bind a man of honour and conscience, would
+impel him to give the most powerful support he could to the motion for the
+abolition.
+
+The motion of Mr. Pitt was assented to, and the house was adjourned
+accordingly.
+
+On the next day the subject was resumed. Sir William Yonge rose, and said,
+that, though he differed from the honourable mover, he had much admired his
+speech of the last evening. Indeed the recollection of it made him only the
+more sensible of the weakness of his own powers; and yet, having what he
+supposed to be irrefragable arguments in his possession, he felt emboldened
+to proceed.
+
+And, first, before he could vote for the abolition, he wished to be
+convinced, that, whilst Britain were to lose, Africa would gain. As for
+himself, he hated a traffic in men, and joyfully anticipated its
+termination at no distant period under a wise system of regulation: but he
+considered the present measure as crude and indolent; and as precluding
+better and wiser measures, which were already in train. A British
+Parliament should attain not only the best ends, but by the wisest means.
+
+Great Britain might abandon her share of this trade, but she could not
+abolish it. Parliament was not an assembly of delegates from the powers of
+Europe, but of a single nation. It could not therefore suppress the trade;
+but would eventually aggravate those miseries incident to it, which every
+enlightened man must acknowledge, and every good man must deplore. He
+wished the traffic for ever closed. But other nations were only waiting for
+our decision, to seize the part we should leave them. The new projects of
+these would be intemperate; and, in the zeal of rivalship, the present
+evils of comparatively sober dealing would be aggravated beyond all
+estimate in this new and heated auction of bidders for life and limb. We
+might indeed by regulation give an example of new principles of policy and
+of justice; but if we were to withdraw suddenly from this commerce, like
+Pontius Pilate, we should wash our hands indeed, but we should not be
+innocent as to the consequences.
+
+On the first agitation of this business, Mr. Wilberforce had spoken
+confidently of other nations following our example. But had not the
+National Assembly of France referred the Slave-trade to a select committee,
+and had not that committee rejected the measure of its abolition? By the
+evidence it appeared, that the French and Spaniards were then giving
+bounties to the Slave-trade; that Denmark was desirous of following it;
+that America was encouraging it; and that the Dutch had recognized its
+necessity, and recommended its recovery. Things were bad enough indeed as
+they were, but he was sure this rivalship would make them worse.
+
+He did not admit the disorders imputed to the trade in all their extent.
+Pillage and kidnapping could not be general, on account of the populousness
+of the country; though too frequent instances of it had been proved. Crimes
+might be falsely imputed. This he admitted; but only partially. Witchcraft,
+he believed, was the secret of poisoning, and therefore deserved the
+severest punishment. That there should be a number of convictions for
+adultery, where polygamy was a custom, was not to be wondered at. But he
+feared, if a sale of these criminals were to be done away, massacre would
+be the substitute.
+
+An honourable member had asked on a former day, "Is it an excuse for
+robbery, to say that another would have committed it?" But the Slave-trade
+did not necessarily imply robbery. Not long since Great Britain sold her
+convicts, indirectly at least, to slavery. But he was no advocate for the
+trade. He wished it had never been begun; and that it might soon terminate.
+But the means were not adequate to the end proposed.
+
+Mr. Burke had said on a former occasion, "that in adopting the measure we
+must prepare to pay the price of our virtue." He was ready to pay his share
+of that price. But the effect of the purchase must be first ascertained. If
+they did not estimate this, it was not benevolence, but dissipation.
+Effects were to be duly appreciated; and though statesmen might rest every
+thing on a plausible manifesto of cause, the humbler moralist, meditating
+peace and goodwill towards men, would venture to call such statesmen
+responsible for consequences.
+
+In regard to the colonies, a sudden abolition would be oppression. The
+legislatures there should be led, and not forced, upon this occasion. He
+was persuaded they would act wisely to attain the end pointed out to them.
+They would see, that a natural increase of their Negros might be effected
+by an improved system of legislation; and that in the result the
+Slave-trade would be no longer necessary.
+
+A sudden abolition, also, would occasion dissatisfaction there. Supplies
+were necessary for some time to come. The Negros did not yet generally
+increase by birth. The gradation of ages was not yet duly filled. These and
+many defects might be remedied, but not suddenly.
+
+It would cause also distress there. The planters, not having their expected
+supplies, could not discharge their debts. Hence their slaves would be
+seized and sold. Nor was there any provision in this case against the
+separation of families, except as to the mother and infant child. These
+separations were one of the chief outrages complained of in Africa. Why
+then should we promote them in the West Indies? The confinement on board a
+slave-ship had been also bitterly complained of; but, under distraint for
+the debt of a master, the poor slave might linger in a gaol twice or thrice
+the time of the Middle Passage.
+
+He again stated his abhorrence of the Slave-trade; but as a resource,
+though he hoped but a temporary one, it was of such consequence to the
+existence of the country, that it could not suddenly be withdrawn. The
+value of the imports and exports between Great Britain and the West Indies,
+including the excise and customs, was between seven and eight millions
+annually; and the tonnage of the ships employed, about an eighth of the
+whole tonnage of these kingdoms.
+
+He complained that in the evidence the West India planters had been by no
+means spared. Cruel stories had been hastily and lightly told against them.
+Invidious comparisons had been made to their detriment. But it was well
+known, that one of our best comic writers, when he wished to show
+benevolence in its fairest colours, had personified it in the character of
+the West Indian. He wished the slave might become as secure as the
+apprentice in this country: but it was necessary that the alarms concerning
+the abolition of the Slave-trade should, in the mean time, be quieted; and
+he trusted that the good sense and true benevolence of the House would
+reject the present motion.
+
+Mr. Matthew Montagu rose, and said a few words in support of the motion;
+and after condemning the trade in the strongest manner, he declared, that
+as long as he had life, he would use every faculty of his body and mind in
+endeavouring to promote its abolition.
+
+Lord John Russell succeeded Mr. Montagu. He said, that although slavery was
+repugnant to his feelings, he must vote against the abolition, as visionary
+and delusive. It was a feeble attempt without the power to serve the cause
+of humanity. Other nations would take up the trade. Whenever a bill of wise
+regulation should be brought forward, no man would be more ready than
+himself to lend his support. In this way the rights of humanity might be
+asserted without injury to others. He hoped he should not incur censure by
+his vote; for, let his understanding be what it might, he did not know that
+he had, notwithstanding the assertions of Mr. Fox, an inaccessible heart.
+
+Mr. Stanley (agent for the islands) rose next. He felt himself called upon,
+he said, to refute the many calumnies, which had for years been propagated
+against the planters, (even through the medium of the pulpit, which should
+have been employed to better purposes,) and which had at length produced
+the mischievous measure, which was now under the discussion of the House. A
+cry had been sounded forth, and from one end of the kingdom to the other;
+as if there had never been a slave from Adam to the present time. But it
+appeared to him to have been the intention of Providence, from the very
+beginning, that one set of men should be slaves to another. This truth was
+as old as it was universal. It was recognized in every history, under every
+government, and in every religion. Nor did the Christian religion itself,
+if the comments of Dr. Halifax, bishop of Gloucester, on a passage in St.
+Paul's epistle to the Corinthians were true, show more repugnance to
+slavery than any other.
+
+He denied that the slaves were procured in the manner which had been
+described. It was the custom of all savages to kill their prisoners; and
+the Africans ought to be thankful that they had been carried safe into the
+British colonies.
+
+As to the tales of misery in the Middle Passage, they were gross
+falsehoods; and as to their treatment in the West Indies, he knew
+personally that it was, in general, indulgent and humane.
+
+With regard to promoting their increase by any better mode of treatment, he
+wished gentlemen would point it out to him. As a planter he would thank
+them for it. It was absurd to suppose that he and others were blind to
+their own interest. It was well known that one Creole slave was worth two
+Africans: and their interest therefore must suggest to them that the
+propagation of slaves was preferable to the purchase of imported Negros, of
+whom one half very frequently died in the seasoning.
+
+He then argued the impossibility of beasts doing the work of the
+plantations. He endeavoured to prove that the number of these, adequate to
+this purpose, could not be supplied with food; and after having made many
+other observations, which, on account of the lowness of his voice, could
+not be heard, he concluded by objecting to the motion.
+
+Mr. William Smith rose. He wondered how the last speaker could have had the
+boldness to draw arguments from scripture in support of the Slave-trade.
+Such arguments could be intended only to impose on those, who never took
+the trouble of thinking for themselves. Could it be thought for a moment,
+that the good sense of the House could be misled by a few perverted or
+misapplied passages, in direct opposition to the whole tenor and spirit of
+Christianity; to the theory, he might say, of almost every religion, which
+had ever appeared in the world? Whatever might have been advanced, every
+body must feel, that the Slave-trade could not exist an hour, if that
+excellent maxim, "to do to others as we would wish that others should do to
+us," had its proper influence on the conduct of men.
+
+Nor was Mr. Stanley more happy in his argument of the antiquity and
+universality of slavery. Because a practice had existed, did it necessarily
+follow that it was just? By this argument every crime might be defended
+from the time of Cain. The slaves of antiquity, however, were in a
+situation far preferable to that of the Negros in the West Indies. A
+passage in Macrobius, which exemplified this in the strongest manner, was
+now brought to his recollection. "Our ancestors," says Macrobius,
+"denominated the master father of the family, and the slave domestic, with
+the intention of removing all odium from the condition of the master, and
+all contempt from that of the servant." Could this language be applied to
+the present state of West India slavery?
+
+It had been complained of by those who supported the trade, that they
+laboured under great disadvantages by being obliged to contend against the
+most splendid abilities which the House could boast. But he believed they
+laboured under one, which was worse, and for which no talents could
+compensate; he meant the impossibility of maintaining their ground fairly
+on any of those principles, which every man within those walls had been
+accustomed, from his infancy, to venerate as sacred. He and his friends too
+laboured under some disadvantages. They had been charged with fanaticism.
+But what had Mr. Long said, when he addressed himself to those planters,
+who were desirous of attempting improvements on their estates?  He advised
+them "not to be diverted by partial views, vulgar prejudices, or the
+ridicule which might spring from weak minds, from a benevolent attention to
+the public good." But neither by these nor by other charges were he or his
+friends to be diverted from the prosecution of their purpose. They were
+convinced of the rectitude and high importance of their object; and were
+determined never to desist from pursuing it, till it should be attained.
+
+But they had to struggle with difficulties far more serious. The West
+Indian interest, which opposed them, was a collected body; of great power,
+affluence, connections, and respectability.
+
+Artifice had also been employed. Abolition and emancipation had been so
+often confounded, and by those who knew better, that it must have been
+purposely done, to throw an odium on the measure which was now before them.
+
+The abolitionists had been also accused as the authors of the late
+insurrection in Dominica. A revolt had certainly taken place in that
+island. But revolts there had occurred frequently before. Mr. Stanley
+himself, in attempting to fix this charge upon them, had related
+circumstances, which amounted to their entire exculpation. He had said,
+that all was quiet there till the disturbances in the French islands; when
+some Negros from the latter had found their way to Dominica, and had
+excited the insurrection in question. He had also said, that the Negros in
+our own islands hated the idea of the abolition; for they thought, as no
+new labourers were to come in, they should be subjected to increased
+hardships. But if they and their masters hated this same measure, how was
+this coincidence of sentiment to give birth to insurrection?
+
+Other fallacies also had been industriously propagated. Of the African
+trade it had been said, that the exports amounted to a million annually;
+whereas, from the report on the table, it had on an average amounted to
+little more than half a million; and this included the articles for the
+purchase of African produce, which were of the value of a hundred and forty
+thousand pounds.
+
+The East Indian trade, also, had been said to depend on the West Indian and
+the African. In the first place, it had but very little connection with the
+former at all. Its connection with the latter was principally on account of
+the saltpetre, which it furnished for making gunpowder. Out of nearly three
+millions of pounds in weight of the latter article, which had been exported
+in a year from this country, one half had been sent to Africa alone; for
+the purposes, doubtless, of maintaining peace, and encouraging civilization
+among its various tribes! Four or five thousand persons were said also to
+depend for their bread in manufacturing guns for the African trade; and
+these, it was pretended, could not make guns of another sort.--But where
+lay the difficulty?--One of the witnesses had unravelled it. He had seen
+the Negros maimed by the bursting of these guns. They killed more from the
+butt than from the muzzle. Another had stated, that on the sea-coast the
+natives were afraid to fire a trade-gun.
+
+In the West Indian commerce two hundred and forty thousand tons of shipping
+were stated to be employed. But here deception intruded itself again. This
+statement included every vessel, great and small, which went from the
+British West Indies to America, and to the foreign islands; and, what was
+yet more unfair, all the repeated voyages of each throughout the year. The
+shipping, which could only fairly be brought into this account, did but
+just exceed half that which had been mentioned.
+
+In a similar manner had the islands themselves been overrated. Their value
+had been computed, for the information of the privy council, at thirty-six
+millions; but the planters had estimated them at seventy. The truth,
+however, might possibly lie between these extremes. He by no means wished
+to depreciate their importance; but he did not like that such palpable
+misrepresentations should go unnoticed.
+
+An honourable member (Colonel Tarleton) had disclaimed every attempt to
+interest the feelings of those present, but had desired to call them to
+reason and accounts. He also desired (though it was a question of feeling,
+if any one ever was,) to draw the attention of the committee to reason and
+accounts--to the voice of reason instead of that of prejudice, and to
+accounts in the place of idle apprehensions. The result, he doubted not,
+would be a full persuasion, that policy and justice were inseparable upon
+this, as upon every other occasion.
+
+The same gentleman had enlarged on the injustice of depriving the Liverpool
+merchants of a business, on which were founded their honour and their
+fortunes. On what part of it they founded their honour he could not
+conjecture, except from those passages in the evidence, where it appeared,
+that their agents in Africa had systematically practised every fraud and
+villainy, which the meanest and most unprincipled cunning could suggest, to
+impose on the ignorance of those with whom they traded.
+
+The same gentleman had also lamented, that the evidence had not been taken
+upon oath. He himself lamented it too. Numberless facts had been related by
+eye-witnesses, called in support of the abolition, so dreadfully atrocious,
+that they appeared incredible; and seemed rather, to use the expression of
+Ossian, like "the histories of the days of other times." These procured for
+the trade a species of acquittal, which it could not have obtained, had the
+committee been authorised to administer an oath. He apprehended also, in
+this case, that some other persons would have been rather more guarded in
+their testimony. Captain Knox would not then perhaps have told the
+committee, that six hundred slaves could have had comfortable room at night
+in his vessel of about one hundred and forty tons; when there could have
+been no more than five feet six inches in length, and fifteen inches in
+breadth, to about two thirds of his number.
+
+The same gentleman had also dwelt upon the Slave-trade as a nursery for
+seamen. But it had appeared by the muster-rolls of the slave-vessels, then
+actually on the table of the House, that more than a fifth of them died in
+the service, exclusive of those who perished when discharged in the West
+Indies; and yet he had been instructed by his constituents to maintain this
+false position. His reasoning, too, was very curious; for, though numbers
+might die, yet as one half, who entered, were landsmen, seamen were
+continually forming. Not to dwell on the expensive cruelty of forming these
+seamen by the yearly destruction of so many hundreds, this very statement
+was flatly contradicted by the evidence. The muster-rolls from Bristol
+stated the proportion of landmen in the trade there at one twelfth, and the
+proper officers of Liverpool itself at but a sixteenth, of the whole
+employed. In the face again of the most glaring facts, others had
+maintained that the mortality in these vessels did not exceed that of other
+trades in the tropical climates. But the same documents, which proved that
+twenty-three per cent, were destroyed in this wasting traffic, proved that
+in West India ships only about one and a half per cent. were lost,
+including every casualty.--But the very men, under whose management this
+dreadful mortality had been constantly occurring, had coolly said, that
+much of it might be avoided by proper regulations. How criminal then were
+they, who, knowing this, had neither publicly proposed, nor in their
+practice adopted, a remedy!
+
+The average loss of the slaves on board, which had been calculated by Mr.
+Wilberforce at twelve and a half per cent., had been denied. He believed
+this calculation, taking in all the circumstances connected with it, to be
+true; but that for years not less than one tenth had so perished, he would
+challenge those concerned in the traffic to disprove. Much evidence had
+been produced on the subject; but the voyages had been generally selected.
+There was only one, who had disclosed the whole account. This was Mr.
+Anderson of London, whose engagements in this trade had been very
+inconsiderable. His loss had only amounted to three per cent.; but,
+unfortunately for the Slave-traders of Liverpool, his vessel had not taken
+above three fourths of that number in proportion to the tonnage which they
+had stated to be necessary to the very existence of their trade.
+
+An honourable member (Mr. Grosvenor) had attributed the protraction of this
+business to those who had introduced it. But from whom did the motion for
+further evidence (when that of the privy council was refused) originate,
+but from the enemies of the abolition? The same gentleman had said, it was
+impossible to abolish the trade; but where was the impossibility of
+forbidding the further importation of slaves into our own colonies? and
+beyond this the motion did not extend.
+
+The latter argument had also been advanced by Sir William Yonge and others.
+But allowing it its full force, would there be no honour in the dereliction
+of such a commerce? Would it be nothing publicly to recognise great and
+just principles? Would our example be nothing?--Yes: every country would
+learn, from our experiment, that American colonies could be cultivated
+without the necessity of continual supplies equally expensive and
+disgraceful.
+
+But we might do more than merely lay down principles or propose examples.
+We might, in fact, diminish the evil itself immediately by no
+inconsiderable part,--by the whole of our own supply: and here he could not
+at all agree with the honourable baronet, in what seemed to him a
+commercial paradox, that the taking away from an open trade by far the
+largest customer, and the lessening of the consumption of the article,
+would increase both the competition and the demand, and of course all those
+mischiefs, which it was their intention to avert.
+
+That the civilization of the Africans was promoted, as had been asserted,
+by their intercourse with the Europeans, was void of foundation, as had
+appeared from the evidence. In manners and dishonesty they had indeed
+assimilated with those who frequented their coasts. But the greatest
+industry and the least corruption of morals were in the interior, where
+they were out of the way of this civilizing connection.
+
+To relieve Africa from famine, was another of the benign reasons which had
+been assigned for continuing the trade. That famines had occurred there, he
+did not doubt; but that they should annually occur, and with such
+arithmetical exactness as to suit the demands of the Slave-trade, was a
+circumstance most extraordinary; so wonderful indeed, that, could it once
+be proved, he should consider it as a far better argument in favour of the
+divine approbation of that trade, than any which had ever yet been
+produced.
+
+As to the effect of the abolition on the West Indies, it would give weight
+to every humane regulation which had been made; by substituting a certain
+and obvious interest, in the place of one depending upon chances and
+calculation. An honourable member (Mr. Stanley) had spoken of the
+impossibility of cultivating the estates there without further importations
+of Negros; and yet, of all the authorities he had brought to prove his
+case, there was scarcely one which might not be pressed to serve more or
+less effectually against him. Almost every planter he had named had found
+his Negros increase under the good treatment he had professed to give them;
+and it was an axiom, throughout the whole evidence, that wherever they were
+well used importations were not necessary. It had been said indeed by some
+adverse witnesses, that in Jamaica all possible means had been used to keep
+up the stock by breeding; but how preposterous was this, when it was
+allowed that the morals of the slaves had been totally neglected, and that
+the planters preferred buying a larger proportion of males than females!
+
+The misfortune was, that prejudice and not reason was the enemy to be
+subdued. The prejudices of the West Indians on these points were numerous
+and inveterate. Mr. Long himself had characterized them on this account, in
+terms which he should have felt diffident in using. But Mr. Long had shown
+his own prejudices also. For he justified the chaining of the Negros on
+board the slave-vessels, on account of "their bloody, cruel, and malicious
+dispositions." But hear his commendation of some of the Aborigines of
+Jamaica, "who had miserably perished in caves, whither they had retired to
+escape the tyranny of the Spaniards. These," says he, "left a glorious
+monument of their having disdained to survive the loss of their liberty and
+their country." And yet this same historian could not perceive that this
+natural love of liberty might operate as strongly and as laudably in the
+African Negro, as in the Indian of Jamaica.
+
+He was concerned to acknowledge that these prejudices were yet further
+strengthened by resentment against those who had taken an active part in
+the abolition of the Slave-trade. But it was never the object of these to
+throw a stigma on the whole body of the West Indians; but to prove the
+miserable effects of the trade. This it was their duty to do; and if, in
+doing this, disgraceful circumstances had come out, it was not their fault;
+and it must never be forgotten that they were true.
+
+That the slaves were exposed to great misery in the islands, was true as
+well from inference as from facts: for what might not be expected from the
+use of arbitrary power, where the three characters of party, judge, and
+executioner were united! The slaves too were more capable on account of
+their passions, than the beasts of the field, of exciting the passions of
+their tyrants. To what a length the ill treatment of them might be carried,
+might be learnt from the instance which General Tottenham mentioned to have
+seen in the year 1780 in the streets of Bridge Town, Barbadoes: "A youth
+about nineteen (to use his own words in the evidence), entirely naked, with
+an iron collar about his neck, having five long projecting spikes. His body
+both before and behind, was covered with wounds. His belly and thighs were
+almost cut to pieces, with running ulcers all over them; and a finger might
+have been laid in some of the weals. He could not sit down, because his
+hinder part was mortified; and it was impossible for him to lie down, on
+account of the prongs of his collar." He supplicated the General for
+relief. The latter asked, who had punished him so dreadfully? The youth
+answered, his master had done it. And because he could not work, this same
+master, in the same spirit of perversion, which extorts from scripture a
+justification of the Slave-trade, had fulfilled the apostolic maxim, that
+he should have nothing to eat. The use he meant to make of this instance
+was to show the unprotected state of the slaves. What must it be, where
+such an instance could pass not only unpunished, but almost unregarded! If,
+in the streets of London, but a dog were to be seen lacerated like this
+miserable man, how would the cruelty of the wretch be execrated, who had
+thus even abused a brute!
+
+The judicial punishments also inflicted upon the Negro showed the low
+estimation, in which, in consequence of the strength of old customs and
+deep-rooted prejudices, they were held. Mr. Edwards, in his speech to the
+Assembly at Jamaica, stated the following case, as one which had happened
+in one of the rebellions there. Some slaves surrounded the dwelling-house
+of their mistress. She was in bed with a lovely infant. They deliberated
+upon the means of putting her to death in torment. But in the end one of
+them reserved her for his mistress; and they killed her infant with an axe
+before her face. "Now," says Mr. Edwards, (addressing himself to his
+audience,) "you will think that no torments were too great for such
+horrible excesses. Nevertheless I am of a different opinion. I think that
+death, unaccompanied with cruelty, should be the utmost exertion of human
+authority over our unhappy fellow-creatures." Torments, however, were
+always inflicted in these cases. The punishment was gibbeting alive, and
+exposing the delinquents to perish by the gradual effects of hunger,
+thirst, and a parching sun; in which situation they were known to suffer
+for nine days, with a fortitude scarcely credible, never uttering a single
+groan. But horrible as the excesses might have been, which occasioned these
+punishments, it muse be remembered, that they were committed by ignorant
+savages, who had been dragged from all they held most dear; whose patience
+had been exhausted by a cruel and loathsome confinement during their
+transportation; and whose resentment had been wound up to the highest pitch
+of fury by the lash of the driver.
+
+But he would now mention another instance, by way of contrast, out of the
+evidence. A child on board a slave-ship, of about ten months old, took sulk
+and would not eat. The captain flogged it with a cat; swearing that he
+would make it eat, or kill it. From this and other ill-treatment the
+child's legs swelled. He then ordered some water to be made hot to abate
+the swelling. But even his tender mercies were cruel; for the cook, on
+putting his hand into the water, said it was too hot. Upon this the captain
+swore at him, and ordered the feet to be put in. This was done. The nails
+and skin came off. Oiled cloths were then put round them. The child was at
+length tied to a heavy log. Two or three days afterwards, the captain
+caught it up again; and repeated that he would make it eat, or kill it. He
+immediately flogged it again, and in a quarter of an hour it died. But,
+after the child was dead, whom should the barbarian select to throw it
+overboard, but the wretched mother? In vain she started from the office. He
+beat her, till he made her take up the child and carry it to the side of
+the vessel. She then dropped it into the sea, turning her head the other
+way that she might not see it. Now it would naturally be asked, Was not
+this captain also gibbered alive? Alas! although the execrable, barbarity
+of the European exceeded that of the Africans before mentioned, almost as
+much as his opportunities of instruction had been greater than theirs, no
+notice whatsoever was taken of this horrible action; and a thousand similar
+cruelties had been committed in this abominable trade with equal impunity:
+but he would say no more. He should vote for the abolition, not only as it
+would do away all the evils complained of in Africa and the Middle Passage;
+but as it would be the most effectual means of ameliorating the condition
+of those unhappy persons, who were still to continue slaves in the British
+colonies.
+
+Mr. Courtenay rose. He said, he could not but consider the assertion of Sir
+William Yonge as a mistake, that the Slave-trade, if abandoned by us, would
+fall into the hands of France. It ought to be recollected, with what
+approbation the motion for abolishing it, made by the late Mirabeau, had
+been received; although the situation of the French colonies might then
+have presented obstacles to carrying the measure into immediate execution.
+He had no doubt, if parliament were to begin, so wise and enlightened a
+body as the National Assembly would follow the example. But even if France
+were not to relinquish the trade, how could we, if justice required its
+abolition, hesitate as to our part of it?
+
+The trade, it had been said, was conducted upon the principles of humanity.
+Yes: we rescued the Africans from what we were pleased to call their
+wretched situation in their own country, and then we took credit for our
+humanity; because, after having killed one half of them in the seasoning,
+we substituted what we were again pleased to call a better treatment than
+that which they would have experienced at home.
+
+
+It had been stated that the principle of war among savages was a general
+massacre. This was not true. They frequently adopted the captives into
+their own families; and, so far from massacring the women and children,
+they often gave them the protection which the weakness of their age and sex
+demanded.
+
+There could be no doubt, that the practice of kidnapping prevailed in
+Africa. As to witchcraft, it had been made a crime in the reign of James
+the First in this country, for the purpose of informations; and how much
+more likely were informations to take place in Africa, under the
+encouragement afforded by the Slave-trade! This trade, it had been said,
+was sanctioned by twenty-six acts of parliament. He did not doubt but
+fifty-six might be found, by which parliament had sanctioned witchcraft; of
+the existence of which we had now no belief whatever.
+
+It had been said by Mr. Stanley, that the pulpit had been used as an
+instrument of attack on the Slave-trade. He was happy to learn it had been
+so well employed; and he hoped the Bishops would rise up in the House of
+Lords, with the virtuous indignation which became them, to abolish a
+traffic so contrary to humanity, justice, and religion.
+
+He entreated every member to recollect, that on his vote that night
+depended the happiness of millions; and that it was then in his power to
+promote a measure, of which the benefits would be felt over one whole
+quarter of the globe; that the seeds of civilization might, by the present
+bill, be sown all over Africa; and the first principles of humanity be
+established in regions, where they had hitherto been excluded by the
+existence of this execrable trade.
+
+Lord Carysfort rose, and said, that the great cause of the abolition had
+flourished by the manner in which it had been opposed. No one argument of
+solid weight has been adduced against it. It had been shown, but never
+disproved, that the colonial laws were inadequate to the protection of the
+slaves; that the punishments of the latter were most unmerciful; that they
+were deprived of the right of self-defence against any White man; and, in
+short, that the system was totally repugnant to the principles of the
+British constitution.
+
+Colonel Phipps followed Lord Carysfort. He denied that this was a question
+in which the rights of humanity and the laws of nature were concerned. The
+Africans became slaves in consequence of the constitution of their own
+governments. These were founded in absolute despotism. Every subject was an
+actual slave. The inhabitants were slaves to the great men; and the great
+men were slaves to the Prince. Prisoners of war, too, were by law subject
+to slavery. Such being the case, he saw no more cruelty in disposing of
+them to our merchants, than to those of any other nation. Criminals also in
+cases of adultery and witchcraft became slaves by the same laws.
+
+It had been said, that there were no regulations in the West Indies for the
+protection of slaves. There were several; though he was ready to admit,
+that more were necessary; and he would go in this respect as far as
+humanity might require. He had passed ten months in Jamaica, where he had
+never seen any such acts of cruelty as had been talked of. Those which he
+had seen were not exercised by the Whites, but by the Blacks. The dreadful
+stories, which had been told, ought no more to fix a general stigma upon
+the planters, than the story of Mrs. Brownrigg to stamp this polished
+metropolis with the general brand of murder. There was once a haberdasher's
+wife (Mrs. Nairne) who locked up her apprentice girl, and starved her to
+death; but did ever any body think of abolishing haberdashery on this
+account? He was persuaded the Negros in the West Indies were cheerful and
+happy. They were fond of ornaments; but it was not the characteristic of
+miserable persons to show a taste for finery. Such a taste, on the
+contrary, implied a cheerful and contented mind. He was sorry to differ
+from his friend Mr. Wilberforce, but he must oppose his motion.
+
+Mr. Pitt rose, and said, that from the first hour of his having had the
+honour to sit in parliament down to the present, among all the questions,
+whether political or personal, in which it had been his fortune to take a
+share, there had never been one in which his heart was so deeply interested
+as in the present; both on account of the serious principles it involved,
+and the consequences connected with it.
+
+The present was not a mere question of feeling. The argument, which ought
+in his opinion to determine the committee, was, that the Slave-trade was
+unjust. It was therefore such a trade as it was impossible for him to
+support, unless it could be first proved to him, that there were no laws of
+morality binding upon nations; and that it was not the duty of a
+legislature to restrain its subjects from invading the happiness of other
+countries, and from violating the fundamental principles of justice.
+
+Several had stated the impracticability of the measure before them. They
+wished to see the trade abolished; but there was some necessity for
+continuing it, which they conceived to exist. Nay, almost every one, he
+believed, appeared to wish, that the further importation of slaves might
+cease; provided it could be made out, that the population of the West
+Indies could be maintained without it. He proposed therefore to consider
+the latter point; for, as the impracticability of keeping up the population
+there appeared to operate as the chief objection, he trusted that, by
+showing it to be ill founded, he should clear away all other obstacles
+whatever; so that, having no ground either of justice or necessity to stand
+upon, there could be no excuse left to the committee for resisting the
+present motion.
+
+He might reasonably, however, hope that they would not reckon any small or
+temporary disadvantage, which might arise from the abolition, to be a
+sufficient reason against it. It was surely not any slight degree of
+expediency, nor any small balance of profit, nor any light shades of
+probability on the one side, rather than on the other, which would
+determine them on this question. He asked pardon even for the supposition.
+The Slave-trade was an evil of such magnitude, that there must be a common
+wish in the committee at once to put an end to it, if there were no great
+and serious obstacles. It was a trade, by which multitudes of unoffending
+nations were deprived of the blessings of civilization, and had their peace
+and happiness invaded. It ought therefore to be no common expediency, it
+ought to be nothing less than the utter ruin of our islands, which it
+became those to plead, who took upon them to defend the continuance of it.
+
+He could not help thinking that the West India gentlemen had manifested an
+over great degree of sensibility as to the point in question; and that
+their alarms had been unreasonably excited upon it. He had examined the
+subject carefully for himself; and he would now detail those reasons, which
+had induced him firmly to believe, not only that no permanent mischief
+would follow from the abolition; but not even any such temporary
+inconvenience, as could be stated to be a reason for preventing the House
+from agreeing to the motion before them; on the contrary, that the
+abolition itself would lay the foundation for the more solid improvement of
+all the various interests of those colonies.
+
+In doing this he should apply his observations chiefly to Jamaica, which
+contained more than half the slaves in the British West Indies; and if he
+should succeed in proving that no material detriment could arise to the
+population there, this would afford so strong a presumption with respect to
+the other islands, that the House could no longer hesitate, whether they
+should, or should not, put a stop to this most horrid trade.
+
+In the twenty years ending in 1788, the annual loss of slaves in Jamaica
+(that is, the excess of deaths above the births,) appeared to be one in the
+hundred. In a preceding period the loss was greater; and, in a period
+before that, greater still; there having been a continual gradation in the
+decrease through the whole time. It might fairly be concluded, therefore,
+that (the average loss of the last period being one per cent.) the loss in
+the former part of it would be somewhat more, and in the latter part
+somewhat less, than one per cent.; insomuch that it might be fairly
+questioned, whether, by this time, the births and deaths in Jamaica might
+not be stated as nearly equal. It was to be added, that a peculiar
+calamity, which swept away fifteen thousand slaves, had occasioned a part
+of the mortality in the last-mentioned period. The probable loss,
+therefore, now to be expected was very inconsiderable indeed.
+
+There was, however, one circumstance to be added, which the West India
+gentlemen, in stating this matter, had entirely overlooked; and which was
+so material, as clearly to reduce the probable diminution in the population
+of Jamaica down to nothing. In all the calculations he had referred to of
+the comparative number of births and deaths, all the Negros in the island
+were included. The newly imported, who died in the seasoning, made a part.
+But these swelled, most materially, the number of the deaths. Now as these
+extraordinary deaths would cease, as soon as the importations ceased, a
+deduction of them ought to be made from his present calculation.
+
+But the number of those, who thus died in the seasoning, would make up of
+itself nearly the whole of that one per cent., which had been stated. He
+particularly pressed an attention to this circumstance; for the complaint
+of being likely to want hands in Jamaica, arose from the mistake of
+including the present unnatural deaths, caused by the seasoning, among the
+natural and perpetual causes of mortality. These deaths, being erroneously
+taken into the calculations, gave the planters an idea, that the numbers
+could not be kept up. These deaths, which were caused merely by the
+Slave-trade, furnished the very ground, therefore, on which the continuance
+of that trade had been thought necessary.
+
+The evidence as to this point was clear; for it would be found in that
+dreadful catalogue of deaths, arising from the seasoning and the passage,
+which the House had been condemned to look into, that one half died. An
+annual mortality of two thousand slaves in Jamaica might be therefore
+charged to the importation; which, compared with the whole number on the
+island, hardly fell short of the whole one per cent. decrease.
+
+Joining this with all the other considerations, he would then ask, Could
+the decrease of the slaves in Jamaica be such--could the colonies be so
+destitute of means--could the planters, when by their own accounts they
+were establishing daily new regulations for the benefit of the
+slaves--could they, under all these circumstances, be permitted to plead
+that total impossibility of keeping up their number, which they had rested
+on, as being indeed the only possible pretext for allowing fresh
+importations from Africa? He appealed therefore to the sober judgment of
+all, whether the situation of Jamaica was such, as to justify a hesitation
+in agreeing to the present motion.
+
+It might be observed also, that, when the importations should stop, that
+disproportion between the sexes, which was one of the obstacles to
+population, would gradually diminish; and a natural order of things be
+established. Through the want of this natural order a thousand grievances
+were created, which it was impossible to define; and which it was in vain
+to think that, under such circumstances, we could cure. But the abolition
+of itself would work this desirable effect. The West Indians would then
+feel a near and urgent interest to enter into a thousand little details,
+which it was impossible for him to describe, but which would have the
+greatest influence on population. A foundation would thus be laid for the
+general welfare of the islands; a new system would rise up, the reverse of
+the old; and eventually both their general wealth and happiness would
+increase.
+
+He had now proved far more than he was bound to do; for, if he could only
+show that the abolition would not be ruinous, it would be enough. He could
+give up, therefore, three arguments out of four, through the whole of what
+he had said, and yet have enough left for his position. As to the Creoles,
+they would undoubtedly increase. They differed in this entirely from the
+imported slaves, who were both a burthen and a curse to themselves and
+others. The measure now proposed would operate like a charm; and, besides
+stopping all the miseries in Africa and the passage, would produce even
+more benefit in the West Indies than legal regulations could effect.
+
+He would now just touch upon the question of emancipation. A rash
+emancipation of the slaves would be mischievous. In that unhappy situation,
+to which our baneful conduct had brought ourselves and them, it would be no
+justice on either side to give them liberty. They were as yet incapable of
+it; but their situation might be gradually amended. They might be relieved
+from every thing harsh and severe; raised from their present degraded
+state; and put under the protection of the law. Till then, to talk of
+emancipation was insanity. But it was the system of fresh importations,
+which interfered with these principles of improvement; and it was only the
+abolition which could establish them. This suggestion had its foundation in
+human nature. Wherever the incentive of honour, credit, and fair profit
+appeared, energy would spring up; and when these labourers should have the
+natural springs of human action afforded them, they would then rise to the
+natural level of human industry.
+
+From Jamaica he would now go to the other islands. In Barbadoes the slaves
+had rather increased. In St. Kitts the decrease for fourteen years had been
+but three fourths per cent.; but here many of the observations would apply,
+which he had used in the case of Jamaica. In Antigua many had died by a
+particular calamity. But for this, the decrease would have been trifling.
+In Nevis and Montserrat there was little or no disproportion of the sexes;
+so that it might well be hoped, that the numbers would be kept up in these
+islands. In Dominica some controversy had arisen about the calculation; but
+Governor Orde had stated an increase of births above the deaths. From
+Grenada and St. Vincents no accurate accounts had been delivered in answer
+to the queries sent them; but they were probably not in circumstances less
+favourable than in the other islands.
+
+On a full review then, of the state of the Negro population in the West
+Indies, was there any serious ground of alarm from the abolition of the
+Slave-trade? Where was the impracticability, on which alone so many had
+rested their objections? Must we not blush at pretending, that it would
+distress our consciences to accede to this measure, as far as the question
+of the Negro population was concerned?
+
+Intolerable were the mischiefs of this trade, both in its origin and
+through every stage of its progress. To say that slaves could be furnished
+us by fair and commercial means was ridiculous. The trade sometimes ceased,
+as during the late war. The demand was more or less according to
+circumstances. But how was it possible, that to a demand so exceedingly
+fluctuating the supply should always exactly accommodate itself? Alas! we
+made human beings the subject of commerce; we talked of them as such; and
+yet we would not allow them the common principle of commerce, that the
+supply must accommodate itself to the consumption. It was not from wars,
+then, that the slaves were chiefly procured. They were obtained in
+proportion as they were wanted. If a demand for slaves arose, a supply was
+forced in one way or other; and it was in vain, overpowered as we then were
+with positive evidence, as well as the reasonableness of the supposition,
+to deny that by the Slave-trade we occasioned all the enormities which had
+been alleged against it.
+
+Sir William Yonge had said, that, if we were not to take the Africans from
+their country, they would be destroyed. But he had not yet read, that all
+uncivilized nations destroyed their captives. We assumed therefore what was
+false. The very selling of them implied this: for, if they would sell their
+captives for profit, why should they not employ them so as to receive a
+profit also? Nay, many of them, while there was no demand from the
+slave-merchants, were often actually so employed. The trade, too, had been
+suspended during the war; and it was never said, or thought, that any such
+consequence had then followed.
+
+The honourable baronet had also said in justification of the Slave-trade,
+that witchcraft commonly implied poison, and was therefore a punishable
+crime; but did he recollect that not only the individual accused, but that
+his whole family, were sold as slaves? The truth was, we stopped the
+natural progress of civilization in Africa. We cut her off from the
+opportunity of improvement. We kept her down in a state of darkness,
+bondage, ignorance and bloodshed. Was not this an awful consideration for
+this country? Look at the map of Africa, and see how little useful
+intercourse had been established on that vast continent! While other
+countries were assisting and enlightening each other, Africa alone had none
+of these benefits. We had obtained as yet only so much knowledge of her
+productions, as to show that there was a capacity for trade, which we
+checked. Indeed, if the mischiefs there were out of the question, the
+circumstance of the Middle Passage alone would, in his mind, be reason
+enough for the abolition. Such a scene as that of the slave-ships passing
+over with their wretched cargoes to the West Indies, if it could be spread
+before the eyes of the House, would be sufficient of itself to make them
+vote in favour of it; but when it could be added, that the interest even of
+the West Indies themselves rested on the accomplishment of this great
+event, he could not conceive an act of more imperious duty, than that,
+which was imposed upon the House, of agreeing to the present motion.
+
+Sir Archibald Edmonstone rose, and asked, whether the present motion went
+so far, as to pledge those who voted for it, to a total and immediate
+abolition.
+
+Mr. Alderman Watson rose next. He defended the Slave-trade as highly
+beneficial to the country, being one material branch of its commerce. But
+he could not think of the African trade without connecting it with the West
+Indian. The one hung upon the other. A third important branch also depended
+upon it; which was the Newfoundland fishery: the latter could not go on, if
+it were not for the vast quantity of inferior fish bought up for the Negros
+in the West Indies; and which was quite unfit for any other market. If
+therefore we destroyed the African, we destroyed the other trades. Mr.
+Turgot, he said, had recommended in the National Assembly of France the
+gradual abolition of the Slave-trade. He would therefore recommend it to
+the House to adopt the same measure, and to soften the rigours of slavery
+by wholesome regulations; but an immediate abolition he could not
+countenance.
+
+Mr. Fox at length rose. He observed that some expressions, which he had
+used on the preceding day, had been complained of as too harsh and severe.
+He had since considered them; but he could not prevail upon himself to
+retract them; because, if any gentleman, after reading the evidence on the
+table, and attending to the debate, could avow himself an abetter of this
+shameful traffic in human flesh, it could only be either from some hardness
+of heart, or some difficulty of understanding, which he really knew not how
+to account for.
+
+Some had considered this question as a question of political, whereas it
+was a question of personal, freedom. Political freedom was undoubtedly a
+great blessing; but, when it came to be compared with personal, it sank to
+nothing. To confound the two, served therefore to render all arguments on
+either perplexing and unintelligible. Personal freedom was the first right
+of every human being. It was a right, of which he who deprived a
+fellow-creature was absolutely criminal in so depriving him, and which he
+who withheld was no less criminal in withholding. He could not therefore
+retract his words with respect to any, who (whatever respect he might
+otherwise have for them) should, by their vote of that night, deprive their
+fellow-creatures of so great a blessing. Nay, he would go further. He would
+say, that if the House, knowing what the trade was by the evidence, did not
+by their vote mark to all mankind their abhorrence of a practice so savage,
+so enormous, so repugnant to all laws human and divine, they would consign
+their character to eternal infamy.
+
+That the pretence of danger to our West Indian islands from the abolition
+of the Slave-trade was totally unfounded, Mr. Wilberforce had abundantly
+proved: but if there were they, who had not been satisfied with that proof,
+was it possible to resist the arguments of Mr. Pitt on the same subject? It
+had been shown, on a comparison of the births and deaths in Jamaica, that
+there was not now any decrease of the slaves. But if there had been, it
+would have made no difference to him in his vote; for, had the mortality
+been ever so great there, he should have ascribed it to the system of
+importing Negros, instead of that of encouraging their natural increase.
+Was it not evident, that the planters thought it more convenient to buy
+them fit for work, than to breed them? Why, then, was this horrid trade to
+be kept up?--To give the planters, truly, the liberty of misusing their
+slaves, so as to check population; for it was from ill-usage only that, in
+a climate so natural to them, their numbers could diminish. The very
+ground, therefore, on which the planters rested the necessity of fresh
+importations, namely, the destruction of lives in the West Indies, was
+itself the strongest argument that could be given, and furnished the most
+imperious call upon parliament for the abolition of the trade.
+
+Against this trade innumerable were the charges. An honourable member, Mr.
+Smith, had done well to introduce those tragical stories, which had made
+such an impression upon the House. No one of these had been yet
+controverted. It had indeed been said, that the cruelty of the African
+captain to the child was too bad to be true; and we had been desired to
+look at the cross-examination of the witness, as if we should find traces
+of the falsehood of his testimony there. But his cross-examination was
+peculiarly honourable to his character; for after he had been pressed, in
+the closest manner, by some able members of the House, the only
+inconsistency they could fix upon him was, whether the fact had happened on
+the same day of the same month of the year 1764 or the year 1765.
+
+But it was idle to talk of the incredibility of such instances. It was not
+denied, that absolute power was exercised by the slave-captains; and if
+this was granted, all the cruelties charged upon them would naturally
+follow. Never did he hear of charges so black and horrible as those
+contained in the evidence on the table. They unfolded such a scene of
+cruelty, that if the House, with all their present knowledge of the
+circumstances, should dare to vote for its continuance, they must have
+nerves, of which he had no conception. We might find instances indeed, in
+history, of men violating the feelings of nature on extraordinary
+occasions. Fathers had sacrificed their sons and daughters, and husbands
+their wives; but to imitate their characters we ought to have not only
+nerves as strong as the two Brutuses, but to take care that we had a cause
+as good; or that we had motives for such a dereliction of our feelings as
+patriotic as those, which historians had annexed to these when they handed
+them to the notice of the world.
+
+But what was our motive in the case before us?--to continue a trade which
+was a wholesale sacrifice of a whole order and race of our
+fellow-creatures; which carried them away by force from their native
+country, in order to subject them to the mere will and caprice, the tyranny
+and oppression, of other human beings, for their whole natural lives, them
+and their posterity for ever!! O most monstrous wickedness! O unparalleled
+barbarity! And, what was more aggravating, this most complicated scene of
+robbery and murder which mankind had ever witnessed, had been honoured by
+the name of--trade.
+
+That a number of human beings should be at all times ready to be furnished
+as fair articles of commerce, just as our occasions might require, was
+absurd. The argument of Mr. Pitt on this head was unanswerable. Our demand
+was fluctuating: it entirely ceased at some times: at others it was great
+and pressing. How was it possible, on every sudden call, to furnish a
+sufficient return in slaves, without resorting to those execrable means of
+obtaining them, which were stated in the evidence? These were of three
+sorts, and he would now examine them.
+
+Captives in war, it was urged, were consigned either to death or slavery.
+This, however, he believed to be false in point of fact. But suppose it
+were true; Did it not become us, with whom it was a custom, founded in the
+wisest policy, to pay the captives a peculiar respect and civility, to
+inculcate the same principles in Africa? But we were so far from doing
+this, that we encouraged wars for the sake of taking, not men's goods and
+possessions, but men themselves; and it was not the war which was the cause
+of the Slave-trade, but the Slave-trade which was the cause of the war. If
+was the practice of the slave-merchants to try to intoxicate the African
+kings in order to turn them to their purpose. A particular instance
+occurred in the evidence of a prince, who, when sober, resisted their
+wishes; but in the moment of inebriety he gave the word for war, attacked
+the next village, and sold the inhabitants to the merchants.
+
+The second mode was kidnapping. He referred the House to various instances
+of this in the evidence: but there was one in particular, from which we
+might immediately infer the frequency of the practice. A Black trader had
+kidnapped a girl and sold her; but he was presently afterwards kidnapped
+and sold himself; and, when he asked the captain who bought him, "What! do
+you buy me, who am a great trader?" the only answer was, "Yes, I will buy
+you, or her, or any body else, provided any one will sell you;" and
+accordingly both the trader and the girl were carried to the West Indies
+and sold for slaves.
+
+The third mode of obtaining slaves was by crimes committed or imputed. One
+of these was adultery. But was Africa the place, where Englishmen, above
+all others, were to go to find out and punish adulterers? Did it become us
+to cast the first stone? It was a most extraordinary pilgrimage for a most
+extraordinary purpose! And yet upon this plea we justified our right of
+carrying off its inhabitants. The offence alleged next was witchcraft. What
+a reproach it was to lend ourselves to this superstition!--Yes: we stood
+by; we heard the trial; we knew the crime to be impossible; and that the
+accused must be innocent: but we waited in patient silence for his
+condemnation; and then we lent our friendly aid to the police of the
+country, by buying the wretched convict, with all his family; whom, for the
+benefit of Africa, we carried away also into perpetual slavery.
+
+With respect to the situation of the slaves in their transportation, he
+knew not how to give the House a more correct idea of the horrors of it,
+than by referring them to the printed section of the slave-ship; where the
+eye might see what the tongue must fall short in describing. On this dismal
+part of the subject he would not dwell. He would only observe, that the
+acts of barbarity, related of the slave-captains in these voyages, were so
+extravagant, that they had been attributed in some instances to insanity.
+But was not this the insanity of arbitrary power? Who ever read the facts
+recorded of Nero without suspecting he was mad? Who would not be apt to
+impute insanity to Caligula--or Domitian--or Caracalla--or Commodus--or
+Heliogabalus? Here were six Roman emperors, not connected in blood, nor by
+descent, who, each of them, possessing arbitrary power, had been so
+distinguished for cruelty, that nothing short of insanity could be imputed
+to them. Was not the insanity of the masters of slave-ships to be accounted
+for on the same principles?
+
+Of the slaves in the West Indies it had been said, that they were taken
+from a worse state to a better. An honourable member, Mr. W. Smith, had
+quoted some instances out of the evidence to the contrary. He also would
+quote one or two others. A slave under hard usage had run away. To prevent
+a repetition of the offence his owner sent for his surgeon, and desired him
+to cut off the man's leg. The surgeon refused. The owner, to render it a
+matter of duty in the surgeon, broke it. "Now," says he, "you must cut it
+off; or the man will die." We might console ourselves, perhaps, that this
+happened in a French island; but he would select another instance, which
+had happened in one of our own. Mr. Ross heard the shrieks of a female
+issuing from an outhouse; and so piercing, that he determined to see what
+was going on. On looking in he perceived a young female tied up to a beam
+by her wrists; entirely naked; and in the act of involuntary writhing and
+swinging; while the author of her torture was standing below her with a
+lighted torch in his hand, which he applied to all the parts of her body as
+it approached him. What crime this miserable woman had perpetrated he knew
+not; but the human mind could not conceive a crime warranting such a
+punishment.
+
+He was glad to see that these tales affected the House. Would they then
+sanction enormities, the bare recital of which made them shudder? Let them
+remember that humanity did not consist in a squeamish ear. It did not
+consist in shrinking and starting at such tales as these; but in a
+disposition of the heart to remedy the evils they unfolded. Humanity
+belonged rather to the mind than to the nerves. But, if so, it should
+prompt men to charitable exertion. Such exertion was necessary in the
+present case. It was necessary for the credit of our jurisprudence at home,
+and our character abroad. For what would any man think of our justice, who
+should see another hanged for a crime, which would be innocence itself, if
+compared with those enormities, which were allowed in Africa and the West
+Indies under the sanction of the British parliament?
+
+It had been said, however, in justification of the trade, that the Africans
+were less happy at home than in the Islands. But what right had we to be
+judges of their condition? They would tell us a very different tale, if
+they were asked. But it was ridiculous to say, that we bettered their
+condition, when we dragged them from every thing dear in life to the most
+abject state of slavery.
+
+One argument had been used, which for a subject so grave was the most
+ridiculous he had ever heard. Mr. Alderman Watson had declared the
+Slave-trade to be necessary on account of its connection with our
+fisheries. But what was this but an acknowledgment of the manner, in which
+these miserable beings were treated? The trade was to be kept up, with all
+its enormities, in order that there might be persons to consume the refuse
+fish from Newfoundland, which was too bad for any body else to eat.
+
+It had been said that England ought not to abolish the Slave-trade, unless
+other nations would also give it up. But what kind of morality was this?
+The trade was defensible upon no other principle than that of a highwayman.
+Great Britain could not keep it upon these terms. Mere gain was not a
+motive for a great country to rest on, as a justification of any measure.
+Honour was its superior; and justice was superior to honour.
+
+With regard to the emancipation of those in slavery, he coincided with Mr.
+Wilberforce and Mr. Pitt; and upon this principle, that it might be as
+dangerous to give freedom at once to a man used to slavery, as, in the case
+of a man who had never seen day-light, to expose him all at once to the
+full glare of a meridian sun.
+
+With respect to the intellect and sensibility of the Africans, it was pride
+only, which suggested a difference between them and ourselves. There was a
+remarkable instance to the point in the evidence, and which he would quote.
+In one of the slave-ships was a person of consequence; a man, once high in
+a military station, and with a mind not insensible to the eminence of his
+rank. He had been taken captive and sold; and was then in the hold,
+confined promiscuously with the rest. Happening in the night to fall
+asleep, he dreamed that he was in his own country; high in honour and
+command; caressed by his family and friends; waited on by his domestics;
+and surrounded with all his former comforts in life. But awaking suddenly,
+and finding where he was, he was heard to burst into the loudest groans and
+lamentations on the miserable contrast of his present state; mixed with the
+meanest of his subjects; and subjected to the insolence of wretches a
+thousand times lower than himself in every kind of endowment. He appealed
+to the House, whether this was not as moving a picture of the miserable
+effects of the Slave-trade, as could be well imagined. There was one way,
+by which they might judge of it. Let them make the case their own. This was
+the Christian rule of judging; and, having mentioned Christianity, he was
+sorry to find that any should suppose, that it had given countenance to
+such a system of oppression. So far was this from being the case, that he
+thought it one of the most splendid triumphs of this religion, that it had
+caused slavery to be so generally abolished on its appearance in the world.
+It had done this by teaching us, among other beautiful precepts, that, in
+the sight of their Maker, all mankind were equal. Its influence appeared to
+have been more powerful in this respect than that of all the ancient
+systems of philosophy; though even in these, in point of theory, we might
+trace great liberality and consideration for human rights. Where could be
+found finer sentiments of liberty than in Demosthenes and Cicero? Where
+bolder assertions of the rights of mankind, than in Tacitus and Thucydides?
+But, alas! these were the holders of slaves! It was not so with those who
+had been converted to Christianity. He knew, however, that what he had been
+ascribing to Christianity had been imputed by others to the advances which
+philosophy had made. Each of the two parties took the merit to itself. The
+philosopher gave it to philosophy, and the divine to religion. He should
+not then dispute with either of them; but, as both coveted the praise, why
+should they not emulate each other by promoting this improvement in the
+condition of the human race?
+
+He would now conclude by declaring, that the whole country, indeed the
+whole civilized world, must rejoice that such a bill as the present had
+been moved for, not merely as a matter of humanity, but as an act of
+justice; for he would put humanity out of the case. Could it be called
+humanity to forbear from committing murder? Exactly upon this ground did
+the present motion stand; being strictly a question of national justice. He
+thanked Mr. Wilberforce for having pledged himself so strongly to pursue
+his object till it was accomplished; and, as for himself, he declared,
+that, in whatever situation he might ever be, he would use his warmest
+efforts for the promotion of this righteous cause.
+
+Mr. Stanley (the member for Lancashire) rose, and declared that, when he
+came into the house, he intended to vote against the abolition; but that
+the impression made both on his feelings and on his understanding was such,
+that he could not persist in his resolution. He was now convinced that the
+entire abolition of the Slave-trade was called for equally by sound policy
+and justice. He thought it right and fair to avow manfully this change in
+his opinion. The abolition, he was sure, could not long fail of being
+carried. The arguments for it were irresistible.
+
+The honourable Mr. Ryder said, that he came to the house, not exactly in
+the same circumstances as Mr. Stanley, but very undecided on the subject.
+He was, however, so strongly convinced by the arguments he had heard, that
+he was become equally earnest for the abolition.
+
+Mr. Smith (member for Pontefract) said, that he should not trouble the
+House at so late an hour, further than to enter his protest, in the most
+solemn manner, against this trade, which he considered as most disgraceful
+to the country, and contrary to all the principles of justice and religion.
+
+Mr. Sumner declared himself against the total, immediate, and unqualified
+abolition, which he thought would wound at least the prejudices of the West
+Indians, and might do mischief; but a gradual abolition should have his
+hearty support.
+
+Major Scott declared there was no member in the house, who would give a
+more independent vote upon this question than himself. He had no concern
+either in the African or West Indian trades; but in the present state of
+the finances of the country, he thought it would be a dangerous experiment
+to risk any one branch of our foreign commerce. As far as regulation would
+go, he would join in the measure.
+
+Mr. Burke said he would use but few words. He declared that he had for a
+long time had his mind drawn towards this great subject. He had even
+prepared a bill for the regulation of the trade, conceiving at that time
+that the immediate abolition of it was a thing hardly to be hoped for; but
+when he found that Mr. Wilberforce had seriously undertaken the work, and
+that his motion was for the abolition, which he approved much more than his
+own, he had burnt his papers; and made an offering of them in honour of his
+nobler proposition, much in the same manner as we read, that the curious
+books were offered up and burnt at the approach of the Gospel. He highly
+applauded the confessions of Mr. Stanley and Mr. Ryder. It would be a
+glorious tale for them to tell their constituents, that it was impossible
+for them, however prejudiced, if sent to hear discussion in that house, to
+avoid surrendering up their hearts and judgments at the shrine of reason.
+
+Mr. Drake said, that he would oppose the abolition to the utmost. We had by
+a want of prudent conduct lost America. The house should be aware of being
+carried away by the meteors with which they had been dazzled. The leaders,
+it was true, were for the abolition; but the minor orators, the dwarfs, the
+pigmies, he trusted, would that night carry the question against them. The
+property of the West Indians was at stake; and, though men might be
+generous with their own property, they should not be so with the property
+of others.
+
+Lord Sheffield reprobated the overbearing language, which had been used by
+some gentlemen towards others, who differed in opinion from them on a
+subject of so much difficulty as the present. He protested against a
+debate, in which he could trace nothing like reason; but, on the contrary,
+downright phrensy, raised perhaps by the most extraordinary eloquence. The
+abolition, as proposed, was impracticable. He denied the right of the
+legislature to pass a law for it. He warned the Chancellor of the Exchequer
+to beware of the day, on which the bill should pass, as the worst he had
+ever seen.
+
+Mr. Milnes declared, that he adopted all those expressions against the
+Slave-trade, which had been thought so harsh; and that the opinion of the
+noble lord had been turned in consequence of having become one of the
+members for Bristol. He quoted a passage from Lord Sheffield's pamphlet;
+and insisted that the separation of families in the West Indies, there
+complained of by himself, ought to have compelled him to take the contrary
+side of the question.
+
+Mr. Wilberforce made a short reply to some arguments in the course of the
+debate; after which, at half past three in the morning, the House divided.
+There appeared for Mr. Wilberforce's motion eighty-eight, and against it
+one hundred and sixty-three; so that it was lost by a majority of
+seventy-five votes.
+
+By this unfavourable division the great contest, in which we had been so
+long engaged, was decided. We were obliged to give way to superior numbers.
+Our fall, however, grievous as it was, was rendered more tolerable by the
+circumstance of having been prepared to expect it. It was rendered more
+tolerable also by other considerations; for we had the pleasure of knowing,
+that we had several of the most distinguished characters in the kingdom,
+and almost all the splendid talents of the House of Commons[A], in our
+favour. We knew too, that the question had not been carried against us
+either by evidence or by argument; but that we were the victims of the
+accidents and circumstances of the times. And as these considerations
+comforted us, when we looked forward to future operations on this great
+question, so we found great consolation as to the past, in believing, that,
+unless human constitutions were stronger then they really were, we could
+not have done more than we had done towards the furtherance of the cause.
+
+[Footnote A: It is a pity that no perfect list was ever made of this or of
+any other division in the House of Commons on this subject. I can give,
+however, the names of the following members, as having voted for Mr.
+Wilberforce's motion at this time.
+
+  Mr. Pitt,            Hon. R. Fitzpatrick,
+  Mr. Fox,             Sir William Dolben,
+  Mr. Burke,           Sir Henry Houghton,
+  Mr. Grey,            Sir Edward Lyttleton,
+  Mr. Windham,         Sir William Scott,
+  Mr. Sheridan,        Mr. Samuel Thornton,
+  Mr. Whitbread,       Mr. Henry Thornton,
+  Mr. Courtenay,       Mr. Robert Thornton,
+  Mr. Francis,         Mr. Duncombe,
+  Mr. Wilberforce,     Mr. Martin,
+  Mr. Ryder,           Mr. Milnes,
+  Mr. William Smith,   Mr. Steele,
+  Mr. John Smyth,      Mr. Coke,
+  Mr. Robert Smith,    Mr. Elliott,
+  Mr. Powys,           Mr. Montagu,
+  Lord Apsley,         Mr. Bastard,
+  Lord Bayham,         Mr. Stanley,
+  Lord Arden,          Mr. Plumer,
+  Lord Carysfort,      Mr. Beaufoy,
+  Lord Muncaster,      Mr. I.H. Browne,
+  Lord Barnard,        Mr. G.N. Edwards,
+  Lord North,          Mr. W.M. Pitt,
+  Lord Euston,         Mr. Bankes.
+  General Burgoyne]
+
+The committee for the abolition held a meeting soon after this our defeat.
+It was the most impressive I ever attended. The looks of all bespoke the
+feelings of their hearts. Little was said previously to the opening of the
+business; and, after it was opened, it was conducted with a kind of solemn
+dignity, which became the occasion. The committee, in the course of its
+deliberations, came to the following resolutions:
+
+That the thanks of this committee be respectfully given to the illustrious
+minority of the House of Commons, who lately stood forth the assertors of
+British justice and humanity, and the enemies of a traffic in the blood of
+man.
+
+
+That our acknowledgements are particularly due to William Wilberforce,
+esquire, for his unwearied exertions to remove this opprobrium of our
+national character; and to the right honourable William Pitt, and the right
+honourable Charles James Fox, for their virtuous and dignified cooperation
+in the same cause.
+
+That the solemn declarations of these gentlemen, and of Matthew Montagu and
+William Smith, esquires, that they will not relinquish, but with life,
+their struggle for the abolition of the Slave-trade, are not only highly
+honourable to themselves as Britons, as Statesmen, and as Christians, but
+must eventually, as the light of evidence shall be more and more diffused,
+be seconded by the good wishes of every man not immediately interested in
+the continuance of that detestable commerce.
+
+And, lastly, that anticipating the opposition they should have to sustain
+from persons trained to a familiarity with the rapine and desolation
+necessarily attendant on the Slave-trade, and sensible also of the
+prejudices which implicitly arise from long-established usages, this
+committee consider the late decision in the House of Commons as a delay,
+rather than a defeat. In addressing a free and enlightened nation on a
+subject, in which its justice, its humanity, and its wisdom are involved,
+they cannot despair of final success; and they do hereby, under an
+increasing conviction of the excellence of their cause, and inconformity to
+the distinguished examples before them, renew their firm protestation, that
+they will never desist from appealing to their countrymen, till the
+commercial intercourse with Africa shall cease to be polluted with the
+blood of its inhabitants.
+
+These resolutions were published, and they were followed by a suitable
+report.
+
+The committee, in order to strengthen themselves for the prosecution of
+their great work, elected Sir William Dolben, baronet, Henry Thornton,
+Lewis Alexander Grant, and Matthew Montagu, esquires, who were members of
+parliament, and Truman Harford, Josiah Wedgwood, jun. esquire, and John
+Clarkson, esquire, of the royal navy, as members of their own body; and
+they elected the Reverend Archdeacon Plymloy (now Corbett) an honorary and
+corresponding member, in consequence of the great services which he had
+rendered their cause in the shires of Hereford and Salop, and the adjacent
+counties of Wales.
+
+The several committees, established in the country, on receiving the
+resolutions and report as before mentioned, testified their sympathy in
+letters of condolence to that of London on the late melancholy occasion;
+and expressed their determination to support it as long as any vestiges of
+this barbarous traffic should remain.
+
+At length the session ended; and though, in the course of it, the
+afflicting loss of the general question had occurred, there was yet an
+attempt made by the abolitionists in parliament, which met with a better
+fate. The Sierra Leone company received the sanction of the legislature.
+The object of this institution was to colonize a small portion of the coast
+of Africa. They, who were to settle there, were to have no concern in the
+Slave-trade, but to discourage it as much as possible. They were to
+endeavour to establish a new species of commerce, and to promote
+cultivation in its neighbourhood by free labour. The persons more generally
+fixed upon for colonists, were such Negros, with their wives and families,
+as chose to abandon their habitations in Nova Scotia. These had followed
+the British arms in America; and had been settled there, as a reward for
+their services, by the British government. My brother, just mentioned to
+have been chosen a member of the committee, and who had essentially served
+the great cause of the abolition on many occasions, undertook a visit to
+Nova Scotia, to see if those in question were willing to undergo the
+change; and in that case to provide transports, and conduct them to Sierra
+Leone. This object he accomplished. He embarked more than eleven hundred
+persons in fifteen vessels, of all which he took the command. On landing
+them he became the first Governor of the new Colony. Having laid the
+foundation of it, he returned to England; when a successor was appointed.
+From that time many unexpected circumstances, but particularly devastations
+by the French in the beginning of the war, took place, which, contributed
+to ruin the trading company, which was attached to it. It is pleasing,
+however, to reflect, that though the object of the institution, as far as
+mercantile profit was concerned, thus failed, the other objects belonging
+to it were promoted. Schools, places of worship, agriculture, and the
+habits of civilized life, were established. Sierra Leone, therefore, now
+presents itself as the medium of civilization for Africa. And, in this
+latter point of view, it is worth all the treasure which has been lost in
+supporting it: for the Slave-trade, which was the great obstacle to this
+civilization, being now happily abolished, there is a metropolis,
+consisting of some hundreds of persons, from which may issue the seeds of
+reformation to this injured continent; and which, when sown, may be
+expected to grow into fruit without interruption. New schools may be
+transplanted from thence into the interior. Teachers, and travellers on
+discovery, may be sent from thence in various directions; who may return to
+it occasionally as to their homes. The natives too, able now to travel in
+safety, may resort to it from various parts. They may see the improvements
+which are going on from time to time. They may send their children to it
+for education. And thus it may become the medium[A] of a great intercourse
+between England and Africa, to the benefit of each other.
+
+[Footnote A: To promote this desirable end an association took place last
+year, called The African Institution, under the patronage of the Duke of
+Gloucester, as president, and of the friends to the African cause,
+particularly of such as were in parliament, and as belonged to the
+committee for the abolition of the Slave-trade.]
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IV.
+
+_Continuation from July 1791 to July 1792--Author travels round the kingdom
+again--Object of his journey--People begin to leave off the use of
+sugar--to form committees--and to send petitions to Parliament--Motion made
+in the House of Commons for the immediate abolition of the trade--Debates
+upon it--Abolition resolved upon, but not to commence till 1796--Resolution
+taken to the Lords--Latter determine upon hearing evidence--Evidence at
+length introduced--Further hearing of it postponed to the next session._
+
+
+The defeat which we had just sustained, was a matter of great triumph to
+our opponents. When they considered the majority in the House of Commons in
+their favour, they viewed the resolutions of the committee, which have been
+detailed, as the last spiteful effort of a vanquished and dying animal, and
+they supposed that they had consigned the question to eternal sleep. The
+committee, however, were too deeply attached to the cause, vanquished as
+they were, to desert it; and they knew also too well the barometer of
+public feeling, and the occasion of its fluctuations, to despair. In the
+year 1787 the members of the House of Commons, as well as the people, were
+enthusiastic in behalf of the abolition of the trade. In the year 1788 the
+fair enthusiasm of the former began to fade. In 1789 it died. In 1790
+prejudice started up as a noxious weed in its place. In 1791 this prejudice
+arrived at its growth. But to what were these changes owing?--To delay;
+during which the mind, having been gradually led to the question as a
+commercial, had been gradually taken from it as a moral object. But it was
+possible to restore the mind to its proper place. Add to which, that the
+nation had never deserted the cause during this whole period.
+
+It is much to the honour of the English people, that they should have
+continued to feel for the existence of an evil which was so far removed
+from their sight. But at this moment their feelings began to be
+insupportable. Many of them resolved, as soon as parliament had rejected
+the bill, to abstain from the use of West Indian produce. In this state of
+things a pamphlet, written by William Bell Crafton, of Tewksbury, and
+called "A Sketch of the Evidence, with a Recommendation on the Subject to
+the Serious Attention of People in general," made its appearance; and
+another followed it, written by William Fox, of London, "On the Propriety
+of abstaining from West India Sugar and Rum." These pamphlets took the same
+ground. They inculcated abstinence from these articles as a moral duty;
+they inculcated it as a peaceable and constitutional measure; and they laid
+before the reader a truth, which was sufficiently obvious, that if each
+would abstain, the people would have a complete remedy for this enormous
+evil in their own power.
+
+While these things were going on, it devolved upon me to arrange all the
+evidence on the part of the abolition under proper heads, and to abridge it
+into one volume. It was intended that a copy of this should be sent into
+different towns of the kingdom, that all might know, if possible, the
+horrors (as far as the evidence contained them) of this execrable trade;
+and as it was possible that these copies might lie in the places where they
+were sent, without a due attention to their contents, I resolved, with the
+approbation of the committee, to take a journey, and for no other purpose
+than personally to recommend that they might be read.
+
+The books, having been printed, were dispatched before me. Of this tour I
+shall give the reader no other account than that of the progress of the
+remedy, which the people were then taking into their own hands. And first I
+may observe, that there was no town, through which I passed, in which there
+was not some one individual who had left off the use of sugar. In the
+smaller towns there were from ten to fifty by estimation, and in the larger
+from two to five hundred, who had made this sacrifice to virtue. These were
+of all ranks and parties. Rich and poor, churchmen and dissenters, had
+adopted the measure. Even grocers had left off trading in the article, in
+some places. In gentlemen's families, where the master had set the example,
+the servants had often voluntarily followed it; and even children, who were
+capable of understanding the history of the sufferings of the Africans,
+excluded, with the most virtuous resolution, the sweets, to which they had
+been accustomed, from their lips. By the best computation I was able to
+make from notes taken down in my journey, no fewer than three hundred
+thousand persons had abandoned the use of sugar.
+
+Having travelled over Wales, and two thirds of England, I found it would be
+impossible to visit Scotland on the same errand. I had already, by moving
+upwards and downwards in parallel lines, and by intersecting these in the
+same manner, passed over six thousand miles. By the best calculation I
+could make, I had yet two thousand to perform. By means of almost incessant
+journeyings night and day, I had suffered much in my health. My strength
+was failing daily. I wrote therefore to the committee on this subject; and
+they communicated immediately with Dr. Dickson, who, on being applied to,
+visited Scotland in my stead. He consulted first with the committee at
+Edinburgh relative to the circulation of the Abridgement of the Evidence.
+He then pursued his journey, and, in conjunction with the unwearied efforts
+of Mr. Campbel Haliburton, rendered essential service to the cause for this
+part of the kingdom.
+
+On my return to London I found that the committee had taken into their own
+body T.F. Forster, B.M. Forster, and James West, esquires, as members; and
+that they had elected Hercules Ross, esquire, an honorary and corresponding
+member, in consequence of the handsome manner in which he had come forward
+as an evidence, and of the peculiar benefit which had resulted from his
+testimony to the cause.
+
+The effects of the two journeys by Dr. Dickson and myself were soon
+visible. The people could not bear the facts, which had been disclosed to
+them by the Abridgement of the Evidence. They were not satisfied, many of
+them, with the mere abstinence from sugar; but began to form committees to
+correspond with that of London. The first of these appeared at Newcastle
+upon Tyne, so early as the month of October. It consisted of the Reverend
+William Turner as chairman, and of Robert Ormston, William Batson, Henry
+Taylor, Ralph Bainbridge, George Brown, Hadwen Bragg, David Sutton, Anthony
+Clapham, George Richardson, and Edward Prowit. It received a valuable
+addition afterwards by the admission of many others. The second was
+established at Nottingham. The Reverend Jeremiah Bigsby became the
+president, and the Rev. G. Walker and J. Smith, and Mess. Dennison, Evans,
+Watson, Hart, Storer, Bott, Hawkesley, Pennington, Wright, Frith, Hall, and
+Wakefield, the committee. The third was formed at Glasgow, under the
+patronage of David Dale, Scott Moncrieff, Robert Graham, Professor Millar,
+and others. Other committees started up in their turn. At length public
+meetings began to take place, and after this petitions to be sent to
+parliament; and these so generally, that there was not a day for three
+months, Sundays excepted, in which five or six were not resolved upon in
+some places or other in the kingdom.
+
+Of the enthusiasm of the nation at this time none can form an opinion but
+they who witnessed it. There never was perhaps a season when so much
+virtuous feeling pervaded all ranks. Great pains were taken by interested
+persons in many places to prevent public meetings. But no efforts could
+avail. The current ran with such strength and rapidity, that it was
+impossible to stem it. In the city of London a remarkable instance
+occurred. The livery had been long waiting for the common council to begin
+a petition. But the lord mayor and several of the aldermen stifled it. The
+former, indignant at this conduct, insisted upon a common hall. A day was
+appointed; and, though the notice given of it was short, the assemblage was
+greater than had ever been remembered on any former occasion. Scarcely a
+liveryman was absent, unless sick, or previously engaged. The petition,
+when introduced, was opposed by those who had prevented it in the common
+council. But their voices were drowned amidst groans and hissings. It was
+shortly after carried; and it had not been signed more than half an hour,
+before it was within the walls of the House of Commons. The reason of this
+extraordinary dispatch was, that it had been kept back by intrigue so late,
+that the very hour, in which it was delivered to the House, was that in
+which Mr. Wilberforce was to make his new motion.
+
+And as no petitions were ever more respectable than those presented on this
+occasion, as far as they breathed the voice of the people, and as far as
+they were founded on a knowledge of the object which they solicited, so
+none were ever more numerous, as far as we have any record of such
+transactions. Not fewer than three hundred and ten were presented from
+England; one hundred and eighty-seven from Scotland; and twenty from Wales.
+Two other petitions also for the abolition came from England, but they were
+too late for delivery. On the other side of the question, one was presented
+from the town of Reading for regulation, in opposition to that for
+abolition from the same place. There were also four against abolition. The
+first of these was from certain persons at Derby in opposition to the other
+from that town. The second was from Stephen Fuller, esquire, as agent for
+Jamaica. The third from J. Dawson, esquire, a slave-merchant at Liverpool.
+And the fourth from the merchants, planters, mortgagees, annuitants, and
+others concerned in the West Indian colonies. Taking in all these
+statements, the account stood thus. For regulation there was one; against
+all abolition there were four; and for the total abolition of the trade
+five hundred and nineteen.
+
+On the second of April Mr. Wilberforce moved the order of the day; which
+having been agreed to, Sir William Dolben was put into the chair.
+
+He then began by soliciting the candid attention of the West Indians to
+what he was going to deliver to the House. However others might have
+censured them indiscriminately, he had always himself made a distinction
+between them and their system. It was the latter only, which he reprobated.
+If aristocracy had been thought a worse form of government than monarchy,
+because the people had many tyrants instead of one, how objectionable must
+be that form of it, which existed in our colonies! Arbitrary power could be
+bought there by any one, who could buy a slave. The fierceness of it was
+doubtless restrained by an elevation of mind in many, as arising from a
+consciousness of superior rank and consequence: but, alas! it was too often
+exercised there by the base and vulgar. The more liberal too of the
+planters were not resident upon their estates. Hence a promiscuous censure
+of them would be unjust, though their system would undoubtedly be odious.
+
+As for the cure of this monstrous evil, he had shown, last year, that
+internal regulations would not produce it. These could have no effect,
+while the evidence of slaves was inadmissible. What would be the situation
+of the bulk of the people of this country, if only gentlemen of five
+hundred a-year were admitted as evidences in our courts of law? Neither was
+the cure of it in the emancipation of the slaves. He did not deny that he
+wished them this latter blessing. But, alas, in their present degraded
+state, they were unfit for it! Liberty was the child of reason and order.
+It was indeed a plant of celestial growth, but the soil must be prepared
+for its reception. He, who would see it flourish and bring forth its proper
+fruit, must not think it sufficient to let it shoot in unrestrained
+licentiousness. But if this inestimable blessing was ever to be imparted to
+them, the cause must be removed, which obstructed its introduction. In
+short, no effectual remedy could be found but in the abolition of the
+Slave-trade.
+
+He then took a copious view of the advantages, which would arise both to
+the master and to the slave, if this traffic were done away; and having
+recapitulated and answered the different objections to such a measure, he
+went to that part of the subject, in which he described himself to be most
+interested.
+
+He had shown, he said, last year, that Africa was exposed to all the
+horrors of war; and that most of these wars had their origin in the
+Slave-trade. It was then said, in reply, that the natural barbarity of the
+natives was alone sufficient to render their country a scene of carnage.
+This was triumphantly instanced in the king of Dahomey. But his honourable
+friend Lord Muncaster, then in the House, had proved in his interesting
+publication, which had appeared since, called Historical Sketches of the
+Slave-trade and of its Effects in Africa, addressed to the People of Great
+Britain, that the very cruelties of this king, on which so much stress had
+been laid, were committed by him in a war, which had been undertaken
+expressly to punish an adjacent people for having stolen some of his
+subjects and sold them for slaves.
+
+He had shown also last year, that kings were induced to seize and sell
+their subjects, and individuals each other, in consequence of the existence
+of the Slave-trade.
+
+He had shown also, that the administration of justice was perverted, so as
+to become a fertile source of supply to this inhuman traffic; that every
+crime was punished by slavery; that false accusations were made, to procure
+convicts; and that even the judges had a profit on the convictions.
+
+He had shown again, that many acts of violence were perpetrated by the
+Europeans themselves. But he would now relate others, which had happened
+since. The captain of an English vessel, lying in the river Cameroons, sent
+his boat with three sailors and a slave to get water. A Black trader seized
+the latter, and took him away. He alleged in his defence, that the captain
+owed him goods to a greater amount than the value of the slave; and that he
+would not pay him.
+
+This being told on board, the captain, and a part of his crew, who were
+compelled to blacken their naked bodies that they might appear like the
+natives, went on shore at midnight, armed with muskets and cutlasses. They
+fired on the trader's dwelling, and killed three of his children on the
+spot. The trader, being badly wounded, died while they were dragging him to
+the boat; and his wife, being wounded also, died in half an hour after she
+was on board the ship. Resistance having been made to these violent
+proceedings, some of the sailors were wounded, and one was killed. Some
+weeks after this affray, a chieftain of the name of Quarmo went on board
+the same vessel to borrow some cutlasses and muskets. He was going, he
+said, into the country to make war; and the captain should have half of his
+booty. So well understood were the practices of the trade, that his request
+was granted. Quarmo, however, and his associates, finding things favourable
+to their design, suddenly seized the captain, threw him overboard, hauled
+him into their canoe, and dragged him to the shore; where another party of
+the natives, lying in ambush, seized such of the crew as were absent from
+the ship. But how did these savages behave, when they had these different
+persons in their power? Did they not instantly retaliate by murdering them
+all? No--they only obliged the captain to give an order on the vessel to
+pay his debts. This fact came out only two months ago in a trial in the
+court of common pleas--not in a trial for piracy and murder--but in the
+trial of a civil suit, instituted by some of the poor sailors, to whom the
+owners refused their wages, because the natives, on account of the
+villanous conduct of their captain, had kept them from their vessel by
+detaining them as prisoners on shore. This instance, he said, proved the
+dreadful nature of the Slave-trade, its cruelty, its perfidy, and its
+effect on the Africans as well as on the Europeans, who carried it on. The
+cool manner, in which the transaction was conducted on both sides, showed
+that these practices were not novel. It showed also the manner of doing
+business in the trade. It must be remembered too, that these transactions
+were carrying on at the very time when the inquiry concerning this trade
+was going forward in Parliament, and whilst the witnesses of his opponents
+were strenuously denying not only the actual, but the possible, existence
+of any such depredations.
+
+But another instance happened only in August last. Six British ships, the
+Thomas, Captain Phillips; the Wasp, Captain Hutchinson; the Recovery,
+Captain Kimber, of Bristol; and the Martha, Captain Houston; the Betsey,
+Captain Doyle; and the Amachree, (he believed,) Captain Lee, of Liverpool;
+were anchored off the town of Calabàr. This place was the scene of a
+dreadful massacre about twenty years before. The captains of these vessels,
+thinking that the natives asked too much for their slaves, held a
+consultation, how they should proceed; and agreed to fire upon the town
+unless their own terms were complied with. On a certain evening they
+notified their determination to the traders; and told them, that, if they
+continued obstinate, they would put it into execution the next morning. In
+this they kept their word. They brought sixty-six guns to bear upon the
+town; and fired on it for three hours. Not a shot was returned. A canoe
+then went off to offer terms of accommodation. The parties however not
+agreeing, the firing recommenced; more damage was done; and the natives
+were forced into submission. There were no certain accounts of their loss.
+Report said that fifty were killed; but some were seen lying badly wounded,
+and others in the agonies of death, by those who went afterwards on shore.
+
+He would now say a few words relative to the Middle Passage, principally to
+show, that regulation could not effect a cure of the evil there. Mr. Isaac
+Wilson had stated in his evidence, that the ship, in which he sailed, only
+three years ago, was of three hundred and seventy tons; and that she
+carried six hundred and two slaves. Of these she lost one hundred and
+fifty-five. There were three or four other vessels in company with her, and
+which belonged to the same owners. One of these carried four hundred and
+fifty, and buried two hundred; another carried four hundred and sixty-six,
+and buried seventy-three; another five hundred and forty-six, and buried
+one hundred and fifty-eight; and from the four together, after the landing
+of their cargoes, two hundred and twenty died. He fell in with another
+vessel, which had lost three hundred and sixty-two; but the number, which
+had been bought, was not specified. Now if to these actual deaths, during
+and immediately after the voyage, we were to add the subsequent loss in the
+seasoning, and to consider that this would be greater than ordinary in
+cargoes which were landed in such a sickly state, we should find a
+mortality, which, if it were only general for a few months, would entirely
+depopulate the globe.
+
+But he would advert to what Mr. Wilson said, when examined, as a surgeon,
+as to the causes of these losses, and particularly on board his own ship,
+where he had the means of ascertaining them. The substance of his reply was
+this--That most of the slaves laboured under a fixed melancholy, which now
+and then broke out into lamentations and plaintive songs, expressive of the
+loss of their relations, friends, and country. So powerfully did this
+sorrow operate, that many of them attempted in various ways to destroy
+themselves, and three actually effected it. Others obstinately refused to
+take sustenance; and when the whip and other violent means were used to
+compel them to eat, they looked up in the face of the officer, who
+unwillingly executed this painful task, and said with a smile, in their own
+language, "Presently we shall be no more." This, their unhappy state of
+mind, produced a general languor and debility, which were increased in many
+instances by an unconquerable aversion to food, arising partly from
+sickness, and partly, to use the language of the slave-captains, from
+sulkiness. These causes naturally produced the flux. The contagion spread;
+several were carried off daily; and the disorder, aided by so many powerful
+auxiliaries, resisted the power of medicine. And it was worth while to
+remark, that these grievous sufferings were not owing either to want of
+care on the part of the owners, or to any negligence or harshness of the
+captain; for Mr. Wilson declared, that his ship was as well fitted out, and
+the crew and slaves as well treated, as any body could reasonably expect.
+
+He would now go to another ship. That, in which Mr. Claxton sailed as a
+surgeon, afforded a repetition of all the horrid circumstances which had
+been described. Suicide was attempted, and effected; and the same barbarous
+expedients were adopted to compel the slaves to continue an existence,
+which they considered as too painful to be endured. The mortality also was
+as great. And yet here again the captain was in no wise to blame. But this
+vessel had sailed since the regulating act. Nay, even in the last year the
+deaths on shipboard would be found to have been between ten and eleven per
+cent. on the whole number exported. In truth, the House could not reach the
+cause of this mortality by all their regulations. Until they could cure a
+broken heart--until they could legislate for the affections, and bind by
+their statutes the passions and feelings of the mind, their labour would be
+in vain.
+
+Such were the evils of the Passage. But evils were conspicuous every where,
+in this trade. Never was there indeed a system so replete with wickedness
+and cruelty. To whatever part of it we turned our eyes, whether to Africa,
+the Middle Passage, or the West Indies, we could find no comfort, no
+satisfaction, no relief. It was the gracious ordinance of Providence, both
+in the natural and moral world, that good should often arise out of evil.
+Hurricanes cleared the air; and the propagation of truth was promoted by
+persecution. Pride, vanity, and profusion contributed often, in their
+remoter consequences, to the happiness of mankind. In common, what was in
+itself evil and vicious was permitted to carry along with it some
+circumstances of palliation. The Arab was hospitable; the robber brave. We
+did not necessarily find cruelty associated with fraud, or meanness with
+injustice. But here the case was far otherwise. It was the prerogative of
+this detested traffic to separate from evil its concomitant good, and to
+reconcile discordant mischiefs. It robbed war of its generosity; it
+deprived peace of its security: we saw in it the vices of polished society,
+without its knowledge or its comforts; and the evils of barbarism without
+its simplicity. No age, no sex, no rank, no condition was exempt from the
+fatal influence of this wide-wasting calamity. Thus it attained to the
+fullest measure of pure, unmixed, unsophisticated wickedness; and, scorning
+all competition and comparison, it stood without a rival in the secure,
+undisputed, possession of its detestable preeminence.
+
+But, after all this, wonderful to relate, this execrable traffic had been
+defended on the ground of benevolence! It had been said, that the slaves
+were captives and convicts, who, if we were not to carry them away, would
+be sacrificed, and many of them at the funerals of people of rank,
+according to the savage custom of Africa. He had shown, however, that our
+supplies of slaves were obtained from other quarters than these. But he
+would wave this consideration for the present. Had it not been acknowledged
+by his opponents, that the custom of ransoming slaves prevailed in Africa?
+With respect to human sacrifices, he did not deny, that there might have
+been some instances of these; but they had not been proved to be more
+frequent than amongst other barbarous nations; and, where they existed,
+being acts of religion, they would not be dispensed with for the sake of
+commercial gain. In fact, they had nothing to do with the Slave-trade; only
+perhaps, if it were abolished, they might, by means of the civilization
+which would follow, be done away.
+
+But, exclusively of these sacrifices, it had been asserted, that it was
+kindness to the inhabitants to take them away from their own country. But
+what said the historians of Africa, long before the question of the
+abolition was started? "Axim," says Bosman, "is cultivated, and abounds
+with numerous large and beautiful villages: its inhabitants are
+industriously employed in trade, fishing, or agriculture."--"The
+inhabitants of Adom always expose large quantities of corn to sale, besides
+what they want for their own use."--"The people of Acron husband their
+grounds and time so well, that every year produces a plentiful harvest."
+Speaking of the Fetu country, he says, "Frequently, when walking through
+it, I have seen it abound with fine well built and populous towns,
+agreeably enriched with vast quantities of corn and cattle, palm-wine and
+oil. The inhabitants all apply themselves without distinction to
+agriculture; some sow corn; others press oil, and draw wine from the
+palm-trees."
+
+Smith, who was sent out by the royal African company in 1726, assures us,
+"that the discerning natives account it their greatest unhappiness, that
+they were ever visited by the Europeans. They say that we Christians
+introduced the traffic of slaves; and that before our coming they lived in
+peace. But, say they, it is observable, wherever Christianity comes, there
+come swords and guns and powder and ball with it."
+
+"The Europeans," says Bruce, "are far from desiring to act as peace-makers
+among them. It would be too contrary to their interests; for the only
+object of their wars is to carry off slaves; and, as these form the
+principal part of their traffic, they would be apprehensive of drying up
+the source of it, were they to encourage the people to live well together."
+
+"The neighbourhood of the Damel and Tin keep them perpetually at war, the
+benefit of which accrues to the Company, who buy all the prisoners made on
+either side; and the more there are to sell, the greater is their profit;
+for the only end of their armaments is to make captives, to sell them to
+the White traders."
+
+Artus, of Dantzic, says that in his time, "those liable to pay fines were
+banished till the fine was paid; when they returned to their houses and
+possessions."
+
+Bosman affirms "that formerly all crimes in Africa were compensated by fine
+or restitution, and, where restitution was impracticable, by corporal
+punishment."
+
+Moore says, "Since this trade has been used, all punishments have been
+changed into slavery. There being an advantage in such condemnation, they
+strain the crimes very hard, in order to get the benefit of selling the
+criminal. Not only murder, theft, and adultery, are punished by selling the
+criminal for a slave, but every trifling crime is punished in the same
+manner."
+
+Loyer affirms that "the King of Sain, on the least pretence, sells his
+subjects for European goods. He is so tyrannically severe, that he makes a
+whole village responsible for the fault of one inhabitant; and on the least
+offence sells them all for slaves."
+
+Such, he said, were the testimonies, not of persons whom he had summoned;
+not of friends of the abolition: but of men who were themselves, many of
+them, engaged in the Slave-trade. Other testimonies might be added; but
+these were sufficient to refute the assertions of his opponents, and to
+show the kind services we had done to Africa by the introduction of this
+trade.
+
+He would just touch upon the argument, so often repeated, that other
+nations would carry on the Slave-trade, if we abandoned it. But how did we
+know this? Had not Denmark given a noble example to the contrary? She had
+consented to abolish the trade in ten years; and had she not done this,
+even though we, after an investigation for nearly five years, had ourselves
+hung back? But what might not be expected, if we were to take up the cause
+in earnest; if we were to proclaim to all nations the injustice of the
+trade, and to solicit their concurrence in the abolition of it! He hoped
+the representatives of the nation would not be less just than the people.
+The latter had stepped forward, and expressed their sense more generally by
+petitions, than in any instance in which they had ever before interfered.
+To see this great cause thus triumphing over distinctions and prejudices
+was a noble spectacle. Whatever might be said of our political divisions,
+such a sight had taught us, that there were subjects still beyond the reach
+of party; that there was a point of elevation, where we ascended above the
+jarring of the discordant elements, which ruffled and agitated the vale
+below. In our ordinary atmosphere clouds and vapours obscured the air, and
+we were the sport of a thousand conflicting winds and adverse currents; but
+here we moved in a higher region, where all was pure and clear, and free
+from perturbation and discomposure.
+
+  "As some tall cliff, that lifts its awful form,
+  Swells from the vale, and midway leaves the storm;
+  Though round its breast the rolling clouds are spread,
+  Eternal sunshine settles on its head."
+
+Here then, on this august eminence, he hoped we should build the Temple of
+Benevolence; that we should lay its foundation deep in Truth and Justice;
+and that we should inscribe upon its gates, "Peace and Goodwill to Men."
+Here we should offer the first-fruits of our benevolence, and endeavour to
+compensate, if possible, for the injuries we had brought upon our
+fellow-men.
+
+He would only now observe, that his conviction of the indispensable
+necessity of immediately abolishing this trade remained as strong as ever.
+Let those who talked of allowing three or four years to the continuance of
+it, reflect on the disgraceful scenes which had passed last year. As for
+himself, he would wash his hands of the blood which would be spilled in
+this horrid interval. He could not, however, but believe, that the hour was
+come, when we should put a final period to the existence of this cruel
+traffic. Should he unhappily be mistaken, he would never desert the cause;
+but to the last moment of his life he would exert his utmost powers in its
+support. He would now move, "That it is the opinion of this committee, that
+the trade carried on by British subjects for the purpose of obtaining
+slaves on the coast of Africa, ought to be abolished."
+
+Mr. Baillie was in hopes that the friends of the abolition would have been
+contented with the innocent blood which had been already shed. The great
+island of St. Domingo had been torn to pieces by insurrections. The most
+dreadful barbarities had been perpetrated there. In the year 1789 the
+imports into it exceeded five millions sterling. The exports from it in the
+same year amounted to six millions; and the trade employed three hundred
+thousand tons of shipping, and thirty thousand seamen. This fine island,
+thus advantageously situated, had been lost in consequence of the agitation
+of the question or the Slave-trade. Surely so much mischief ought to have
+satisfied those who supported it; but they required the total destruction
+of all the West Indian colonies, belonging to Great Britain, to complete
+the ruin.
+
+The honourable gentleman, who had just spoken, had dwelt, upon the
+enormities of the Slave-trade. He was far from denying, that many acts of
+inhumanity might accompany it; but as human nature was much the same every
+where, it would be unreasonable to expect among African traders, or the
+inhabitants of our islands, a degree of perfection in morals, which was not
+to be found in Great Britain itself. Would any man estimate the character
+of the English nation by what was to be read in the records of the Old
+Bailey? He himself, however, had lived sixteen years in the West Indies,
+and he could bear testimony to the general good usage of the slaves.
+
+Before the agitation of this impolitic question the slaves were contented
+with their situation. There was a mutual confidence between them and their
+masters: and this continued to be the case till the new doctrines were
+broached. But now depots of arms were necessary on every estate; and the
+scene was totally reversed. Nor was their religious then inferior to their
+civil state. When the English took possession of Grenada, where his
+property lay, they found them baptized and instructed in the principles of
+the Roman Catholic faith. The priests of that persuasion had indeed been
+indefatigable in their vocation; so that imported Africans generally
+obtained within twelve months a tolerable idea of their religious duties.
+He had seen the slaves there go through the public mass in a manner, and
+with a fervency, which would have done credit to more civilized societies.
+But the case was now altered; for, except where the Moravians had been,
+there was no trace in our islands of an attention to their religious
+interests.
+
+It had been said, that their punishments were severe. There might be
+instances of cruelty; but these were not general. Many of them were
+undoubtedly ill disposed; though not more, according to their number, on a
+plantation, than in a regiment, or in a ship's crew. Had we never heard of
+seamen being flogged from ship to ship, or of soldiers dying in the very
+act of punishment? Had we not also heard, even in this country of boasted
+liberty, of seamen being seized, and carried away, when returning from
+distant voyages, after an absence of many years; and this without even
+being allowed to see their wives and families? As to distressed objects, he
+maintained, that there was more wretchedness and poverty in St. Giles's,
+than in all the West Indian islands belonging to Great Britain.
+
+He would now speak of the African and West Indian trades. The imports and
+exports of these amounted to upwards of ten millions annually; and they
+gave employment to three hundred thousand tons of shipping, and to about
+twenty-five thousand seamen. These trades had been sanctioned by our
+ancestors in parliament. The acts for this purpose might be classed under
+three heads. First, they were such as declared the colonies and the trade
+thereof advantageous to Great Britain, and therefore entitled to her
+protection. Secondly, such as authorised, protected, and encouraged the
+trade to Africa, as advantageous in itself, and necessary to the welfare
+and existence of the sugar colonies: and, Thirdly, such as promoted and
+secured loans of money to the proprietors of the said colonies, either from
+British subjects or from foreigners. These acts[A], he apprehended, ought
+to satisfy every person of the legality and usefulness of these trades.
+They were enacted in reigns distinguished for the production of great and
+enlightened characters. We heard then of no wild and destructive doctrines
+like the present. These were reserved for this age of novelty and
+innovation. But he must remind the House, that the inhabitants of our
+islands had as good a right to the protection of their property, as the
+inhabitants of Great Britain. Nor could it be diminished in any shape
+without full compensation. The proprietors of lands in the ceded islands,
+which were purchased of government under specific conditions of settlement,
+ought to be indemnified. They also (of whom he was one) who had purchased
+the territory granted by the crown to General Monkton in the Island of St.
+Vincent, ought to be indemnified also. The sale of this had gone on
+briskly, till it was known, that a plan was in agitation for the abolition
+of the Slave-trade. Since that period the original purchasers had done
+little or nothing, and they had many hundred acres on hand, which would be
+of no value, if the present question was carried. In fact, they had a right
+to compensation. The planters generally spent their estates in this
+country. They generally educated their children in it. They had never been
+found seditious or rebellious; and they demanded of the Parliament of Great
+Britain that protection, which, upon the principles of good faith, it was
+in duty bound to afford them in common with the rest of his majesty's loyal
+subjects.
+
+[Footnote A: Here he quoted them specifically.]
+
+Mr. Vaughan stated that, being a West Indian by birth and connected with
+the islands, he could speak from his own knowledge. In the early part of
+his life he was strongly in favour of the abolition of the Slave-trade. He
+had been educated by Dr. Priestley and the father of Mrs. Barbauld; who
+were both of them friends to that question. Their sentiments he had
+imbibed: but, although bred at the feet of Gamaliel, he resolved to judge
+for himself, and he left England for Jamaica.
+
+He found the situation of the slaves much better than he had imagined.
+Setting aside liberty, they were as well off as the poor in Europe. They
+had little want of clothes or fuel: they had a house and garden found them;
+were never imprisoned for debts; nor deterred from marrying through fear of
+being unable to support a family; their orphans and widows were taken care
+of, as they themselves were when old and disabled; they had medical
+attendance without expense; they had private property, which no master ever
+took front them; and they were resigned to their situation, and looked for
+nothing beyond it. Perhaps persons might have been prejudiced by living in
+the towns, to which slaves were often sent for punishment; and where there
+were many small proprietors; or by seeing no Negro otherwise than as
+belonging to the labouring poor; but they appeared to him to want nothing
+but liberty; and it was only occasionally that they were abused.
+
+There were two prejudices with respect to the colonies, which he would
+notice. The first was, that cruel usage occasioned the inequality of births
+and deaths among the slaves. But did cruelty cause the excess of deaths
+above births in the city of London? No--this excess had other causes. So it
+had among the slaves. Of these more males were imported than females: they
+were dissolute too in their morals; they had also diseases peculiar to
+themselves. But in those islands where they nearly kept up their numbers,
+there was this difficulty, that the equality was preserved by the increase
+on one estate compensating for the decrease on another. These estates,
+however, would not interchange their numbers; whereas, where freedom
+prevailed, the free labourers circulated from one employer to another, and
+appeared wherever they were wanted.
+
+The second was, that all chastisement of the slaves was cruelty. But this
+was not true. Their owners generally withdrew them from public justice; so
+that they, who would have been publicly executed elsewhere, were often kept
+alive by their masters, and were found punished again and again for
+repeating their faults. Distributive justice occasioned many punishments;
+as one slave was to be protected against every other slave: and, when one
+pilfered from another, then the master interfered. These punishments were
+to be distinguished from such as arose from enforcing labour, or from the
+cruelty of their owners. Indeed he had gone over the islands, and he had
+seen but little ill usage. He had seen none on the estate where he resided.
+The whip, the stocks, and confinement, were all the modes of punishment he
+had observed in other places. Some slaves belonging to his father were
+peculiarly well off. They saved money, and spent it in their own way.
+
+But, notwithstanding all he had said, he allowed that there was room for
+improvement; and particularly for instilling into the slaves the principles
+of religion. Where this should be realized, there would be less punishment,
+more work, more marriages, more issue, and more attachment to masters.
+Other improvements would be the establishment of medical societies; the
+introduction of task-work; and grants of premiums and honorary distinctions
+both to fathers and mothers, according to the number of children which they
+should rear. Besides this, Negro evidence should be allowed in the courts
+of law, it being left to the discretion of the court or jury to take or
+reject it, according to the nature of the case. Cruel masters also should
+be kept in order in various ways. They should be liable to have their
+slaves taken from them, and put in trust. Every instrument of punishment
+should be banished, except the whip. The number of lashes should be
+limited; and the punishment should not be repeated till after intervals.
+These and other improvements should be immediately adopted by the planters.
+The character of the exemplary among them was hurt by being confounded with
+that of lower and baser men. He concluded by stating, that the owners of
+slaves were entitled to compensation, if, by means of the abolition, they
+should not be able to find labourers for the cultivation of their lands[A].
+
+[Footnote A: Mr. Vaughan declared in a future stage of the debate, that he
+wished to see a prudent termination both of the Slave-trade and of slavery;
+and that, though he was the eldest son of his father, he never would, on
+any consideration, become the owner of a slave.]
+
+Mr. Henry Thornton conceived, that the two last speakers had not spoken to
+the point. The first had described the happy state of the slaves in the
+West Indies. The latter had made similar representations; but yet had
+allowed, that much improvement might be made in their condition. But this
+had nothing to do with the question then before them. The manner of
+procuring slaves in Africa was the great evil to be remedied. Africa was to
+be stripped of its inhabitants to supply a population for the West Indies.
+There was a Dutch proverb, which said, "My son, get money, honestly if you
+can--but get money:" or, in other words, "Get slaves, honestly if you
+can--but get slaves." This was the real grievance; and the two honourable
+gentlemen, by confining their observations to the West Indies, had entirely
+overlooked it.
+
+Though this evil had been fully proved, he could not avoid stating to the
+House some new facts, which had come to his knowledge as a director of the
+Sierra Leone Company, and which would still further establish it. The
+consideration, that they had taken place since the discussion of the last
+year on this subject, obliged him to relate them.
+
+Mr. Falconbridge, agent to the Company, sitting one evening in Sierra
+Leone, heard a shout, and immediately afterwards the report of a gun.
+Fearing an attack, he armed forty of the settlers, and rushed with them to
+the place from whence the noise came. He found a poor wretch, who had been
+crossing from a neighbouring village, in the possession of a party of
+kidnappers, who were tying his hands. Mr. Falconbridge, however, dared not
+rescue him, lest, in the defenceless state of his own town, retaliation
+might be made upon him.
+
+At another time a young woman, living half a mile off, was sold, without
+any criminal charge, to one of the slave-ships. She was well acquainted
+with the agent's wife, and had been with her only the day before. Her cries
+were heard; but it was impossible to relieve her.
+
+At another time a young lad, one of the free settlers who went from
+England, was caught by a neighbouring chief, as he was straggling alone
+from home, and sold for a slave. The pretext was, that some one in the town
+of Sierra Leone had committed an offence. Hence the first person belonging
+to it, who could be seized, was to be punished. Happily the free settlers
+saw him in his chains; and they recovered him, before he was conveyed to
+the ship.
+
+To mark still more forcibly the scenes of misery, to which the Slave-trade
+gave birth, he would mention a case stated to him in a letter by King
+Naimbanna. It had happened to this respectable person, in no less than
+three instances, to have some branches of his family kidnapped, and carried
+off to the West Indies. At one time three young men, Corpro, Banna, and
+Marbrour, were decoyed on board a Danish slave-ship, under pretence of
+buying something, and were taken away. At another time another relation
+piloted a vessel down the river. He begged to be put on shore, when he came
+opposite to his own town; but he was pressed to pilot her to the river's
+mouth. The captain then pleaded the impracticability of putting him on
+shore; carried him to Jamaica; and sold him for a slave. Fortunately,
+however, by means of a letter, which was conveyed there, the man, by the
+assistance of the governor, was sent back to Sierra Leone. At another time
+another relation was also kidnapped. But he had not the good fortune, like
+the former, to return.
+
+He would mention one other instance. A son had sold his own father, for
+whom he obtained a considerable price: for, as the father was rich in
+domestic slaves, it was not doubted that he would offer largely for his
+ransom. The old man accordingly gave twenty-two of these in exchange for
+himself. The rest, however, being from that time filled with apprehensions
+of being on some ground or other sold to the slave-ships, fled to the
+mountains of Sierra Leone, where they now dragged on a miserable existence.
+The son himself was sold, in his turn, soon after. In short, the whole of
+that unhappy peninsula, as he learnt from eye-witnesses, had been desolated
+by the trade in slaves. Towns were seen standing without inhabitants all
+over the coast; in several of which the agent of the Company had been.
+There was nothing but distrust among the inhabitants. Every one, if he
+stirred from home, felt himself obliged to be armed.
+
+Such was the nature of the Slave-trade. It had unfortunately obtained the
+name of a trade; and many had been deceived by the appellation. But it was
+war, and not trade. It was a mass of crimes, and not commerce. It was that
+which prevented the introduction of a trade in Africa; for it was only by
+clearing and cultivating the lands, that the climate could be made healthy
+for settlements; but this wicked traffic, by dispersing the inhabitants,
+and causing the lands to remain uncultivated, made the coast unhealthy to
+Europeans. He had found, in attempting to establish a colony there, that it
+was an obstacle, which opposed itself to him in innumerable ways; it
+created more embarrassments than all the natural impediments of the
+country; and it was more hard to contend with, than any difficulties of
+climate, soil, or natural disposition of the people.
+
+We would say a few words relative to the numerous petitions, which were
+then on the table of the House. They had shown, in an extraordinary manner,
+the opinion of the people. He did not wish to turn this into a
+constitutional question; but he would observe, that it was of the utmost
+consequence to the maintenance of the constitution of this country, that
+the reputation of Parliament should be maintained. But nothing could
+prejudice its character so much, as a vote, which should lead the people to
+believe, that the legislative body was the more corrupt part of it, and
+that it was slow to adopt moral principles.
+
+It had been often insinuated that Parliament, by interfering in this trade,
+departed from its proper functions. No idea could be more absurd: for, was
+it not its duty to correct abuses? and what abuses were greater than
+robbery and murder? He was indeed anxious for the abolition. He desired it,
+as a commercial man, on account of the commercial character of the country.
+He desired it for the reputation of Parliament, on which so materially
+depended the preservation of our happy constitution: but most of all he
+prayed for it for the sake of those eternal principles of justice, which it
+was the duty of nations, as well as of individuals, to support.
+
+Colonel Tarleton repeated his arguments of the last year. In addition to
+these he inveighed bitterly against the abolitionists, as a junto of
+sectaries, sophists, enthusiasts, and fanatics. He condemned the abolition
+as useless, unless other nations would take it up. He brought to the
+recollection of the House the barbarous scenes which had taken place in St.
+Domingo, all of which, he said, had originated in the discussion of this
+question. He described the alarms, in which the inhabitants of our own
+islands were kept, lest similar scenes should occur from the same cause. He
+ridiculed the petitions on the table. Itinerant clergymen, mendicant
+physicians, and others, had extorted signatures from the sick, the
+indigent, and the traveller. School-boys were invited to sign them, under
+the promise of a holiday. He had letters to produce, which would prove all
+these things, though he was not authorized to give up the names of those
+who had written them.
+
+Mr. Montagu said, that, in the last session, he had simply entered his
+protest against the trade; but now he could be no longer silent; and as
+there were many, who had conceived regulation to be more desirable than
+abolition, he would confine himself to that subject.
+
+Regulation, as it related to the manner of procuring slaves, was utterly
+impossible: for how could we know the case of each individual, whom we
+forced away into bondage? Could we establish tribunals all along the coast,
+and in every ship, to find it out? What judges could we get for such an
+office? But, if this could not be done upon the coast, how could we
+ascertain the justness of the captivity of by far the greatest number, who
+were brought from immense distances inland?
+
+He would not dwell upon the proof of the inefficiency of regulations, as to
+the Middle Passage. His honourable friend Mr. Wilberforce had shown, that,
+however the mortality might have been lessened in some ships by the
+regulations of Sir William Dolben, yet, wherever a contagious disorder
+broke out, the greatest part of the cargo was swept away. But what
+regulations by the British Parliament could prevent these contagions, or
+remove them suddenly, when they appeared?
+
+Neither would regulations be effectual, as they related to the protection
+of the slaves in the West Indies. It might perhaps be enacted, as Mr.
+Vaughan had suggested, that their punishments should be moderate; and that
+the number of lashes should be limited. But the colonial legislatures had
+already done as much, as the magic of words alone could do, upon this
+subject: yet the evidence upon the table clearly proved, that the only
+protection of slaves was in the clemency of their masters. Any barbarity
+might be exercised with impunity, provided no White person were to see it,
+though it happened in the sight of a thousand slaves. Besides, by splitting
+the offence, and inflicting the punishment at intervals, the law could be
+evaded, although the fact was within the reach of the evidence of a White
+man. Of this evasion, Captain Cook, of the eighty-ninth regiment, had given
+a shocking instance: and Chief Justice Ottley had candidly confessed, that
+"he could devise no method of bringing a master, so offending, to justice,
+while the evidence of the slave continued inadmissible." But perhaps
+councils of protection, and guardians of the slaves, might be appointed.
+This again was an expedient, which sounded well; but which would be
+nugatory and absurd. What person would risk the comfort of his life by the
+exercise of so invidious an interference? But supposing that one or two
+individuals could be found, who would sacrifice all their time, and the
+friendship of their associates, for the good of the slaves; what could they
+effect? Could they be in all places at once? But even if acts of barbarity
+should be related to them, how were they to come at the proof of them?
+
+It appeared then that no regulations could be effectual until the slaves
+were admitted to give their evidence: but to admit them to this privilege
+in their present state would be to endanger the safety and property of
+their masters. Mr. Vaughan had, however, recommended this measure with
+limitations, but it would produce nothing but discontent; for how were the
+slaves to be persuaded, that it was fit they should be admitted to speak
+the truth, and then be disbelieved and disregarded? What a fermentation
+would such a conduct naturally excite in men dismissed with injuries
+unredressed, though abundantly proved, in their apprehension, by their
+testimony! In fact, no regulations would do. There was no cure for these
+evils, but in the abolition of the Slave-trade. He called upon the planters
+to concur with his honourable friend Mr. Wilberforce in this great measure.
+He wished them to consider the progress, which the opinion of the injustice
+of this trade was making in the nation at large, as manifested by the
+petitions; which had almost obstructed the proceedings of the House by
+their perpetual introduction. It was impossible for them to stifle this
+great question. As for himself, he would renew his profession of last year,
+that he would never cease, but with life, to promote so glorious an end.
+
+Mr. Whitbread said, that even if he could conceive, that the trade was, as
+some had asserted it to be, founded on principles of humanity; that the
+Africans were rescued from death in their own country; that, upon being
+carried to the West Indies, they were put under kind masters; that their
+labour there was easy; that at evening they returned cheerful to their
+homes; that in sickness they were attended with care; and that their old
+age was rendered comfortable; even then he would vote for the abolition of
+the Slave-trade; inasmuch as he was convinced, that that, which was
+fundamentally wrong, no practice could justify.
+
+No eloquence could persuade him, that the Africans were torn from their
+country and their dearest connections, merely that they might lead a
+happier life; or that they could be placed under the uncontrolled dominion
+of others without suffering. Arbitrary power would spoil the hearts of the
+best. Hence would arise tyranny on the one side, and a sense of injury on
+the other. Hence the passions would be let loose, and a state of perpetual
+enmity would follow.
+
+He needed only to go to the accounts of those who defended the system of
+slavery, to show that it was cruel. He was forcibly struck last year by an
+expression of an honourable member, an advocate for the trade, who, when
+he came to speak of the slaves, on selling off the stock of a plantation,
+said, that they fetched less than the common price, because they were
+damaged.--Damaged!--What! were they goods and chattels? What an idea was
+this to hold out of our fellow-creatures. We might imagine how slaves were
+treated, if they could be spoken of in such a manner. Perhaps these unhappy
+people had lingered out the best part of their lives in the service of
+their master. Able then to do but little, they were sold for little! and
+the remaining substance of their sinews was to be pressed out by another,
+yet more hardened than the former, and who had made a calculation of their
+vitals accordingly.
+
+As another proof, he would mention a passage in a pamphlet, in which the
+author, describing the happy situation of the slaves, observed, that a good
+Negro never wanted a character. A bad one could always be detected by his
+weals and scars. What was this but to say, that there were instruments in
+use, which left indelible marks behind them; and who would say, that these
+were used justly?
+
+An honourable gentleman, Mr. Vaughan, had said, that setting aside slavery,
+the slaves were better off than the poor in this country. But what was it
+that we wished to abolish? Was it not the Slave-trade, which would destroy
+in time the cruel distinction he had mentioned? The same honourable
+gentleman had also expressed his admiration of their resignation; but might
+it not be that resignation, which was the consequence of despair?
+
+Colonel Tarleton had insinuated, that the petitions on the table had been
+obtained in an objectionable manner. He had the honour to present one from
+his constituents; which he would venture to say had originated with
+themselves; and that there did not exist more respectable names in the
+kingdom, than those of the persons who had signed it. He had also asserted,
+that there was a strong similitude in their tenour and substance, as if
+they had been manufactured by the same persons. This was by no means to be
+wondered at. There was surely but one plain tale to tell; and it was not
+surprising, that it had been clothed in nearly the same expressions. There
+was but one boon to ask, and that was--the abolition of this wicked trade.
+
+It had been said by another, (Mr. Baillie) that the horrible insurrections
+in St. Domingo arose from the discussion of the question of the
+Slave-trade. He denied the assertion; and maintained that they were the
+effect of the trade itself. There was a point of endurance, beyond which
+human nature could not go; at which the mind of man rose by its native
+elasticity with a spring and violence proportioned to the degree to which
+it had been depressed. The calamities in St. Domingo proceeded from the
+Slave-trade alone; and, if it were continued, similar evils were to be
+apprehended in our own islands. The cruelties, which the slaves had
+perpetrated in that unfortunate colony, they had learnt from their masters.
+Had not an African eyes? Had he not ears? Had he not organs, senses, and
+passions? If you pricked him, would he not feel the puncture and bleed? If
+you poisoned him, would he not die? and, if you wronged him, would he not
+revenge? But he had said sufficient; for he feared he could not better the
+instruction.
+
+Mr. Milbank would only just observe, that the policy of the measure of the
+abolition was as great, as its justice was undeniable. Where slavery
+existed, every thing was out of its natural place. All improvement was at
+an end. There must also, from the nature of the human heart, be oppression.
+He warned the planters against the danger of fresh importations, and
+invited their concurrence in the measure.
+
+Mr. Dundas (now Lord Melville) declared, that he had always been a warm
+friend to the abolition of the Slave-trade, though he differed with Mr.
+Wilberforce as to the mode of effecting it.
+
+The abolitionists, and those on the opposite side of the question, had,
+both of them, gone into extremes. The former were for the immediate and
+abrupt annihilation of the trade. The latter considered it as essentially
+necessary to the existence of the West Indian islands, and therefore laid
+it down, that it was to be continued for ever. Such was the vast distance
+between the parties. He would now address himself to each.
+
+He would say first, that he agreed with his honourable friend Mr.
+Wilberforce in very material points. He believed the trade was not founded
+in policy; that the continuation of it was not essential to the
+preservation of our trade with the West Indian islands; and that the slaves
+were not only to be maintained, but increased there, by natural population.
+He agreed, too, as to the propriety of the abolition. But when his
+honourable friend talked of direct and abrupt abolition, he would submit it
+to him, whether he did not run counter to the prejudices of those who were
+most deeply interested in the question; and whether, if he could obtain his
+object without wounding these, it would not be better to do it? Did he not
+also forget the sacred attention, which Parliament had ever shown to the
+private interests and patrimonial rights of individuals?
+
+Whatever idea men might then have of the African trade, certain it was that
+they, who had connected themselves with it, had done it under the sanction
+of Parliament. It might also be well worth while to consider (though the
+conduct of other nations ought not to deter us from doing our duty) whether
+British subjects in the West Indies might not be supplied with slaves under
+neutral flags. Now he believed it was possible to avoid these objections,
+and at the same time to act in harmony with the prejudices which had been
+mentioned. This might be done by regulations, by which we should effect the
+end much more speedily than by the way proposed. By regulations, he meant
+such as would increase the breed of the slaves in the West Indies; such as
+would ensure a moral education to their children; and such as would even in
+time extinguish hereditary slavery. The extinction, however, of this was
+not to be effected by allowing the son of an African slave to obtain his
+freedom on the death of his parent. Such a son should be considered as born
+free. He should then be educated at the expense of the person importing his
+parents; and, when arrived at such a degree of strength as might qualify
+him to labour, he should work for a term of years for the payment of the
+expense of his education and maintenance. It was impossible to emancipate
+the existing slaves at once; nor would such an emancipation be of any
+immediate benefit to themselves: but this observation would not apply to
+their descendants, if trained and educated in the manner he had proposed.
+
+He would now address himself to those who adopted the opposite extreme: and
+he thought he should not assume too much, when he said, that if both
+slavery and the Slave-trade could be abolished with safety to their
+property, it deeply concerned their interests to do it. Such a measure,
+also, would only be consistent with the principles of the British
+Constitution. It was surely strange that we, who were ourselves free,
+should carry on a Slave-trade with Africa; and that we should never think
+of introducing cultivation into the West Indies by free labourers.
+
+That such a measure would tend to their interest he had no doubt. Did not
+all of them agree with Mr. Long, that the great danger in the West Indies
+arose from the importation of the African slaves there? Mr. Long had
+asserted, that all the insurrections there arose from these. If this
+statement were true, how directly it bore upon the present question! But we
+were told also, by the same author, that the Slave-trade gave rise to
+robbery, murder, and all kinds of depredations on the coast of Africa. Had
+this been answered? No: except indeed it had been said, that the slaves
+were such as had been condemned for crimes. Well then: the imported
+Africans consisted of all the convicts, rogues, thieves, and vagabonds in
+Africa. But would the West Indians choose to depend on fresh supplies of
+these for the cultivation of their lands, and the security of their
+islands, when it was also found that every insurrection had arisen from
+them? it was plain the safety of the islands was concerned in this
+question. There would be danger so long as the trade lasted. The Planters
+were, by these importations, creating the engines of their own destruction.
+Surely they would act more to their own interest, if they would concur in
+extinguishing the trade, than by standing up for its continuance.
+
+He would now ask them, what right they had to suppose that Africa would for
+ever remain in a state of barbarism. If once an enlightened prince were to
+rise up there, his first act would be to annihilate the Slave-trade. If the
+light of heaven were ever to descend upon that continent, it would directly
+occasion its downfall. It was their interest then to contrive a mode of
+supplying labour, without trusting to precarious importations from that
+quarter. They might rest assured that the trade could not continue. He did
+not allude to the voice of the people in the petitions then lying on the
+table of the House; but he knew certainly, that an idea not only of the
+injustice but of the impolicy of this trade had been long entertained by
+men of the most enlightened understandings in this country. Was it then a
+prudent thing for them to rest on this commerce for the further improvement
+of their property?
+
+There was a species of slavery, prevailing only a few years ago, in the
+collieries in certain boroughs of Scotland. Emancipation there was thought
+a duty by Parliament: But what an opposition there was to the measure!
+Nothing but ruin would be the consequence of it! After several years
+struggle the bill was carried. Within a year after, the ruin so much talked
+of vanished in smoke, and there was an end of the business. It had also
+been contended that Sir William Dolben's bill would be the ruin of
+Liverpool: and yet one of its representatives had allowed, that this bill
+had been of benefit to the owners of the slave-vessels there. Was he then
+asking too much of the West Indians, to request a candid consideration of
+the real ground of their alarms? He would conclude by stating, that he
+meant to propose a middle way of proceeding. If there was a number of
+members in the House, who thought with him, that this trade ought to be
+ultimately abolished, but yet by moderate measures, which should neither
+invade the property nor the prejudices of individuals; he wished them to
+unite, and they might then reduce the question to its proper limits.
+
+Mr. Addington (the speaker) professed himself to be one of those moderate
+persons called upon by Mr. Dundas. He wished to see some middle measure
+suggested. The fear of doing injury to the property of others, had hitherto
+prevented him from giving an opinion against a system, the continuance of
+which he could not countenance.
+
+He utterly abhorred the Slave-trade. A noble and learned lord, who had now
+retired from the bench, said on a certain occasion, that he pitied the
+loyalty of that man, who imagined that any epithet could aggravate the
+crime of treason. So he himself knew of no language which could aggravate
+the crime of the Slave-trade. It was sufficient for every purpose of
+crimination, to assert, that man thereby was bought and sold, or that he
+was made subject to the despotism of man. But though he thus acknowledged
+the justice due to a whole continent on the one side, he confessed there
+were opposing claims of justice on the other. The case of the West Indians
+deserved a tender consideration also.
+
+He doubted, if we were to relinquish the Slave-trade alone, whether it
+might not be carried on still more barbarously than at present; and
+whether, if we were to stop it altogether, the islands could keep up their
+present stocks. It had been asserted that they could. But he thought that
+the stopping of the importations could not be depended upon for this
+purpose, so much as a plan for providing them with more females.
+
+With the mode suggested by his right honourable friend, Mr. Dundas, he was
+pleased, though he did not wholly agree to it. He could not grant liberty
+to the children born in the islands. He thought also, that the trade ought
+to be permitted for ten or twelve years longer, under such arrangements as
+should introduce a kind of management among the slaves there, favourable to
+their interests, and of course to their future happiness. One species of
+regulation which he should propose, would be greater encouragement to the
+importation of females than of males, by means of a bounty on the former
+till their numbers should be found equal. Rewards also might be given to
+those slaves who should raise a certain number of children; and to those
+who should devise means of lightening negro-labour. If the plan of his
+honourable friend should comprehend these regulations, he would heartily
+concur in it. He wished to see the Slave-trade abolished. Indeed it did not
+deserve the name of a trade. It was not a trade, and ought not to be
+allowed. He was satisfied, that in a few years it would cease to be the
+reproach of this nation and the torment of Africa. But under regulations
+like these, it would cease without any material injury to the interests of
+others.
+
+Mr. Fox said, that after what had fallen from the two last speakers he
+could remain no longer silent. Something so mischievous had come out, and
+something so like a foundation had been laid for preserving, not only for
+years to come, but for ever, this detestable traffic, that he should feel
+himself wanting in his duty, if he were not to deprecate all such
+deceptions and delusions upon the country.
+
+The honourable gentlemen had called themselves moderate men: but upon this
+subject he neither felt, nor desired to feel, any thing like a sentiment of
+moderation. Their speeches had reminded him of a passage in Middleton's
+Life of Cicero. The translation of it was defective, though it would
+equally suit his purpose. He says, "To enter into a man's house, and kill
+him, his wife, and family, in the night, is certainly a most heinous crime,
+and deserving of death; but to break open his house, to murder him, his
+wife, and all his children, in the night, may be still very right, provided
+it be done with moderation." Now, was there any thing more absurd in this
+passage, than to say, that the Slave-trade might be carried on with
+moderation; for, if you could not rob or murder a single man with
+moderation, with what moderation could you pillage and wound a whole
+nation? In fact, the question of the abolition was simply a question of
+justice. It was only, whether we should authorize by law, respecting
+Africa, the commission of crimes, for which, in this country, we should
+forfeit our lives; notwithstanding which, it was to be treated, in the
+opinion of these honourable gentlemen, with moderation.
+
+Mr. Addington had proposed to cure the disproportion of the sexes in the
+islands, by a bounty on the importation of females; or, in other words, by
+offering a premium to any crew of ruffians, who would tear them from their
+native country. He would let loose a banditti against the most weak and
+defenceless of the sex. He would occasion these to kill fathers, husbands,
+and brothers, to get possession of their relatives, the females, who, after
+this carnage, were to be reserved for--slavery. He should like to see the
+man, who would pen such a moderate clause for a British Parliament.
+
+Mr. Dundas had proposed to abolish the Slave-trade, by bettering the state
+of the slaves in the islands, and particularly that of their offspring. His
+plan, with respect to the latter, was not a little curious. They were to
+become free, when born; and then they were to be educated at the expense of
+those to whom their fathers belonged. But it was clear, that they could not
+be educated for nothing. In order, therefore, to repay this expense, they
+were to be slaves for ten or fifteen years. In short, they were to have an
+education, which was to qualify them to become freemen; and, after they had
+been so educated, they were to become slaves. But as this free education
+might possibly unfit them for submitting to slavery; so, after they had
+been made to bow under the yoke for ten or fifteen years, they might then,
+perhaps, be equally unfit to become free; and therefore, might be retained
+as slaves for a few years longer, if not for their whole lives. He never
+heard of a scheme so moderate, and yet so absurd and visionary.
+
+The same honourable gentleman had observed, that the conduct of other
+nations should not hinder us from doing our duty; but yet neutrals would
+furnish our islands with slaves. What was the inference from this moderate
+assertion, but that we might as well supply them ourselves? He hoped, if we
+were yet to be supplied, it would never be by Englishmen. We ought no
+longer to be concerned in such a crime.
+
+An adversary, Mr. Baillie, had said, that it would not be fair to take the
+character of this country from the records of the Old Bailey. He did not at
+all wonder, when the subject of the Slave-trade was mentioned, that the Old
+Bailey naturally occurred to his recollection. The facts which had been
+described in the evidence, were associated in all our minds with the ideas
+of criminal justice. But Mr. Baillie had forgot the essential difference
+between the two cases. When we learnt from these records, that crimes were
+committed in this country, we learnt also, that they were punished with
+transportation and death. But the crimes committed in the Slave-trade were
+passed over with impunity. Nay, the perpetrators were even sent out again
+to commit others.
+
+As to the mode of obtaining slaves, it had been suggested as the least
+disreputable, that they became so in consequence of condemnation as
+criminals. But he would judge of the probability of this mode by the
+reasonableness of it. No less than eighty thousand Africans were exported
+annually by the different nations of Europe from their own country. Was it
+possible to believe, that this number could have been legally convicted of
+crimes, for which they had justly forfeited their liberty? The supposition
+was ridiculous. The truth was, that every enormity was practised to obtain
+the persons of these unhappy people. He referred those present to the case
+in the evidence of the African trader, who had kidnapped and sold a girl,
+and who was afterwards kidnapped and sold himself. He desired them to
+reason upon the conversation which had taken place between the trader and
+the captain of the ship on this occasion. He desired them also to reason
+upon the instance mentioned this evening, which had happened in the river
+Cameroons, and they would infer all the rapine, all the desolation, and all
+the bloodshed, which had been placed to the account of this execrable
+trade.
+
+An attempt had been made to impress the House with the horrible scenes
+which had taken place in St. Domingo, as an argument against the abolition
+of the Slave-trade; but could any more weighty argument be produced in its
+favour? What were the causes of the insurrections there? They were two. The
+first was the indecision of the National Assembly, who wished to compromise
+between that which was right and that which was wrong on this subject. And
+the second was the oppression of the People of Colour, and of the Slaves.
+In the first of the causes we saw something like the moderation of Mr.
+Dundas and Mr. Addington. One day this Assembly talked of liberty, and
+favoured the Blacks. Another day they suspended their measures, and
+favoured the Whites. They wished to steer a middle course; but decision had
+been mercy. Decision even against the Planters would have been a thousand
+times better than indecision and half measures. In the mean time, the
+People of Colour took the great work of justice into their own hands.
+Unable, however, to complete this of themselves, they called in the aid of
+the Slaves. Here began the second cause; for the Slaves, feeling their own
+power, began to retaliate on the Whites. And here it may be observed, that,
+in all revolutions, the clemency or cruelty of the victors will always be
+in proportion to their former privileges, or their oppression. That the
+Slaves then should have been guilty of great excesses was not to be
+wondered at; for where did they learn their cruelty? They learnt it from
+those who had tyrannized over them. The oppression, which they themselves
+had suffered, was fresh in their memories, and this had driven them to
+exercise their vengeance so furiously. If we wished to prevent similar
+scenes in our own islands, we must reject all moderate measures, and at
+once abolish the Slave-trade. By doing this, we should procure a better
+treatment for the Slaves there; and when this happy change of system should
+have taken place, we might depend on them for the defence of the islands as
+much as on the Whites themselves.
+
+Upon the whole, he would give his opinion of this traffic in a few words.
+He believed it to be impolitic--he knew it to be inhuman--he was certain it
+was unjust--he though it so inhuman and unjust, that, if the colonies could
+not be cultivated without it, they ought not to be cultivated at all. It
+would be much better for us to be without them, than not abolish the
+Slave-trade. He hoped therefore that members would this night act the part
+which would do them honour. He declared, that, whether he should vote in a
+large minority or a small one, he would never give up the cause. Whether in
+the House of Parliament or out of it, in whatever situation he might ever
+be, as long as he had a voice to speak, this question should never be at
+rest. Believing the trade to be of the nature of crimes and pollutions,
+which stained the honour of the country, he would never relax his efforts.
+It was his duty to prevent man from preying upon man; and if he and his
+friends should die before they had attained their glorious object, he hoped
+there would never be wanting men alive to their duty, who would continue to
+labour till the evil should be wholly done away. If the situation of the
+Africans was as happy as servitude could make them, he could not consent to
+the enormous crime of selling man to man; nor permit a practice to
+continue, which put an entire bar to the civilization of one quarter of the
+globe. He was sure that the nation would not much longer allow the
+continuance of enormities which shocked human nature. The West Indians had
+no right to demand that crimes should be permitted by this country for
+their advantage; and, if they were wise, they would lend their cordial
+assistance to such measures, as would bring about, in the shortest possible
+time, the abolition of this execrable trade.
+
+Mr. Dundas rose again, but it was only to move an amendment, namely, that
+the word "gradually" should be inserted before the words "to be abolished"
+in Mr. Wilberforce's motion.
+
+Mr. Jenkinson (now Lord Hawkesbury) said, that the opinions of those who
+were averse to the abolition had been unfairly stated. They had been
+described as founded on policy, in opposition to humanity. If it could be
+made out that humanity would be aided by the abolition, he would be the
+last person to oppose it. The question was not, he apprehended, whether the
+trade was founded in injustice and oppression. He admitted it was: nor was
+it, whether it was in itself abstractedly an evil: he admitted this also:
+but whether, under all the circumstances of the case, any considerable
+advantage would arise to a number of our fellow-creatures from the
+abolition of the trade in the manner in which it had been proposed.
+
+He was ready to admit, that the Africans at home were made miserable by the
+Slave-trade, and that, if it were universally abolished, great benefit
+would arise to them. No one, however, would assert, that these miseries
+arose from the trade as carried on by Great Britain only. Other countries
+occasioned as much of the evil as we did; and if the abolition of it by us
+should prove only the transferring of it to those countries, very little
+benefit would result from the measure.
+
+What then was the probability of our example being followed by foreign
+powers? Five years had now elapsed since the question was first started,
+and what had any of them done? The Portuguese continued the trade. The
+Spaniards still gave a bounty to encourage it. He believed there were
+agents from Holland in this country, who were then negotiating with persons
+concerned in it in order to secure its continuance. The abolition also had
+been proposed in the National Assembly of France, and had been rejected
+there. From these circumstances he had a right to infer, that if we gave up
+the trade, we should only transfer it to those countries: but this transfer
+would be entirely against the Africans. The mortality on board English
+ships, previously to the regulating bill, was four and an eighth per cent.
+Since that time it had been reduced to little more than three per cent.[A]
+In French ships it was near ten, and in Dutch ships from five to seven, per
+cent. In Portuguese it was less than either in French or Dutch, but more
+than in English ships since the regulating bill. Thus the deaths of the
+Africans would be more than doubled, if we were to abolish the trade.
+
+[Footnote A: Mr. Wilberforce stated it on the same evening to be between
+ten and eleven per cent. for the last year. The number then exported from
+Africa to our islands was rather more than 22,000, of whom more than 2,300
+died.]
+
+Perhaps it might be replied, that, the importations being stopped in our
+own islands, fewer Africans would experience this misery, because fewer
+would be taken from their own country on this account. But he had a right
+to infer, that as the planters purchased slaves at present, they would
+still think it their interest to have them. The question then was, whether
+they could get them by smuggling. Now it appeared by the evidence, that
+many hundred slaves had been stolen from time to time from Jamaica, and
+carried into Cuba. But if persons could smuggle slaves out of our colonies,
+they could smuggle slaves into them; but particularly when the planters
+might think it to their interest to assist them.
+
+With respect to the slaves there, instances had been related of their
+oppression, which shocked the feelings of all who heard them: But was it
+fair to infer from these their general ill usage? Suppose a person were to
+make a collection of the different abuses, which had happened for a series
+of years under our own happy constitution, and use these as an argument of
+its worthlessness; should we not say to him, that in the most perfect
+system which the human intellect could form, some defects would exist; and
+that it was unfair to draw inferences from such partial facts? In the same
+manner he would argue relative to the alleged treatment of the slaves.
+Evidence had been produced upon this point on both sides. He should not be
+afraid to oppose the authorities of Lord Rodney, and others, against any,
+however respectable, in favour of the abolition. But this was not
+necessary. There was another species of facts, which would answer the same
+end. Previously to the year 1730 the decrease of the slaves in our islands
+was very considerable. From 1730 to 1755 the deaths were reduced to only
+two and a half per cent. above the births: from 1755 to 1768 to only one
+and three fourths; and from 1768 to 1788 to only one per cent. This then,
+on the first view of the subject, would show, that whatever might have been
+the situation of slaves formerly, it had been gradually improved. But if,
+in addition to this, we considered the peculiar disadvantages under which
+they laboured; the small proportion of females to males; and the
+hurricanes, and famines, which had swept away thousands, we should find it
+physically impossible, that they could have increased as related, if they
+had been treated as cruelly as the friends of the abolition had described.
+
+This species of facts would enable him also to draw still more important
+conclusions; namely, that as the slaves in the West Indies had gradually
+increased, they would continue to increase; that very few years would pass,
+not only before the births were equal to the deaths, but before they were
+more numerous than the deaths; and that if this was likely to happen in the
+present state of things, how much more would it happen, if by certain
+regulations the increase of the slaves should be encouraged?
+
+The only question then was, whether it was more advantageous to breed or to
+import. He thought he should prove the former; and if so, then this
+increase was inevitable, and the importations would necessarily cease.
+
+In the first place, the gradual increase of the slaves of late years
+clearly proved, that such increase had been encouraged. But their price had
+been doubled in the last twenty years. The planter therefore must feel it
+his interest to desist from purchasing, if possible. But again, the
+greatest mortality was among the newly imported slaves. The diseases they
+contracted on the passage, and their deaths in the seasoning, all made for
+the same doctrine. Add to this, that slaves bred in the islands were more
+expert at colonial labour, more reconciled to their situation, and better
+disposed towards their masters, than those who were brought from Africa.
+
+But it had been said, that the births and deaths in the islands were now
+equal; and, that therefore no further supply was wanted. He denied the
+propriety of this inference. The slaves were subject to peculiar diseases.
+They were exposed also to hurricanes and consequent famines. That the day,
+however, would come, when the stock there would be sufficient, no person
+who attended to the former part of his argument could doubt. That they had
+gradually increased, were gradually, increasing, and would, by certain
+regulations, increase more and more, must be equally obvious. But these
+were all considerations for continuing the traffic a little longer.
+
+He then desired the House to reflect upon the state of St. Domingo. Had not
+its calamities been imputed by its own deputies to the advocates for the
+abolition? Were ever any scenes of horror equal to those which had passed
+there? And should we, when principles of the same sort were lurking in our
+own islands, expose our fellow-subjects to the same miseries, who, if
+guilty of promoting this trade, had, at least, been encouraged in it by
+ourselves?
+
+That the Slave-trade was an evil, he admitted. That the state of slavery
+itself was likewise an evil, he admitted; and if the question was, not
+whether we should abolish, but whether we should establish these, he would
+be the first to oppose himself to their existence; but there were many
+evils, which we should have thought it our duty to prevent, yet which, when
+they had once arisen, it was more dangerous to oppose than to submit to.
+The duty of a statesman was, to consider abstractedly what was right or
+wrong, but to weigh the consequences which were likely to result from the
+abolition of an evil, against those, which were likely to result from its
+continuance. Agreeing then most perfectly with the abolitionists in their
+end, he differed from them only in the means of accomplishing it. He was
+desirous of doing that gradually, which he conceived they were doing
+rashly. He had therefore drawn up two propositions. The first was, That an
+address be presented to His Majesty, that he would recommend to the
+colonial assemblies to grant premiums to such planters, and overseers, as
+should distinguish themselves by promoting the annual increase of the
+slaves by birth; and likewise freedom to every female slave, who had reared
+five children to the age of seven years. The second was, That a bounty of
+five pounds per head be given to the master of every slave-ship, who should
+import in any cargo a greater number of females than males, not exceeding
+the age of twenty-five years. To bring forward these propositions, he would
+now move that the chairman leave the chair.
+
+Mr. Este wished the debate to be adjourned. He allowed there ware many
+enormities in the trade, which called for regulation. There were two
+propositions before the House: the one for the immediate, and the other for
+the gradual, abolition of the trade. He thought that members should be
+allowed time to compare their respective merits. At present his own opinion
+was, that gradual abolition would answer the end proposed in the least
+exceptionable manner.
+
+Mr. Pitt rejoiced that the debate had taken a turn, which contracted the
+question into such narrow limits. The matter then in dispute was merely as
+to the time at which the abolition should take place. He therefore
+congratulated the House, the country, and the world, that this great point
+had been gained; that we might now consider this trade as having received
+its condemnation; that this curse of mankind was seen in its true light;
+and that the greatest stigma on our national character, which ever yet
+existed, was about to be removed! Mankind, he trusted, were now likely to
+be delivered from the greatest practical evil that ever afflicted the human
+race--from the most severe and extensive calamity recorded in the history
+of the world.
+
+His honourable friend (Mr. Jenkinson) had insinuated, that any act for the
+abolition would be evaded. But if we were to enforce this act with all the
+powers of the country, how could it fail to be effectual? But his
+honourable friend had himself satisfied him upon this point. He had
+acknowledged, that the trade would drop of itself, on account of the
+increasing dearness of the commodity imported. He would ask then, if we
+were to leave to the importer no means of importation but by smuggling; and
+if, besides all the present disadvantages, we were to load him with all the
+charges and hazards of the smuggler, would there be any danger of any
+considerable supply of fresh slaves being poured into the islands through
+this channel? The question under these circumstances, he pronounced, would
+not bear a dispute.
+
+His honourable friend had also maintained, that it would be inexpedient to
+stop the importations immediately, because the deaths and births in the
+islands were as yet not equal. But he (Mr. Pitt) had proved last year, from
+the most authentic documents, that an increase of the births above the
+deaths had already taken place. This then was the time for beginning the
+abolition. But he would now observe, that five years had elapsed since
+these documents were framed; and therefore the presumption was, that the
+Black population was increasing at an extraordinary rate. He had not, to be
+sure, in his consideration of the subject, entered into the dreadful
+mortality arising from the clearing of new lands. Importations for this
+purpose were to be considered, not as carrying on the trade, but as setting
+on foot a Slave-trade, a measure which he believed no one present would
+then support. He therefore asked his honourable friend, whether the period
+he had looked to was now arrived? whether the West Indies, at this hour,
+were not in a state, in which they could maintain their population?
+
+It had been argued, that one or other of these two assertions was false;
+that either the population of the slaves must be decreasing, (which the
+abolitionists denied,) or, if it was increasing, the slaves must have been
+well treated. That their population was rather increasing than otherwise,
+and also that their general treatment was by no means so good as it ought
+to have been, were both points which had been proved by different
+witnesses. Neither were they incompatible with each other. But he would see
+whether the explanation of this seeming contradiction would not refute the
+argument of expediency, as advanced by his honourable friend. Did the
+slaves decrease in numbers?--Yes. Then ill usage must have been the cause
+of it; but if so, the abolition was immediately necessary to restrain it.
+Did they, on the other hand, increase?--Yes. But if so, no further
+importations were wanted: Was their population (to take a middle course)
+nearly stationary, and their treatment neither so good nor so bad as it
+might be?--Yes. But if so, this was the proper period for stopping further
+supplies; for both the population and the treatment would be improved by
+such a measure.
+
+But he would show again the futility of the argument of his honourable
+friend. He himself had admitted, that it was in the power of the colonists
+to correct the various abuses, by which the Negro population was
+restrained. But they could not do this without improving the condition of
+their slaves; without making them approximate towards the rank of citizens;
+without giving them some little interest in their labour, which would
+occasion them to work with the energy of men. But now the Assembly of
+Grenada had themselves stated, "that though the Negros were allowed the
+afternoons of only one day in every week, they would do as much work in
+that afternoon, when employed for their own benefit, as in the whole day,
+when employed in their masters' service." Now after this confession, the
+House might burn all his calculations relative to the Negro population;
+for, if it had not yet quite reached the desirable state which he had
+pointed out, this confession had proved, that further supplies were not
+wanted. A Negro, if he worked for himself, could do double work. By an
+improvement then in the mode of labour, the work in the islands could be
+doubled. But if so, what would become of the argument of his honourable
+friend? for then only half the number of the present labourers were
+necessary.
+
+He would now try this argument of expediency by other considerations. The
+best informed writers on the subject had told us, that the purchase of new
+Negros was injurious to the planters. But if this statement was just, would
+not the abolition be beneficial to them? That it would, was the opinion of
+Mr. Long, their own historian. "If the Slave-trade," says he, "was
+prohibited for four or five years, it would enable them, to retrieve their
+affairs by preventing them from running into debt, either by renting or
+purchasing Negros." To this acknowledgment he would add a fact from the
+evidence, which was, that a North American province, by such a prohibition
+alone for a few years, from being deeply plunged in debt, had become
+independent, rich, and flourishing.
+
+The next consideration was the danger, to which the islands were exposed
+from the newly imported slaves. Mr. Long, with a view of preventing
+insurrections, had advised, that a duty, equal to a prohibition, might be
+laid on the importation of Coromantine slaves. After noticing one
+insurrection, which happened through their means, he speaks of another in
+the following year, in which thirty-three Coromantines, "most of whom had
+been newly imported, murdered and wounded no less than nineteen Whites in
+the space of an hour." To the authority of Mr. Long he would add the
+recorded opinion of a Committee of the House of Assembly of Jamaica, which
+was appointed to inquire into the best means of preventing future
+insurrections. The Committee reported, that "the rebellion had originated,
+like most others, with the Coromantines," and they proposed that a bill
+should be brought in for laying a higher duty on the importation of these
+particular Negros, which should operate as a prohibition. But the danger
+was not confined to the introduction of Coromantines. Mr. Long accounts for
+the frequent insurrections in Jamaica from the greatness of its general
+importations. "In two years and a half," says he, "twenty-seven thousand
+Negros have been imported--No wonder that we have rebellions!" Surely then,
+when his honourable friend spoke of the calamities of St. Domingo, and of
+similar dangers impending over our own islands, it ill became him to be the
+person to cry out for further importations! It ill became him to charges
+upon the abolitionists the crime of stirring up insurrections, who only
+recommended what the Legislature of Jamaica itself had laid down in a time
+of danger with an avowed view to prevent them. It was indeed a great
+satisfaction to himself, that among the many arguments for prohibiting the
+Slave-trade, the security of our West Indian possessions against internal
+commotions, as well as foreign enemies, was among the most prominent and
+forcible. And here he would ask his honourable friend, whether in this part
+of the argument he did not see reason for immediate abolition. Why should
+we any longer persist in introducing those latent principles of
+conflagration, which, if they should once burst forth, might annihilate the
+industry of a hundred years? which might throw the planters back a whole
+century in their profits, in their cultivation, and in their progress
+towards the emancipation of their slaves? It was our duty to vote, that the
+abolition of the Slave-trade should be immediate, and not to leave it to he
+knew not what future time or contingency.
+
+Having now done with the argument of expediency, he would consider the
+proposition of his right honourable friend Mr. Dundas; that, on account of
+some patrimonial rights of the West Indians, the prohibition of the
+Slave-trade would be an invasion of their legal inheritance. He would first
+observe, that, if this argument was worth any thing, it applied just as
+much to gradual as to immediate abolition. He had no doubt, that, at
+whatever period we should say the trade should cease, it would be equally
+set up; for it would certainly be just as good an argument against the
+measure in seventy years hence, as it was against it now. It implied also,
+that Parliament had no right to stop the importations: but had this
+detestable traffic received such a sanction, as placed it more out of the
+jurisdiction of the legislature for ever after, than any other branch of
+our trade? In what a situation did the proposition of his honourable friend
+place the legislature of Great Britain! It was scarcely possible to lay a
+duty on any one article, which might not in some way affect the property of
+individuals. But if the laws respecting the Slave-trade implied a contract
+for its perpetual continuance, the House could never regulate any other of
+the branches of our national commerce.
+
+But any contract for the promotion of this trade must, in his opinion, have
+been void from the beginning: for if it was an outrage upon justice, and
+only another name for fraud, robbery, and murder, What pledge could devolve
+upon the legislature to incur the obligation of becoming principals in the
+commission of such enormities by sanctioning their continuance?
+
+But he would appeal to the acts themselves. That of 23 George II. c. 31,
+was the one upon which the greatest stress was laid. How would the House be
+surprised to hear, that the very outrages committed in the prosecution of
+this trade had been forbidden by that act! "No master of a ship trading to
+Africa," says the act, "shall by fraud, force, or violence, or by any
+indirect practice whatever, take on board or carry away from that coast any
+Negro, or native of that country, or commit any violence on the natives, to
+the prejudice of the said trade; and every person so offending, shall for
+every such offence forfeit one hundred pounds." But the whole trade had
+been demonstrated to be a system of fraud, force, and violence; and
+therefore the contract was daily violated, under which the Parliament
+allowed it to continue.
+
+But why had the trade ever been permitted at all? The preamble of the act
+would show: "Whereas the trade to and from Africa is very advantageous to
+Great Britain, and necessary for supplying the Plantations and Colonies
+thereunto belonging with a sufficient number of Negros at reasonable rates,
+and for that purpose the said trade should be carried on"--Here then we
+might see what the Parliament had in view, when it passed this act. But no
+one of the occasions, on which it grounded its proceedings, now existed. He
+would plead, then, the act itself as an argument for the abolition. If it
+had been proved that, instead of being very advantageous to Great Britain,
+it was the most destructive to her interests--that it was the ruin of her
+seamen--that it stopped the extension of her manufactures;--if it had been
+proved, in the second place, that it was not now necessary for the supply
+of our Plantations with Negros;--if it had been further established, that
+it was from the beginning contrary to the first principles of justice, and
+consequently that a pledge for its continuance, had one been attempted to
+be given, must have been absolutely void--where in this act of parliament
+was the contract to be found, by which Britain was bound, as she was said
+to be, never to listen to her own true interests and to the cries of the
+natives of Africa? Was it not clear, that all argument, founded on the
+supposed pledge of Parliament, made against those who employed it?
+
+But if we were not bound by existing laws to the support of this trade, we
+were doubly criminal in pursuing it: for why ought it to be abolished at
+all? Because it was incurable injustice. Africa was the ground, on which he
+chiefly rested; and there it was, that his two honourable friends, one of
+whom had proposed gradual abolition, and the other regulation, did not
+carry their principles to their full extent. Both had confessed the trade
+to be a moral evil. How much stronger then was the argument for immediate
+than for gradual abolition! If on the ground of a moral evil it was to be
+abolished at last, why ought it not now? Why was injustice to be suffered
+to remain for a single hour? He knew of no evil, which ever had existed,
+nor could he imagine any to exist, worse than the tearing of eighty
+thousand persons annually from their native land, by a combination of the
+most civilized nations, in the most enlightened quarter of the globe; but
+more especially by that nation, which called herself the most free and the
+most happy of them all.
+
+He would now notice the objection, that other nations would not give up the
+Slave-trade, if we were to renounce it. But if the trade were stained but
+by a thousandth part of the criminality, which he and others, after a
+thorough investigation of the subject, charged upon it, the House ought
+immediately to vote its abolition. This miserable argument, if persevered
+in, would be an eternal bar to the annihilation of the evil. How was it
+ever to be eradicated, if every nation was thus prudentially to wait till
+the concurrence of all the world should be obtained? But it applied a
+thousand times more strongly in a contrary way. How much more justly would
+other nations say, "Great Britain, free as she is, just and honourable as
+she is, not only has not abolished, but has refused to abolish, the
+Slave-trade. She has investigated it well. Her senate has deliberated upon
+it. It is plain, then, that she sees no guilt in it." With this argument we
+should furnish the other nations of Europe, if we were again to refuse to
+put an end to this cruel traffic: and we should have from henceforth not
+only to answer for our own, but for their crimes also. Already we had
+suffered one year to pass away; and now, when the question was renewed, not
+only had this wretched argument been revived, but a proposition had been
+made for the gradual abolition of the trade. He knew indeed the difficulty
+of reforming long established abuses: but in the present case, by proposing
+some other period than the present, by prescribing some condition, by
+waiting for some contingency, perhaps till we obtained the general
+concurrence of Europe, (a concurrence which he believed never yet took
+place at the commencement of any one improvement in policy or morals,) he
+feared that this most enormous evil would never be redressed. Was it not
+folly to wait for the stream to run down before we crossed the bed of its
+channel? Alas! we might wait for ever. The river would still flow on. We
+should be no nearer the object, which we had in view, so long as the step,
+which could alone bring us to it, was not taken.
+
+He would now proceed to the civilization of Africa; and as his eye had just
+glanced upon a West Indian law in the evidence upon the table, he would
+begin with an argument, which the sight of it had suggested to him. This
+argument had been ably answered in the course of the evening; but he would
+view it in yet another light. It had been said, that the savage disposition
+of the Africans rendered the prospect of their civilization almost
+hopeless. This argument was indeed of long standing; but, last year, it had
+been supported upon a new ground. Captain Frazer had stated in his
+evidence, that a boy had been put to death at Cabenda, because there were
+those who refused to purchase him as a slave. This single story was deemed
+by him, and had been considered by others, as a sufficient proof of the
+barbarity of the Africans, and of the inutility of abolishing the
+Slave-trade. But they, who had used this fact, had suppressed several
+circumstances relating to it. It appeared, on questioning Captain Frazer
+afterward, that this boy had previously run away from his master three
+several times; that the master had to pay his value, according to the
+custom of the country, every time he was brought back; and that partly from
+anger at the boy for running away so frequently, and partly to prevent a
+repetition of the same expense, he determined to destroy him. Such was the
+explanation of the signal instance, which was to fix barbarity on all
+Africa, as it came out in the cross-examination of Captain Frazer. That
+this African master was unenlightened and barbarous, he freely admitted:
+but what would an enlightened and civilized West Indian have done in a
+similar case? He would quote the law, passed in the West Indies in 1722,
+which he had just cast his eye upon in the book of evidence, by which law
+this very same crime of running away was by the legislature of an island,
+by the grave and deliberate sentence of an enlightened legislature,
+punished with death; and this, not in the case only of the third offence,
+but even in the very first instance. It was enacted, "That, if any Negro or
+other slave should withdraw himself from his master for the term of six
+months; or any slave, who was absent, should not return within that time,
+every such person should suffer death." There was also another West Indian
+law, by which every Negro was armed against his fellow-negro, for he was
+authorized to kill every runaway slave; and he had even a reward held out
+to him for so doing. Let the House now contrast the two cases. Let them ask
+themselves which of the two exhibited the greater barbarity; and whether
+they could possibly vote for the continuance of the Slave-trade, upon the
+principle, that the Africans had shown themselves to be a race of
+incorrigible barbarians?
+
+Something like an opposite argument, but with a like view, had been
+maintained by others on this subject. It had been said, in justification of
+the trade, that the Africans had derived some little civilization from
+their intercourse with us. Yes: we had given them just enough of the forms
+of justice to enable them to add the pretext of legal trials to their other
+modes of perpetrating the most atrocious crimes. We had given them just
+enough of European improvements, to enable them the more effectually to
+turn Africa into a ravaged wilderness. Alas! alas! we had carried on a
+trade with them from this civilized and enlightened country, which, instead
+of diffusing knowledge, had been a check to every laudable pursuit. We had
+carried a poison into their country, which spread its contagious effects
+from one end of it to the other, and which penetrated to its very centre,
+corrupting every part to which it reached. We had there subverted the whole
+order of nature; we had aggravated every natural barbarity, and furnished
+to every man motives for committing, under the name of trade, acts of
+perpetual hostility and perfidy against his neighbour. Thus had the
+perversion of British commerce carried misery instead of happiness to one
+whole quarter of the globe. False to the very principles of trade,
+misguided in our policy, unmindful of our duty, what almost irreparable
+mischief had we done to that continent! How should we hope to obtain
+forgiveness from Heaven, if we refused to use those means, which the mercy
+of Providence had still reserved to us for wiping away the guilt and shame,
+with which we were now covered? If we refused even this degree of
+compensation, how aggravated would be our guilt! Should we delay, then, to
+repair these incalculable injuries? We ought to count the days, nay the
+very hours, which intervened to delay the accomplishment of such a work.
+
+On this great subject, the civilization of Africa, which, he confessed, was
+near his heart, he would yet add a few observations. And first he would
+say, that the present deplorable state of that country, especially when we
+reflected that her chief calamities were to be ascribed to us, called for
+our generous aid, rather than justified any despair, on our part, of her
+recovery, and still less a repetition of our injuries. On what ground of
+theory or history did we act, when we supposed that she was never to be
+reclaimed? There was a time, which it might be now fit to call to
+remembrance, when human sacrifices, and even, this very practice of the
+Slave-trade, existed in our own island. Slaves, as we may read in Henry's
+History of Great Britain, were formerly an established article of our
+exports. "Great numbers," he says, "were exported, like cattle, from the
+British coast, and were to be seen exposed for sale in the Roman
+market."--"Adultery, witchcraft, and debt," says the same historian, "were
+probably some of the chief sources of supplying the Roman market with
+British slaves--prisoners taken in war were added to the number--there
+might be also among them some unfortunate gamesters, who, after having lost
+all their goods, at length, staked themselves, their wives, and their
+children." Now every one of these sources of slavery had been stated to be
+at this hour a source of slavery in Africa. If these practices, therefore,
+were to be admitted as proofs of the natural incapacity of its inhabitants,
+why might they not have been applied to ancient Britain? Why might not then
+some Roman senator, pointing to British barbarians, have predicted with
+equal boldness, that these were a people, who were destined never to be
+free; who were without the understanding necessary for the attainment of
+useful arts; depressed by the hand of Nature below the level of the human
+species; and created to form a supply of slaves for the rest of the world?
+But happily, since that time, notwithstanding what would then have been the
+justness of these predictions, we had emerged from barbarism. We were now
+raised to a situation, which exhibited a striking contrast to every
+circumstance, by which a Roman might have characterized us, and by which we
+now characterized Africa. There was indeed one thing wanting to complete
+the contrast, and to clear us altogether from the imputation of acting even
+to this hour as barbarians; for we continued to this hour a barbarous
+traffic in slaves. We continued it even yet, in spite of all our great
+pretensions. We were once as obscure among the nations of the earth, as
+savage in our manners, as debased in our morals, as degraded in our
+understandings, as these unhappy Africans. But in the lapse of a long
+series of years, by a progression slow, and for a time almost
+imperceptible, we had become rich in a variety of acquirements. We were
+favoured above measure in the gifts of Providence, we were unrivalled in
+commerce, preeminent in arts, foremost in the pursuits of philosophy and
+science, and established in all the blessings of civil society: we were in
+the possession of peace, of liberty, and of happiness: we were under the
+guidance of a mild and a beneficent religion; and we were protected by
+impartial laws, and the purest administration of justice: we were living
+under a system of government, which our own happy experience led us to
+pronounce the best and wisest, and which had become the admiration of the
+world. From all these blessings we must for ever have been excluded, had
+there been any truth in those principles, which some had not hesitated to
+lay down as applicable to the case of Africa; and we should have been at
+this moment little superior, either in morals, knowledge, or refinement, to
+the rude inhabitants of that continent.
+
+If then we felt that this perpetual confinement in the fetters of brutal
+ignorance would have been the greatest calamity which could have befallen
+us; if we viewed with gratitude the contrast between our present and our
+former situation; if we shuddered to think of the misery, which would still
+have overwhelmed us, had our country continued to the present times,
+through some cruel policy, to be the mart for slaves to the more civilized
+nations of the world;--God forbid, that we should any longer subject Africa
+to the same dreadful scourge, and exclude the sight of knowledge from her
+coasts, which had reached every other quarter of the globe!
+
+He trusted we should no longer continue this commerce; and that we should
+no longer consider ourselves as conferring too great a boon on the natives
+of Africa in restoring them to the rank of human beings. He trusted we
+should not think ourselves too liberal, if, by abolishing the Slave-trade,
+we gave them the same common chance of civilization with other parts of the
+world. If we listened to the voice of reason and duty this night, some of
+us might live to see a reverse of that picture, from which we now turned
+our eyes with shame. We might live to behold the natives engaged in the
+calm occupations of industry, and in the pursuit of a just commerce. We
+might behold the beams of science and philosophy breaking in upon their
+land, which at some happy period in still later times might blaze with full
+lustre; and joining their influence to that of pure religion, might
+illuminate and invigorate the most distant extremities of that immense
+continent. Then might we hope, that even Africa (though last of all the
+quarters of the globe) should enjoy at length, in the evening of her days,
+those blessings, which had descended so plentifully upon us in a much
+earlier period of the world. Then also would Europe, participating in her
+improvement and prosperity, receive an ample recompense for the tardy
+kindness (if kindness it could be called) of no longer hindering her from
+extricating herself out of the darkness, which, in other more fortunate
+regions, had been so much more speedily dispelled.
+
+  --Nos primus equis Oriens afflavit anhelis;
+  Illic sera rubens accendit lumina Vesper.
+
+Then might be applied to Africa those words, originally used indeed with a
+different view:
+
+  Hic demum exactis ---- ----
+  Devenere locos laetos, et amoena vireta
+  Fortunatorum nemorum, sedesque beatas;
+  Largior hic campos aether et lumine vestit
+  Purpurco:
+
+It was in this view--it was as an atonement for our long and cruel
+injustice towards Africa, that the measure proposed by his honourable
+friend Mr. Wilberforce most forcibly recommended itself to his mind. The
+great and happy change to be expected in the state of her inhabitants was,
+of all the various benefits of the abolition, in his estimation the most
+extensive and important. He should vote against the adjournment; and he
+should also oppose every proposition, which tended either to prevent, or
+even to postpone for an hour, the total abolition of the Slave-trade.
+
+Mr. Pitt having concluded his speech (at about six in the morning), Sir
+William Dolben, the chairman, proposed the following questions. The first
+was on the motion of Mr. Jenkinson, "that the chairman do now leave the
+chair." This was lost by a majority of two hundred and thirty-four to
+eighty-seven. The second was on the motion of Mr. Dundas, "that the
+abolition should be gradual;" when the votes for gradual exceeded those for
+immediate by one hundred and ninety-three to one hundred and twenty-five.
+He then put the amended question, that "it was the opinion of the
+committee, that the trade ought to be gradually abolished." The committee
+having divided again, the votes for a gradual abolition were two hundred
+and thirty, and those against any abolition were eighty-five.
+
+After this debate, the committee for the abolition of the Slave-trade held
+a meeting. They voted their thanks to Mr. Wilberforce for his motion, and
+to Mr. Pitt, Mr. Fox, and those other members of the House, who had
+supported it. They resolved also, that the House of Commons, having
+determined that the Slave-trade ought to be gradually abolished, had by
+that decision manifested their opinion, that it was cruel and unjust. They
+resolved also, that a gradual abolition of it was not an adequate remedy
+for its injustice and cruelty; neither could it be deemed a compliance with
+the general wishes of the people, as expressed in their numerous and urgent
+petitions to Parliament. And they resolved lastly, that the interval, in
+which the Slave-trade should be permitted to continue, afforded a prospect
+of redoubled cruelties and ravages on the coast of Africa; and that it
+imposed therefore an additional obligation on every friend to the cause to
+use all constitutional means to obtain its immediate abolition.
+
+At a subsequent meeting they voted their thanks to the right honourable
+Lord Muncaster, for the able support he had given to the great object of
+their institution by his Historical Sketches of the Slave-trade, and of its
+Effects in Africa, addressed to the People of Great Britain; and they
+elected the Reverend Richard Gifford and the Reverend Thomas Gisborne
+honorary and corresponding members; the first on account of his excellent
+sermon before mentioned and other services, and the latter on account of
+his truly Christian and seasonable pamphlet, entitled Remarks on the late
+Decision of the House of Commons respecting the Abolition of the
+Slave-trade.
+
+On the twenty-third of April, the House of Commons resolved itself into a
+committee of the whole House, to consider the subject again; and Mr.
+Beaufoy was put into the chair.
+
+Mr. Dundas, upon whom the task of introducing a bill for the gradual
+abolition of the Slave-trade now devolved, rose to offer the outlines of a
+plan for that purpose. He intended, he said, immediately to abolish that
+part of the trade, by which we supplied foreigners with slaves. The other
+part of it was to be continued seven years from the first of January next.
+He grounded the necessity of its continuance till this time upon the
+documents of the Negro-population in the different islands. In many of
+these, slaves were imported, but they were re-exported nearly in equal
+numbers. Now all these he considered to be in a state to go on without
+future supplies from Africa. Jamaica and the ceded islands retained almost
+all the slaves imported into them. This he considered as a proof that these
+had not attained the same desirable state; and it was therefore necessary,
+that the trade should be continued longer on this account.
+
+It was his intention, however, to provide proper punishments, while it
+lasted, for abuses both in Africa and the Middle Passage. He would take
+care, as far as he could, that none but young slaves should be brought from
+the Coast of Africa. He would encourage establishments there for a new
+species of traffic. Foreign nations should be invited to concur in the
+abolition. He should propose a praedial rather than a personal service for
+the West Indies, and institutions, by which the slaves there should be
+instructed in religious duties. He concluded by reading several
+resolutions, which he would leave to the future consideration of the House.
+
+Mr. Pitt then rose. He deprecated the resolutions altogether. He denied
+also the inferences, which Mr. Dundas had drawn from the West-Indian
+documents relative to the Negro-population. He had looked over his own
+calculations from the same documents again and again, and he would submit
+them, with all their data, if it should be necessary, to the House.
+
+Mr. Wilberforce and Mr. Fox held the same language. They contended also,
+that Mr. Dundas had now proved, a thousand times more strongly than ever,
+the necessity of immediate abolition. All the resolutions he had read were
+operative against his own reasoning. The latter observed, that the
+Slave-traders were in future only to be allowed to steal innocent children
+from their disconsolate parents.
+
+After a few observations by Lord Sheffield, Mr. Drake, Colonel Tarleton,
+and Mr. Rolle, the House adjourned.
+
+On the twenty-fifth of April it resumed the consideration of the subject.
+Mr. Dundas then went over his former resolutions, and concluded by moving,
+"that it should not be lawful to import any African Negros into any British
+colonies, in ships owned or navigated by British subjects, at any time
+after the first of January 1800."
+
+Lord Mornington (now Marquis Wellesley) rose to propose an amendment. He
+congratulated his countrymen, that the Slave-trade had received its
+death-wound. This traffic was founded in injustice; and between right and
+wrong there could be no compromise. Africa was not to be sacrificed to the
+apparent good of the West-Indies. He would not repeat those enormities out
+of the evidence, which had made such a deep impression upon the House. It
+had been resolved, that the trade should be abolished. The question then
+was, how long they were to persevere in the crime of its continuance. One
+had said, that they might be unjust for ten years longer; another, only
+till the beginning of the next century. But this diversity of opinion had
+proceeded from an erroneous statement of Mr. Dundas against the clear and
+irrefragable calculations of Mr. Pitt. The former had argued, that, because
+Jamaica and the ceded islands had retained almost all the slaves which had
+been imported into them, they were therefore not yet in a situation to
+support their population without further supplies from Africa. But the
+truth was, that the slaves, so retained, were kept, not to maintain the
+population there, but to clear new land. Now the House had determined, that
+the trade was not to be continued for this purpose. The population,
+therefore, in the islands was sufficient to continue the ordinary
+cultivation of them.
+
+He deprecated the idea, that the Slave-trade had been so sanctioned by the
+acts of former parliaments, that the present could make no alteration in
+it. Had not the House altered the import of foreign sugar into our islands?
+a measure, which at the time affected the property of many. Had they not
+prohibited the exports of provisions from America to the same quarter?
+Again, as to compacts, had the Africans ever been parties to these? It was
+rather curious also, when King James the Second gave a charter to the
+slave-traders, that he should have given them a right to all the south of
+Africa, and authority over every person born therein! But, by doing this,
+it was clear, that he gave them a right which he never possessed himself.
+After many other observations, he concluded by moving, "that the year 1793
+be substituted in the place of the year 1800."
+
+In the course of the debate, which followed, Mr. Burdon stated his
+conviction of the necessity of immediate abolition; but he would support
+the amendment, as the shortest of the terms proposed.
+
+Mr. Robert Thornton would support it also, as the only choice left him. He
+dared not accede to a motion, by which we were to continue for seven years
+to imbrue our hands in innocent blood.
+
+Mr. Ryder would not support the trade for one moment, if he could avoid it.
+He could not hold a balance with gold in one scale, and blood in the other.
+
+Mr. William Smith exposed the wickedness of restricting the trade to
+certain ages. The original motion, he said, would only operate as a
+transfer of cruelty from the aged and the guilty to the young and the
+innocent. He entreated the House to consider, whether, if it related to
+their own children, any one of them would vote for it.
+
+Mr. Windham had hitherto felt a reluctance to speaking, not from the
+abstruseness, but from the simplicity, of the subject; but he could not
+longer be silent, when he observed those arguments of policy creeping again
+out of their lurking-places, which had fled before eloquence and truth. The
+House had clearly given up the policy of the question. They had been
+determined by the justice of it. Why were they then to be troubled again
+with arguments of this nature? These, if admitted, would go to the
+subversion of all public as well as private morality. Nations were as much
+bound as individuals to a system of morals, though a breach in the former
+could not be so easily punished. In private life morality took pretty good
+care of itself. It was a kind of retail article, in which the returns were
+speedy. If a man broke open his neighbour's house, he would feel the
+consequences. There was an ally of virtue, who rendered it the interest of
+individuals to be moral, and he was called the executioner. But as such
+punishment did not always await us in our national concerns, we should
+substitute honour as the guardian of our national conduct. He hoped the
+West-Indians would consider the character of the mother-country, and the
+obligations to national as well as individual justice. He hoped also they
+would consider the sufferings, which they occasioned both in Africa, in the
+passage, and in the West-Indies. In the passage indeed no one was capable
+of describing them. The section of the slave-ship, however, made up the
+deficiency of language, and did away all necessity of argument, on this
+subject. Disease there had to struggle with the new affliction of chains
+and punishment. At one view were the irksomeness of a gaol, and the
+miseries of an hospital; so that the holds of these vessels put him in mind
+of the regions of the damned. The trade, he said, ought immediately to be
+abolished. On a comparison of the probable consequences of the abolition of
+it, he saw on one side only doubtful contingencies, but on the other shame
+and disgrace.
+
+Sir James Johnstone contended for the immediate abolition of the trade. He
+had introduced the plough into his own plantation in the West Indies, and
+he found the land produced more sugar than when cultivated in the ordinary
+way by slaves. Even for the sake of the planters, he hoped the abolition
+would not be long delayed.
+
+Mr. Dundas replied: after which a division took place. The number of votes
+in favour of the original motion were one hundred and fifty-eight, and for
+the amendment one hundred and nine.
+
+On the 27th of April the House resumed the subject. Mr. Dundas moved, as
+before, that the Slave-trade should cease in the year 1800; upon which Lord
+Mornington moved, that the year 1795 should be substituted for the latter
+period.
+
+In the course of the debate, which followed, Mr. Hubbard said, that he had
+voted against the abolition, when the year 1793 was proposed; but he
+thought that, if it were not to take place till 1795, sufficient time would
+be allowed the planters. He would support this amendment; and he
+congratulated the House on the prospect of the final triumph of truth,
+humanity, and justice.
+
+Mr. Addington preferred the year 1796 to the year 1795.
+
+Mr. Alderman Watson considered the abolition in 1796 to be as destructive
+as if it were immediate.
+
+A division having taken place, the number of votes in favour of the
+original motion were one hundred and sixty-one, and in favour of Lord
+Mornington's amendment for the year 1795, one hundred and twenty-one. Sir
+Edward Knatchbull, however, seeing that there was a disposition in the
+House to bring the matter to a conclusion, and that a middle line would be
+preferred, moved that the year 1796 should be substituted for the year
+1800. Upon this the House divided again; when there appeared for the
+original motion only one hundred and thirty-two, but for the amendment one
+hundred and fifty-one.
+
+The gradual abolition having been now finally agreed upon for the year
+1796, a committee was named, which carried the resolution to the Lords.
+
+On the eighth of May, the Lords were summoned to consider it. Lord
+Stormont, after having spoken for some time, moved, that they should hear
+evidence upon it. Lord Grenville opposed the motion on account of the
+delay, which would arise from an examination of the witnesses by the House
+at large: but he moved that such witnesses should be examined by a
+committee of the House. Upon this a debate ensued, and afterwards a
+division; when the original motion was carried by sixty-three against
+thirty-six.
+
+On the 15th of May the Lords met again. Evidence was then ordered to be
+summoned in behalf of those interested in the continuance of the trade. At
+length it was introduced; but on the fifth of June, when only seven persons
+had been examined, a motion was made and carried, that the farther
+examinations should be postponed to the next session.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER V.
+
+_Continuation from July 1792 to July 1793--Author travels round the kingdom
+again--Motion to renew the resolution of the last year in the
+Commons--Motion lost--New Motion in the Commons to abolish the foreign
+Slave-trade--Motion lost--Proceedings of the Lords._
+
+
+The resolution adopted by the Commons, that the trade should cease in 1796,
+was a matter of great joy to many; and several, in consequence of it,
+returned to the use of sugar. The committee, however, for the abolition did
+not view it in the same favourable light. They considered it as a political
+manoeuvre to frustrate the accomplishment of the object. But the
+circumstance, which gave them the most concern, was the resolution of the
+Lords to hear evidence. It was impossible now to say, when the trade would
+cease. The witnesses in behalf of the merchants and planters had obtained
+possession of the ground; and they might keep it, if they chose, even till
+the year 1800, to throw light upon a measure which was to be adopted in
+1796. The committee found too, that they had again the laborious task
+before them of finding out new persons to give testimony in behalf of their
+cause; for some of their former witnesses were dead, and others were out of
+the kingdom; and unless they replaced these, there would be no probability
+of making out that strong case in the Lords, which they had established in
+the Commons. It devolved therefore upon me once more to travel for this
+purpose: but as I was then in too weak a state to bear as much fatigue as
+formerly, Dr. Dickson relieved me, by taking one part of the tour, namely,
+that to Scotland, upon himself.
+
+These journeys we performed with considerable success; during which the
+committee elected Mr. Joseph Townsend of Baltimore, in Maryland, an
+honorary and corresponding member.
+
+Parliament having met, Mr. Wilberforce, in February 1793, moved, that the
+House resolve itself into a committee of the whole House on Thursday next,
+to consider of the circumstances of the Slave-trade. This motion was
+opposed by Sir William Yonge, who moved, that this day six months should be
+substituted for Thursday next. A debate ensued: of this, however, as well
+as of several which followed, I shall give no account; as it would be
+tedious to the reader to hear a repetition of the same arguments. Suffice
+it to say, that the motion was lost by a majority of sixty-one to
+fifty-three.
+
+This sudden refusal of the House of Commons to renew their own vote of the
+former year gave great uneasiness to the friends of the cause. Mr.
+Wilberforce, however, resolved, that the session should not pass without an
+attempt to promote it in another form; and accordingly, on the fourteenth
+of May, he moved for leave to bring in a bill to abolish that part of the
+Slave-trade, by which the British merchants supplied foreigners with
+slaves. This motion was opposed like the former; but was carried by a
+majority of seven. The bill was then brought in; and it passed its first
+and second reading with little opposition; but on the fifth of June,
+notwithstanding the eloquence of Mr. Pitt and of Mr. Fox, and the very able
+speeches of Mr. Francis, Mr. Courtenay, and others, it was lost by a
+majority of thirty-one to twenty-nine.
+
+In the interval between these motions the question experienced in the Lords
+considerable opposition. The Duke of Clarence moved that the House should
+not proceed in the consideration of the Slave-trade till after the Easter
+recess. The Earl of Abingdon was still more hostile afterwards. He
+deprecated the new philosophy. It was as full of mischief as the Box of
+Pandora. The doctrine of the abolition of the Slave-trade was a species of
+it; and he concluded by moving, that all further consideration of the
+subject be postponed. To the epithet, then bestowed upon the abolition of
+it by this nobleman, the Duke of Clarence added those of fanatics and
+hypocrites! among whom he included Mr. Wilberforce by name. All the other
+Lords, however, who were present, manifested such a dislike to the
+sentiments of the Earl of Abingdon, that he withdrew this motion.
+
+After this the hearing of evidence on the resolution of the House of
+Commons was resumed; and seven persons were examined before the close of
+the session.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VI.
+
+_Continuation from July 1793 to July 1794--Author travels round the kingdom
+again--Motion to abolish the foreign Slave-trade renewed in the
+Commons--and carried--but lost in the Lords--further proceedings
+there--Author, on account of his declining health, obliged to retire from
+the cause._
+
+
+The committee for the abolition could not view the proceedings of both
+Houses of Parliament on this subject during the year 1793, without being
+alarmed for the fate of their question. The only two sources of hope, which
+they could discover, were in the disposition then manifested by the peers
+as to the conduct of the Earl of Abingdon, and in their determination to
+proceed in the hearing of evidence. The latter circumstance indeed was the
+more favourable, as the resolution, upon which the witnesses were to be
+examined, had not been renewed by the Commons. These considerations,
+however, afforded no solid ground for the mind to rest upon. They only
+broke in upon it, like faint gleams of sunshine, for a moment, and then
+were gone. In this situation the committee could only console themselves by
+the reflection, that they had done their duty. In looking, however, to
+their future services, one thing, and only one, seemed practicable; and
+this was necessary; namely, to complete the new body of evidence, which
+they had endeavoured to form in the preceding year. The determination to do
+this rendered another journey on my part indispensable; and I undertook it,
+broken down us my constitution then was, beginning it in September 1793,
+and completing it in February 1794.
+
+Mr. Wilberforce, in this interval, had digested his plan of operations; and
+accordingly, early in the session of 1794, he asked leave to renew his
+former bill, to abolish that part of the trade, by means of which British
+merchants supplied foreigners with slaves. This request was opposed by Sir
+William Yonge; but it was granted, on a division of the House, by a
+majority of sixty-three to forty votes.
+
+When the bill was brought in, it was opposed by the same member; upon which
+the House divided; and there appeared for Sir William Yonge's amendment
+thirty-eight votes, but against it fifty-six.
+
+On a motion for the recommitment of the bill, Lord Sheffield divided the
+House, against whose motion there was a majority of forty-two. And, on the
+third reading of it, it was opposed again; but it was at length carried.
+
+The speakers against the bill were; Sir William Yonge, Lord Sheffield,
+Colonel Tarleton, Alderman Newnham, and Mr. Payne, Este, Lechmere,
+Cawthorne, Jenkinson, and Dent. Those who spoke in favour of it were; Mr.
+Pitt, Fox, William Smith, Whitbread, Francis, Burdon, Vaughan, Barham, and
+Serjeants Watson and Adair.
+
+While the foreign Slave-bill was thus passing its stages in the Commons,
+Dr. Horsley, bishop of Rochester, who saw no end to the examinations, while
+the witnesses were to be examined at the bar of the House of Lords, moved,
+that they should be taken in future before a committee above-stairs. Dr.
+Porteus, bishop of London, and the Lords Guildford, Stanhope, and
+Grenville, supported this motion. But the Lord Chancellor Thurlow, aided by
+the Duke of Clarence, and by the Lords Mansfield, Hay, Abingdon, and
+others, negatived it by a majority of twenty-eight.
+
+At length the bill itself was ushered into the House of Lords. On reading
+it a second time, it was opposed by the Duke of Clarence, Lord Abingdon,
+and others. Lord Grenville and the Bishop of Rochester declined supporting
+it. They alleged, as a reason, that they conceived the introduction of it
+to have been improper pending the inquiry on the general subject of the
+Slave-trade. This declaration brought up the Lords Stanhope and Lauderdale,
+who charged them with inconsistency as professed friends of the cause. At
+length the bill was lost. During these discussions the examination of the
+witnesses was resumed by the Lords; but only two of them were heard in this
+session[A].
+
+[Footnote A: After this the examinations wholly dropped in the House of
+Lords.]
+
+After this decision the question was in a desperate state; for if the
+Commons would not renew their own resolution, and the Lords would not
+abolish the foreign part of the Slave-trade, What hope was there, of
+success? It was obvious too, that in the former House, Mr. Pitt and Mr.
+Dundas voted against each other. In the latter, the Lord Chancellor Thurlow
+opposed every motion in favour of the cause. The committee therefore were
+reduced to this;--either they must exert themselves without hope, or they
+must wait till some change should take place in their favour. As far as I
+myself was concerned, all exertion was then over. The nervous system was
+almost shattered to pieces. Both my memory and my hearing failed me. Sudden
+dizziness seized my head. A confused singing in the ears followed me,
+wherever I went. On going to bed the very stairs seemed to dance up and
+down under me, so that, misplacing my foot, I sometimes fell. Talking too,
+if it continued but half an hour, exhausted me, so that profuse
+perspirations followed; and the same effect was produced even by an active
+exertion of the mind for the like time. These disorders had been brought on
+by degrees in consequence of the severe labours necessarily attached to the
+promotion of the cause. For seven years I had a correspondence to maintain
+with four hundred persons with my own hand. I had some book or other
+annually to write in behalf of the cause. In this time I had travelled more
+than thirty-five thousand miles in search of evidence, and a great part of
+these journeys in the night. All this time my mind had been on the stretch.
+It had been bent too to this one subject; for I had not even leisure to
+attend to my own concerns. The various instances of barbarity, which had
+come successively to my knowledge within this period, had vexed, harassed,
+and afflicted it. The wound, which these had produced, was rendered still
+deeper by those cruel disappointments before related, which arose from the
+reiterated refusal of persons to give their testimony, after I had
+travelled hundreds of miles in quest of them. But the severest stroke was
+that inflicted by the persecution, begun and pursued by persons interested
+in the continuance of the trade, of such witnesses as had been examined
+against them; and whom, on account of their dependent situation in life, it
+was most easy to oppress. As I had been the means of bringing these forward
+on these occasions, they naturally came to me, when thus persecuted, as the
+author of their miseries and their ruin. From their supplications and wants
+it would have been ungenerous and ungrateful to have fled[A]. These
+different circumstances, by acting together, had at length brought me into
+the situation just mentioned; and I was therefore obliged, though very
+reluctantly, to be borne out of the field, where I had placed the great
+honour and glory of my life.
+
+[Footnote A: The late Mr. Whitbread, to whom one day in deep affliction on
+this account I related accidentally a circumstance of this kind, generously
+undertook, in order to make my mind easy upon the subject, to make good all
+injuries, which should in future arise to individuals from such
+persecution; and he repaired these, at different times, at a considerable
+expense. I feel it a duty to divulge this circumstance, out of respect to
+the memory of one of the best of men, and of one, whom, if the history of
+his life were written, it would appear to have been an extraordinary honour
+to the country to have produced.]
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VII.
+
+_Continuation from July 1794 to July 1799--Various motions within this
+period._
+
+
+I purpose, though it may seem abrupt after the division which has hitherto
+been made of the contents of this volume, to throw the events of the next
+five years into one chapter.
+
+Mr. Wilberforce and the members of the committee, whose constitutions had
+not suffered like my own, were still left; and they determined to persevere
+in the promotion of their great object; as long as their health and their
+faculties permitted them. The former, accordingly, in the month of February
+1795, moved in the House of Commons for leave to bring in a bill for the
+abolition of the Slave-trade. This motion was then necessary, if, according
+to the resolution of that House, the Slave-trade was to cease in 1796. It
+was opposed, however, by Sir William Yonge, and unfortunately lost by a
+majority of seventy-eight to fifty-seven.
+
+In the year 1796 Mr. Wilberforce renewed his efforts in the Commons. He
+asked leave to bring in a bill for the abolition of the Slave-trade, but in
+a limited time. The motion was opposed as before; but on a division, there
+were for it ninety-three, and against it only sixty-seven.
+
+The bill having been brought in, was opposed in its second reading; but it
+was carried through it by a majority of sixty-four to thirty-one.
+
+In a future stage it was opposed again; but it triumphed by a majority of
+seventy-six to thirty-one. Mr. Eliott was then put into the chair. Several
+clauses were adopted; and the first of March 1797 was fixed for the
+abolition of the trade: but in the next stage of it, after a long speech
+from Mr. Dundas, it was lost by a majority of seventy-four against seventy.
+
+Mr. Francis, who had made a brilliant speech in the last debate,
+considering that nothing effectual had been yet done on this great
+question, and wishing that a practical beginning might be made, brought
+forward soon afterwards, a motion relative to the improvement of the
+condition of the slaves in the West Indies. This, after a short debate, was
+negatived without a division. Mr. William Smith also moved an address to
+His Majesty, that he would be pleased to give directions to lay before the
+House copies of the several acts relative to regulations in behalf of the
+slaves, passed by the different colonial assemblies since the year 1788.
+This motion was adopted by the House. Thus passed away the session of 1796.
+
+In the year 1797, while Mr. Wilberforce was deliberating upon the best
+measure for the advancement of the cause, Mr. C. Ellis came forward with a
+new motion. He began by declaring, that he agreed with the abolitionists as
+to their object; but he differed with them as to the mode of attaining it.
+The Slave-trade he condemned as a cruel and pernicious system; but, as it
+had become an inveterate evil, he feared it could not be done away all at
+once, without injury to the interests of numerous individuals, and even to
+the Negros themselves. He concluded by moving an address to His Majesty,
+humbly requesting, that he would give directions to the governors of the
+West Indian islands, to recommend it to the colonial assemblies to adopt
+such measures as might appear to them best calculated to ameliorate the
+condition of the Negros, and thereby to remove gradually the Slave-trade;
+and likewise to assure His Majesty of the readiness of this House to concur
+in any measure to accelerate this desirable object. This motion was
+seconded by Mr. Barham. It was opposed, however, by Mr. Wilberforce, Mr.
+Pitt, and others; but was at length carried by a majority of ninety-nine to
+sixty-three.
+
+In the year 1798 Mr. Wilberforce asked leave to renew his former bill, to
+abolish the Slave-trade within a limited time. He was supported by Mr.
+Canning, Mr. Hobhouse, Sir Robert Buxton, Mr. Bouverie, and others. Mr.
+Sewell, Bryan Edwards, Henniker, and C. Ellis, took the opposite side of
+the question. Mr. Ellis, however, observed, that he had no objection to
+restricting the Slave-trade to plantations already begun in the colonies;
+and Mr. Barham professed himself a friend to the abolition, if it could be
+accomplished in a reasonable way. On a division, there appeared to be for
+Mr. Wilberforce's motion eighty-three, but against it eighty-seven.
+
+In the year 1799 Mr. Wilberforce, undismayed by these different
+disappointments, renewed his motion. Colonel M. Wood, Mr. Petrie, and
+others, among whom were Mr. Windham and Mr. Dundas, opposed it. Mr. Pitt,
+Fox, W. Smith, Sir William Dolben, Sir R. Milbank, Mr. Hobhouse, and Mr.
+Canning, supported it. Sir R. Milbank contended, that modifications of a
+system fundamentally wrong ought not to be tolerated by the legislature of
+a free nation. Mr. Hobhouse said, that nothing could be so nefarious as
+this traffic in blood. It was unjust in its principle. It was cruel in its
+practice. It admitted of no regulation whatever. The abolition of it was
+called for equally by morality and sound policy. Mr. Canning exposed the
+folly of Mr. Dundas, who had said, that as Parliament had in the year 1787
+left the abolition to the colonial assemblies, it ought not to be taken out
+of their hands. This great event, he observed, could only be accomplished
+in two ways; either by these assemblies, or by the Parliament of England.
+Now the members of the assembly of Jamaica had professed, that they would
+never abolish the trade. Was it not therefore idle to rely upon them for
+the accomplishment of it? He then took a very comprehensive view of the
+arguments, which had been offered in the course of the debate, and was
+severe upon the planters in the House, who, he said, had brought into
+familiar use certain expressions, with no other view than to throw a veil
+over their odious system. Among these was--their right to import labourers.
+But never was the word "labourers" so prostituted, as when it was used for
+slaves. Never was the word "right" so prostituted, not even when The Rights
+of Man were talked of, as when the right to trade in man's blood was
+asserted by the members of an enlightened assembly. Never was the right of
+importing these labourers worse defended than when the antiquity of the
+Slave-trade, and its foundation on antient acts of parliament, were brought
+forward in its support. We had been cautioned not to lay our unhallowed
+hands on the antient institution of the Slave-trade; nor to subvert a
+fabric, raised by the wisdom of our ancestors, and consecrated by a lapse
+of ages. But on what principles did we usually respect the institutions of
+antiquity? We respected them when we saw some shadow of departed worth and
+usefulness; or some memorial of what had been creditable to mankind. But
+was this the case with the Slave-trade? Had it begun in principles of
+justice or national honour, which the changes of the world alone had
+impaired? had it to plead former services and glories in behalf of its
+present disgrace? In looking at it we saw nothing but crimes and sufferings
+from the beginning--nothing but what wounded and convulsed our
+feelings--nothing but what excited indignation and horror. It had not even
+to plead what could often be said in favour of the most unjustifiable wars.
+Though conquest had sometimes originated in ambition, and in the worst of
+motives, yet the conquerors and the conquered were sometimes blended
+afterwards into one people; so that a system of common interest arose out
+of former differences. But where was the analogy of the cases? Was it only
+at the outset that we could trace violence and injustice on the part of the
+Slave-trade? Were the oppressors and the oppressed so reconciled, that
+enmities ultimately ceased?--No. Was it reasonable then to urge a
+prescriptive right, not to the fruits of an antient and forgotten evil, but
+to a series of new violences; to a chain of fresh enormities; to cruelties
+continually repeated; and of which every instance inflicted a fresh
+calamity, and constituted a separate and substantial crime?
+
+The debate being over, the House divided; when it appeared that there were
+for Mr. Wilberforce's motion seventy-four, but against it eighty-two.
+
+The motion for the general abolition of the Slave-trade having been thus
+lost again in the Commons, a new motion was made there soon after, by Mr.
+Henry Thornton, on the same subject. The prosecution of this traffic on
+certain parts of the coast of Africa had become so injurious to the new
+settlement at Sierra Leone, that not only its commercial prospects were
+impeded, but its safety endangered. Mr. Thornton therefore brought in a
+bill to confine the Slave-trade within certain limits. But even this bill,
+though it had for its object only to free a portion of the coast from the
+ravages of this traffic, was opposed by Mr. Gascoyne, Dent, and others.
+Petitions also were presented against it. At length, after two divisions,
+on the first of which there were thirty-two votes to twenty-seven, and on
+the second thirty-eight to twenty-two, it passed through all its stages.
+
+When it was introduced into the Lords the petitions were renewed against
+it. Delay also was interposed to its progress by the examination of
+witnesses. It was not till the fifth of July that the matter was brought to
+issue. The opponents of the bill at that time were, the Duke of Clarence,
+Lord Westmoreland, Lord Thurlow, and the Lords Douglas and Hay, the two
+latter being Earls of Morton and Kinnoul in Scotland. The supporters of it
+were Lord Grenville, who introduced it; Lord Loughborough; Holland; and Dr.
+Horsley, bishop of Rochester. The latter was peculiarly eloquent. He began
+his speech by arraigning the injustice and impolicy of the trade:
+injustice, he said, which no considerations of policy could extenuate;
+impolicy, equal in degree to its injustice.
+
+He well knew that the advocates for the Slave-trade had endeavoured to
+represent the project for abolition as a branch of jacobinism; but they,
+who supported it, proceeded upon no visionary motives of equality or of the
+imprescriptible rights of man. They strenuously upheld the gradations of
+civil society: but they did indeed affirm that these gradations were, both
+ways, both as they ascended and as they descended, limited. There was an
+existence of power, to which no good king would aspire; and there was an
+extreme condition of subjection, to which man could not be degraded without
+injustice; and this they would maintain was the condition of the African,
+who was torn away into slavery.
+
+He then explained the limits of that portion of Africa, which the bill
+intended to set apart as sacred to peace and liberty. He showed that this
+was but one-third of the coast; and therefore that two-thirds were yet left
+for the diabolical speculations of the slave-merchants. He expressed his
+surprise that such witnesses as those against the bill should have been
+introduced at all. He affirmed that their oaths were falsified by their own
+log-books; and that from their own accounts the very healthiest of their
+vessels were little better than pestilential gaols. Mr. Robert Hume, one of
+these witnesses, had made a certain voyage. He had made it in thirty-three
+days. He had shipped two hundred and sixty-five slaves, and he had lost
+twenty-three of them. If he had gone on losing his slaves, all of whom were
+under twenty-five years of age, at this rate, it was obvious, that he would
+have lost two hundred and fifty-three of them, if his passage had lasted
+for a year. Now in London only seventeen would have died, of that age, out
+of one thousand within the latter period.
+
+After having exposed the other voyages of Mr. Hume in a similar manner, he
+entered into a commendation of the views of the Sierra Leone company; and
+then defended the character of the Africans in their own country, as
+exhibited in the Travels of Mr. Mungo Park. He made a judicious
+discrimination with respect to slavery, as it existed among them. He showed
+that this slavery was analogous to that of the heroic and patriarchal ages;
+and contrasted it with the West Indian in an able manner.
+
+He adverted, lastly, to what had fallen from the learned counsel, who had
+supported the petitions of the slave-merchants. One of them had put this
+question to their lordships, "if the Slave-trade were as wicked as it had
+been represented, why was there no prohibition of it in the holy
+scriptures?" He then entered into a full defence of the scriptures on this
+ground, which he concluded by declaring that, as St. Paul had coupled
+men-stealers with murderers, he had condemned the Slave-trade in one of its
+most productive modes, and generally in all its modes:--and here it was
+worthy of remark, that the word used by the apostle on this occasion, and
+which had been translated men-stealers, should have been rendered
+slave-traders. This was obvious from the Scholiast of Aristophanes, whom he
+quoted. It was clear therefore that the Slave-trade, if murder was
+forbidden, had been literally forbidden also.
+
+The learned counsel too had admonished their lordships, to beware how they
+adopted the visionary projects of fanatics. He did not know in what
+direction this shaft was shot; and he cared not. It did not concern him.
+With the highest reverence for the religion of the land, with the firmest
+conviction of its truth, and with the deepest sense of the importance of
+its doctrines, he was proudly conscious, that the general shape and fashion
+of his life bore nothing of the stamp of fanaticism. But he begged leave,
+in his turn, to address a word of serious exhortation to their lordships.
+He exhorted them to beware, how they were persuaded to bury, under the
+opprobrious name of fanaticism, the regard which they owed to the great
+duties of mercy and justice, for the neglect of which (if they should
+neglect them) they would be answerable at that tribunal, where no
+prevarication of witnesses could misinform the judge; and where no subtlety
+of an advocate, miscalling the names of things, putting evil for good and
+good for evil, could mislead his judgement.
+
+At length the debate ended: when the bill was lost by a majority of
+sixty-eight to sixty-one, including personal votes and proxies.
+
+I cannot conclude this chapter without offering a few remarks. And, first,
+I may observe, as the substance of the debates has not been given for the
+period which it contains, that Mr. Wilberforce, upon whom too much praise
+cannot be bestowed for his perseverance from year to year, amidst the
+disheartening circumstances which attended his efforts, brought every new
+argument to bear, which either the discovery of new light or the events of
+the times produced. I may observe also, in justice to the memories of Mr.
+Pitt and Mr. Fox, that there was no debate within this period, in which
+they did not take a part; and in which they did not irradiate others from
+the profusion of their own light: and, thirdly, that in consequence of the
+efforts of the three, conjoined with those of others, the great cause of
+the abolition was secretly gaining ground. Many members who were not
+connected with the trade, but who had yet hitherto supported it, were on
+the point of conversion. Though the question had oscillated backwards and
+forwards, so that an ordinary spectator could have discovered no gleam of
+hope at these times, nothing is more certain, than that the powerful
+eloquence then displayed had smoothed the resistance to it; had shortened
+its vibrations; and had prepared it for a state of rest.
+
+With respect to the West Indians themselves, some of them began to see
+through the mists of prejudice, which had covered them. In the year 1794,
+when the bill for the abolition of the foreign Slave-trade was introduced,
+Mr. Vaughan and Mr. Barham supported it. They called upon the planters in
+the House to give way to humanity, where their own interests could not be
+affected by their submission. This indeed may be said to have been no
+mighty thing; but it was a frank confession of the injustice of the
+Slave-trade, and the beginning of the change which followed, both with
+respect to themselves and others.
+
+With respect to the old friends of the cause, it is with regret I mention,
+that it lost the support of Mr. Windham within this period; and this regret
+is increased by the consideration, that he went off on the avowed plea of
+expediency against moral rectitude; a doctrine, which, at least upon this
+subject, he had reprobated for ten years. It was, however, some
+consolation, as far as talents were concerned, (for there can be none for
+the loss of virtuous feeling,) that Mr. Canning, a new member, should have
+so ably supplied his place.
+
+Of the gradual abolitionists, whom we have always considered as the most
+dangerous enemies of the cause, Mr. Jenkinson (now Lord Hawkesbury), Mr.
+Addington (now Lord Sidmouth), and Mr. Dundas (now Lord Melville),
+continued their opposition during all this time. Of the first two I shall
+say nothing at present; but I cannot pass over the conduct of the latter.
+He was the first person, as we have seen, to propose the gradual abolition
+of the Slave-trade; and he fixed the time for its cessation on the first of
+January 1800. His sincerity on this occasion was doubted by Mr. Fox at the
+very outset; for he immediately rose and said, that "something so
+mischievous had come out, something so like a foundation had been laid for
+preserving, not only for years to come, but for any thing he knew for ever,
+this detestable traffic, that he felt it his duty immediately to deprecate
+all such delusions upon the country." Mr. Pitt, who spoke soon afterwards,
+in reply to an argument advanced by Mr. Dundas, maintained, that "at
+whatever period the House should say that the Slave-trade should actually
+cease, this defence would equally be set up; for it would be just as good
+an argument in seventy years hence, as it was against the abolition then."
+And these remarks Mr. Dundas verified in a singular manner within this
+period: for in the year 1796, when his own bill, as amended in the Commons,
+was to take place, he was one of the most strenuous opposers of it; and in
+the year 1799, when in point of consistency it devolved upon him to propose
+it to the House, in order that the trade might cease on the first of
+January 1800, (which was the time of his own original choice, or a time
+unfettered by parliamentary amendment,) he was the chief instrument of
+throwing out Mr. Wilberforce's bill, which promised even a longer period to
+its continuance: so that it is obvious, that there was no time, within his
+own limits, when the abolition would have suited him, notwithstanding his
+profession, "that he had always been a warm advocate for the measure."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VIII.
+
+_Continuation from July 1799 to July 1805--Various motions within this
+period._
+
+
+The question had now been brought forward in almost every possible way, and
+yet had been eventually lost. The total and immediate abolition had been
+attempted; and then the gradual. The gradual again had been tried for the
+year 1793, then for 1795, and then for 1796, at which period it was
+decreed, but never allowed to be executed. An abolition of a part of the
+trade, as it related to the supply of foreigners with slaves, was the next
+measure proposed; and when this failed, the abolition of another part of
+it, as it related to the making of a certain portion of the coast of Africa
+sacred to liberty, was attempted; but this failed also. Mr. Wilberforce
+therefore thought it prudent, not to press the abolition as a mere annual
+measure, but to allow members time to digest the eloquence, which had been
+bestowed upon it for the last five years, and to wait till some new
+circumstances should favour its introduction. Accordingly he allowed the
+years 1800, 1801, 1802, and 1803 to pass over without any further
+parliamentary notice than the moving for certain papers; during which he
+took an opportunity of assuring the House, that he had not grown cool in
+the cause, but that he would agitate it in a future session.
+
+In the year 1804, which was fixed upon for renewed exertion, the committee
+for the abolition of the Slave-trade elected James Stephen, Zachary
+Macaulay, Henry Brougham, esquires, and William Phillips, into their own
+body. Four other members also, Robert Grant and John Thornton, esquires,
+and William Manser and William Allen, were afterwards added to the list.
+Among the reasons for fixing upon this year one may be assigned, namely,
+that the Irish members, in consequence of the Union which had taken place
+between the two countries, had then all taken their seats in the House of
+Commons; and that most of them were friendly to the cause.
+
+This being the situation of things, Mr. Wilberforce, on the thirtieth of
+March, asked leave to renew his bill for the abolition of the Slave-trade
+within a limited time. Mr. Fuller opposed the motion. A debate ensued.
+Colonel Tarleton, Mr. Devaynes, Mr. Addington, and Mr. Manning spoke
+against it. The latter, however, notwithstanding his connection with the
+West Indies, said he would support it, if an indemnification were offered
+to the planters, in case any actual loss should accompany the measure.
+
+Sir William Geary questioned the propriety of immediate abolition.
+
+Sir Robert Buxton, Mr. Pitt, Fox, and Durham, spoke in favour of the
+motion.
+
+Mr. William Smith rose, when the latter had seated himself, and
+complimented him on this change of sentiment, so honourable to him,
+inasmuch as he had espoused the cause of humanity against his supposed
+interest as a planter. Mr. Leigh said, that he would not tolerate such a
+traffic for a moment. All the feelings of nature revolted at it. Lord de
+Blaquiere observed, "it was the first time the question had been proposed
+to Irishmen as legislators. He believed it would be supported by most of
+them. As to the people of Ireland, he could pledge himself, that they were
+hostile to this barbarous traffic." An amendment having been proposed by
+Mr. Manning, a division took place upon it, when leave was given to bring
+in the bill, by a majority of one hundred and twenty-four to forty-nine.
+
+On the seventh of June, when the second reading of the bill was moved, it
+was opposed by Sir W. Yonge, Dr. Laurence, Mr. C. Brook, Mr. Dent, and
+others. Among these Lord Castlereagh professed himself a friend to the
+abolition of the trade, but he differed as to the mode. Sir J. Wrottesley
+approved of the principle of the bill, but would oppose it in some of its
+details. Mr. Windham allowed the justice, but differed as to the
+expediency, of the measure. Mr. Deverell professed himself to have been a
+friend to it; but he had then changed his mind. Sir Laurence Parsons wished
+to see a plan for the gradual extinction of the trade. Lord Temple
+affirmed, that the bill would seal the death-warrant of every White
+inhabitant of the islands. The second reading was supported by Sir Ralph
+Milbank, Mr. Pitt, Fox, William Smith, Whitbread, Francis, Barham, and by
+Mr. Grenfell, and Sir John Newport. Mr. Grenfell observed, that he could
+not give a silent vote, where the character of the country was concerned.
+When the question of the abolition first came before the public, he was a
+warm friend to it; and from that day to this he had cherished the same
+feelings. He assured Mr. Wilberforce of his constant support. Sir John
+Newport stated that the Irish nation took a virtuous interest in this noble
+cause. He ridiculed the idea, that the trade and manufactures of the
+country would suffer by the measure in contemplation; but, even if they
+should suffer, he would oppose it. "Fiat justitia, ruat coelum." Upon a
+division, there appeared for the second reading one hundred, and against it
+forty-two.
+
+On the twelfth of June, when a motion was made to go into a committee upon
+the bill, it was opposed by Mr. Fuller, C. Brook, C. Ellis, Dent, Deverell,
+and Manning: and it was supported by Sir Robert Buxton, Mr. Barham, and the
+honourable J.S. Cocks. The latter condemned the imprudence of the planters.
+Instead of profiting by the discussions, which had taken place, and making
+wise provisions against the great event of the abolition, which would
+sooner or later take place, they had only thought of new stratagems to
+defeat it. He declared his abhorrence of the trade, which he considered to
+be a national disgrace. The House divided: when there were seventy-nine for
+the motion, and against it twenty.
+
+On the twenty-seventh of June the bill was opposed in its last stage by Sir
+W. Young, Mr. Dickenson, G. Rose, Addington, and Dent: and supported by Mr.
+Pitt, W. Smith, Francis, and Barham; when it was carried by a majority of
+sixty-nine to thirty-six. It was then taken up to the Lords; but on a
+motion of Lord Hawkesbury, then a member of that House, the discussion of
+it was postponed to the next year.
+
+The session being ended, the committee for the abolition of the Slave-trade
+increased its number, by the election of the right honourable Lord
+Teignmouth, Dr. Dickson, and Wilson Birkbeck, as members.
+
+In the year 1805, Mr. Wilberforce renewed his motion of the former year.
+Colonel Tarleton, Sir William Yonge, Mr. Fuller, and Mr. Gascoyne opposed
+it. Leave, however, was given him to introduce his bill.
+
+On the second reading of it a serious opposition took place; and an
+amendment was moved for postponing it till that day six months. The
+amendment was opposed by Mr. Fox and Mr. Huddlestone. The latter could not
+help lifting his voice against this monstrous traffic in the sinews and
+blood of man, the toleration of which had so long been the disgrace of the
+British legislature. He did not charge the enormous guilt resulting from it
+upon the nation at large; for the nation had washed its hands of it by the
+numerous petitions it had sent against it; and it had since been a matter
+of astonishment to all Christendom, how the constitutional guardians of
+British freedom should have sanctioned elsewhere the greatest system of
+cruelty and oppression in the world.
+
+He said that a curse attended this trade even in the mode of defending it.
+By a certain fatality, none but the vilest arguments were brought forward,
+which corrupted the very persons, who used them. Every one of these were
+built on the narrow ground of interest; of pecuniary profit; of sordid
+gain; in opposition to every higher consideration; to every motive that had
+reference to humanity, justice, and religion; or to that great principle,
+which comprehended them all. Place only before the most determined advocate
+of this odious traffic the exact image of himself in the garb and harness
+of a slave, dragged and whipped about like a beast: place this image also
+before him, and paint it as that of one without a ray of hope to cheer him;
+and you would extort from him the reluctant confession, that he would not
+endure for an hour the misery, to which he condemned his fellow-man for
+life. How dared he then to use this selfish plea of interest against the
+voice of the generous sympathies of his nature? But even upon this narrow
+ground the advocates for the traffic had been defeated. If the unhallowed
+argument of expediency was worth any thing when opposed to moral rectitude,
+or if it were to supersede the precepts of Christianity, where was a man to
+stop, or what line was he to draw? For any thing he knew, it might be
+physically true, that human blood was the best manure for the land; but who
+ought to shed it on that account? True expediency, however, was, where it
+ever would be found, on the side of that system, which was most merciful
+and just. He asked how it happened, that sugar could be imported cheaper
+from the East Indies, than from the West, notwithstanding the vast
+difference of the length of the voyages, but on account of the impolicy of
+slavery, or that it was made in the former case by the industry of free
+men, and in the latter by the languid drudgery of slaves.
+
+As he had had occasion to advert to the Eastern part of the world, he would
+make an observation upon an argument, which had been collected from that
+quarter. The condition of the Negros in the West Indies had been lately
+compared with that of the Hindoos. But he would observe that the Hindoo,
+miserable as his hovel was, had sources of pride and happiness, to which
+not only the West Indian slave, but even his master, was a stranger. He was
+to be sure a peasant; and his industry was subservient to the
+gratifications of an European lord. But he was, in his own belief, vastly
+superior to him. He viewed him as one of the lowest cast. He would not on
+any consideration eat from the same plate. He would not suffer his son to
+marry the daughter of his master, even if she could bring him all the West
+Indies as her portion. He would observe too, that the Hindoo-peasant drank
+his water from his native well; that, if his meal were scanty, he received
+it from the hand of her, who was most dear to him; that, when he laboured,
+he laboured for her and his offspring. His daily task being finished, he
+reposed with his family. No retrospect of the happiness of former days,
+compared with existing misery, disturbed his slumber; nor horrid dreams
+occasioned him to wake in agony at the dawn of day. No barbarous sounds of
+cracking whips reminded him, that with the form and image of a man his
+destiny was that of the beast of the field. Let the advocates for the
+bloody traffic state what they had to set off on their side of the question
+against the comforts and independence of the man, with whom they compared
+the slave.
+
+The amendment was supported by Sir William Yonge, Sir William Pulteney,
+Colonel Tarleton, Mr. Gascoyne, C. Brook, and Hiley Addington. On dividing
+the House upon it, there appeared for it seventy-seven, but against it only
+seventy.
+
+This loss of the question, after it had been carried in the last year by so
+great a majority, being quite unexpected, was a matter of severe
+disappointment; and might have discouraged the friends of the cause in this
+infancy of their renewed efforts, if they had not discovered the reason of
+its failure. After due consideration it appeared, that no fewer than nine
+members, who had never been absent once in sixteen years when it was
+agitated, gave way to engagements on the day of the motion, from a belief
+that it was safe. It appeared also, that out of the great number of Irish
+members, who supported it in the former year, only nine were in the House,
+when it was lost. It appeared also that, previously to this event, a
+canvass, more importunate than had been heard of on any former occasion,
+had been made among the latter by those interested in the continuance of
+the trade. Many of these, unacquainted with the detail of the subject, like
+the English members, admitted the dismal representations, which were then
+made to them. The desire of doing good on the one hand, and the fear of
+doing injury on the other, perplexed them; and in this dubious state they
+absented themselves at the time mentioned.
+
+The causes of the failure having been found accidental, and capable of a
+remedy, it was resolved, that an attempt should be made immediately in the
+House in a new form. Accordingly Lord Henry Petty signified his intention
+of bringing in a bill for the abolition of the foreign part of the
+Slave-trade; but the impeachment of Lord Melville, and other weighty
+matters coming on, the notice was not acted upon in that session.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IX.
+
+_Continuation from July 1805 to July 1806--Author returns to his duty in
+the committee--travels again round the Kingdom--Death of Mr. Pitt--his
+character, an it related to the question--Motion for the abolition of the
+foreign Slave-trade--resolution to take measures for the total abolition of
+it--Address to the King to negotiate with foreign powers for their
+concurrence in it--Motion to prevent any new vessel going into the
+trade--these carried through both houses of parliament._
+
+
+It was now almost certain, to the inexpressible joy of the committee, that
+the cause, with proper vigilance, could be carried in the next session in
+the House of Commons. It became them therefore to prepare to support it. In
+adverting to measures for this purpose, it occurred to them, that the House
+of Lords, if the question should be then carried to them from the Commons,
+might insist upon hearing evidence on the general subject. But, alas, even
+the body of witnesses, which had been last collected, was broken by death
+or dispersion! It was therefore to be formed again. In this situation it
+devolved upon me, as I had now returned to the committee after an absence
+of nine years, to take another journey for this purpose.
+
+This journey I performed with extraordinary success. In the course of it I
+had also much satisfaction on another account. I found the old friends of
+the cause still faithful to it. It was remarkable, however, that the youth
+of the rising generation knew but little about the question. For the last
+eight or nine years the committee had not circulated any books; and the
+debates in the Commons during that time had not furnished them with the
+means of an adequate knowledge concerning it. When, however, I conversed
+with these, as I travelled along, I discovered a profound attention to what
+I said; an earnest desire to know more of the subject; and a generous
+warmth in favour of the injured Africans, which I foresaw could soon be
+turned into enthusiasm. Hence I perceived that the cause furnished us with
+endless sources of rallying; and that the ardour, which we had seen with so
+much admiration in former years, could be easily renewed.
+
+I had scarcely finished my journey, when Mr. Pitt died. This event took
+place in January 1806. I shall stop therefore to make a few observations
+upon his character, as it related to this cause. This I feel myself bound
+in justice to do, because his sincerity towards it has been generally
+questioned.
+
+The way, in which Mr. Pitt became acquainted with this question, has
+already been explained. A few doubts having been removed, when it was first
+started, he professed himself a friend to the abolition. The first proof,
+which he gave of his friendship to it is known but to few; but it is,
+nevertheless, true, that so early as in 1788, he occasioned a communication
+to be made to the French government, in which he recommended an union of
+the two countries for the promotion of the great measure. This proposition
+seemed to be then new and strange to the court of France; and the answer
+was not favourable.
+
+From this time his efforts were reduced within the boundaries of his own
+power.
+
+As far, however, as he had scope, he exerted them. If we look at him in his
+parliamentary capacity, it must be acknowledged by all, that he took an
+active, strenuous, and consistent part, and this year after year, by which
+he realized his professions. In my own private communications with him,
+which were frequent, he never failed to give proofs of a similar
+disposition. I had always free access to him. I had no previous note or
+letter to write for admission. Whatever papers I wanted, he ordered. He
+exhibited also in his conversation with me on these occasions marks of a
+more than ordinary interest in the welfare of the cause. Among the
+subjects, which were then started, there was one, which was always near his
+heart. This was the civilization of Africa. He looked upon this great work
+as a debt due to that continent for the many injuries we had inflicted upon
+it: and had the abolition succeeded sooner, as in the infancy of his
+exertions he had hoped, I know he had a plan, suited no doubt to the
+capaciousness of his own mind, for such establishments in Africa, as he
+conceived would promote in due time this important end.
+
+I believe it will be said, notwithstanding what I have advanced, that if
+Mr. Pitt had exerted himself as the minister of the country in behalf of
+the abolition, he could have carried it. This brings the matter to an
+issue; for unquestionably the charge of insincerity, as it related to this
+great question, arose from the mistaken notion, that, as his measures in
+parliament were supported by great majorities, he could do as he pleased
+there. But, they who hold this opinion, must be informed, that there were
+great difficulties, against which he had to struggle on this subject. The
+Lord Chancellor Thurlow ran counter to his wishes almost at the very
+outset. Lord Liverpool and Mr. Dundas did the same. Thus, to go no further,
+three of the most powerful members of the cabinet were in direct opposition
+to him. The abolition then, amidst this difference of opinion, could never
+become a cabinet measure; but if so, then all his parliamentary efforts in
+this case wanted their usual authority, and he could only exert his
+influence as a private man[A].
+
+[Footnote A: This he did with great effect on one or two occasions. On the
+motion of Mr. Cawthorne in 1791, the cause hung as it were by a thread; and
+would have failed that day, to my knowledge, but for his seasonable
+exertions.]
+
+But a difficulty, still more insuperable, presented itself, in an
+occurrence which took place in the year 1791, but which is much too
+delicate to be mentioned. The explanation of it, however, would convince
+the reader, that all the efforts of Mr. Pitt from that day were rendered
+useless, I mean as to bringing the question, as a minister of state, to a
+favourable issue.
+
+But though Mr. Pitt did not carry this great question, he was yet one of
+the greatest supporters of it. He fostered it in its infancy. If, in his
+public situation, he had then set his face against it, where would have
+been our hope? He upheld it also in its childhood; and though in this state
+of its existence it did not gain from his protection all the strength which
+it was expected it would have acquired, he yet kept it from falling, till
+his successors, in whose administration a greater number of favourable
+circumstances concurred to give it vigour, brought it to triumphant
+maturity.
+
+Lord Grenville and Mr. Fox, having been called to the head of the executive
+government on the death of Mr. Pitt, the cause was ushered into parliament
+under new auspices. In a former year His Majesty had issued a proclamation,
+by which British merchants were forbidden (with certain defined exceptions)
+to import slaves into the colonies, which had been conquered by the British
+arms in the course of the war. This circumstance afforded an opportunity of
+trying the question in the House of Commons with the greatest hope of
+success. Accordingly Sir A. Pigott, the attorney-general, as an officer of
+the crown; brought in a bill on the thirty-first of March 1806, the first
+object of which was, to give effect to the proclamation now mentioned. The
+second was, to prohibit British subjects from being engaged in importing
+slaves into the colonies of any foreign power, whether hostile or neutral.
+And the third was, to prohibit British subjects and British capital from
+being employed in carrying on a Slave-trade in foreign ships; and also to
+prevent the outfit of foreign ships from British ports.
+
+Sir A. Pigott, on the introduction of this bill, made an appropriate
+speech. The bill was supported by Mr. Fox, Sir William Yonge, Mr. Brook,
+and Mr. Bagwell; but opposed by Generals Tarleton and Gascoyne, Mr. Rose,
+Sir Robert Peele, and Sir Charles Price. On the third reading a division
+being called for, there appeared for it thirty-five, and against it only
+thirteen.
+
+On the seventh of May it was introduced into the Lords. The supporters of
+it there were, the Duke of Gloucester, Lord Grenville, the Bishops of
+London and St. Asaph, the Earl of Buckinghamshire, and the Lords Holland,
+Lauderdale, Auckland, Sidmouth, and Ellenborough. The opposers were, the
+Dukes of Clarence and Sussex, the Marquis of Sligo, the Earl of
+Westmoreland, and the Lords Eldon and Sheffield. At length a division took
+place, when there appeared to be in favour of it forty-three, and against
+it eighteen.
+
+During the discussions, to which this bill gave birth, Lord Grenville and
+Mr. Fox declared in substance, in their respective Houses of Parliament,
+that they felt the question of the Slave-trade to be one, which involved
+the dearest interests of humanity, and the most urgent claims of policy,
+justice, and religion; and that, should they succeed in effecting its
+abolition, they would regard that success as entailing more true glory on
+their administration, and more honour and advantage on their country, than
+any other measure, in which they could be engaged. The bill having passed
+(the first, which dismembered this cruel trade,) it was thought proper to
+follow it up in a prudent manner; and, as there was not then time in the
+advanced period of the session to bring in another for the total extinction
+of it, to move a resolution, by which both Houses should record those
+principles, on which the propriety of the latter measure was founded. It
+was judged also expedient that Mr. Fox, as the prime minister in the House
+of Commons, should introduce it there.
+
+On the tenth of June Mr. Fox rose. He began by saying that the motion, with
+which he should conclude, would tend in its consequences to effect the
+total abolition of the Slave-trade; and he confessed that, since he had sat
+in that House (a period of between thirty and forty years), if he had done
+nothing else, but had only been instrumental in carrying through this
+measure, he should think his life well spent; and should retire quite
+satisfied, that he had not lived in vain.
+
+In adverting to the principle of the trade, he noticed some strong
+expressions of Mr. Burke concerning it. "To deal in human flesh and blood,"
+said that great man, "or to deal, not in the labour of men, but in men
+themselves, was to devour the root, instead of enjoying the fruit of human
+diligence."
+
+Mr. Fox then took a view of the opinions of different members of the House
+on this great question; and showed that, though many had opposed the
+abolition, all but two or three, among whom were the members for Liverpool,
+had confessed, that the trade ought to be done away. He then went over the
+different resolutions of the House on the subject, and concluded from
+thence, that they were bound to support his motion.
+
+He combated the argument, that the abolition would ruin the West-Indian
+Islands. In doing this he paid a handsome compliment to the memory of Mr.
+Pitt, whose speech upon this particular point was, he said, the most
+powerful and convincing of any he had ever heard. Indeed they, who had not
+heard it, could have no notion of it. It was a speech, of which he would
+say with the Roman author, reciting the words of the Athenian orator, "Quid
+esset, si ipsum audivissetis!" It was a speech no less remarkable for
+splendid eloquence, than for solid sense and convincing reason; supported
+by calculations founded on facts, and conclusions drawn from premises, as
+correctly as if they had been mathematical propositions; all tending to
+prove that, instead of the West Indian plantations suffering an injury,
+they would derive a material benefit by the abolition of the Slave-trade.
+He then called upon the friends of this great man to show their respect for
+his memory by their votes; and he concluded with moving, "that this House,
+considering the African Slave-trade to be contrary to the principles of
+justice, humanity, and policy, will, with all practicable expedition, take
+effectual measures for the abolition of the said trade, in such a manner,
+and at such a period, as may be deemed advisable."
+
+Sir Ralph Milbank rose, and seconded the motion.
+
+General Tarleton rose next. He deprecated the abolition, on account of the
+effect which it would have on the trade and revenue of the country.
+
+Mr. Francis said the merchants of Liverpool were at liberty to ask for
+compensation; but he, for one, would never grant it for the loss of a
+trade, which had been declared to be contrary to humanity and justice. As
+an uniform friend to this great cause, he wished Mr. Fox had not introduced
+a resolution, but a real bill for the abolition of the Slave-trade. He
+believed that both Houses were then disposed to do it away. He wished the
+golden opportunity might not be lost.
+
+Lord Castlereagh thought it a proposition, on which no one could entertain
+a doubt, that the Slave-trade was a great evil in itself; and that it was
+the duty and policy of Parliament to extirpate it; but he did not think the
+means offered were adequate to the end proposed. The abolition, as a
+political question, was a difficult one. The year 1796 had been once fixed
+upon by the House, as the period when the trade was to cease; but, when the
+time arrived, the resolution was not executed. This was a proof, either
+that the House did not wish for the event, or that they judged it
+impracticable. It would be impossible, he said, to get other nations to
+concur in the measure; and, even if they were to concur, it could not be
+effected. We might restrain the subjects of the parent-state from following
+the trade; but we could not those in our colonies. A hundred frauds would
+be committed by those, which we could not detect. He did not mean by this,
+that the evil was to go on for ever. Had a wise plan been proposed at
+first, it might have been half-cured by this time. The present resolution
+would do no good. It was vague, indefinite, and unintelligible. Such
+resolutions were only the Slave-merchants' harvests. They would go for more
+slaves than usual in the interim. He should have advised a system of duties
+on fresh importations of slaves, progressively increasing to a certain
+extent; and that the amount of these duties should be given to the
+planters, as a bounty to encourage the Negro-population upon their estates.
+Nothing could be done, unless we went hand in hand with the latter. But he
+should deliver himself more fully on this subject, when any thing specific
+should be brought forward in the shape of a bill.
+
+Sir S. Romilly, the solicitor-general, differed from Lord Castlereagh; for
+he thought the resolution of Mr. Fox was very simple and intelligible. If
+there was a proposition vague and indefinite, it was that, advanced by the
+noble lord, of a system of duties on fresh importations, rising
+progressively, and this under the patronage and cooperation of the
+planters. Who could measure the space between the present time and the
+abolition of the trade, if that measure were to depend upon the approbation
+of the colonies?
+
+The cruelty and injustice of the Slave-trade had been established by
+evidence beyond a doubt. It had been shown to be carried on by rapine,
+robbery, and murder; by fomenting and encouraging wars; by false
+accusations; and imaginary crimes. The unhappy victims were torn away not
+only in the time of war, but of profound peace. They were then carried
+across the Atlantic, in a manner too horrible to describe; and afterwards
+subjected to eternal slavery. In support of the continuance of such a
+traffic, he knew of nothing but assertions already disproved, and arguments
+already refuted. Since the year 1796, when it was to cease by a resolution
+of Parliament, no less than three hundred and sixty thousand Africans had
+been torn away from their native land. What an accumulation was this to our
+former guilt!
+
+General Gascoyne made two extraordinary assertions: First, that the trade
+was defensible on Scriptural ground.--"Both thy bondmen and thy bondmaids,
+which thou shalt have, shall be of the heathen, that are round about thee;
+of them shall you have bondmen and bondmaids. And thou shalt take them as
+an heritance for thy children after thee to inherit them for a possession;
+they shall be thy bondmen for ever." Secondly, that the trade had been so
+advantageous to this country, that it would have been advisable even to
+institute a new one, if the old had not existed.
+
+Mr. Wilberforce replied to General Gascoyne. He then took a view of the
+speech of Lord Castlereagh, which he answered point by point. In the course
+of his observations he showed, that the system of duties progressively
+increasing, as proposed by the noble lord, would be one of the most
+effectual modes of perpetuating the Slave-trade. He exposed also the false
+foundation of the hope of any reliance on the cooperation of the colonists.
+The House, he said, had on the motion of Mr. Ellis in the year 1797, prayed
+His Majesty to consult with the colonial legislatures to take such
+measures, as might conduce to the gradual abolition of the African
+Slave-trade. This address was transmitted to them by Lord Melville. It was
+received in some of the islands with a declaration, "that they possibly
+might, in some instances, endeavour to improve the condition of their
+slaves; but they should do this, not with any view to the abolition of the
+Slave-trade; for they considered that trade as their birth-right, which
+could not be taken from them; and that we should deceive ourselves by
+supposing, that they would agree to such a measure." He desired to add to
+this the declaration of General Prevost in his public letter from Dominica.
+Did he not say, when asked what steps had been taken there in consequence
+of the resolution of the House in 1797, "that the act of the legislature,
+entitled an act for the encouragement, protection, and better government of
+slaves, appeared to him to have been considered, from the day it was passed
+until this hour, as a political measure to avert the interference of the
+mother-country in the management of the slaves."
+
+Sir William Yonge censured the harsh language of Sir Samuel Romilly, who
+had applied the terms rapine, robbery, and murder to those, who were
+connected with the Slave-trade. He considered the resolution of Mr. Fox as
+a prelude to a bill for the abolition of that traffic, and this bill as a
+prelude to emancipation, which would not only be dangerous in itself, but
+would change the state of property in the islands.
+
+Lord Henry Petty, after having commented on the speeches of Sir S. Romilly
+and Lord Castlereagh, proceeded to state his own opinion on the trade;
+which was, that it was contrary to justice, humanity, and sound policy, all
+of which he considered to be inseparable. On its commencement in Africa the
+wickedness began. It produced there fraud and violence, robbery and murder.
+It gave birth to false accusations, and a mockery of justice. It was the
+parent of every crime, which could at once degrade and afflict the human
+race. After spreading vice and misery all over this continent, it doomed
+its unhappy victims to hardships and cruelties which were worse than death.
+The first of these was conspicuous in their transportation. It was found
+there, that cruelty begat cruelty; that the system, wicked in its
+beginning, was equally so in its progress; and that it perpetuated its
+miseries wherever it was carried on. Nor was it baneful only to the
+objects, but to the promoters of it. The loss of British seamen in this
+traffic was enormous. One fifth of all, who were employed in it, perished;
+that is, they became the victims of a system, which was founded on fraud,
+robbery, and murder; and which procured to the British nation nothing but
+the execration of mankind. Nor had we yet done with the evils, which
+attended it; for it brought in its train the worst of all moral effects,
+not only as it respected the poor slaves, when transported to the colonies,
+but as it respected those, who had concerns with them there. The arbitrary
+power, which it conferred, afforded men of bad dispositions full scope for
+the exercise of their passions; and it rendered men, constitutionally of
+good dispositions, callous to the misery of others. Thus it depraved the
+nature of all, who were connected with it. These considerations had made
+him a friend to the abolition from the time he was capable of reasoning
+upon it. They were considerations also, which determined the House in the
+year 1782 to adopt a measure of the same kind as the present. Had any thing
+happened to change the opinion of members since? On the contrary, they had
+now the clearest evidence, that all the arguments then used against the
+abolition were fallacious; being founded not upon truth, but on assertions
+devoid of all truth, and derived from ignorance or prejudice.
+
+Having made these remarks, he proved by a number of facts the folly of the
+argument, that the Africans laboured under such a total degradation of
+mental and moral faculties, that they were made for slavery.
+
+He then entered into the great subject of population. He showed that in all
+countries, where there were no unnatural hardships, mankind would support
+themselves. He applied this reasoning to the Negro-population in the West
+Indies; which he maintained could not only be kept up, but increased,
+without any further importations from Africa.
+
+He then noticed the observations of Sir W. Yonge on the words of Sir S.
+Romilly; and desired him to reserve his indignation for those, who were
+guilty of acts of rapine, robbery, and murder, instead of venting it on
+those, who only did their duty in describing them. Never were accounts more
+shocking than those lately sent to government from the West Indies. Lord
+Seaforth, and the Attorney-general, could not refrain, in explaining them,
+from the use of the words murder and torture. And did it become members of
+that House (in order to accommodate the nerves of the friends of the
+Slave-trade) to soften down their expressions, when they were speaking on
+that subject; and to desist from calling that murder and torture, for which
+a governor, and the attorney-general, of one of the islands could find no
+better name?
+
+After making observations relative to the cooperation of foreign powers in
+this great work, he hoped that the House would not suffer itself to be
+drawn, either by opposition or by ridicule, to the right or to the left;
+but that it would, advance straight forward to the accomplishment of the
+most magnanimous act of justice, that was ever achieved by any legislature
+in the world.
+
+Mr. Rose declared, that on the very first promulgation of this question, he
+had proposed to the friends of it the very plan of his noble friend Lord
+Castlereagh; namely, a system of progressive duties, and of bounties for
+the promotion of the Negro-population. This he said to show that he was
+friendly to the principle of the measure. He would now observe, that he did
+not wholly like the present resolution. It was too indefinite. He wished
+also, that something had been said on the subject of compensation. He was
+fearful also, lest the abolition should lead to the dangerous change of
+emancipation. The Negros, he said, could not be in a better state, or more
+faithful to their masters, than they were. In three attacks made by the
+enemy on Dominica, where he had a large property, arms had been put into
+their hands; and every one of them had exerted himself faithfully. With
+respect to the cruel acts in Barbadoes, an account of which had been sent
+to government by Lord Seaforth and the Attorney-general of Barbadoes, he
+had read them; and never had he read any thing on this subject with more
+horror. He would agree to the strongest measures for the prevention of such
+acts in future. He would even give up the colony, which should refuse to
+make the wilful murder of a slave felony. But as to the other, or common,
+evils complained of, he thought the remedy should be gradual; and such also
+as the planters would concur in. He would nevertheless not oppose the
+present resolution.
+
+Mr. Barham considered compensation but reasonable, where losses were to
+accrue from the measure, when it should be put in execution; but he
+believed that the amount of it would be much less than was apprehended. He
+considered emancipation, though so many fears had been expressed about it,
+as forming no objection to the abolition, though he had estates in the West
+Indies himself. Such a measure, if it could be accomplished successfully,
+would be an honour to the country, and a blessing to the planters; but
+preparation must be made for it by rendering the slaves fit for freedom,
+and by creating in them an inclination to free labour. Such a change could
+only be the work of time.
+
+Sir John Newport said that the expressions of Sir S. Romilly, which had
+given such offence, had been used by others; and would be used with
+propriety, while the trade lasted. Some slave-dealers of Liverpool had
+lately attempted to prejudice certain merchants of Ireland in their favour.
+But none of their representations answered; and it was remarkable, that the
+reply made to them was in these words. "We will have no share in a traffic,
+consisting in rapine, blood, and murder." He then took a survey of a system
+of duties progressively increasing, and showed, that it would be utterly
+inefficient; and that there was no real remedy for the different evils
+complained of, but in the immediate prohibition of the trade.
+
+Mr. Canning renewed his professions of friendship to the cause. He did not
+like the present resolution; yet he would vote for it. He should have been
+better pleased with a bill, which would strike at once at the root of this
+detestable commerce.
+
+Mr. Manning wished the question to be deferred to the next session. He
+hoped, compensation would then be brought forward as connected with it.
+Nothing, however, effectual could be done without the concurrence of the
+planters.
+
+Mr. William Smith noticed, in a striking manner, the different
+inconsistencies in the arguments of those, who contended for the
+continuance of the trade.
+
+Mr. Windham deprecated not only the Slave-trade, but slavery also. They
+were essentially connected with each other. They were both evils, and ought
+both of them to be done away. Indeed, if emancipation would follow the
+abolition, he should like the latter measure the better. Rapine, robbery,
+and murder were the true characteristics of this traffic. The same epithets
+had not indeed been applied to slavery, because this was a condition, in
+which some part of the human race had been at every period of the history
+of the world. It was, however, a state, which ought not to be allowed to
+exist. But, notwithstanding all these confessions, he should weigh well the
+consequences of the abolition before he gave it his support. It would be on
+a balance between the evils themselves and the consequences of removing
+them, that he should decide for himself on this question.
+
+Mr. Fox took a view of all the arguments, which had been advanced by the
+opponents of the abolition; and having given an appropriate answer to each,
+the House divided, when there appeared for the resolution one hundred and
+fourteen, and against it but fifteen.
+
+Immediately after this division Mr. Wilberforce moved an address to His
+Majesty, "praying that he would be graciously pleased, to direct a
+negotiation to be entered into, by which foreign powers should be invited
+to cooperate with His Majesty in measures to be adopted for the abolition
+of the African Slave-trade."
+
+This address was carried without a division. It was also moved and carried,
+that "these resolutions be communicated to the Lords; and that their
+concurrence should be desired therein."
+
+On the twenty-fourth of June the Lords met to consider of the resolution
+and address. The Earl of Westmoreland proposed, that both counsel and
+evidence should be heard against them; but his proposition was overruled.
+
+Lord Grenville then read the resolution of the Commons. This resolution, he
+said, stated first, that the Slave-trade was contrary to humanity, justice,
+and sound policy. That it was contrary to humanity was obvious; for
+humanity might be said to be sympathy for the distress of others, or a
+desire to accomplish benevolent ends by good means. But did not the
+Slave-trade convey ideas the very reverse of this definition? It deprived
+men of all those Comforts, in which it pleased the Creator to make the
+happiness of his creatures to consist,--of the blessings of society,--of
+the charities of the dear relationships of husband, wife, father, son, and
+kindred,--of the due discharge of the relative duties of these,--and of
+that freedom, which in its pure and natural sense was one of the greatest
+gifts of God to man.
+
+It was impossible to read the evidence, as it related to this trade,
+without acknowledging the inhumanity of it, and our own disgrace. By what
+means was it kept up in Africa? By wars instigated, not by the passions of
+the natives, but by our avarice. He knew it would be said in reply to this,
+that the slaves, who were purchased by us, would be put to death, if we
+were not to buy them. But what should we say, if it should turn out, that
+we were the causes of those very cruelties, which we affected to prevent?
+But, if it were not so, ought the first nation in the world to condescend
+to be the executioner of savages?
+
+Another way of keeping up the Slave-trade was by the practice of
+man-stealing. The evidence was particularly clear upon this head. This
+practice included violence, and often bloodshed. The inhumanity of it
+therefore could not be doubted.
+
+The unhappy victims, being thus procured, were conveyed, he said, across
+the Atlantic in a manner which justified the charge of inhumanity again.
+Indeed the suffering here was so great, that neither the mind could
+conceive nor the tongue describe it. He had said on a former occasion, that
+in their transportation there was a greater portion of misery condensed
+within a smaller space, than had ever existed in the known world. He would
+repeat his words; for he did not know, how he could express himself better
+on the subject. And, after all these horrors, what was their destiny? It
+was such, as justified the charge in the resolution again: for, after
+having survived the sickness arising from the passage, they were doomed to
+interminable slavery.
+
+We had been, he said, so much accustomed to words, descriptive of the
+cruelty of this traffic, that we had almost forgotten their meaning. He
+wished that some person, educated as an Englishman, with suitable powers of
+eloquence, but now for the first time informed of all the horrors of it,
+were to address their lordships upon it, and he was sure, that they would
+instantly determine that it should cease. But the continuance of it had
+rendered cruelty familiar to us; and the recital of its horrors had been so
+frequent, that we could now hear them stated without being affected as we
+ought to be. He intreated their lordships, however, to endeavour to
+conceive the hard case of the unhappy victims of it; and as he had led them
+to the last stage of their miserable existence, which was in the colonies,
+to contemplate it there. They were there under the arbitrary will of a
+cruel task-master from morning till night. When they went to rest, would
+not their dreams be frightful? When they awoke, would they not awake,
+
+          ----"only to discover sights of woe,
+  Regions of sorrow, doleful shades, where peace
+  And rest can never dwell, hope never comes
+  That comes to all; but torture without end
+  Still urges?"----
+
+They knew no change, except in the humour of their masters, to whom their
+whole destiny was entrusted. We might perhaps flatter ourselves with
+saying, that they were subject to the will of Englishmen. But Englishmen
+were not better than others, when in possession of arbitrary power. The
+very fairest exercise of it was a never-failing corrupter of the heart. But
+suppose it were allowed, that self-interest might operate some little
+against cruelty; yet where was the interest of the overseer or the driver?
+But he knew it would be said, that the evils complained of in the colonies
+had been mitigated. There might be instances of this; but they could never
+be cured, while slavery existed. Slavery took away more than half of the
+human character. Hence the practice, where it existed, of rejecting the
+testimony of the slave: but, if his testimony was rejected, where could be
+his redress against his oppressor?
+
+Having shown the inhumanity, he would proceed to the second point in the
+resolution, or the injustice, of the trade. We had two ideas of justice,
+first, as it belonged to society by virtue of a social compact; and,
+secondly, as it belonged to men, not as citizens of a community, but as
+beings of one common nature. In a state of nature, man had a right to the
+fruit of his own labour absolutely to himself; and one of the main
+purposes, for which he entered into society, was, that he might be better
+protected in the possession of his rights. In both cases therefore it was
+manifestly unjust, that a man should be made to labour during the whole of
+his life, and yet have no benefit from his labour. Hence the Slave-trade
+and the Colonial slavery were a violation of the very principle, upon which
+all law for the protection of property was founded. Whatever benefit was
+derived from that trade to an individual, it was derived from dishonour and
+dishonesty. He forced from the unhappy victim of it that, which the latter
+did not wish to give him; and he gave to the same victim that, which he in
+vain attempted to show was an equivalent to the thing he took, it being a
+thing for which there was no equivalent; and which, if he had not obtained
+by force, he would not have possessed at all. Nor could there be any answer
+to this reasoning, unless it could be proved, that it had pleased God to
+give to the inhabitants of Britain a property in the liberty and life of
+the natives of Africa. But he would go further on this subject. The
+injustice complained of was not confined to the bare circumstance of
+robbing them of the right to their own labour. It was conspicuous
+throughout the system. They, who bought them, became guilty of all the
+crimes which had been committed in procuring them; and, when they possessed
+them, of all the crimes which belonged to their inhuman treatment. The
+injustice in the latter case amounted frequently to murder. For what was it
+but murder to pursue a practice, which produced untimely death to thousands
+of innocent and helpless beings? It was a duty, which their lordships owed
+to their Creator, if they hoped for mercy, to do away this monstrous
+oppression.
+
+With respect to the impolicy of the trade (the third point in the
+resolution), he would say at once, that whatever was inhuman and unjust
+must be impolitic. He had, however, no objection to argue the point upon
+its own particular merits; and, first, he would observe, that a great man,
+Mr. Pitt, now no more, had exerted his vast powers on many subjects to the
+admiration of his hearers; but on none more successfully than on the
+subject of the abolition of the Slave-trade. He proved, after making an
+allowance for the price paid for the slaves in the West Indies, for the
+loss of them in the seasoning, and for the expense of maintaining them
+afterwards, and comparing these particulars with the amount in value of
+their labour there, that the evils endured by the victims of the traffic
+were no gain to the master, in whose service they took place. Indeed Mr.
+Long had laid it down in his History of Jamaica, that the best way to
+secure the planters from ruin would be to do that, which the resolution
+recommended. It was notorious, that when any planter was in distress, and
+sought to relieve himself by increasing the labour on his estate by means
+of the purchase of new slaves, the measure invariably tended to his
+destruction. What then was the importation of fresh Africans but a system,
+tending to the general ruin of the islands?
+
+But it had often been said, that without fresh importations the population
+of the slaves could not be supported in the islands. This, however, was a
+mistake. It had arisen from reckoning the deaths of the imported Africans,
+of whom so many were lost in the seasoning, among the deaths of the
+Creole-slaves. He did not mean to say, that under the existing degree of
+misery the population would greatly increase; but he would maintain, that,
+if the deaths and the births were calculated upon those, who were either
+born, or who had been a long time in the islands, so as to be considered as
+natives, it would be found that the population had not only been kept up,
+but that it had been increased.
+
+If it was true, that the labour of a free man was cheaper than that of a
+slave; and also that the labour of a long imported slave was cheaper than
+that of a fresh imported one; and again, that the chances of mortality were
+much more numerous among the newly imported slaves in the West Indies, than
+among those of old standing there (propositions, which he took to be
+established), we should see new arguments for the impolicy of the trade.
+
+It might be stated also, that the importation of vast bodies of men, who
+had been robbed of their rights, and grievously irritated on that account,
+into our colonies (where their miserable condition opened new sources of
+anger and revenge), was the importation only of the seeds of insurrection
+into them. And here he could not but view with astonishment the reasoning
+of the West Indian planters, who held up the example of St. Domingo as a
+warning against the abolition of the Slave-trade; because the continuance
+of it was one of the great causes of the insurrections and subsequent
+miseries in that devoted island. Let us but encourage importations in the
+same rapid progression of increase every year, which took place in St.
+Domingo, and we should witness the same effect in our own islands.
+
+To expose the impolicy of the trade further, he would observe, that it was
+an allowed axiom, that as the condition of man was improved, he became more
+useful. The history of our own country, in very early times, exhibited
+instances of internal slavery, and this to a considerable extent. But we
+should find that precisely in proportion as that slavery was ameliorated,
+the power and prosperity of the country flourished. This was exactly
+applicable to the case in question. There could be no general amelioration
+of slavery in the West Indies, while the Slave-trade lasted: but, if we
+were to abolish it, we should make it the interest of every owner of slaves
+to do that, which would improve their condition; and which indeed would
+lead ultimately to the annihilation of slavery itself. This great event,
+however, could not be accomplished at once. It could only be effected in a
+course of time.
+
+It would be endless, he said, to go into all the cases, which would
+manifest the impolicy of this odious traffic. Inhuman as it was, unjust as
+it was, he believed it to be equally impolitic; and if their lordships
+should be of this opinion also, he hoped they would agree to that part of
+the resolution, in which these truths were expressed. With respect to the
+other part of it, or that they would proceed to abolish the trade, he
+observed, that neither the time nor the manner of doing it were specified.
+Hence if any of them should differ as to these particulars, they might yet
+vote for the resolution; as they were not pledged to any thing definite in
+these respects; provided they thought that the trade should be abolished at
+some time or other; and he did not believe, that there was any one of them,
+who would sanction its continuance for ever.
+
+Lord Hawkesbury said, that he did not mean to discuss the question on the
+ground of justice and humanity, as contradistinguished from sound policy.
+If it could fairly be made out, that the African Slave-trade was contrary
+to justice and humanity, it ought to be abolished. It did not, however,
+follow, because a great evil subsisted, that therefore it should be
+removed; for it might be comparatively a less evil, than that which would
+accompany the attempt to remove it. The noble lord, who had just spoken,
+had exemplified this: for though slavery was a great evil in itself, he was
+of opinion, that it could not be done away but in a course of time.
+
+A state of slavery, he said, had existed in Africa from the earliest time;
+and, unless other nations would concur with England in the measure of the
+abolition, we could not change it for the better.
+
+Slavery had existed also throughout all Europe. It had now happily in a
+great measure been done away. But how? Not by acts of parliament; for these
+might have retarded the event; but by the progress of civilization, which
+removed the evil in a gradual and rational manner.
+
+He then went over the same ground of argument, as when a member of the
+Commons in 1792. He said that the inhumanity of the abolition was visible
+in this, that not one slave less would be taken from Africa; and that such,
+as were taken from it, would suffer more than they did now, in the hands of
+foreigners. He maintained also, as before, that the example of St. Domingo
+afforded one of the strongest arguments against the abolition of the trade.
+And he concluded by objecting to the resolution, inasmuch as it could do no
+good; for the substance of it would be to be discussed again in a future
+session.
+
+The Bishop of London (Dr. Porteus) began by noticing the concession of the
+last speaker, namely, that, if the trade was contrary to humanity and
+justice, it ought to be abolished. He expected, he said, that the noble
+lord would have proved, that it was not contrary to these great principles,
+before he had supported its continuance; but not a word had he said to
+show, that the basis of the resolution in these respects was false. It
+followed then, he thought, that as the noble lord had not disproved the
+premises, he was bound to abide by the conclusion.
+
+The ways, he said, in which the Africans were reduced to slavery in their
+own country, were by wars, many of which were excited for the purpose; by
+the breaking up of villages; by kidnapping; and by convictions for a
+violation of their own laws. Of the latter class many were accused falsely,
+and of crimes which did not exist. He then read a number of extracts from
+the evidence examined before the privy council, and from the histories of
+those, who, having lived in Africa, had thrown light upon this subject,
+before the question was agitated. All these, he said, (and similar
+instances could be multiplied,) proved the truth of the resolution, that
+the African Slave-trade was contrary to the principles of humanity,
+justice, and sound policy.
+
+It was moreover, he said, contrary to the principles of the religion we
+professed. It was not superfluous to say this, when it had been so
+frequently asserted, that it was sanctioned both by the Jewish and the
+Christian dispensations. With respect to the Jews he would observe, that
+there was no such thing as perpetual slavery among them. Their slaves were
+of two kinds, those of their own nation, and those from the country round
+about them. The former were to be set free on the seventh year; and the
+rest, of whatever nation, on the fiftieth, or on the year of Jubilee. With
+respect to the Christian dispensation, it was a libel to say, that it
+countenanced such a traffic. It opposed it both in its spirit and in its
+principle. Nay, it opposed it positively; for it classed men-stealers, or
+slave-traders, among the murderers of fathers and mothers and the most
+profane criminals upon earth.
+
+The antiquity of slavery in Africa, which the noble lord had glanced at,
+afforded, he said, no argument for its continuance. Such a mode of defence
+would prevent for ever the removal of any evil. It would justify the
+practice of the Chinese, who exposed their infants in the streets to
+perish. It would also justify piracy; for that practice existed long before
+we knew any thing of the African Slave-trade.
+
+He then combated the argument, that we did a kindness to the Africans by
+taking them from their homes; and concluded, by stating to their lordships,
+that, if they refused to sanction the resolution, they would establish
+these principles, "that though individuals might not rob and murder, yet
+that nations might--that though individuals incurred the penalties of death
+by such practices, yet that bodies of men might commit them with impunity
+for the purposes of lucre,--and that for such purposes they were not only
+to be permitted, but encouraged."
+
+The Lord Chancellor (Erskine) confessed, that he was not satisfied with his
+own conduct on this subject. He acknowledged with deep contrition, that,
+during the time he was a member of the other House, he had not once
+attended, when this great question was discussed.
+
+In the West Indies he could say personally, that the slaves were well
+treated, where he had an opportunity of seeing them. But no judgement was
+to be formed there with respect to the evils complained of. They must be
+appreciated as they existed in the trade. Of these he had also been an
+eye-witness. It was on this account that he felt contrition for not having
+attended the House on this subject; for there were some cruelties in this
+traffic which the human imagination could not aggravate. He had witnessed
+such scenes over the whole coast of Africa: and he could say, that, if
+their lordships could only have a sudden glimpse of them, they would be
+struck with horror; and would be astonished, that they could ever have been
+permitted to exist. What then would they say to their continuance year
+after year, and from age to age?
+
+From information, which he could not dispute, he was warranted in saying,
+that on this continent husbands were fraudulently and forcibly severed from
+their wives, and parents from their children; and that all the ties of
+blood and affection were torn up by the roots. He had himself seen the
+unhappy natives put together in heaps in the hold of a ship, where, with
+every possible attention to them, their situation must have been
+intolerable. He had also heard proved, in courts of justice, facts still
+more dreadful than those which he had seen. One of these he would just
+mention. The slaves on board a certain ship rose in a mass to liberate
+themselves; and having advanced far in the pursuit of their object, it
+became necessary to repel them by force. Some of them yielded; some of them
+were killed in the scuffle; but many of them actually jumped into the sea
+and were drowned; thus preferring death to the misery of their situation;
+while others hung to the ship, repenting of their rashness, and bewailing
+with frightful noises their horrid fate. Thus the whole vessel exhibited
+but one hideous scene of wretchedness. They, who were subdued, and secured
+in chains, were seized with the flux, which carried many of them off. These
+things were proved in a trial before a British jury, which had to consider,
+whether this was a loss, which fell within the policy of insurance, the
+slaves being regarded as if they had been only a cargo of dead matter. He
+could mention other instances, but they were much too shocking to be
+described. Surely their lordships could never consider such a traffic to be
+consistent with humanity or justice. It was impossible.
+
+That the trade had long subsisted there was no doubt; but this was no
+argument for its continuance. Many evils of much longer standing had been
+done away; and it was always our duty to attempt to remove them. Should we
+not exult in the consideration, that we, the inhabitants of a small island,
+at the extremity of the globe, almost at its north pole, were become the
+morning-star to enlighten the nations of the earth, and to conduct them out
+of the shades of darkness into the realms of light; thus exhibiting to an
+astonished and an admiring world the blessings of a free constitution? Let
+us then not allow such a glorious opportunity to escape us.
+
+It had been urged that we should suffer by the abolition of the
+Slave-trade. He believed we should not suffer. He believed that our duty
+and our interest were inseparable: and he had no difficulty in saying, in
+the face of the world, that his own opinion was, that the interests of a
+nation would be best preserved by its adherence to the principles of
+humanity, justice, and religion.
+
+The Earl of Westmoreland said, that the African Slave-trade might be
+contrary to humanity and justice, and yet it might be politic; at least, it
+might be inconsistent with humanity, and yet be not inconsistent with
+justice: this was the case, when we executed a criminal, or engaged in war.
+
+It was, however, not contrary to justice; for justice in this case must be
+measured by the law of nations. But the purchase of slaves was not contrary
+to this law. The Slave-trade was a trade with the consent of the
+inhabitants of two nations, and procured by no terror, nor by any act of
+violence whatever. Slavery had existed from the first ages of the world,
+not only in Africa, but throughout the habitable globe; among the Persians,
+Greeks, and Romans; and he could compare, with great advantage to his
+argument, the wretched condition of the slaves in these ancient states with
+that of those in our colonies. Slavery too had been allowed in a nation,
+which was under the especial direction of Providence. The Jews were allowed
+to hold the heathen in bondage. He admitted, that what the learned prelate
+had said relative to the emancipation of the latter in the year of jubilee
+was correct; but he denied that his quotation relative to the stealers of
+men referred to the Christian religion. It was a mere allusion to that,
+which was done contrary to the law of nations, which was the only measure
+of justice between states.
+
+With respect to the inhumanity of the trade, he would observe, that if
+their lordships, sitting there as legislators, were to set their faces
+against every thing which appeared to be inhuman, much of the security on
+which their lives and property depended, might be shaken, if not totally
+destroyed. The question was, not whether there was not some evil attending
+the Slave-trade, but whether by the measure now before them they should
+increase or diminish the quantum of human misery in the world. He believed,
+for one, considering the internal state of Africa, and the impossibility of
+procuring the concurrence of foreign nations in the measure, that they
+would not be able to do any good by the adoption of it.
+
+As to the impolicy of the trade, the policy of it, on the other hand, was
+so great, that he trembled at the consequences of its abolition. The
+property connected with this question amounted to a hundred millions. The
+annual produce of the islands was eighteen millions, and it yielded a
+revenue of four millions annually. How was this immense property and income
+to be preserved? Some had said it would be preserved, because the Black
+population in the islands could be kept up without further supplies. But
+the planters denied this assertion; and they were the best judges of the
+subject.
+
+He condemned the resolution as a libel upon the wisdom of the law of the
+land, and upon the conduct of their ancestors. He condemned it also,
+because, if followed up, it would lead to the abolition of the trade, and
+the abolition of the trade to the emancipation of the slaves in our
+colonies.
+
+The Bishop of St. Asaph (Dr. Horsley) said, that, allowing the slaves in
+the West Indies even to be pampered with delicacies, or to be put to rest
+on a bed of roses, they could not be happy, for--a slave would be still a
+slave. The question, however, was not concerning the alteration of their
+condition, but whether we should abolish the practice, by which they were
+put in that condition? Whether it was humane, just, and politic in us so to
+place them? This question was easily answered; for he found it difficult to
+form any one notion of humanity, which did not include a desire of
+promoting the happiness of others; and he knew of no other justice than
+that, which was founded on the principle of doing to others, as we should
+wish they should do to us. And these principles of humanity and justice
+were so clear, that he found it difficult to make them clearer. Perhaps no
+difficulty was greater than that of arguing a self-evident proposition, and
+such he took to be the character of the proposition, that the Slave-trade
+was inhuman and unjust.
+
+It had been said, that slavery had existed from the beginning of the world.
+He would allow it. But had such a trade as the Slave-trade ever existed
+before? Would the noble Earl, who had talked of the slavery of ancient Rome
+and Greece, assert, that in the course of his whole reading, however
+profound it might have been, he had found any thing resembling such a
+traffic? Where did it appear in history, that ships were regularly fitted
+out to fetch away tens of thousands of persons annually, against their
+will, from their native land; that these were subject to personal
+indignities and arbitrary punishments during their transportation; and that
+a certain proportion of them, owing to suffocation and other cruel causes,
+uniformly perished? He averred, that nothing like the African Slave-trade
+was ever practised in any nation upon earth.
+
+If the trade then was repugnant, as he maintained it was, to justice and
+humanity, he did not see how, without aiding and abetting injustice and
+inhumanity, any man could sanction it: and he thought that the noble baron
+(Hawkesbury) was peculiarly bound to support the resolution; for he had
+admitted that if it could be shown, that the trade was contrary to these
+principles, the question would be at an end. Now this contrariety had been
+made apparent, and his lordship had not even attempted to refute it.
+
+He would say but little on the subject of revealed religion, as it related
+to this question, because the reverend prelate, near him, had spoken so
+fully upon it. He might observe, however, that at the end of the sixth
+year, when the Hebrew slave was emancipated, he was to be furnished
+liberally from the flock, the floor, and the wine-press of his master.
+
+Lord Holland lamented the unfaithfulness of the noble baron (Hawkesbury) to
+his own principles, and the inflexible opposition of the noble earl
+(Westmoreland), from both which circumstances he despaired for ever of any
+assistance from them to this glorious cause. The latter wished to hear
+evidence on the subject, for the purpose, doubtless, of delay. He was sure,
+that the noble earl did not care what the evidence would say on either
+side; for his mind was made up, that the trade ought not to be abolished.
+
+The noble earl had made a difference between humanity, justice, and sound
+policy. God forbid, that we should ever admit such distinctions in this
+country! But he had gone further, and said, that a thing might be inhuman,
+and yet not unjust; and he put the case of the execution of a criminal in
+support of it. Did he not by this position confound all notions of right
+and wrong in human institutions? When a criminal was justly executed, was
+not the execution justice to him who suffered, and humanity to the body of
+the people at large?
+
+The noble earl had said also, that we should do no good by the abolition,
+because other nations would not concur in it. He did not know what other
+nations would do; but this he knew, that we ourselves ought not to be
+unjust because they should refuse to be honest. It was, however,
+self-obvious, that, if we admitted no more slaves into our colonies, the
+evil would be considerably diminished.
+
+Another of his arguments did not appear to be more solid; for surely the
+Slave-trade ought not to be continued, merely because the effect of the
+abolition might ultimately be that of the emancipation of the slaves; an
+event, which would be highly desirable in its due time.
+
+The noble lord had also said, that the planters were against the abolition,
+and that without their consent it could never be accomplished. He differed
+from him in both these points: for, first, he was a considerable planter
+himself, and yet he was a friend to the measure: secondly, by cutting off
+all further supplies, the planters would be obliged to pay more attention
+to the treatment of their slaves, and this treatment would render the trade
+unnecessary.
+
+The noble earl had asserted also, that the population in the West Indies
+could not be kept up without further importations; and this was the opinion
+of the planters, who were the best judges of the subject. As a planter he
+differed from his lordship again. If indeed all the waste lands were to be
+brought into cultivation, the present population would be insufficient. But
+the government had already determined, that the trade should not be
+continued for such a purpose. We were no longer to continue pirates, or
+executioners for every petty tyrant in Africa, in order that every holder
+of a bit of land in our islands might cultivate the whole of his allotment;
+a work, which might require centuries. Making this exception, he would
+maintain, that no further importations were necessary. Few or no slaves had
+been imported into Antigua for many years; and he believed, that even some
+had been exported from it. As to Jamaica, although in one year fifteen
+thousand died in consequence of a hurricane and famine, the excess of
+deaths over the births during the twenty years preceding 1788 was only one
+per cent. Deducting, however, the mortality of the newly imported slaves,
+and making the calculation upon the Negros born in the island or upon those
+who had been long there, he believed the births and the deaths would be
+found equal. He had a right therefore to argue that the Negros, with better
+treatment (which the abolition would secure), would not only maintain but
+increase their population, without any aid from Africa. He would add, that
+the newly imported Africans brought with them not only disorders, which
+ravaged the plantations, but danger from the probability of insurrections.
+He wished most heartily for the total abolition of the trade. He was
+convinced, that it was both inhuman, unjust, and impolitic. This had always
+been his opinion as an individual since he was capable of forming one. It
+was his opinion then as a legislator. It was his opinion as a colonial
+proprietor; and it was his opinion as an Englishman, wishing for the
+prosperity of the British empire.
+
+The Earl of Suffolk contended, that the population of the slaves in the
+islands could be kept up by good treatment, so as to be sufficient for
+their cultivation. He entered into a detail of calculations from the year
+1772 downwards in support of this statement. He believed all the miseries
+of St. Domingo arose from the vast importation of Africans. He had such a
+deep sense of the inhumanity and injustice of the Slave-trade, that, if
+ever he wished any action of his life to be recorded, it would be that of
+the vote he should then give in support of the resolution.
+
+Lord Sidmouth said, that he agreed to the substance of the resolution, but
+yet he could not support it. Could he be convinced that the trade would be
+injurious to the cause of humanity and justice, the question with him would
+be decided; for policy could not be opposed to humanity and justice. He had
+been of opinion for the last twenty years, that the interests of the
+country and those of numerous individuals were so deeply blended with this
+traffic, that we should be very cautious how we proceeded. With respect to
+the cultivation of new lands, he would not allow a single Negro to be
+imported for such a purpose; but he must have a regard to the old
+plantations. When he found a sufficient increase in the Black population to
+continue the cultivation already established there, then, but not till
+then, he would agree to an abolition of the trade.
+
+Earl Stanhope said he would not detain their lordships long. He could not,
+however, help expressing his astonishment at what had fallen from the last
+speaker; for he had evidently confessed that the Slave-trade was inhuman
+and unjust, and then he had insinuated, that it was neither inhuman nor
+unjust to continue it. A more paradoxical or whimsical opinion, he
+believed, was never entertained, or more whimsically expressed in that
+house. The noble viscount had talked of the interests of the planters: but
+this was but a part of the subject; for surely the people of Africa were
+not to be forgotten. He did not understand the practice of complimenting
+the planters with the lives of men, women, and helpless children by
+thousands for the sake of their pecuniary advantage; and they, who adopted
+it, whatever they might think of the consistency of their own conduct,
+offered an insult to the sacred names of humanity and justice.
+
+The noble earl (Westmoreland) had asked what would be the practical effect
+of the abolition of the Slave-trade. He would inform him. It would do away
+the infamous practices, which took place in Africa; it would put an end to
+the horrors of the passage; it would save many thousands of our
+fellow-creatures from the miseries of eternal slavery; it would oblige the
+planters to treat those better, who were already in that unnatural state;
+it would increase the population of our islands; it would give a death-blow
+to the diabolical calculations, whether it was cheaper to work the Negros
+to death and recruit the gangs by fresh importations, or to work them
+moderately and to treat them kindly. He knew of no event, which would be
+attended with so many blessings.
+
+There was but one other matter, which he would notice. The noble baron
+(Hawkesbury) had asserted, that all the horrors of St. Domingo were the
+consequence of the speculative opinions, which were current in a
+neighbouring kingdom on the subject of liberty. They had, he said, no such
+origin. They were owing to two causes; first, to the vast number of Negros
+recently imported into that island; and, secondly, to a scandalous breach
+of faith by the French legislature. This legislature held out the idea not
+only of the abolition of the Slave-trade, but also of all slavery; but it
+broke its word. It held forth the rights of man to the whole human race,
+and then, in practice, it most infamously abandoned every article in these
+rights; so that it became the scorn of all the enlightened and virtuous
+part of mankind. These were the great causes of the miseries of St.
+Domingo, and not the speculative opinions of France.
+
+Earl Grosvenor could not but express the joy he felt at the hope, after all
+his disappointments, that this wicked trade would be done away. He hoped
+that His Majesty's ministers were in earnest, and that they would, early in
+the next session, take this great question up with a determination to go
+through with it; so that another year should not pass, before we extended
+the justice and humanity of the country to the helpless and unhappy
+inhabitants of Africa.
+
+Earl Fitzwilliam said he was fearful, lest the calamities of St. Domingo
+should be brought home to our own islands. We ought not, he thought, too
+hastily to adopt the resolution on that account. He should therefore
+support the previous question.
+
+Lord Ellenborough said, he was sorry to differ from his noble friend (Lord
+Sidmouth), and yet he could not help saying that if after twenty years,
+during which this question had been discussed by both Houses of Parliament,
+their Lordships' judgments were not ripe for its determination, he could
+not look with any confidence to a time, when they would be ready to decide
+it.
+
+The question then before them was short and plain. It was, whether the
+African Slave-trade was inhuman, unjust, and impolitic. If the premises
+were true, we could not too speedily bring it to a conclusion.
+
+The subject had been frequently brought before him in a way, which had
+enabled him to become acquainted with it; and he was the more anxious on
+that account to deliver his sentiments upon it as a peer of Parliament,
+without reference to any thing he had been called upon to do in the
+discharge of his professional duty. When he looked at the mode in which
+this traffic commenced, by the spoliation of the rights of a whole quarter
+of the globe; by the misery of whole nations of helpless Africans; by
+tearing them from their homes, their families, and their friends; when he
+saw the unhappy victims carried away by force; thrust into a dungeon in the
+hold of a ship, in which the interval of their passage from their native to
+a foreign land was filled up with misery, under every degree of debasement,
+and in chains; and when he saw them afterwards consigned to an eternal
+slavery; he could not but contemplate the whole system with horror. It was
+inhuman in its beginning, inhuman in its progress, and inhuman to the very
+end.
+
+Nor was it more inhuman than it was unjust. The noble earl, (Westmoreland)
+in adverting to this part of the question, had considered it as a question
+of justice between two nations. But it was a moral question. Although the
+natives of Africa might be taken by persons authorized by their own laws to
+take and dispose of them, and the practice therefore might be said to be
+legal as it respected them, yet no man could doubt, whatever ordinances
+they might have to sanction it, that it was radically, essentially, and in
+principle, unjust; and therefore there could be no excuse for us in
+continuing it. On the general principle of natural justice, which was
+paramount to all ordinances of men, it was quite impossible to defend this
+traffic; and he agreed with the noble baron (Hawkesbury) that, having
+decided that it was inhuman and unjust, we should not inquire whether it
+was impolitic. Indeed, the inquiry itself would be impious; for it was the
+common ordinance of God, that that, which was inhuman and unjust, should
+never be for the good of man. Its impolicy therefore was included in its
+injustice and its inhumanity. And he had no doubt, when the importations
+were stopped, that the planters would introduce a change of system among
+their slaves, which would increase their population, so as to render any
+further supplies from Africa unnecessary. It had been proved indeed, that
+the Negro-population in some of the islands was already in this desirable
+state. Many other happy effects would follow. As to the losses which would
+arise from the abolition of the Slave-trade, they, who were interested in
+the continuance of it, had greatly over-rated, them. When pleading formerly
+in his professional capacity for the merchants of Liverpool at their
+lordships' bar, he had often delivered statements, which he had received
+from them; and which he afterward discovered to be grossly incorrect. He
+could say from his own knowledge, that the assertion of the noble earl
+(Westmoreland), that property to the amount of a hundred millions would be
+endangered, was wild and fanciful. He would not however deny, that some
+loss might accompany the abolition; but there could be no difficulty in
+providing for it. Such a consideration ought not to be allowed to impede
+their progress in getting rid of an horrible injustice.
+
+But it had been said, that we should do but little in the cause of humanity
+by abolishing the Slave-trade; because other nations would continue it. He
+did not believe they would. He knew that America was about to give it up.
+He believed the states of Europe would give it up. But, supposing that they
+were all to continue it, would not our honour be the greater? Would not our
+virtue be the more signal? for then,
+
+                  ----"faithful we
+  Among the faithless found"----
+
+to which he would add, that undoubtedly we should diminish the evil, as far
+as the number of miserable beings was concerned, which was accustomed to be
+transported to our own colonies.
+
+Earl Spencer agreed with the noble viscount (Sidmouth) that the
+amelioration of the condition of the slaves was an object, which might be
+effected in the West Indies; but he was certain, that the most effectual
+way of improving it would be by the total and immediate abolition of the
+Slave-trade; and for that reason he would support the resolution. Had the
+resolution held out emancipation to them, it would not have had his assent;
+for it would have ill become the character of this country, if it had been
+once promised, to have withheld it from them. It was to such deception that
+the horrors of St. Domingo were to be attributed. He would not enter into
+the discussion of the general subject at present. He was convinced that the
+trade was what the resolution stated it to be, inhuman, unjust, and
+impolitic. He wished therefore, most earnestly indeed, for its abolition.
+As to the mode of effecting it, it should be such, as would be attended
+with the least inconvenience to all parties. At the same time he would not
+allow small inconveniences to stand in the way of the great claims of
+humanity, justice, and religion.
+
+The question was then put on the resolution, and carried by a majority of
+forty-one to twenty. The same address also to His Majesty, which had been
+agreed upon by the Commons, was directly afterward moved. This also was
+carried, but without the necessity of a division.
+
+The resolution and the motion having passed both Houses, one other
+parliamentary measure was yet necessary to complete the proceedings of this
+session. It was now almost universally believed, in consequence of what had
+already taken place there, that the Slave-trade had received its
+death-wound; and that it would not long survive it. It was supposed
+therefore, that the slave-merchants would, in the interim, fit out not only
+all the vessels they had, but even buy others, to make what might be called
+their last harvest. Hence extraordinary scenes of rapine, and murder, would
+be occasioned in Africa. To prevent these a new bill was necessary. This
+was accordingly introduced into the Commons. It enacted, but with one
+exception, that from and after the first of August 1806, no vessel should
+clear out for the Slave-trade, unless it should have been previously
+employed by the same owner or owners in the said trade, or should be proved
+to have been contracted for previously to the tenth of June 1806, for the
+purpose of being employed in that trade. It may now be sufficient to say
+that this bill also passed both houses of parliament; soon after which the
+session ended.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER X.
+
+_Continuation from July 18O6 to March 18O7--Death of Mr. Fox--Bill for the
+total abolition of the Slave-trade carried in the House of Lords--sent from
+thence to the Commons--amended and passed there--carried back, and passed
+with its amendments by the Lords--receives the royal assent--Reflections on
+this great event._
+
+
+It was impossible for the committee to look back to the proceedings of the
+last session, as they related to the great question under their care,
+without feeling a profusion of joy, as well as of gratitude to those, by
+whose virtuous endeavours they had taken place. But, alas, how few of our
+earthly pleasures come to us without alloy! a melancholy event succeeded.
+We had the painful intelligence, in the month of October 1806, that one of
+the oldest and warmest friends of the cause was then numbered with the
+dead.
+
+Of the character of Mr. Fox, as it related to this cause, I am bound to
+take notice. And, first, I may observe, that he professed an attachment to
+it almost as soon as it was ushered into the world. Early in the year 1788,
+when he was waited upon by a deputation of the committee, his language was,
+as has appeared in the first volume, "that he would support their object to
+its fullest extent, being convinced that there was no remedy for the evil
+but in the total abolition of the trade."
+
+His subsequent conduct evinced the sincerity of his promises. He was
+constant in his attendance in Parliament whenever the question was brought
+forward; and he never failed to exert his powerful eloquence in its favour.
+The countenance, indeed, which he gave it, was of the greatest importance
+to its welfare; for most of his parliamentary friends, who followed his
+general political sentiments, patronized it also. By the aid of these,
+joined to that of the private friends of Mr. Pitt, and of other members,
+who espoused it without reference to party, it was always so upheld, that
+after the year 1791 no one of the defeats, which it sustained, was
+disgraceful. The majority on the side of those interested in the
+continuance of the trade was always so trifling, that the abolitionists
+were preserved a formidable body, and their cause respectable.
+
+I never heard whether Mr. Fox, when he came into power, made any
+stipulations with His Majesty on the subject of the Slave-trade: but this I
+know, that he determined upon the abolition of it, if it were practicable,
+as the highest glory of his administration, and as the greatest earthly
+blessing which it was in the power of the Government to bestow; and that he
+took considerable pains to convince some of his colleagues in the cabinet
+of the propriety of the measure.
+
+When the resolution, which produced the debates in parliament, as detailed
+in the last chapter, was under contemplation, it was thought expedient that
+Mr. Fox, as the minister of state in the House of Commons, should introduce
+it himself. When applied to for this purpose he cheerfully undertook the
+office, thus acting in consistency with his public declaration in the year
+1791, "that in whatever situation he might ever be, he would use his
+warmest efforts for the promotion of this righteous cause."
+
+Before the next measure, or the bill to prevent the sailing of any new
+vessel in the trade after the first of August, was publicly disclosed, it
+was suggested to him, that the session was nearly over; that he might
+possibly weary both Houses by another motion on the subject; and that, if
+he were to lose it, or to experience a diminution of his majorities in
+either, he might injure the cause; which was then in the road to triumph.
+To this objection he replied, "that he believed both Houses were disposed
+to get rid of the trade; that his own life was precarious; that if he
+omitted to serve the injured Africans on this occasion, he might have no
+other opportunity of doing it; and that he dared not, under these
+circumstances, neglect so great a duty."
+
+This prediction relative to himself became unfortunately verified; for his
+constitution, after this, began to decline, till at length his mortal
+destiny, in the eyes of his medical attendants, was sealed. But even then,
+when removed by pain and sickness from the discussion of political
+subjects, he never forgot this cause. In his own sufferings he was not
+unmindful of those of the injured Africans. "Two things," said he, on his
+death-bed, "I wish earnestly to see accomplished--peace with Europe,--and
+the abolition of the Slave-trade." But knowing well, that we could much
+better protect ourselves against our own external enemies, than this
+helpless people against their oppressors, he added, "but of the two I wish
+the latter." These sentiments he occasionally repeated, so that the subject
+was frequently in his thoughts in his last illness. Nay, "the very hope of
+the abolition (to use the expression of Lord Howick in the House of
+Commons) quivered on his lips in the last hour of it." Nor is it
+improbable, if earthly scenes ever rise to view at that awful crisis, and
+are perceptible, that it might have occupied his mind in the last moment of
+his existence. Then indeed would joy ineffable, from a conviction of having
+prepared the way for rescuing millions of human beings from misery, have
+attended the spirit on its departure from the body; and then also would
+this spirit, most of all purified when in the contemplation of peace,
+good-will, and charity upon earth, be in the fittest state, on gliding from
+its earthly cavern, to commix with the endless ocean of benevolence and
+love.
+
+At length the session of 1807 commenced. It was judged advisable by Lord
+Grenville, that the expected motion on this subject should, contrary to the
+practice hitherto adopted, be agitated first in the Lords. Accordingly, on
+the second of January he presented a bill, called an act for the abolition
+of the Slave-trade; but he then proposed only to print it, and to let it
+lie on the table, that it might be maturely considered, before it should be
+discussed.
+
+On the fourth no less than four counsel were heard against the bill.
+
+On the fifth the debate commenced. But of this I shall give no detailed
+account; nor, indeed, of any of those, which followed it. The truth is,
+that the subject has been exhausted. They, who spoke in favour of the
+abolition, said very little that was new concerning it. They, who spoke
+against it, brought forward, as usual, nothing but negative assertions and
+fanciful conjectures. To give therefore, what was said by both parties at
+these times, would be but useless repetition[A]. To give, on the other
+hand, that which was said on one side only would appear partial. Hence I
+shall offer to the reader little more than a narrative of facts upon these
+occasions.
+
+[Footnote A: The different debates in both Houses on this occasion would
+occupy the half of another volume. This is another circumstance, which
+reconciles me to the omission. But that, which reconciles me the most is,
+that they will be soon published. In these debates justice has been done to
+every individual concerned in them.]
+
+Lord Grenville opened the debate by a very luminous speech. He was
+supported by the Duke of Glocester, the Bishop of Durham (Dr. Barrington),
+the Earls Moira, Selkirk, and Roslyn, and the Lords Holland, King, and
+Hood. The opponents of the bill were the Duke of Clarence, the Earls
+Westmoreland and St. Vincent, and the Lords Sidmouth, Eldon, and
+Hawkesbury.
+
+
+The question being called for at four o'clock in the morning, it appeared
+that the personal votes and proxies in favour of Lord Grenville's motion
+amounted to one hundred, and those against it to thirty-six. Thus passed
+the first bill in England, which decreed, that the African Slave-trade
+should cease. And here I cannot omit paying to his Highness the Duke of
+Glocester the tribute of respect, which is due to him, for having opposed
+the example of his royal relations on this subject in behalf of an helpless
+and oppressed people. The sentiments too, which he delivered on this
+occasion, ought not to be forgotten. "This trade," said he, "is contrary to
+the principles of the British constitution. It is, besides, a cruel and
+criminal traffic in the blood of my fellow-creatures. It is a foul stain on
+the national character. It is an offence to the Almighty. On every ground
+therefore on which a decision can be made; on the ground of policy, of
+liberty, of humanity, of justice, but, above all, on the ground of
+religion, I shall vote for its immediate extinction."
+
+On the tenth of February the bill was carried to the House of Commons. On
+the twentieth, counsel were heard against it; after which, by agreement,
+the second reading of it took place. On the twenty-third the question being
+put for the commitment of it, Lord Viscount Howick (now Earl Grey) began an
+eloquent speech. After he had proceeded in it some way, he begged leave to
+enter his protest against certain principles of relative justice, which had
+been laid down. "The merchants and planters," said he, "have an undoubted
+right, in common with other subjects of the realm, to demand justice at our
+hands. But that, which they denominate justice, does not correspond with
+the legitimate character of that virtue; for they call upon us to violate
+the rights of others, and to transgress our own moral duties. That, which
+they distinguish as justice, involves in itself the greatest injury to
+others. It is not in fact justice, which they demand, but--favour--and
+favour to themselves at the expense of the most grievous oppression of
+their fellow-creatures."
+
+He then argued the question upon the ground of policy. He showed by a
+number of official documents, how little this trade had contributed to the
+wealth of the nation, being but a fifty-fourth part of its export trade;
+and he contended that as four-sevenths of it had been cut off by His
+Majesty's proclamation, and the passing of the foreign Slave-bill in a
+former year, no detriment of any consequence would arise from the present
+measure.
+
+He entered into an account of the loss of seamen, and of the causes of the
+mortality, in this trade.
+
+He went largely into the subject of the Negro-population in the islands
+from official documents, giving an account of it up to the latest date. He
+pointed out the former causes of its diminution, and stated how the
+remedies for these would follow.
+
+He showed how, even if the quantity of colonial produce should be
+diminished for a time, this disadvantage would, in a variety of instances,
+be more than counterbalanced by advantages, which would not only be great
+in themselves, but permanent.
+
+He then entered into a refutation of the various objections which had been
+made to the abolition, in an eloquent and perspicuous manner; and concluded
+by appealing to the great authorities of Mr. Pitt and Mr. Fox in behalf of
+the proposed measure. "These precious ornaments, he said, of their age and
+country had examined the subject with all the force of their capacious
+minds. On this question they had dismissed all animosity--all difference of
+opinion--and had proceeded in union;--and he believed, that the best
+tribute of respect we could show, or the most splendid monument we could
+raise, to their memories, Would be by the adoption of the glorious measure
+of the abolition of the Slave-trade."
+
+Lord Howick was supported by Mr. Roscoe, who was then one of the members
+for Liverpool; by Mr. Lushington, Mr. Fawkes, Lord Mahon, Lord Milton, Sir
+John Doyle, Sir Samuel Romilly, Mr. Wilberforce, and Earl Percy, the latter
+of whom wished that a clause might be put into the bill, by which all the
+children of slaves, born after January 1810, should be made free. General
+Gascoyne and Mr. Hibbert opposed the bill. Mr. Manning hoped that
+compensation would be made to the planters in case of loss. Mr. Bathurst
+and Mr. Hiley Addington preferred a plan for gradual abolition to the
+present mode. These having spoken, it appeared on a division that there
+were for the question two hundred and eighty-three, and against it only
+sixteen.
+
+Of this majority I cannot but remark, that it was probably the largest that
+was ever announced on any occasion, where the House was called upon to
+divide. I must observe also, that there was such an enthusiasm among the
+members at this time, that there appeared to be the same kind and degree of
+feeling, as manifested itself within the same walls in the year 1788, when
+the question was first started. This enthusiasm too, which was of a moral
+nature, was so powerful, that it seemed even to extend to a conversion of
+the heart: for several of the old opponents of this righteous cause went
+away, unable to vote against it; while others of them staid in their
+places, and voted in its favour.
+
+On the twenty-seventh of February Lord Howick moved, that the House resolve
+itself into a committee on the bill for the abolition of the Slave-trade.
+Sir C. Pole, Mr. Hughan, Brown, Bathurst, Windham, and Fuller opposed the
+motion; and Sir R. Milbank, and Mr. Wynne, Barham, Courtenay, Montague,
+Jacob, Whitbread, and Herbert (of Kerry), supported it. At length the
+committee was allowed to sit _pro forma_, and Mr. Hobhouse was put into the
+chair. The bill then went through it, and, the House being resumed, the
+report was received and read.
+
+On the sixth of March, when the committee sat again, Sir C. Pole moved,
+that the year 1812 be substituted for the year 1807, as the time when the
+trade should be abolished. This amendment produced a long debate, which was
+carried on by Sir C. Pole, Mr. Fuller, Hiley Addington, Rose, Gascoyne, and
+Bathurst on one side; and by Mr. Ward, Sir P. Francis, General Vyse, Sir T.
+Turton, Mr. Whitbread, Lord Henry Petty, Mr. Canning, Stanhope, Perceval,
+and Wilberforce on the other. At length, on a division, there appeared to
+be one hundred and twenty-five against the amendment, and for it only
+seventeen. The chairman then read the bill, and it was agreed that he
+should report it with the amendments on Monday. The bill enacted, that no
+vessel should clear out for slaves from any port within the British
+dominions after the first of May 1807, and that no slave should be landed
+in the colonies after the first of March 1808.
+
+On the sixteenth of March, on the motion of Lord Henry Petty, the question
+was put, that the bill be read a third time. Mr. Hibbert, Captain Herbert,
+Mr. T.W. Plomer, Mr. Windham, and Lord Castlereagh spoke against the
+motion. Sir P. Francis, Mr. Lyttleton, Mr. H. Thornton, and Mr. Barham,
+Sheridan, and Wilberforce supported it. After this the bill was passed
+without a division[A].
+
+[Footnote A: S. Lushington, esq. M.P. for Yarmouth, gave his voluntary
+attendance and assistance to the Committee, during all these motions, and
+J. Bowdler, esquire, was elected a member of it.]
+
+On Wednesday, the eighteenth, Lord Howick, accompanied by Mr. Wilberforce
+and others, carried the bill to the Lords. Lord Grenville, on receiving it,
+moved that it should be printed, and that, if this process could be
+finished by Monday, it should be taken into consideration on that day. The
+reason of this extraordinary haste was, that His Majesty, displeased with
+the introduction of the Roman-catholic officers' bill into the Commons, had
+signified his intention to the members of the existing administration, that
+they were to be displaced.
+
+The uneasiness, which, a few days before, had sprung up among the friends
+of the abolition, on the report that this event was probable, began now to
+show itself throughout the kingdom. Letters were written from various
+parts, manifesting the greatest fear and anxiety on account of the state of
+the bill, and desiring answers of consolation. Nor was this state of the
+mind otherwise than what might have been expected upon such an occasion;
+for the bill was yet to be printed--Being an amended one, it was to be
+argued again in the Lords--It was then to receive the royal assent--All
+these operations implied time; and it was reported that the new ministry[A]
+was formed; among whom were several, who had shown a hostile disposition to
+the cause.
+
+[Footnote A: The only circumstance, which afforded comfort at this time,
+was that the honourable Spencer Perceval and Mr. Canning were included in
+it, who were warm patrons of this great measure.]
+
+On Monday, the twenty-third, the House of Lords met. Such extraordinary
+diligence had been used in printing the bill, that it was then ready. Lord
+Grenville immediately brought it forward. The Earl of Westmoreland and the
+Marquis of Sligo opposed it. The Duke of Norfolk and the Bishop of Llandaff
+(Dr. Watson) supported it. The latter said, that this great act of justice
+would be recorded in heaven. The amendments were severally adopted without
+a division. But here an omission of three words was discovered, namely,
+"country, territory, or place," which, if not rectified, might defeat the
+purposes of the bill. An amendment was immediately proposed and carried.
+Thus the bill received the last sanction of the Peers. Lord Grenville then
+congratulated the House on the completion, on its part, of the most
+glorious measure, that had ever been adopted by any legislative body in the
+world.
+
+The amendment, now mentioned, occasioned the bill to be sent back to the
+Commons. On the twenty-fourth, on the motion of Lord Howick, it was
+immediately taken into consideration there, and agreed to; and it was
+carried back to the Lords, as approved of, on the same day.
+
+But though the bill had now passed both houses, there was an awful fear
+throughout the kingdom, lest it should not receive the royal assent before
+the ministry was dissolved. This event took place the next day; for on
+Wednesday the twenty-fifth, at half past eleven in the morning; His
+Majesty's message was delivered to the different members of it, that they
+were then to wait upon him to deliver up the seals of their offices. It
+then appeared that a commission for the royal assent to this bill among
+others had been obtained. This commission was instantly opened by the Lord
+Chancellor (Erskine), who was accompanied by the Lords Holland and
+Auckland; and as the clock struck twelve, just when the sun was in its
+meridian splendour to witness this august Act, this establishment of a
+Magna Charta for Africa in Britain, and to sanction it by its most vivid
+and glorious beams, it was completed. The ceremony being over, the seals of
+the respective offices were delivered up; so that the execution of this
+commission was the last act of the administration of Lord Grenville; an
+administration, which, on account of its virtuous exertions in behalf of
+the oppressed African race, will pass to posterity, living through
+successive generations, in the love and gratitude of the most virtuous of
+mankind.
+
+Thus ended one of the most glorious contests, after a continuance for
+twenty years, of any ever carried on in any age or country. A contest, not
+of brutal violence, but of reason. A contest between those, who felt deeply
+for the happiness and the honour of their fellow-creatures, and those, who,
+through vicious custom and the impulse of avarice, had trampled under-foot
+the sacred rights of their nature, and had even attempted to efface all
+title to the divine image from their minds.
+
+Of the immense advantages of this contest I know not how to speak. Indeed,
+the very agitation of the question, which it involved, has been highly
+important. Never was the heart of man so expanded. Never were its generous
+sympathies so generally and so perseveringly excited. These sympathies,
+thus called into existence, have been useful in the preservation of a
+national virtue. For any thing we know, they may have contributed greatly
+to form a counteracting balance against the malignant spirit, generated by
+our almost incessant wars during this period, so as to have preserved us
+from barbarism.
+
+It has been useful also in the discrimination of moral character. In
+private life it has enabled us to distinguish the virtuous from the more
+vicious part of the community[A]. It has shown the general philanthropist.
+It has unmasked the vicious in spite of his pretension to virtue. It has
+afforded us the same knowledge in public life. It has separated the moral
+statesman from the wicked politician. It has shown us who, in the
+legislative and executive offices of our country are fit to save, and who
+to destroy, a nation.
+
+[Footnote A: I have had occasion to know many thousand persons in the
+course of my travels on this subject; and I can truly say, that the part,
+which these took on this great question, was always a true criterion of
+their moral character. Some indeed opposed the abolition, who seemed to be
+so respectable, that it was difficult to account for their conduct; but it
+invariably turned out in a course of time, either that they had been
+influenced by interested motives, or that they were not men of steady moral
+principle. In the year 1792, when the national enthusiasm was so great, the
+good were as distinguishable from the bad, according to their disposition
+to this great cause, as if the divine Being had marked them; or, as a
+friend of mine the other day observed, as we may suppose the sheep to be
+from the goats on the day of judgment.]
+
+It has furnished us also with important lessons. It has proved what a
+creature man is! how devoted he is to his own interest! to what a length of
+atrocity he can go, unless fortified by religious principle! But as if this
+part of the prospect would be too afflicting, it has proved to us, on the
+other hand, what a glorious instrument he may become in the hands of his
+Maker; and that a little virtue, when properly leavened, is made capable of
+counteracting the effects of a mass of vice!
+
+With respect to the end obtained by this contest, or the great measure of
+the abolition of the Slave-trade as it has now passed, I know not how to
+appreciate its importance. To our own country, indeed, it is invaluable. We
+have lived, in consequence of it, to see the day, when it has been recorded
+as a principle in our legislation, that commerce itself shall have its
+moral boundaries. We have lived to see the day, when we are likely to be
+delivered from the contagion of the most barbarous opinions. They, who
+supported this wicked traffic, virtually denied, that man was a moral
+being. They substituted the law of force for the law of reason. But the
+great Act now under our consideration, has banished the impious doctrine,
+and restored the rational creature to his moral rights. Nor is it a matter
+of less pleasing consideration, that, at this awful crisis, when the
+constitutions of kingdoms are on the point of dissolution, the stain of the
+blood of Africa is no longer upon us, or that we have been freed (alas, if
+it be not too late!) from a load of guilt, which has long hung like a
+mill-stone about our necks, ready to sink us to perdition.
+
+In tracing the measure still further, or as it will affect other lands, we
+become only the more sensible of its importance: for can we pass over to
+Africa; can we pass over to the numerous islands, the receptacles of
+miserable beings from thence; and can we call to mind the scenes of misery,
+which have been passing in each of these regions of the earth, without
+acknowledging, that one of the greatest sources of suffering to the human
+race has, as far as our own power extends, been done away? Can we pass over
+to these regions again, and contemplate the multitude of crimes, which the
+agency necessary for keeping up the barbarous system produced, without
+acknowledging, that a source of the most monstrous and extensive wickedness
+has been removed also? But here, indeed, it becomes us peculiarly to
+rejoice; for though nature shrinks from pain, and compassion is engendered
+in us when we see it become the portion of others, yet what is physical
+suffering compared with moral guilt? The misery of the oppressed is, in the
+first place, not contagious like the crime of the oppressor. Nor is the
+mischief, which it generates, either so frightful or so pernicious. The
+body, though under affliction, may retain its shape; and, if it even
+perish, what is the loss of it but of worthless dust? But when the moral
+springs of the mind are poisoned, we lose the most excellent part of the
+constitution of our nature, and the divine image is no longer perceptible
+in us. Nor are the two evils of similar duration. By a decree of
+Providence, for which we cannot be too thankful, we are made mortal. Hence
+the torments of the oppressor are but temporary; whereas the immortal part
+of us, when once corrupted, may carry its pollutions with it into another
+world.
+
+But independently of the quantity of physical suffering and the innumerable
+avenues to vice in more than a quarter of the globe, which this great
+measure will cut off, there are yet blessings, which we have reason to
+consider as likely to flow from it. Among these we cannot overlook the
+great probability, that Africa, now freed from the vicious and barbarous
+effects of this traffic, may be in a better state to comprehend and receive
+the sublime truths of the Christian religion. Nor can we overlook the
+probability, that, a new system of treatment necessarily springing up in
+our islands, the same bright sun of consolation may visit her children
+there. But here a new hope rises to our view. Who knows but that
+emancipation, like a beautiful plant, may, in its due season, rise out of
+the ashes of the abolition of the Slave-trade, and that, when its own
+intrinsic value shall be known, the seed of it may be planted in other
+lands? And looking at the subject in this point of view, we cannot but be
+struck with the wonderful concurrence of events as previously necessary for
+this purpose, namely, that two nations, England and America, the mother and
+the child, should, in the same month of the same year, have abolished this
+impious traffic; nations, which at this moment have more than a million of
+subjects within their jurisdiction to partake of the blessing; and one of
+which, on account of her local situation and increasing power, is likely in
+time to give, if not law, at least a tone to the manners and customs of the
+great continent, on which she is situated.
+
+Reader! Thou art now acquainted with the history of this contest! Rejoice
+in the manner of its termination! And, if thou feelest grateful for the
+event, retire within thy closet, and pour out thy thanksgivings to the
+Almighty for this his unspeakable act of mercy to thy oppressed
+fellow-creatures.
+
+
+
+
+THE END.
+
+
+
+
+TABLE OF CONTENTS.
+
+
+
+
+VOL. I.
+
+
+CHAP. 1. INTRODUCTION--Estimate of the evil of the Slave-trade--and of the
+blessing of the Abolition of it--Usefulness of the contemplation of this
+subject
+
+CHAP. 2. Those, who favoured the cause of the Africans previously to 1787,
+were so many necessary forerunners in it--Cardinal Ximenes--and others
+
+CHAP. 3. Forerunners continued to 1787--divided now into four
+classes--First consists of persons in England of various descriptions,
+Godwyn, Baxter, and others
+
+CHAP. 4. Second, of the Quakers in England, George Fox, and his religious
+descendants
+
+CHAP. 5. Third, of the Quakers in America--Union of these with individuals
+of other religious denominations in the same cause
+
+CHAP. 6. Facility of junction between the members of these three different
+classes
+
+CHAP. 7. Fourth consists of Dr. Peckard--then of the Author--Author wishes
+to embark in the cause--falls in with several of the members of these
+classes
+
+CHAP. 8. Fourth class continued--Langton--Baker--and others--Author now
+embarks in the cause as a business of his life
+
+CHAP. 9. Fourth class continued--Sheldon--Mackworth--and others--Author
+seeks for further information on the subject--and visits Members of
+Parliament
+
+CHAP. 10. Fourth class continued--Author enlarges his knowledge--Meeting at
+Mr. Wilberforce's--Remarkable junction of all the four classes, and a
+Committee formed out of them, in May 1787, for the Abolition of the
+Slave-trade
+
+CHAP. 11. History of the preceding classes, and of their junction, shown by
+means of a map
+
+CHAP. 12. Author endeavours to do away the charge of ostentation in
+consequence of becoming so conspicuous in this work
+
+CHAP. 13. Proceedings of the Committee--Emancipation declared to be no part
+of its object--Wrongs of Africa by Mr. Roscoe
+
+CHAP. 14. Author visits Bristol to collect information--Ill usage of seamen
+in the Slave-trade--Articles of African produce--Massacre at Calebàr
+
+CHAP. 15. Mode of procuring and paying seamen in that trade--their
+mortality in it--Construction and admeasurement of Slave-ships--Difficulty
+of procuring evidence--Cases of Gardiner and Arnold
+
+CHAP. 16. Author meets with Alexander Falconbridge--visits ill-treated and
+disabled seamen--takes a mate out of one of the Slave-vessels--and puts
+another in prison for murder
+
+CHAP. 17. Visits Liverpool--Specimens of African
+produce--Dock-duties--Iron-instruments used in the traffic--His
+introduction to Mr. Norris
+
+CHAP. 18. Manner of procuring and paying seamen at Liverpool in the
+Slave-trade--their treatment and mortality--Murder of Peter
+Green--Dangerous situation of the Author in consequence of his inquiries
+
+CHAP. 19. Author proceeds to Manchester--delivers a discourse there on the
+subject of the Slave-trade--revisits Bristol--New and difficult
+situation--suddenly crosses the Severn at night--returns to London
+
+CHAP. 20. Labours of the Committee during the Author's journey--Mr. Sharp
+elected chairman--Seal engraved--Letters from different correspondents to
+the Committee
+
+CHAP. 21. Further labours of the Committee to February 1788--List of new
+Correspondents
+
+CHAP. 22. Progress of the cause to the middle of May--Petitions to
+Parliament--Author's interviews with Mr. Pitt and Mr. Grenville--Privy
+council inquire into the subject--examine Liverpool-delegates--Proceedings
+of the Committee for the abolition--Motion and debate in the House of
+Commons--Discussion of the general question postponed to the next session
+
+CHAP. 23. Progress to the middle of July--Bill to diminish the horrors of
+the Middle Passage--Evidence examined against it--Debates--Bill passed
+through both Houses--Proceedings of the Committee, and effects of them.
+
+
+
+
+VOL. II.
+
+
+CHAP. 1. Continuation from June 1758 to July 1739--Author travels in search
+of fresh evidence--Privy council resume their examinations--prepare their
+report--Proceedings of the Committee for the abolition--and of the Planters
+and others--Privy council report laid on the table of the House of
+Commons--Debate upon it--Twelve propositions--Opponents refuse to argue
+from the report--Examine new evidence of their own in the House of
+Commons--Renewal of the Middle Passage-Bill--Death and character of Ramsay
+
+CHAP. 2. Continuation from July 1789 to July 1790--Author travels to Paris
+to promote the abolition in France--His proceedings there--returns to
+England--Examination of opponents' evidence resumed in the Commons--Author
+travels in quest of new evidence on the side of the abolition--This, after
+great opposition, introduced--Renewal of the Middle Passage-Bill--Section
+of the Slave-ship--Cowper's Negro's Complaint--Wedgwood's Cameos.
+
+CHAP. 3. Continuation from July 1790 to July 1791--Author travels
+again--Examinations on the side of the abolition resumed in the
+Commons--List of those examined--Cruel circumstances of the times--Motion
+for the abolition of the trade--Debates--Motion lost--Resolutions of the
+Committee--Sierra Leone Company established
+
+CHAP. 4. Continuation from July 1791 to July 1792--Author travels
+again--People begin to leave off sugar--Petition Parliament--Motion renewed
+in the Commons--Debates--Abolition resolved upon, but not to commence till
+1796--The Lords determine upon hearing evidence on the resolution--This
+evidence introduced--Further hearing of it postponed to the next session
+
+CHAP. 5. Continuation from July 1792 to July 1793--Author travels
+again--Motion to renew the Resolution of the last year in the
+Commons--Motion lost--New motion to abolish the foreign Slave-trade--Motion
+lost--Proceedings of the Lords
+
+CHAP. 6. Continuation from July 1793 to July 1794--Author travels
+again--Motion to abolish the foreign Slave-trade renewed and carried--but
+lost in the Lords--Further proceedings there--Author, on account of
+declining health, obliged to retire from the cause
+
+CHAP. 7. Continuation from July 1794 to July 1799--Various motions within
+this period
+
+CHAP. 8. Continuation from July 1799 to July 18O5--Various motions within
+this period
+
+CHAP. 9. Continuation from July 1805 to July 1806--Author, restored, joins
+the Committee again--Death of Mr. Pitt--Foreign Slave-trade
+abolished--Resolution to take measures for the total abolition of the
+trade--Address to the King to negotiate with foreign powers for their
+concurrence in it--Motion to prevent new vessels going into the trade--all
+these carried through both Houses of Parliament
+
+CHAP. 10. Continuation from July 1806 to July 1807--Death of Mr. Fox--Bill
+for the total abolition carried in the Lords--Sent from thence to the
+Commons--amended, and passed there, and sent back to the Lords--receives
+the royal assent--Reflections on this great event
+
+
+
+
+
+End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The History of the Rise, Progress and
+Accomplishment of the Abolition of the African Slave Trade by the British Parliament (1808), by Thomas Clarkson
+
+*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 12507 ***
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+Project Gutenberg (https://www.gutenberg.org) public repository for
+eBook #12507 (https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/12507)
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+The Project Gutenberg EBook of The History of the Rise, Progress and
+Accomplishment of the Abolition of the African Slave Trade by the British Parliament (1808), by Thomas Clarkson
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: The History of the Rise, Progress and Accomplishment of the Abolition of the African Slave Trade by the British Parliament (1808)
+       Vol. II
+
+Author: Thomas Clarkson
+
+Release Date: June 3, 2004 [EBook #12507]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ABOLITION OF THE SLAVE TRADE V.2. ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Carlo Traverso, Robert Morse and PG Distributed
+Proofreaders. This file was produced from images generously made
+available by the Bibliothèque nationale de France (BnF/Gallica) at
+http://gallica.bnf.fr.
+
+
+
+
+
+THE
+HISTORY
+OF THE
+RISE, PROGRESS, AND ACCOMPLISHMENT
+OF
+THE ABOLITION
+OF
+THE AFRICAN SLAVE-TRADE
+BY THE
+BRITISH PARLIAMENT.
+
+BY THOMAS CLARKSON, M.A.
+
+1808.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER I.
+
+_Continuation from June 1788 to July 1789--Author travels to collect
+further evidence--great difficulties in obtaining it--forms committees on
+his tour--Privy council resume the examinations--inspect cabinet of African
+productions--obliged to leave many of the witnesses in behalf of the
+abolition unexamined--prepare their report--Labours of the committee in the
+interim--Proceedings of the planters and others--Report laid on the table
+of the House of Commons--Introduction of the question, and debate
+there--twelve propositions deduced from the report and reserved for future
+discussion--day of discussion arrives--opponents refuse to argue from the
+report--require new evidence--this granted and introduced--further
+consideration of the subject deferred to the next session--Renewal of Sir
+William Dolben's bill--Death and character of Ramsay._
+
+
+Matters had now become serious. The gauntlet had been thrown down and
+accepted. The combatants had taken their stations, and the contest was to
+be renewed, which was to be decided soon on the great theatre of the
+nation. The committee by the very act of their institution had pronounced
+the Slave-trade to be criminal. They, on the other hand, who were concerned
+in it, had denied the charge. It became the one to prove, and the other to
+refute it, or to fall in the ensuing session.
+
+The committee, in this perilous situation, were anxious to find out such
+other persons, as might become proper evidences before the privy council.
+They had hitherto sent there only nine or ten, and they had then only
+another, whom they could count upon for this purpose, in their view. The
+proposal of sending persons to Africa, and the West Indies, who might come
+back and report what they had witnessed, had been already negatived. The
+question then was, what they were to do. Upon this they deliberated, and
+the result was an application to me to undertake a journey to different
+parts of the kingdom for this purpose.
+
+When this determination was made I was at Teston, writing a long letter to
+the privy council on the ill usage and mortality of the seamen employed in
+the Slave-trade, which it had been previously agreed should be received as
+evidence there. I thought it proper, however, before I took my departure,
+to form a system of questions upon the general subject. These I divided
+into six tables. The first related to the productions of Africa, and the
+disposition and manners of the natives. The second, to the methods of
+reducing them to slavery. The third, to the manner of bringing them to the
+ships, their value, the medium of exchange, and other circumstances. 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 ships 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 Dorsetshire 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 instituted 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 assertion 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 assertion 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 consequent 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 a 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 principal 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 establishing a committee there. This was
+afterwards effected; and Mr. Milford, who, at a general meeting of the
+inhabitants of Exeter, on the tenth 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
+circumstances affected many. When I took out my pen and ink to put down the
+information, which a person was giving me, he became evidently embarrassed
+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 any thing 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
+Jimlaké, were of a yellow colour; Acajoú was of a beautiful deep crimson;
+Bork and Quellé 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 pronounced, 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
+grass, and fancifully coloured; ornaments made of the same materials; ropes
+made from a species of aloes, and others, remarkably strong, from grass 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 Galàm 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 the former volume, 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 that all of them might be examined. I 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 Lordships, they had agreed to meet on the Saturday next, and
+on the Tuesday following, for the purpose of receiving the evidence of some
+of the gentlemen named in it. And it was their Lordships' desire that I
+would give notice to any three of them (whose information I might consider
+as 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 then 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 Mr. 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 volume, who had promised me, when I was in Bristol,
+in the year 1787, that they would keep a journal of facts for me during the
+voyages they were then going to perform. They had both of them 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 circumstances,
+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
+circumstances, 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 of ten
+or twelve daily became necessary.
+
+But the contents of these letters afforded the circumstances, which gave
+birth to so much suffering. They contained usually some affecting tale of
+woe. At Bristol my feelings had been harassed 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 proceed. 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 harassed: 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 passed over on these occasions.
+
+The disappointments too, which I frequently experienced in these 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 noble 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 spacious 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 an 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
+nobler part of it ought not to be forgotten. While I passed 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 institution. 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, esquire, on Sir William Dolben's Bill, of which an extract was
+given in the first volume; Notes by a Planter on the two Reports from the
+Committee of the honourable House of Assembly of Jamaica; Observations on
+the Slave-trade by Mr. Wadstrom; and Dickson'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 reverend Mr. Gifford, 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, esquires, into their own
+body, and Alexander Jaffray, esquire, the reverend Charles Symmons of
+Haverfordwest, and the reverend T. Burgess (now bishop of St. David's), 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 Shields; William Proud, of Hull; the
+reverend T. Gisborne, of Yoxall Lodge; and William Ellford, esquire, of
+Plymouth. The latter, as chairman of the Plymouth committee, sent up for
+inspection an engraving of a plan and section of a slave-ship, 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, esquire, of West Bromwich;
+the reverend T. Clarke, of Hull; S.P. Wolferstan, esquire, of Stafford near
+Tamworth; Edmund Lodge, esquire, of Halifax; the reverend 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 institution 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 Dickson, John Erskine, John Campbell, Archibald Gibson,
+Archibald Fletcher, and Horatius Canning, esquires, as the committee.
+
+The others were, the reverend J. Bidlake, of Plymouth; Joseph Storrs, of
+Chesterfield; William Fothergill, of Carr End, Yorkshire; 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 reverend 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 institution 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 (now Lord Auckland), 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 Bourdeaux; 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 assistance in my power. I have for a long time taken
+an interest in the general alarm on this occasion, and in the noble
+alliance of the friends of humanity in favour of the injured Africans.
+Such an attempt throws a new lustre 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 nineteenth 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 twenty-third of April, for
+this purpose. This motion was agreed to; after which he moved for certain
+official documents, necessary to throw light upon the subject in the course
+of its discussion.
+
+This motion, by means of which the great day of trial was now fixed, seemed
+to be the signal for the planters, merchants, and other interested persons
+to begin a furious opposition. Meetings were accordingly called by
+advertisement. At these meetings much warmth and virulence were manifested
+in debate, and propositions breathing a spirit of anger were adopted. It
+was suggested there, in the vehemence of passion, that the Islands could
+exist independently of the Mother-country; nor were even threats withheld
+to intimidate government from effecting the abolition.
+
+From this time, also, the public papers began to be filled with such
+statements as were thought most likely to influence the members of the
+House of Commons, previously to the discussion of the question.
+
+The first impression attempted to be made upon them was with respect to the
+slaves themselves. It was contended, and attempted to be shown by the
+revival of the old argument of human sacrifices in Africa, that these were
+better off in the islands than in their own country. It was contended also,
+that they were people of very inferior capacities, and but little removed
+from the brute creation; whence an inference was drawn, that their
+treatment, against which so much clamour had arisen, was adapted to their
+intellect and feelings.
+
+The next attempt was to degrade the abolitionists in the opinion of the
+house, by showing the wildness and absurdity of their schemes. It was again
+insisted upon that emancipation was the real object of the former; so that
+thousands of slaves would be let loose in the islands to rob or perish, and
+who could never be brought back again into habits of useful industry.
+
+An attempt was then made to excite their pity in behalf of the planters.
+The abolition, it was said, would produce insurrections among the slaves.
+But insurrections would produce the massacre of their masters; and, if any
+of these should happily escape from butchery, they would be reserved only
+for ruin.
+
+An appeal was then made to them on the ground of their own interest and of
+that of the people, whom they represented. It was stated that the ruin of
+the islands would be the ruin of themselves and of the country. Its revenue
+would be half annihilated. Its naval strength would decay. Merchants,
+manufacturers and others would come to beggary. But in this deplorable
+situation they would expect to be indemnified for their losses.
+Compensation indeed must follow. It could not be withheld. But what would
+be the amount of it? The country would have no less than from eighty to a
+hundred millions to pay the sufferers; and it would be driven to such
+distress in paying this sum us it had never before experienced.
+
+The last attempt was to show them that a regulation of the trade was all
+that was now wanted. While this would remedy the evils complained of, it
+would prevent the mischief which would assuredly follow the abolition. The
+planters had already done their part. The assemblies of the different
+islands had most of them made wholesome laws upon the subject. The very
+bills passed for this purpose in Jamaica and Grenada had arrived in
+England, and might be seen by the public: the great grievances had
+been redressed: no slave could now be mutilated or wantonly killed
+by his owner; one man could not now maltreat, or bruise, or wound
+the slave of another; the aged could not now be turned off to perish
+by hunger. There were laws also relative to the better feeding and
+clothing of the slaves. It remained only that the trade to Africa
+should be put under as wise and humane regulations as the slavery in
+the islands had undergone.
+
+These different statements, appearing now in the public papers from day to
+day, began, in this early stage of the question, when the subject in all
+its bearings was known but to few, to make a considerable impression upon
+those, who were soon to be called to the decision of it. But that, which
+had the greatest effect upon them, was the enormous amount of the
+compensation, which, it was said, must be made. This statement against the
+abolition was making its way so powerfully, that Archdeacon Paley thought
+it his duty to write, and to send to the committee, a little treatise
+called Arguments against the unjust Pretensions of Slave-dealers and
+Holders, to be indemnified by pecuniary Allowances at the public Expense in
+case the Slave-trade should be abolished. This treatise, when the substance
+of it was detailed in the public papers, had its influence upon several
+members of the House of Commons. But there were others, who had been as it
+were panic-struck by the statement. These in their fright seemed to have
+lost the right use of their eyes, or to have looked through a magnifying
+glass. With these the argument of emancipation, which they would have
+rejected at another time as ridiculous, obtained now easy credit. The
+massacres too and the ruin, though only conjectural, they admitted also.
+Hence some of them deserted our cause wholly, while others, wishing to do
+justice as far as they could to the slaves on the one hand, and to their
+own countrymen on the other, adopted a middle line of conduct, and would go
+no further than the regulation of the trade.
+
+While these preparations were making by our opponents to prejudice the
+minds of those, who were to be the judges in this contest, Mr. Pitt
+presented the privy council report at the bar of the House of Commons; and
+as it was a large folio volume, and contained the evidence upon which the
+question was to be decided, it was necessary that time should be given to
+the members to peruse it. Accordingly the twelfth of May was appointed,
+instead of the twenty-third of April, for the discussion of the question.
+
+This postponement of the discussion of the question gave time to all
+parties to prepare themselves further. The merchants and planters availed
+themselves of it to collect petitions to parliament from interested persons
+against the abolition of the trade, to wait upon members of parliament by
+deputation, in order to solicit their attendance in their favour, and to
+renew their injurious paragraphs in the public papers. The committee for
+the abolition availed themselves of it to reply to these; and here Dr.
+Dickson, who had been secretary to Governor Hey, in Barbadoes, and who had
+offered the committee his Letters on Slavery before mentioned and his
+services also, was of singular use. Many members of parliament availed
+themselves of it to retire into the country to read the report. Among the
+latter were Mr. Wilberforce and Mr. Pitt. In this retirement they
+discovered, notwithstanding the great disadvantages under which we had
+laboured with respect to evidence, that our cause was safe, and that, as
+far as it was to be decided by reason and sound policy, it would triumph.
+It was in this retirement that Mr. Pitt made those able calculations, which
+satisfied him for ever after, as the minister of the country, as to the
+safety of the great measure of the abolition of the Slave-trade; for he had
+clearly proved, that not only the islands could go on in a flourishing
+state without supplies from the coast of Africa, but that they were then in
+a condition to do it.
+
+At length, the twelfth of May arrived. Mr. Wilberforce rose up in the
+Commons, and moved the order of the day for the house to resolve itself
+into a committee of the whole house, to take into consideration the
+petitions, which had been presented against the Slave-trade.
+
+This order having been read, he moved that the report of the committee of
+privy council; that the acts passed in the islands relative to slaves; that
+the evidence adduced last year on the Slave-trade; that the petitions
+offered in the last session against the Slave-trade; and that the accounts
+presented to the house, in the last and present session, relative to the
+exports and imports to Africa, be referred to the same committee.
+
+These motions having been severally agreed to, the house immediately
+resolved itself into a committee of the whole house, and Sir William Dolben
+was put into the chair.
+
+Mr. Wilberforce began by declaring, that, when he considered how much
+discussion the subject, which he was about to explain to the committee, had
+occasioned not only in that house but throughout the kingdom, and
+throughout Europe; and when he considered the extent and importance of it,
+the variety of interests involved in it, and the consequences which might
+arise, he owned he had been filled with apprehensions, lest a subject of
+such magnitude, and a cause of such weight, should suffer from the weakness
+of its advocate; but when he recollected that in the progress of his
+inquiries he had every where been received with candour, that most people
+gave him credit for the purity of his motives, and that, however many of
+these might then differ from him, they were all likely to agree in the end,
+he had dismissed his fears and marched forward with a firmer step in this
+cause of humanity, justice and religion. He could not, however, but lament
+that the subject had excited so much warmth. He feared that too many on
+this account were but ill prepared to consider it with impartiality. He
+entreated all such to endeavour to be calm and composed. A fair and cool
+discussion was essentially necessary. The motion he meant to offer was as
+reconcileable to political expediency as to national humanity. It belonged
+to no party-question. It would in the end be found serviceable to all
+parties; and to the best interests of the country. He did not come forward
+to accuse the West India planter, or the Liverpool merchant, or indeed any
+one concerned in this traffic; but, if blame attached any where, to take
+shame to himself, in common indeed with the whole parliament of Great
+Britain, who, having suffered it to be carried on under their own
+authority, were all of them participators in the guilt.
+
+In endeavouring to explain the great business of the day, he said he should
+call the attention of the house only to the leading features of the
+Slave-trade. Nor should he dwell long upon these. Every one might imagine
+for himself, what must be the natural consequence of such a commerce with
+Africa. Was it not plain that she must suffer from it? that her savage
+manners must be rendered still more ferocious? and that a trade of this
+nature, carried on round her coasts, must extend violence and desolation to
+her very centre? It was well known that the natives of Africa were sold as
+goods, and that numbers of them were continually conveyed away from their
+country by the owners of British vessels. The question then was, which way
+the latter came by them. In answer to this question the privy council
+report, which was then on the table, afforded evidence the most
+satisfactory and conclusive. He had found things in it, which had confirmed
+every proposition he had maintained before, whether this proposition had
+been gathered from living information of the best authority, or from the
+histories he had read. But it was unnecessary either to quote the report,
+or to appeal to history on this occasion. Plain reason and common sense
+would point out how the poor Africans were obtained. Africa was a country
+divided into many kingdoms, which had different governments and laws. In
+many parts the princes were despotic. In others they had a limited rule.
+But in all of them, whatever the nature of the government was, men were
+considered as goods and property, and, as such, subject to plunder in the
+same manner as property in other countries. The persons in power there were
+naturally fond of our commodities; and to obtain them (which could only be
+done by the sale of their countrymen) they waged war on one another, or
+even ravaged their own country, when they could find no pretence for
+quarrelling with their neighbours; in their courts of law many poor
+wretches, who were innocent, were condemned; and, to obtain these
+commodities in greater abundance, thousands were kidnapped and torn from
+their families and sent into slavery. Such transactions, he said, were
+recorded in every history of Africa, and the report on the table confirmed
+them. With respect, however, to these he should make but one or two
+observations. If we looked into the reign of Henry the Eighth, we should
+find a parallel for one of them. We should find that similar convictions
+took place; and that penalties followed conviction.
+
+With respect to wars, the kings of Africa were never induced to engage in
+them by public principles, by national glory, and least of all by the love
+of their people. This had been stated by those most conversant in the
+subject, by Dr. Spaarman and Mr. Wadstrom. They had conversed with these
+princes, and had learned from their own mouths, that to procure slaves was
+the object of their hostilities. Indeed, there was scarcely a single person
+examined before the privy council, who did not prove that the Slave-trade
+was the source of the tragedies acted upon that extensive continent. Some
+had endeavoured to palliate this circumstance; but there was not one who
+did not more or less admit it to be true. By one the Slave-trade was called
+the concurrent cause, by the majority it was acknowledged to be the
+principal motive of the African wars. The same might be said with respect
+to those instances of treachery and injustice, in which individuals were
+concerned. And here he was sorry to observe that our own countrymen were
+often guilty. He would only at present advert to the tragedy at Calabàr,
+where two large African villages, having been for some time at war, made
+peace. This peace was to have been ratified by intermarriages; but some of
+our captains, who were there, seeing their trade would be stopped for a
+while, sowed dissension again between them. They actually set one village
+against the other, took a share in the contest, massacred many of the
+inhabitants, and carried others of them away as slaves. But shocking as
+this transaction might appear, there was not a single history of Africa to
+be read, in which scenes of as atrocious a nature were not related. They,
+he said, who defended this trade, were warped and blinded by their own
+interests, and would not be convinced of the miseries they were daily
+heaping on their fellow-creatures. By the countenance they gave it, they
+had reduced the inhabitants of Africa to a worse state than that of the
+most barbarous nation. They had destroyed what ought to have been the bond
+of union and safety among them: they had introduced discord and anarchy
+among them: they had set kings against their subjects, and subjects against
+each other: they had rendered every private family wretched: they had, in
+short, given birth to scenes of injustice and misery not to be found in any
+other quarter of the globe.
+
+Having said thus much on the subject of procuring slaves in Africa, he
+would now go to that of the transportation of them. And here he had fondly
+hoped, that when men with affections and feelings like our own had been
+torn from their country, and every thing dear to them, he should have found
+some mitigation of their sufferings; but the sad reverse was the case. This
+was the most wretched part of the whole subject. He was incapable of
+impressing the house with what he felt upon it. A description of their
+conveyance was impossible. So much misery condensed in so little room was
+more than the human imagination had ever before conceived. Think only of
+six hundred persons linked together, trying to get rid of each other,
+crammed in a close vessel with every object that was nauseous and
+disgusting, diseased, and struggling with all the varieties of
+wretchedness. It seemed impossible to add any thing more to human misery.
+Yet shocking as this description must be felt to be by every man, the
+transportation had been described by several witnesses from Liverpool to be
+a comfortable conveyance. Mr. Norris had painted the accommodations on
+board a slave-ship in the most glowing colours. He had represented them in
+a manner which would have exceeded his attempts at praise of the most
+luxurious scenes. Their apartments, he said, were fitted up as
+advantageously for them as circumstances could possibly admit: they had
+several meals a day; some, of their own country provisions, with the best
+sauces of African cookery; and, by way of variety, another meal of pulse,
+according to the European taste. After breakfast they had water to wash
+themselves, while their apartments were perfumed with frankincense and
+lime-juice. Before dinner they were amused after the manner of their
+country; instruments of music were introduced: the song and the dance were
+promoted: games of chance were furnished them: the men played and sang,
+while the women and girls made fanciful ornaments from beads, with which
+they were plentifully supplied. They were indulged in all their little
+fancies, and kept in sprightly humour. Another of them had said, when the
+sailors were flogged, it was out of the hearing of the Africans, lest it
+should depress their spirits. He by no means wished to say that such
+descriptions were wilful misrepresentations. If they were not, it proved
+that interest of prejudice was capable of spreading a film over the eyes
+thick enough to occasion total blindness.
+
+Others, however, and these men of the greatest veracity, had given a
+different account. What would the house think, when by the concurring
+testimony of these the true history was laid open? The slaves who had been
+described as rejoicing in their captivity, were so wrung with misery at
+leaving their country, that it was the constant practice to set sail in the
+night, lest they should know the moment of their departure. With respect to
+their accommodation, the right ancle of one was fastened to the left ancle
+of another by an iron fetter; and if they were turbulent, by another on the
+wrists. Instead of the apartments described, they were placed in niches,
+and along the decks, in such a manner, that it was impossible for any one
+to pass among them, however careful he might be, without treading upon
+them. Sir George Yonge had testified, that in a slave-ship, on board of
+which he went, and which had not completed her cargo by two hundred and
+fifty, instead of the scent of frankincense being perceptible to the
+nostrils, the stench was intolerable. The allowance of water was so
+deficient, that the slaves were frequently found gasping for life, and
+almost suffocated. The pulse with which they had been said to be favoured,
+were absolutely English horse-beans. The legislature of Jamaica had stated
+the scantiness both of water and provisions, as a subject which called for
+the interference of parliament. As Mr. Norris had said, the song and the
+dance were promoted, he could not pass over these expressions without
+telling the house what they meant. It would have been much more fair if he
+himself had explained the word _promoted_. The truth was, that, for the
+sake of exercise, these miserable wretches, loaded with chains and
+oppressed with disease, were forced to dance by the terror of the lash, and
+sometimes by the actual use of it. "I," said one of the evidences, "was
+employed to dance the men, while another person danced the women." Such
+then was the meaning of the word _promoted_; and it might also be observed
+with respect to food, that instruments were sometimes carried out, in order
+to force them to eat; which was the same sort of proof, how much they
+enjoyed themselves in this instance also. With respect to their singing, it
+consisted of songs of lamentation for the loss of their country. While they
+sung they were in tears: so that one of the captains, more humane probably
+than the rest, threatened a woman with a flogging because the mournfulness
+of her song was too painful for his feelings. Perhaps he could not give a
+better proof of the sufferings of these injured people during their
+passage, than by stating the mortality which accompanied it. This was a
+species of evidence which was infallible on this occasion. Death was a
+witness which could not deceive them; and the proportion of deaths would
+not only confirm, but, if possible, even aggravate our suspicion of the
+misery of the transit. It would be found, upon an average of all the ships,
+upon which evidence had been given, that, exclusively of such as perished
+before they sailed from Africa, not less than twelve and a half per cent
+died on their passage: besides these, the Jamaica report stated that four
+and a half per cent died while in the harbours, or on shore before the day
+of sale, which was only about the space of twelve or fourteen days after
+their arrival there; and one third more died in the seasoning: and this in
+a climate exactly similar to their own, and where, as some of the witnesses
+pretended, they were healthy and happy. Thus, out of every lot of one
+hundred, shipped from Africa, seventeen died in about nine weeks, and not
+more than fifty lived to become effective labourers in our islands.
+
+Having advanced thus far in his investigation, he felt, he said, the
+wickedness of the Slave-trade to be so enormous, so dreadful, and
+irremediable, that he could stop at no alternative short of its abolition.
+A trade founded on iniquity, and carried on with such circumstances of
+horror, must be abolished, let the policy of it be what it might; and he
+had from this time determined, whatever were the consequences, that he
+would never rest till he had effected that abolition. His mind had indeed
+been harassed by the objections of the West India planters, who had
+asserted, that the ruin of their property must be the consequence of such a
+measure. He could not help, however, distrusting their arguments. He could
+not believe that the Almighty Being, who had forbidden the practice of
+rapine and bloodshed, had made rapine and bloodshed necessary to any part
+of his universe. He felt a confidence in this persuasion, and took the
+resolution to act upon it. Light indeed soon broke in upon him. The
+suspicion of his mind was every day confirmed by increasing information,
+and the evidence he had now to offer upon this point was decisive and
+complete. The principle upon which he founded the necessity of the
+abolition was not policy, but justice: but, though justice were the
+principle of the measure, yet he trusted he should distinctly prove it to
+be reconcileable with our truest political interest.
+
+In the first place, he asserted that the number of the slaves in our West
+India islands might be kept up without the introduction of recruits from
+Africa; and to prove this, he would enumerate the different sources of
+their mortality. The first was the disproportion of the sexes, there being,
+upon an average, about five males imported to three females: but this evil,
+when the Slave-trade was abolished, would cure itself. The second consisted
+in the bad condition in which they were brought to the islands, and the
+methods of preparing them for sale. They arrived frequently in a sickly and
+disordered state, and then they were made up for the market by the
+application of astringents, washes, mercurial ointments, and repelling
+drugs, so that their wounds and diseases might be hid. These artifices were
+not only fraudulent but fatal: but these, it was obvious, would of
+themselves fall with the trade. A third was, excessive labour joined with
+improper food; and a fourth was, the extreme dissoluteness of their
+manners. These also would both of them be counteracted by the impossibility
+of getting further supplies: for owners, now unable to replace those slaves
+whom they might lose, by speedy purchases in the markets, would be more
+careful how they treated them in future, and a better treatment would be
+productive of better morals. And here he would just advert to an argument
+used against those who complained of cruelty in our islands, which was,
+that it was the interest of masters to treat their slaves with humanity:
+but surely it was immediate and present, not future and distant, interest,
+which was the great spring of action in the affairs of mankind. Why did we
+make laws to punish men? It was their interest to be upright and virtuous:
+but there was a present impulse continually breaking in upon their better
+judgment, and an impulse, which was known to be contrary to their permanent
+advantage. It was ridiculous to say that men would be bound by their
+interest, when gain or ardent passion urged them. It might as well be
+asserted that a stone could not be thrown into the air, or a body move from
+place to place, because the principle of gravitation bound them to the
+surface of the earth. If a planter in the West Indies found himself reduced
+in his profits, he did not usually dispose of any part of his slaves; and
+his own gratifications were never given up, so long as there was a
+possibility of making any retrenchment in the allowance of his slaves.--But
+to return to the subject which he had left: He was happy to state, that as
+all the causes of the decrease which he had stated might be remedied, so,
+by the progress of light and reformation, these remedies had been gradually
+coming into practice; and that, as these had increased, the decrease of
+slaves had in an equal proportion been lessened. By the gradual adoption of
+these remedies, he could prove from the report on the table, that the
+decrease of slaves in Jamaica had lessened to such a degree, that from the
+year 1774 to the present it was not quite one in a hundred, and that in
+fact they were at present in a state of increase; for that the births in
+that island, at this moment, exceeded the deaths by one thousand or eleven
+hundred per annum. Barbadoes, Nevis, Antigua, and the Bermudas, were, like
+Jamaica, lessening their decrease, and holding forth an evident and
+reasonable expectation of a speedy state of increase by natural population.
+But allowing the number of negros even to decrease for a time, there were
+methods which would ensure the welfare of the West India islands. The lands
+there might be cultivated by fewer hands, and this to greater advantage to
+the proprietors and to this country, by the produce of cinnamon, coffee,
+and cotton, than by that of sugar. The produce of the plantations might
+also be considerably increased, even in the case of sugar, with less hands
+than were at present employed, if the owners of them would but introduce
+machines of husbandry. Mr. Long himself, long resident as a planter, had
+proved, upon his own estate, that the plough, though so little used in the
+West Indies, did the service of a hundred slaves, and caused the same
+ground to produce three hogsheads of sugar, which, when cultivated by
+slaves, would only produce two. The division of work, which, in free and
+civilized countries, was the grand source of wealth, and the reduction of
+the number of domestic servants, of whom not less than from twenty to forty
+were kept in ordinary families, afforded other resources for this purpose.
+But, granting that all these suppositions should be unfounded, and that
+every one of these substitutes should fail for a time, the planters would
+be indemnified, as is the case in all transactions of commerce, by the
+increased price of their produce in the British market. Thus, by contending
+against the abolition, they were defeated in every part of the argument.
+But he would never give up the point, that the number of the slaves could
+be kept up by natural population, and without any dependence whatever on
+the Slave-trade. He therefore called upon the house again to abolish it as
+a criminal waste of life--it was utterly unnecessary--he had proved it so
+by documents contained in the report. The merchants of Liverpool, indeed,
+had thought otherwise, but he should be cautious how he assented to their
+opinions. They declared last year that it was a losing trade at two slaves
+to a ton, and yet they pursued it when restricted to five slaves to three
+tons. He believed, however, that it was upon the whole a losing concern; in
+the same manner as the lottery would be a losing adventure to any company
+who should buy all the tickets. Here and there an individual gained a large
+prize, but the majority of adventurers gained nothing. The same merchants,
+too, had asserted that the town of Liverpool would be ruined by the
+abolition. But Liverpool did not depend for its consequence upon the
+Slave-trade. The whole export-tonnage from that place amounted to no less
+than 170,000 tons; whereas the export part of it to Africa amounted only to
+13,000. Liverpool, he was sure, owed its greatness to other and very
+different causes; the Slave-trade bearing but a small proportion to its
+other trades.
+
+Having gone through that part of the subject which related to the slaves,
+he would now answer two objections which he had frequently heard started.
+The first of these was, that the abolition of the Slave-trade would operate
+to the total ruin of our navy, and to the increase of that of our rivals.
+For an answer to these assertions, he referred, to what he considered to be
+the most valuable part of the report, and for which the house and the
+country were indebted to the indefatigable exertions of Mr. Clarkson. By
+the report it appeared, that, instead of the Slave-trade being a nursery
+for British seamen, it was their grave. It appeared that more seamen died
+in that trade in one year than in the whole remaining trade of the country
+in two. Out of 910 sailors in it, 216 died in the year, while upon a fair
+average of the same number of men employed in the trades to the East and
+West Indies, Petersburgh, Newfoundland, and Greenland, no more than 87
+died. It appeared also, that out of 3170, who had left Liverpool in the
+slave-ships in the year 1787, only 1428 had returned. And here, while he
+lamented the loss which the country thus annually sustained in her seamen,
+he had additionally to lament the barbarous usage which they experienced,
+and which this trade, by its natural tendency to harden the heart,
+exclusively produced. He would just read an extract of a letter from
+Governor Parrey, of Barbadoes, to Lord Sydney, one of the secretaries of
+state. The Governor declared he could no longer contain himself on account
+of the ill treatment, which the British sailors endured at the hands of
+their savage captains. These were obliged to have their vessels strongly
+manned, not only on account of the unhealthiness of the climate of Africa,
+but of the necessity of guarding the slaves, and preventing and suppressing
+insurrections; and when they arrived in the West Indies, and were out of
+all danger from the latter, they quarrelled with their men on the most
+frivolous pretences, on purpose to discharge them, and thus save the
+payment of supernumerary wages home. Thus many were left in a diseased and
+deplorable state; either to perish by sickness, or to enter into foreign
+service; great numbers of whom were for ever lost to their country. The
+Governor concluded by declaring, that the enormities attendant on this
+trade were so great, as to demand the immediate interference of the
+legislature.
+
+
+The next objection to the abolition was, that if we were to relinquish the
+Slave-trade, our rivals, the French, would take it up; so that, while we
+should suffer by the measure, the evil would still go on, and this even to
+its former extent. This was, indeed, a very weak argument; and, if it would
+defend the continuance of the Slave-trade, might equally be urged in favour
+of robbery, murder, and every species of wickedness, which, if we did not
+practise, others would commit. But suppose, for the sake of argument, that
+they were to take it up. What good would it do them? What advantages, for
+instance, would they derive from this pestilential commerce to their
+marine? Should not we, on the other hand, be benefited by this change?
+Would they not be obliged to come to us, in consequence of the cheapness of
+our manufactures, for what they wanted for the African market? But he would
+not calumniate the French nation so much as to suppose that they would
+carry on the trade if we were to relinquish it. He believed, on the other
+hand, that they would abolish it also. Mr. Necker, the present minister of
+France, was a man of religious principle; and, in his work upon the
+administration of the finances, had recorded his abhorrence of this trade.
+He was happy also to relate an anecdote of the present King of France,
+which proved that he was a friend to the abolition; for, being petitioned
+to dissolve a society, formed at Paris, for the annihilation of the
+Slave-trade, his majesty answered, that he would not, and was happy to hear
+that so humane an association was formed in his dominions. And here, having
+mentioned the society in Paris, he could not help paying a due compliment
+to that established in London for the same purpose, which had laboured with
+the greatest assiduity to make this important subject understood, and which
+had conducted itself with so much judgment and moderation as to have
+interested men of all religions, and to have united them in their cause.
+
+There was another topic which he would submit to the notice of the house
+before he concluded. They were perhaps not aware, that a fair and
+honourable trade might be substituted in the natural productions of Africa,
+so that our connection with that continent in the way of commercial
+advantage need not be lost. The natives had already made some advances in
+it; and if they had not appeared so forward in raising and collecting their
+own produce for sale as in some other countries, it was to be imputed to
+the Slave-trade: but remove the cause, and Africa would soon emerge from
+her present ignorant and indolent state. Civilization would go on with her
+as well as with other nations. Europe three or four centuries ago was in
+many parts as barbarous as Africa at present, and chargeable with as bad
+practices. For, what would be said, if, so late as the middle of the
+thirteenth century, he could find a parallel there for the
+Slave-trade?--Yes. This parallel was to be found even in England. The
+people of Bristol, in the reign of Henry the Seventh, had a regular market
+for children, which were bought by the Irish: but the latter having
+experienced a general calamity, which they imputed as a judgment from
+Heaven on account of this wicked traffic, abolished it. The only thing,
+therefore, which he had to solicit of the house, was to show that they were
+now as enlightened as the Irish were four centuries back, by refusing to
+buy the children of other nations. He hoped they would do it. He hoped,
+too, they would do it in an unqualified manner. Nothing less than a total
+abolition of the trade would do away the evils complained of. The
+legislature of Jamaica, indeed, had thought that regulations might answer
+the purpose. Their report had recommended, that no person should be
+kidnapped, or permitted to be made a slave, contrary to the customs of
+Africa. But might he not be reduced to this state very unjustly, and yet by
+no means contrary to the African laws? Besides, how could we distinguish
+between those who were justly or unjustly reduced to it? Could we discover
+them by their physiognomy?--But if we could, Who would believe that the
+British captains would be influenced by any regulations made in this
+country, to refuse to purchase those who had not been fairly, honestly, and
+uprightly enslaved? They who were offered to us for sale were brought, some
+of them, three or four thousand miles, and exchanged like cattle from one
+hand to another, till they reached the coast. But who could return these to
+their homes, or make them compensation for their sufferings during their
+long journeyings? He would now conclude by begging pardon of the house for
+having detained them so long. He could indeed have expressed his own
+conviction in fewer words. He needed only to have made one or two short
+statements, and to have quoted the commandment, "Thou shalt do no murder."
+But he thought it his duty to lay the whole of the case, and the whole of
+its guilt, before them. They would see now that no mitigations, no
+palliatives, would either be efficient or admissible. Nothing short of an
+absolute abolition could be adopted. This they owed to Africa: they owed
+it, too, to their own moral characters. And he hoped they would follow up
+the principle of one of the repentant African captains, who had gone before
+the committee of privy council as a voluntary witness, and that they would
+make Africa all the atonement in their power for the multifarious injuries
+she had received at the hands of British subjects. With respect to these
+injuries, their enormity and extent, it might be alleged in their excuse,
+that they were not fully acquainted with them till that moment, and
+therefore not answerable for their former existence: but now they could no
+longer plead ignorance concerning them. They had seen them brought directly
+before their eyes, and they must decide for themselves, and must justify to
+the world and their own consciences the facts and principles upon which
+their decision was formed.
+
+Mr. Wilberforce having concluded his speech, which lasted three hours and a
+half, read, and laid on the table of the house, as subjects for their
+future discussion, twelve propositions, which he had deduced from the
+evidence contained in the privy council report, and of which the following
+is the abridged substance:
+
+1. That the number of slaves annually carried from the coast of Africa, in
+British vessels, was about 38,000, of which, on an average, 22,500 were
+carried to the British islands, and that of the latter only 17,500 were
+retained there.
+
+2. That these slaves, according to the evidence on the table, consisted,
+First, of prisoners of war; Secondly, of free persons sold for debt, or on
+account of real or imputed crimes, particularly adultery and witchcraft; in
+which cases they were frequently sold with their whole families, and
+sometimes for the profit of those by whom they were condemned; Thirdly, of
+domestic slaves sold for the profit of their masters, in some places at the
+will of the masters, and in others, on being condemned by them for real or
+imputed crimes; Fourthly, of persons made slaves by various acts of
+oppression, violence, or fraud, committed either by the princes and chiefs
+of those countries on their subjects, or by private individuals on each
+other;--or, lastly, by Europeans engaged in this traffic.
+
+3. That the trade so carried on had necessarily a tendency to occasion
+frequent and cruel wars among the natives; to produce unjust convictions
+and punishments for pretended or aggravated crimes; to encourage acts of
+oppression, violence, and fraud, and to obstruct the natural course of
+civilization and improvement in those countries.
+
+4. That Africa in its present state furnished several valuable articles of
+commerce which were partly peculiar to itself, but that it was adapted to
+the production of others, with which we were now either wholly or in great
+part supplied by foreign nations. That an extensive commerce with Africa
+might be substituted in these commodities, so as to afford a return for as
+many articles as had annually been carried thither in British vessels: and,
+lastly, that such a commerce might reasonably be expected to increase by
+the progress of civilization there.
+
+5. That the Slave-trade was peculiarly destructive to the seamen employed
+in it; and that the mortality there had been much greater than in any
+British vessels employed upon the same coast in any other service or trade.
+
+6. That the mode of transporting the slaves from Africa to the West Indies
+necessarily exposed them to many and grievous sufferings, for which no
+regulations could provide an adequate remedy; and that in consequence
+thereof a large proportion had annually perished during the voyage.
+
+7. That a large proportion had also perished in the harbours in the West
+Indies, from the diseases contracted in the voyage and the treatment of the
+same, previously to their being sold, and that this loss amounted to four
+and a half per cent. of the imported slaves.
+
+8. That the loss of the newly imported slaves, within the three first years
+after their importation, bore a large proportion to the whole number
+imported.
+
+9. That the natural increase of population among the slaves in the islands,
+appeared to have been impeded principally by the following causes:--First,
+By the inequality of the sexes in the importations from Africa. Secondly,
+By the general dissoluteness of manners among the slaves, and the want of
+proper regulations for the encouragement of marriages and of rearing
+children among them. Thirdly, By the particular diseases which were
+prevalent among them, and which were in some instances to be attributed to
+too severe labour, or rigorous treatment, and in others to insufficient or
+improper food. Fourthly, By those diseases, which affected a large
+proportion of negro-children in their infancy, and by those, to which the
+negros newly imported from Africa had been found to be particularly liable.
+
+10. That the whole number of the slaves in the island of Jamaica in 1768
+was about 167,000, in 1774 about 193,000, and in 1787 about 256,000: that
+by comparing these numbers with the numbers imported and retained in the
+said island during all these years, and making proper allowances, the
+annual excess of deaths above births was in the proportion of about
+seven-eighths per cent.; that in the first six years of this period it was
+in the proportion of rather more than one on every hundred; that in the
+last thirteen years of the same it was in the proportion of about
+three-fifths on every hundred; and that a number of slaves, amounting to
+fifteen thousand, perished during the latter period in consequence of
+repeated hurricanes, and of the want of foreign supplies of provisions.
+
+11. That the whole number of slaves in the island of Barbadoes was in the
+year 1764 about 70,706; in 1774 about 74,874; in 1780 about 68,270; in
+1781, after the hurricane, about 63,248, and in 1786 about 62,115: that by
+comparing these numbers with the number imported into this island (not
+allowing for any re-exportation), the annual excess of deaths above births
+in the ten years from 1764 to 1774 was in the proportion of about five on
+every hundred; that in the seven years from 1774 to 1780 it was in the
+proportion of about one and one-third on every hundred; that between the
+year 1780 and 1781 there had been a decrease in the number of slaves of
+about five thousand; that in the six years from 1781 to 1786 the excess of
+deaths was in the proportion of rather less than seven-eighths on every
+hundred; that in the four years from 1783 to 1786 it was in the proportion
+of rather less than one-third on every hundred; and that, during the whole
+period, there was no doubt that some had been exported from the island, but
+considerably more in the first part of this period than in the last.
+
+12. That the accounts from the Leeward Islands, and from Dominica, Grenada,
+and St. Vincent's, did not furnish sufficient grounds for comparing the
+state of population in the said islands at different periods with the
+number of slaves, which had been from time to time imported there and
+exported therefrom; but that from the evidence which had been received
+respecting the present state of these islands, as well as that of Jamaica
+and Barbadoes, and from a consideration of the means of obviating the
+causes, which had hitherto operated to impede the natural increase of the
+slaves, and of lessening the demand for manual labour, without diminishing
+the profit of the planters, no considerable or permanent inconvenience
+would result from discontinuing the further importation of African slaves.
+
+These propositions having been laid upon the table of the house, Lord
+Penrhyn rose in behalf of the planters, and, next after him, Mr. Gascoyne
+(both members for Liverpool) in behalf of the merchants concerned in the
+latter place. They both predicted the ruin and misery, which would
+inevitably follow the abolition of the trade. The former said, that no less
+than seventy millions were mortgaged upon lands in the West Indies, all of
+which would be lost. Mr. Wilberforce therefore should have made a motion to
+pledge the house to the repayment of this sum, before he had brought
+forward his propositions. Compensation ought to have been agreed upon as a
+previously necessary measure. The latter said, that in consequence of the
+bill of last year many ships were laid up and many seamen out of employ.
+His constituents had large capitals engaged in the trade, and, if it were
+to be wholly done away, they would suffer from not knowing where to employ
+them. They both joined in asserting, that Mr. Wilberforce had made so many
+misrepresentations in all the branches of this subject, that no reliance
+whatever was to be placed on the picture, which he had chosen to exhibit.
+They should speak however more fully to this point, when the propositions
+were discussed.
+
+The latter declaration called up Mr. Wilberforce again, who observed, that
+he had no intention of misrepresenting any fact. He did not know that he
+had done it in any one instance; but, if he had, it would be easy to
+convict him out of the report upon the table.
+
+Mr. Burke then rose. He would not, he said, detain the committee long.
+Indeed he was not able, weary and indisposed as he then felt himself, even
+if he had an inclination to do it; but as, on account of his other
+parliamentary duty, he might not have it in his power to attend the
+business now before them in its course, he would take that opportunity of
+stating his opinion upon it.
+
+
+And, first, the house, the nation, and all Europe were under great
+obligations to Mr. Wilberforce for having brought this important subject
+forward. He had done it in a manner the most masterly, impressive, and
+eloquent. He had laid down his principles so admirably, and with so much
+order and force, that his speech had equalled any thing he had ever heard
+in modern oratory, and perhaps it had not been excelled by any thing to be
+found in ancient times. As to the Slave-trade itself, there could not be
+two opinions about it where men were not interested. A trade, begun in
+savage war, prosecuted with unheard-of barbarity, continued during the
+transportation with the most loathsome imprisonment, and ending in
+perpetual exile and slavery, was a trade so horrid in all its
+circumstances, that it was impossible to produce a single argument in its
+favour. On the ground of prudence, nothing could be said in defence of it;
+nor could it be justified by necessity. It was necessity alone, that could
+be brought to justify inhumanity; but no case of necessity could be made
+out strong enough to justify this monstrous traffic. It was therefore the
+duty of the house to put an end to it, and this without further delay. This
+conviction, that it became them to do it immediately, made him regret (and
+it was the only thing he regretted in the admirable speech he had heard)
+that his honourable friend should have introduced propositions on this
+subject. He could have wished that the business had been brought to a
+conclusion at once, without voting the propositions, which had been read to
+them. He was not over fond of abstract propositions. They were seldom
+necessary; and often occasioned great difficulty, embarrassment, and delay.
+There was besides no occasion whatever to assign detailed reasons for a
+vote, which Nature herself dictated, and which Religion enforced. If it
+should happen, that the propositions were not carried in that house or the
+other, such a complication of mischiefs might follow, as might occasion
+them heartily to lament that they were ever introduced. If the ultimate
+resolution should happen to be lost, he was afraid the propositions would
+pass as waste paper, if not be injurious to the cause at a future time.
+
+And now, as the house must bring this matter to an issue, he would beg
+their attention to a particular point. He entreated them to look further
+than the present moment, and to ask themselves, if they had fortified their
+minds sufficiently to bear the consequences, which might arise from the
+abolition of the Slave-trade, supposing they should decide upon it. When
+they abandoned it, other foreign powers might take it up, and clandestinely
+supply our islands with slaves. Had they virtue enough to see another
+country reaping profits, which they themselves had given up; and to abstain
+from that envy natural to rivals, and firmly to adhere to their
+determination? If so, let them thankfully proceed to vote the immediate
+abolition of the Slave-trade. But if they should repent of their virtue
+(and he had known miserable instances of such repentance), all hopes of
+future reformation of this enormous evil would be lost. They would go back
+to a trade they had abandoned with redoubled attachment, and would adhere
+to it with a degree of avidity and shameless ardour, to their own
+humiliation, and to the degradation and disgrace of the nation in the eyes
+of all Europe. These were considerations worth regarding, before they took
+a decisive step in a business, in which they ought not to move with any
+other determination than to abide by the consequences at all hazards. The
+honourable gentleman (who to his eternal honour had introduced this great
+subject to their notice) had in his eloquent oration knocked at every door,
+and appealed to every passion, well knowing that mankind were governed by
+their sympathies. But there were other passions to be regarded. Men were
+always ready to obey their sympathies, when it cost them nothing. But were
+they prepared to pay the price of their virtue on this great occasion? This
+was the question. If they were, they would do themselves immortal honour,
+and would have the satisfaction of having done away a commerce, which,
+while it was productive of misery not to be described, most of all hardened
+the heart, and vitiated the human character.
+
+With respect to the consequences mentioned by the two members for
+Liverpool, he had a word or two to offer upon them. Lord Penrhyn had talked
+of millions to be lost and paid for. But seeing no probability of any loss
+ultimately, he could see no necessity for compensation. He believed, on the
+other hand, that the planters would be great gainers by those wholesome
+regulations, which they would be obliged to make, if the Slave-trade were
+abolished. He did not however flatter them with the idea that this gain
+would be immediate. Perhaps they might experience inconveniences at first,
+and even some loss. But what then? With their loss, their virtue would be
+the greater. And in this light he hoped the house would consider the
+matter; for, if they were called upon to do an act of virtuous energy and
+heroism, they ought to think it right to submit to temporary disadvantages
+for the sake of truth, justice, humanity, and the prospect of greater
+happiness.
+
+The other member, Mr. Gascoyne, had said, that his constituents, if the
+trade were abolished, could not employ their capitals elsewhere. But
+whether they could or not, it was the duty of that house, if they put them
+into a traffic, which was shocking to humanity and disgraceful to the
+nation, to change their application, and not to allow them to be used to a
+barbarous purpose. He believed, however, that the merchants of Liverpool
+would find no difficulty on this head. All capitals required active motion.
+It was in their nature not to remain passive and unemployed. They would
+soon turn them into other channels. This they had done themselves during
+the American war; for the Slave-trade was then almost wholly lost, and
+yet they had their ships employed, either as transports in the service
+of Government, or in other ways.
+
+And as he now called upon the house not to allow any conjectural losses to
+become impediments in the way of the abolition of the Slave-trade, so he
+called upon them to beware how they suffered any representations of the
+happiness of the state of slavery in our islands to influence them against
+so glorious a measure. Admiral Barrington had said in his testimony, that
+he had often envied the condition of the slaves there. But surely, the
+honourable admiral must have meant, that, as he had often toiled like a
+slave in the defence of his country, (as his many gallant actions had
+proved,) so he envied the day, when he was to toil in a similar manner in
+the same cause. If, however, his words to be taken literally, his
+sensations could only be accounted for by his having seen the negros in the
+hour of their sports, when a sense of the misery of their condition was
+neither felt by themselves nor visible to others. But their appearance on
+such occasions did by no means disprove their low and abject state. Nothing
+made a happy slave but a degraded man. In proportion as the mind grows
+callous to its degradation, and all sense of manly pride is lost, the slave
+feels comfort. In fact, he is no longer a man. If he were to define a man,
+he would say with Shakespeare,
+
+  "Man is a being holding large discourse, Looking before and after."
+
+But a slave was incapable of looking before and after. He had no motive to
+do it. He was a mere passive instrument in the hands of others, to be used
+at their discretion. Though living, he was dead as to all voluntary agency.
+Though moving amidst the creation with an erect form, and with the shape
+and semblance of a human being, he was a nullity as a man.
+
+Mr. Pitt thanked his honourable friend Mr. Wilberforce for having at length
+introduced this great and important subject to the consideration of the
+house. He thanked him also for the perspicuous, forcible, and masterly
+manner, in which he had treated it. He was sure that no argument,
+compatible with any idea of justice, could be assigned for the continuation
+of the Slave-trade. And, at the same time that he was willing to listen
+with candour and attention to every thing, that could be urged on the other
+side of the question, he was sure that the principles from which his
+opinion was deduced were unalterable. He had examined the subject with the
+anxiety which became him, where the happiness and interests of so many
+thousands were concerned, and with the minuteness which would be expected
+of him, on account of the responsible situation which he held; and he
+averred, that it was sophistry, obscurity of ideas, and vagueness of
+reasoning, which alone could have hitherto prevented all mankind (those
+immediately interested in the question excepted) from agreeing in one and
+the same opinion upon the subject. With respect to the propriety of
+introducing the individual propositions, which had been offered, he
+differed with Mr. Burke, and he thanked his honourable friend Mr.
+Wilberforce for having chosen the only way, in which it could be made
+obvious to the world, that they were warranted on every ground of reason
+and of fact in coming to that vote, which he trusted would be the end of
+their proceeding. The grounds for the attainment of this end were
+distinctly stated in the propositions. Let the propositions be brought
+before the house, one by one, and argued from the evidence; and it would
+then be seen, that they were such as no one, who was not deaf to the
+language of reason, could deny. Let them be once entered upon the journals
+of that house, and it was almost impossible they should fail. The abolition
+must be voted. As to the mode of it, or how it should be effected, they
+were not at present to discuss it; but he trusted it would be such, as
+would not invite foreign powers to supply our islands with slaves by a
+clandestine trade. After a debt, founded on the immutable principles of
+justice, was found to be due, it was impossible but the country had means
+to cause it to be paid. Should such an illicit proceeding be attempted, the
+only language which it became us to adopt was, that Great Britain had
+resources to enable her to protect her islands, and to prevent that traffic
+from being clandestinely carried on by them, which she had thought fit from
+a regard to her character to abandon. It was highly becoming Great Britain
+to take the lead of other nations in such a virtuous and magnificent
+measure, and he could not but have confidence, that they would be inclined
+to share the honour with us, or be pleased to follow us as their example.
+If we were disposed to set about this glorious work in earnest, they might
+be invited to concur with us by a negotiation to be immediately opened for
+that purpose. He would only now observe, before he sat down, in answer to
+certain ideas thrown out, that he could by no means acquiesce in any
+compensation for losses, which might be sustained by the people of
+Liverpool, or by others in any other part of the kingdom, in the execution
+of this just and necessary undertaking.
+
+Sir William Yonge said, he wanted no inducement to concur with the
+honourable mover of the propositions, provided the latter could be fairly
+established, and no serious mischiefs were to arise from the abolition. But
+he was apprehensive that many evils might follow, in the case of any sudden
+or unlooked-for decrease in the slaves. They might be destroyed by
+hurricanes. They might be swept off by many fatal disorders. In these
+cases, the owners of them would not be able to fill up their places, and
+they who had lent money upon the lands, where the losses had happened,
+would foreclose their mortgages. He was fearful also that a clandestine
+trade would be carried on, and then the sufferings of the Africans, crammed
+up in small vessels, which would be obliged to be hovering about from day
+to day, to watch an opportunity of landing, would be ten times greater than
+any which they now experienced in the legal trade. He was glad, however, as
+the matter was to be discussed, that it had been brought forward in the
+shape of distinct propositions, to be grounded upon the evidence in the
+privy council report.
+
+Mr. Fox observed, that he did not like, where he agreed as to the substance
+of a measure, to differ with respect to the form of it. If, however, he
+differed in any thing in the present case, it was with a view rather to
+forward the business than to injure it, or to throw any thing like an
+obstacle in its way. Nothing like either should come from him. What he
+thought was, that all the propositions were not necessary to be voted
+previously to the ultimate decision, though some of them undoubtedly were.
+He considered them as of two classes: the one, alleging the grounds upon
+which it was proper to proceed to the abolition; such as that the trade was
+productive of inexpressible misery, in various ways, to the innocent
+natives of Africa; that it was the grave of our seamen; and so on: the
+other, merely answering objections which might be started, and where there
+might be a difference of opinion. He was however glad that the propositions
+were likely to be entered upon the journals; since, if from any misfortune
+the business should be deferred, it might succeed another year. Sure he was
+that it could not fail to succeed sooner or later. He highly approved of
+what Mr. Pitt had said, relative to the language it became us to hold out
+to foreign powers in case of a clandestine trade. With respect, however, to
+the assertion of Sir William Yonge, that a clandestine trade in slaves
+would be worse than a legal one, he could not admit it. Such a trade, if it
+existed at all, ought only to be clandestine. A trade in human flesh and
+sinews was so scandalous, that it ought not openly to be carried on by any
+government whatever, and much less by that of a Christian country. With
+regard to the regulation of the Slave-trade, he knew of no such thing as a
+regulation of robbery and murder. There was no medium. The legislature must
+either abolish it, or plead guilty of all the wickedness which had been
+shown to attend it. He would now say a word or two with respect to the
+conduct of foreign nations on this subject. It was possible that these,
+when they heard that the matter had been discussed in that house, might
+follow the example, or they might go before us and set one themselves. If
+this were to happen, though we might be the losers, humanity would be the
+gainer. He himself had been thought sometimes to use expressions relative
+to France, which were too harsh, and as if he could only treat her as the
+enemy of this country. Politically speaking, France was our rival. But he
+well knew the distinction between political enmity and illiberal prejudice.
+If there was any great and enlightened nation in Europe, it was France,
+which was as likely as any country upon the face of the globe to catch a
+spark from the light of our fire, and to act upon the present subject with
+warmth and enthusiasm. France had often been improperly stimulated by her
+ambition; and he had no doubt but that, in the present instance, she would
+readily follow its honourable dictates.
+
+Mr. (now Lord) Grenville would not detain the house by going into a
+question, which had been so ably argued; but he should not do justice to
+his feelings, if he did not express publicly to his honourable friend, Mr.
+Wilberforce, the pleasure he had received from one of the most masterly and
+eloquent speeches he had ever heard,--a speech, which, while it did honour
+to him, entitled him to the thanks of the house, of the people of England,
+of all Europe, and of the latest posterity. He approved of the
+propositions, as the best mode of bringing this great question to a happy
+issue. He was pleased also with the language which had been held out with
+respect to foreign nations, and with our determination to assert our right
+of preventing our colonies from carrying on any trade, which we had thought
+it our duty to abandon.
+
+Aldermen Newnham, Sawbridge, and Watson, though they wished well to the
+cause of humanity, could not, as representatives of the city of London,
+give their concurrence to a measure, which would injure it so essentially
+as that of the abolition of the Slave-trade. This trade might undoubtedly
+be put under wholesome regulations, and made productive of great commercial
+advantages. But, if it were abolished, it would render the city of London
+one scene of bankruptcy and ruin. It became the house to take care, while
+they were giving way to the goodness of their hearts, that they did not
+contribute to the ruin of the mercantile interests of their country.
+
+Mr. Martin stated, that he was so well satisfied with the speech of the
+honourable gentleman, who had introduced the propositions, and with the
+language held out by other distinguished members on this subject, that he
+felt himself more proud than ever of being an Englishman. He hoped and
+believed, that the melancholy predictions of the worthy aldermen would not
+prove true, and that the citizens of London would have too much public
+spirit to wish that a great national object (which comprehended the great
+duties of humanity, and justice) should be set aside, merely out of
+consideration to their own private interests.
+
+Mr. Dempster expected, notwithstanding all he had heard, that the first
+proposition submitted to them, would have been to make good out of the
+public purse all the losses individuals were liable to sustain from an
+abolition of the Slave-trade. This ought to have been, as Lord Penrhyn had
+observed, a preliminary measure. He did not like to be generous out of the
+pockets of others. They were to abolish the trade, it was said, out of a
+principle of humanity. Undoubtedly they owed humanity to all mankind. But
+they also owed justice to those, who were interested in the event of the
+question, and had embarked their fortunes on the faith of parliament. In
+fact, he did not like to see men introducing even their schemes of
+benevolence to the detriment of other people; and much less did he like to
+see them going to the colonies, as it were upon their estates, and
+prescribing rules to them for their management. With respect to his own
+speculative opinion, as it regarded cultivation, he had no objection to
+give it. He was sure that sugar could be raised cheaper by free men than by
+slaves. This the practice in China abundantly proved. But yet neither he
+nor any other person had a right to force a system upon others. As to the
+trade itself, by which the present labourers were supplied, it had been
+considered by that house as so valuable, that they had preferred it to all
+others, and had annually voted a considerable sum towards carrying it on.
+They had hitherto deemed it an essential nursery for our seamen. Had it
+really been such as had been represented, our ancestors would scarcely have
+encouraged it; and therefore, upon these and other considerations, he could
+not help thinking that they would be wanting in their duty, if they
+abolished it altogether.
+
+Mr. William Smith would not detain the house long at that late hour upon
+this important subject; but he could not help testifying the great
+satisfaction he felt at the manner, in which the honourable gentleman who
+opened the debate (if it could be so called) had treated it. He approved of
+the propositions as the best mode of bringing the decision to a happy
+issue. He gave Mr. Fox great credit for the open and manly way, in which he
+had manifested his abhorrence of this trade, and for the support he meant
+to give to the total and unqualified abolition of it; for he was satisfied,
+that the more it was inquired into, the more it would be found that nothing
+short of abolition would cure the evil. With respect to certain assertions
+of the members for Liverpool, and certain melancholy predictions about the
+consequences of such an event, which others had held out, he desired to lay
+in his claim for observation upon them, when the great question should come
+before the house.
+
+Soon after this the house broke up; and the discussion of the propositions,
+which was the next parliamentary measure intended, was postponed to a
+future day, which was sufficiently distant to give all the parties
+concerned time to make the necessary preparations for it.
+
+Of this interval the committee for the abolition availed themselves to
+thank Mr. Wilberforce for the very able and satisfactory manner, in which
+he had stated to the house his propositions for the abolition of the
+Slave-trade, and for the unparalleled assiduity and perseverance, with
+which he had all along endeavoured to accomplish this object, as well as to
+take measures themselves for the further promotion of it. Their opponents
+availed themselves of this interval also. But that, which now embarrassed
+them, was the evidence contained in the privy council report. They had no
+idea, considering the number of witnesses they had sent to be examined,
+that this evidence, when duly weighed, could by right reasoning have given
+birth to the sentiments, which had been displayed in the speeches of the
+most distinguished members of the House of Commons, or to the contents of
+the propositions, which had been laid upon their table. They were
+thunder-struck as it were by their own weakness; and from this time they
+were determined, if possible, to get rid of it as a standard for decision,
+or to interpose every parliamentary delay in their power.
+
+On the twenty-first of May, the subject came again before the attention of
+the house. It was ushered in, as was expected, by petitions collected in
+the interim, and which were expressive of the frightful consequences, which
+would attend the abolition of the Slave-trade. Alderman Newnham presented
+one from certain merchants in London; Alderman Watson another from certain
+merchants, mortgagees, and creditors of the sugar-islands; Lord Maitland
+another from the planters of Antigua; Mr. Blackburne another from certain
+manufacturers of Manchester; Mr. Gascoyne another from the corporation of
+Liverpool; and Lord Penrhyn others from different interested bodies in the
+same town.
+
+Mr. Wilberforce then moved the order of the day, for the house to go into a
+committee of the whole house on the report of the privy council, and the
+several matters of evidence already upon the table relative to the
+Slave-trade.
+
+Mr. Alderman Sawbridge immediately arose, and asked Mr. Wilberforce, if he
+meant to adduce any other evidence, besides that in the privy council
+report, in behalf of his propositions, or to admit other witnesses, if such
+could be found, to invalidate them. Mr. Wilberforce replied, that he was
+quite satisfied with the report on the table. It would establish all his
+propositions. He should call no witnesses himself: as to permission to
+others to call them, that must be determined by the house.
+
+This question and this answer gave birth immediately to great disputes upon
+the subject. Aldermen Sawbridge, Newnham, and Watson; Lords Penrhyn and
+Maitland; Mr. Gascoyne, Marsham, and others spoke against the admission of
+the evidence, which had been laid upon the table. They contended, that it
+was insufficient, defective, and contradictory; that it was _ex parte_
+evidence; that it had been manufactured by ministers; that it was founded
+chiefly on hearsay, and that the greatest part of it was false; that it had
+undergone no cross-examination; that it was unconstitutional; and that, if
+they admitted it, they would establish a dangerous precedent, and abandon
+their rights. It was urged on the other hand by Mr. Courtenay, that it
+could not be _ex parte_ evidence, because it contained testimony on both
+sides of the question. The circumstance also of its being contradictory,
+which had been alleged against it, proved that it was the result of an
+impartial examination. Mr. Fox observed, that it was perfectly admissible.
+He called upon those, who took the other side of the question, to say why,
+if it was really inadmissible, they had not opposed it at first. It had
+now been a long time on the table, and no fault had been found with it.
+The truth was, it did not suit them, and they were determined by a
+side-wind as it were to put an end to the inquiry. Mr. Pitt observed
+that, if parliament had previously resolved to receive no evidence
+on a given subject but from the privy council, such a resolution
+indeed would strike at the root of the privileges of the House of
+Commons; but it was absurd to suppose that the house could upon
+no occasion receive evidence, taken where it was most convenient
+to take it, and subject throughout to new investigation, if any
+one doubted its validity. The report of the privy council consisted, first,
+of calculations and accounts from the public offices, and, next, of written
+documents on the subject; both of which were just as authentic, as if they
+had been laid upon the table of that house. The remaining part of it
+consisted of the testimony of living witnesses, all of whose names were
+published, so that if any one doubted their veracity, it was open to him to
+reexamine all or each of them. It had been said by adversaries that the
+report on the table was a weak and imperfect report, but would not these
+have the advantage of its weakness and imperfection? It was strange, when
+his honourable friend, Mr. Wilberforce, had said, "Weak and imperfect as
+the report may be thought to be, I think it strong enough to bear me out in
+all my propositions," that they, who objected to it, should have no better
+reason to give than this, "We object, because the ground of evidence on
+which you rest is too weak to support your cause." Unless it were meant to
+say (and the meaning seemed to be but thinly disguised) that the house
+ought to abandon the inquiry, he saw no reason whatever for not going
+immediately into a committee; and he wished gentlemen to consider whether
+it became the dignity of their proceedings to obstruct the progress of an
+inquiry, which the house had pledged itself to undertake. Their conduct
+indeed seemed extraordinary on this occasion. It was certainly singular
+that, while the report had been five weeks upon the table, no argument had
+been brought against its sufficiency; but that on the moment when the house
+was expected to come to an ultimate vote upon the subject, it should be
+thought defective, contradictory, unconstitutional, and otherwise
+objectionable. These objections, he was satisfied, neither did nor could
+originate with the country gentlemen; but they were brought forward, for
+purposes not now to be concealed, by the avowed enemies of this noble
+cause.
+
+In the course of the discussion, which arose upon this subject, every
+opportunity was taken to impress the house with the dreadful consequences
+of the abolition. Mr. Henniker read a long letter from the King of Dahomey
+to George the First; which had been found among the papers of James, first
+Duke of Chandos, and which had remained in the family till that time. In
+this, the King of Dahomey boasted of his victory over the King of Ardrah,
+and how he had ornamented the pavement and walls of his palace with the
+heads of the vanquished. These cruelties, Mr. Henniker said, were not
+imputable to the Slave-trade. They showed the Africans to be naturally a
+savage people, and that we did them a great kindness by taking them from
+their country. Alderman Sawbridge maintained that, if the abolition passed,
+the Africans, who could not be sold as slaves, would be butchered at home;
+while those, who had been carried to our islands, would be no longer under
+control. Hence insurrections, and the manifold evils which belonged to
+them. Alderman Newnham was certain that the abolition would be the ruin of
+the trade of the country. It would affect even the landed interest, and the
+funds. It would be impossible to collect money to diminish the national
+debt. Every man in the kingdom would feel the abolition come home to him.
+Alderman Watson maintained the same argument, and pronounced the trade
+under discussion to be a merciful and humane trade.
+
+Compensation was also insisted upon by Mr. Drake, Alderman Newnham, Mr.
+Henniker, Mr. Cruger, and others. This was resisted by Mr. Burke; who said
+that compensation in such a case would be contrary to every principle of
+legislation. Government gave encouragement to any branch of commerce, while
+it was regarded as conducive to the welfare of the community, or compatible
+with humanity and justice. But they were competent to withdraw their
+countenance from it, when it was found to be immoral, and injurious, and
+disgraceful to the state. They, who engaged in it, knew the terms under
+which they were placed, and adopted it with all the risks with which it was
+accompanied; and of consequence it was but just, that they should be
+prepared to abide by the loss which might accrue, when the public should
+think it right no longer to support it. But such a trade as this it was
+impossible any longer to support. Indeed it was not a trade. It was a
+system of robbery. It was a system, too, injurious to the welfare of other
+nations.
+
+How could Africa ever be civilized under it? While we continued to purchase
+the natives, they must remain in a state of barbarism. It was impossible to
+civilize slaves. It was contrary to the system of human nature. There was
+no country placed under such disadvantageous circumstances, into which the
+shadow of improvement had ever been introduced.
+
+Great pains were taken to impress the house with the propriety of
+regulation. Sir Grey Cooper; Aldermen Sawbridge, Watson, and Newnham; Mr.
+Marsham, and Mr. Cruger, contended strenuously for it, instead of
+abolition. It was also stated that the merchants would consent to any
+regulation of the trade, which might be offered them.
+
+In the course of the debate much warmth of temper was manifested on both
+sides. The expression of Mr. Fox in a former debate, "that the Slave-trade
+could not be regulated, because there could be no regulation of robbery and
+murder," was brought up, and construed by planters in the house as a charge
+of these crimes upon themselves. Mr. Fox, however, would not retract the
+expression. He repeated it. He had no notion, however, that any individual
+would have taken it to himself. If it contained any reflection at all, it
+was on the whole parliament, who had sanctioned such a trade. Mr. Molyneux
+rose up, and animadverted severely on the character of Mr. Ramsay, one of
+the evidences in the privy council report, during his residence in the West
+Indies. This called up Sir William Dolben and Sir Charles Middleton in his
+defence, the latter of whom bore honourable testimony to his virtues from
+an intimate acquaintance with him, and a residence in the same village with
+him, for twenty years. Mr. Molyneux spoke also in angry terms of the
+measure of abolition. To annihilate the trade, he said, and to make no
+compensation on account of it, was an act of swindling. Mr. Macnamara
+called the measure hypocritical, fanatic, and methodistical. Mr. Pitt was
+so irritated at the insidious attempt to set aside the privy council
+report, when no complaint had been alleged against it before, that he was
+quite off his guard, and he thought it right afterwards to apologize for
+the warmth into he had been betrayed. The Speaker too was obliged
+frequently to interfere. On this occasion no less than thirty members
+spoke. And there had probably been few seasons, when so much disorder had
+been discoverable in that house.
+
+The result of the debate was, a permission to those interested in the
+continuance of the Slave-trade to bring counsel to the bar on the
+twenty-sixth of May, and then to introduce such witnesses, as might throw
+further light on the propositions in the shortest time: for Mr. Pitt only
+acquiesced in this new measure on a supposition, "that there would be no
+unnecessary delay, as he could, by no means submit to the ultimate
+procrastination of so important a business." He even hoped (and in this
+hope he was joined by Mr. Fox) that those concerned would endeavour to
+bring the whole of the evidence they meant to offer at the first
+examination.
+
+On the day appointed, the house met for the purposes now specified; when
+Alderman Newnham, thinking that such an important question should not be
+decided but in a full assembly of the representatives of the nation, moved
+for a call of the house on that day fortnight. Mr. Wilberforce stated that
+he had no objection to such a measure; believing the greater the number
+present the more favourable it would be to his cause. This motion, however,
+produced a debate and a division, in which it appeared that there were one
+hundred and fifty-eight in favour of it, and twenty-eight against it. The
+business of the day now commenced. The house went into a committee, and Sir
+William Dolben was put into the chair. Mr. Serjeant Le Blanc was then
+called in. He made an able speech in behalf of his clients; and introduced
+John Barnes, esquire, as his first witness, whose examination took up the
+remainder of the day. By this step they, who were interested in the
+continuance of the trade, attained their wishes, for they had now got
+possession of the ground with their evidence; and they knew they could keep
+it, almost as long as they pleased, for the purposes of delay. Thus they,
+who boasted, when the privy council examinations began, that they would
+soon do away all the idle tales, which had been invented against them, and
+who desired the public only to suspend their judgment till the report
+should come out, when they would see the folly and wickedness of all our
+allegations, dared not abide by the evidence, which they themselves had
+taught others to look up to as the standard by which they were desirous of
+being judged: thus they, who had advantages beyond measure in forming a
+body of evidence in their own favour, abandoned that, which they had
+collected. And here it is impossible for me not to make a short comparative
+statement on this subject, if it were only to show how little can be made
+out, with the very best opportunities, against the cause of humanity and
+religion. With respect to ourselves, we had almost all our witnesses to
+seek. We had to travel after them for weeks together. When we found them,
+we had scarcely the power of choice. We were obliged to take them as they
+came. When we found them, too, we had generally to implore them to come
+forward in our behalf. Of those so implored three out of four refused, and
+the plea for this refusal was a fear lest they should injure their own
+interests. The merchants, on the other hand, had their witnesses ready on
+the spot. They had always ships in harbour containing persons, who had a
+knowledge of the subject. They had several also from whom to choose. If one
+man was favourable to their cause in three of the points belonging to it,
+but was unfavourable in the fourth, he could be put aside and replaced.
+When they had thus selected them, they had not to entreat, but to command,
+their attendance. They had no fear, again, when they thus commanded, of a
+refusal on the ground of interest; because these were promoting their
+interest by obliging those who employed them. Viewing these and other
+circumstances, which might be thrown into this comparative statement, it
+was some consolation to us to know, amidst the disappointment which this
+new measure occasioned, and our apparent defeat in the eyes of the public,
+that we had really beaten our opponents at their own weapons, and that, as
+this was a victory in our own private feelings, so it was the presage to us
+of a future triumph.
+
+On the twenty-ninth of May, Mr. Tierney made a motion to divide the
+consideration of the Slave-trade into two heads, by separating the African
+from the West Indian part of the question. This he did for the more clear
+discussion of the propositions, as well as to save time. This motion,
+however, was overruled by Mr. Pitt.
+
+At length, on the ninth of June, by which time it was supposed that new
+light, and this in sufficient quantity, would have been thrown upon the
+propositions, it appeared that only two witnesses had been fully heard. The
+examinations, therefore, were continued, and they went on till the
+twenty-third. On this day, the order for the call of the house, which had
+been prolonged, standing unrepealed, there was a large attendance of
+members. A motion was then made to get rid of the business altogether, but
+it failed. It was now seen, however, that it was impossible to bring the
+question to a final decision in this session, for they, who were interested
+in it, affirmed that they had yet many important witnesses to introduce.
+Alderman Newnham, therefore, by the consent of Mr. Wilberforce, moved, that
+"the further consideration of the subject be deferred to the next session."
+On this occasion, Mr. William Smith remarked, that though the decision on
+the great question was thus to be adjourned, he hoped the examinations, at
+least, would be permitted to go on. He had not heard any good reason, why
+they might not be carried on for some weeks longer. It was known that the
+hearing of evidence was at all times thinly attended. If therefore the few
+members, who did attend, were willing to give up their time a little
+longer, why should other members complain of an inconvenience in the
+suffering of which they took no share? He thought that by this proceeding
+the examination of witnesses on the part of the merchants might be
+finished, and of consequence the business brought into a very desirable
+state of forwardness against the ensuing session. These observations had
+not the desired effect, and the motion of Mr. Alderman Newnham was carried
+without a division. Thus the great question, for the elucidation of which
+all the new evidences were to be heard at the very first examination, in
+order that it might be decided by the ninth of June, was by the intrigue of
+our opponents deferred to another year.
+
+The order of the day for going into the further consideration of the
+Slave-trade having been discharged, Sir William Dolben rose, to state, that
+it was his intention to renew his bill of the former year, relative to the
+conveyance of the unhappy Africans from their own country to the West
+Indies, and to propose certain alterations in it. He made a motion
+accordingly, which was adopted; and he and Mr. Wilberforce were desired to
+prepare the same.
+
+This bill he introduced soon afterwards, and it passed; but not without
+opposition. It was a matter, however, of great pleasure to find that the
+worthy baronet was enabled by the assistance of Captain (afterwards
+Admiral) Macbride, and other naval officers in the house, to carry such
+clauses, as provided in some degree for the comfort of the poor seamen, who
+were seduced into this wicked trade. They could not indeed provide against
+the barbarity of their captains; but they secured them a space under the
+half deck in which to sleep. They prescribed a form of muster-rolls, which
+they were to see and sign in the presence of the clearing officer. They
+regulated their food both as to kind and quantity; and they preserved them
+from many of the impositions, to which they had been before exposed.
+
+From the time when Mr. Wilberforce gave his first notice this session to
+the present, I had been variously employed, but more particularly in the
+composition of a new work. It was soon perceived to be the object of our
+opponents, to impress upon the public the preference of regulation to
+abolition. I attempted therefore to show the fallacy and wickedness of this
+notion. I divided the evils belonging to the Slave-trade into two kinds.
+These I enumerated in their order. With respect to those of the first kind,
+I proved that they were never to be remedied by any acts of the British
+parliament. Thus, for instance, what bill could alter the nature of the
+human passions? What bill could prevent fraud and violence in Africa, while
+the Slave-trade existed there? What bill could prevent the miserable
+victims of the trade from rising, when on board the ships, if they saw an
+opportunity, and felt a keen sense of their oppression? Those of the second
+I stated to admit of a remedy, and, after making accurate calculations on
+the subject of each, I showed that those merchants, who were to do them
+away effectually, would be ruined by their voyages. The work was called An
+Essay on the comparative Efficiency of Regulation or Abolition as applied
+to the Slave-trade.
+
+The committee also in this interval brought out their famous print of the
+plan and section of a slave-ship; which was designed to give the spectator
+an idea of the sufferings of the Africans in the Middle Passage, and this
+so familiarly, that he might instantly pronounce upon the miseries
+experienced there. The committee at Plymouth had been the first to suggest
+the idea; but that in London had now improved it. As this print seemed
+to make an instantaneous impression of horror upon all who saw it, and
+as it was therefore very instrumental, in consequence of the wide
+circulation given it, in serving the cause of the injured Africans,
+I have given the reader a copy of it in the annexed plate, and I will
+now state the ground or basis, upon which it was formed.
+
+[Illustration]
+
+[Illustration]
+
+[Illustration]
+
+It must be obvious that it became the committee to select some one ship,
+which had been engaged in the Slave-trade, with her real dimensions, if
+they meant to make a fair representation of the manner of the
+transportation. When Captain Parrey, of the royal navy, returned from
+Liverpool, to which place Government had sent him, he brought with him the
+admeasurement of several vessels, which had been so employed, and laid them
+on the table of the House of Commons. At the top of his list stood the ship
+Brookes. The committee therefore, in choosing a vessel on this occasion,
+made use of the ship Brookes; and this they did, because they thought it
+less objectionable to take the first that came, than any other. The vessel
+then in the plate is the vessel now mentioned, and the following is her
+admeasurement as given in by Captain Parrey.
+
+                                                          Ft.  In.
+Length of the lower deck, gratings, and bulkheads
+  included at A A,                                       100    0
+Breadth of beam on the lower deck inside, B B,            25    0
+Depth of hold O O O, from ceiling to ceiling,             10    0
+Height between decks from deck to deck,                    5    0
+Length of the men's room, C C, on the lower deck,         46    0
+Breadth of the men's room, C C, on the lower deck,        25    4
+Length of the platform, D D, in the men's room,           46    0
+Breadth of the platform, in the men's room, on
+  each side,                                               6    0
+Length of the boys' room, E E,                            13    0
+Breadth of the boys' room,                                25    0
+Breadth of platform, F F, in boys' room,                   6    0
+Length of women's room, G G,                              28    6
+Breadth of women's room,                                  23    6
+Length of platform, H H, in women's room,                 28    6
+Breadth of platform in women's room,                       6    0
+Length of the gun-room, I I, on the lower deck,           10    6
+Breadth of the gun-room on the lower deck,                12    0
+Length of the quarter deck, K K,                          33    6
+Breadth of the quarter deck,                              19    6
+Length of the cabin, L L,                                 14    0
+Height of the cabin,                                       6    2
+Length of the half deck, M M,                             16    6
+Height of the half deck,                                   6    2
+Length of the platform, N N, on the half deck,            16    6
+Breadth of the platform on the half deck,                  6    0
+Upper deck, P P,
+
+The committee, having proceeded thus far, thought that they should now
+allow certain dimensions for every man, woman, and child; and then see, how
+many persons, upon such dimensions and upon the admeasurements just given,
+could be stowed in this vessel. They allowed, accordingly, to every man
+slave six feet by one foot four inches for room, to every woman five feet
+by one foot four, to every boy five feet by one foot two, and to every girl
+four feet six by one foot. They then stowed them, and found them as in the
+annexed plate, that is, they found (deducting the women stowed in Z of
+figures 6 and 7, which spaces, being half of the half deck, were allowed by
+Sir William Dolben's last bill to the seamen) that only four hundred and
+fifty could be stowed in her; and the reader will find, if he should think
+it worth while to count the figures in the plate, that, on making the
+deduction mentioned, they will amount to this number.
+
+The committee then thought it right to inquire how many slaves, the act of
+Sir William Dolben allowed this vessel to carry, and they found the number
+to be one hundred and fifty-four; that is, they found it allowed her to
+carry four more than could be put in without trespassing upon the room
+allotted to the rest; for we see that the bodies of the slaves, except just
+at the head of the vessel, already touch each other, and that no deduction
+has been made for tubs or stanchions to support the platforms and decks.
+
+Such was the picture, which the committee were obliged to draw, if they
+regarded mathematical accuracy, of the room allotted to the slaves in this
+vessel. By this picture was exhibited the nature of the Elysium, which Mr.
+Norris and others had invented for them during their transportation from
+their own country. By this picture were seen also the advantages of Sir
+William Dolben's bill; for many, on looking at the plate, considered the
+regulation itself as perfect barbarism. The advantages however obtained by
+it were considerable; for the Brookes was now restricted to four hundred
+and fifty slaves, whereas it was proved that she carried six hundred and
+nine in a former voyage.
+
+The committee, at the conclusion of the session of parliament, made a
+suitable report. It will be unnecessary to detail this for obvious reasons.
+There was, however, one thing contained in it, which ought not to be
+omitted. It stated, with appropriate concern, the death of the first
+controversial writer, and of one of the most able and indefatigable
+labourers, in their cause. Mr. Ramsay had been for some time indisposed.
+The climate of the West Indies, during a residence of twenty years, and the
+agitation in which his mind had been kept for the last four years of his
+life, in consequence of the virulent attacks on his word and character by
+those interested in the continuance of the trade, had contributed to
+undermine his constitution. During his whole illness he was cheerful and
+composed; nor did he allow it to hinder him, severe as it was, from taking
+any opportunity which offered of serving those unhappy persons, for whose
+injuries he had so deeply felt. A few days only before he died, I received
+from him probably the last letter he ever wrote, of which the following is
+an extract:
+
+"My health has certainly taken a most alarming turn; and if some
+considerable alteration does not take place for the better in a very little
+time, it will be all over with me; I mean as to the present life. I have
+lost all appetite; and suffer grievously from an almost continual pain in
+my stomach, which leaves me no enjoyment of myself, but such as I can
+collect from my own reflections, and the comforts of religion. I am glad
+the bill for the abolition is in such forwardness. Whether it goes through
+the House or not, the discussion attending it will have a most beneficial
+effect. The whole of this business I think now to be in such a train, as to
+enable me to bid farewell to the present scene with the satisfaction of not
+having lived in vain, and of having done something towards the improvement
+of our common nature; and this at no little expense of time and reputation.
+The little I have now written is my utmost effort; yet yesterday I thought
+it necessary to write an answer to a scurrilous libel in The Diary by one
+Scipio. On my own account he should have remained unnoticed, but our great
+cause must be kept unsullied."
+
+Mr. Ramsay was a man of active habit, of diligence and perseverance in his
+undertakings, and of extraordinary application. He was of mild and humble
+manners. He possessed a strong understanding, with great coolness and
+courage. Patriotism and public spirit were striking traits in his
+character. In domestic life he was amiable: in the ministry, exemplary and
+useful; and he died to the great regret of his parishioners, but most of
+all to that of those, who moved with him in his attempts to bring about the
+important event of the abolition of the Slave-trade.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER II.
+
+_Continuation from July 1789 to July 1790--Author travels to Paris to
+promote the abolition in France--attends the committees of the Friends of
+the Negros--Counter attempts of the committee of White Colonists--An
+account of the deputies of Colour--Meeting at the Duke de la
+Rochefoucauld's--Mirabeau espouses the cause--canvasses the National
+Assembly--Distribution of the section of the slave-ship there--Character of
+Brissot--Author leaves Paris and returns to England--Examination of
+merchants' and planters' evidence resumed in the House of Commons--Author
+travels in search of evidence in favour of the abolition--Opposition to the
+hearing of it--This evidence is at length introduced--Renewal of Sir
+William Dolben's bill--Distribution of the section of the slave-ship in
+England--and of Cowper's Negro's Complaint--and of Wedgewood's Cameos._
+
+
+We usually find, as we give ourselves up to reflection, some little
+mitigation of the afflictions we experience; and yet of the evils which
+come upon us, some are often so heavy as to overpower the sources of
+consolation for a time, and to leave us wretched. This was nearly our
+situation at the close of the last session of parliament. It would be idle
+not to confess that circumstances had occurred, which wounded us deeply.
+Though we had foiled our opponents at their own weapons, and had
+experienced the uninterrupted good wishes and support of the public, we had
+the great mortification to see the enthusiasm of members of parliament
+beginning to cool; to see a question of humanity and justice (for such it
+was, when it was delivered into their hands) verging towards that of
+commercial calculation; and finally to see regulation, as it related to it
+in the way of being substituted for abolition. But most of all were we
+affected, knowing as we did the nature and the extent of the sufferings
+belonging to Slave-trade, that these should be continued to another year.
+This last consideration almost overpowered me. It had fallen to my lot,
+more than to that of any other person, to know these evils, and I seemed
+almost inconsolable at the postponement of the question. I wondered how
+members of parliament, and these Englishmen, could talk as they did on this
+subject; how they could bear for a moment to consider their fellow-man as
+an article of trade; and how they should not count even the delay of an
+hour, which occasioned so much misery to continue, as one of the most
+criminal actions of their lives.
+
+It was in vain, however, to sink under our burthens. Grief could do no
+good; and if our affairs had taken an unfavourable turn, the question was,
+how to restore them. It was sufficiently obvious that, if our opponents
+were left to themselves, or, without any counteracting evidence, they would
+considerably soften down the propositions, if not invalidate them in the
+minds of many. They had such a power of selection of witnesses, that they
+could bring men forward, who might say with truth, that they had seen but
+very few of the evils complained of, and these in an inferior degree. We
+knew also from the example of the Liverpool delegates, how interest and
+prejudice could blind the eyes, and how others might be called upon to give
+their testimony, who would dwell upon the comforts of the Africans, when
+they came into our power; on the sprinkling of their apartments with
+frankincense; on the promotion of music and the dance among them; and on
+the health and festivity of their voyages. It seemed therefore necessary,
+that we should again be looking out for evidence on the part of the
+abolition. Nor did it seem to me to be unreasonable, if our opponents were
+allowed to come forward in a new way, because it was more constitutional,
+that we should be allowed the same privilege. By these means the evidence,
+of which we had now lost the use, might be restored; indifference might be
+fanned into warmth; commercial calculation might be overpowered by justice;
+and abolition, rising above the reach of the cry of regulation, might
+eventually triumph.
+
+I communicated my ideas to the committee, and offered to go round the
+kingdom to accomplish this object. The committee had themselves been
+considering what measures to take, and as each in his own mind had come to
+conclusions similar with my own, my proposal was no sooner made, than
+adopted.
+
+I had not been long upon this journey, when I was called back. Mr.
+Wilberforce, always solicitous for the good of this great cause, was of
+opinion, that, as commotions had taken place in France, which then aimed at
+political reforms, it was possible that the leading persons concerned in
+them might, if an application were made to them judiciously, be induced to
+take the Slave-trade into their consideration, and incorporate it among the
+abuses to be done away. Such a measure, if realized, would not only lessen
+the quantity of human suffering, but annihilate a powerful political
+argument against us. He had a conference therefore with the committee on
+this subject; and, as they accorded with his opinion, they united with him
+in writing a letter to me, to know if I would change my journey, and
+proceed to France.
+
+As I had no object in view but the good of the cause, it was immaterial to
+me where I went, if I could but serve it; and therefore, without any
+further delay, I returned to London.
+
+As accounts had arrived in England of the excesses which had taken place in
+the city of Paris, and of the agitated state of the provinces through which
+I was to pass, I was desired by several of my friends to change my name. To
+this I could not consent; and, on consulting the committee, they were
+decidedly against it.
+
+I was introduced as quickly as possible, on my arrival at Paris, to the
+friends of the cause there, to the Duke de la Rochefoucald, the Marquis de
+Condorcet, Messieurs Petion de Villeneuve, Claviere, and Brissot, and to
+the Marquis de la Fayette. The latter received me with peculiar marks of
+attention. He had long felt for the wrongs of Africa, and had done much to
+prevent them. He had a plantation in Cayenne, and had devised a plan, by
+which the labourers upon it should pass by degrees from slavery to freedom.
+With this view he had there laid it down as a principle, that all crimes
+were equal, whether they were committed by Blacks or Whites, and ought
+equally to be punished. As the human mind is of such a nature, as to be
+acted upon by rewards as well as punishments, he thought it unreasonable,
+that the slaves should have no advantage from a stimulus from the former.
+He laid it down therefore as another principle, that temporal profits
+should follow virtuous action. To this he subjoined a reasonable education
+to be gradually given. By introducing such principles, and by making
+various regulations for the protection and comforts of the slaves, he
+thought he could prove to the planters, that there was no necessity for the
+Slave-trade; that the slaves upon all their estates would increase
+sufficiently by population; that they might be introduced gradually, and
+without detriment, to a state of freedom; and that then the real interests
+of all would be most promoted. This system he had begun to act upon two
+years before I saw him. He had also, when the society was established in
+Paris, which took the name of The Friends of the Negros, enrolled himself a
+member of it.
+
+The first public steps taken after my arrival in Paris were at a committee
+of the Friends of the Negros, which was but thinly attended. None of those
+mentioned, except Brissot, were present. It was resolved there, that the
+committee should solicit an audience of Mr. Necker; and that I should wait
+upon him, accompanied by a deputation consisting of the Marquis de
+Condorcet, Monsieur de Bourge, and Brissot de Warwille; Secondly, that the
+committee should write to the president of the National Assembly, and
+request the favour of him to appoint a day for hearing the cause of the
+Negros; and, Thirdly, that it should be recommended to the committee in
+London to draw up a petition to the National Assembly of France, praying
+for the abolition of the Slave-trade by that country. This petition, it was
+observed, was to be signed by as great a number of the friends to the cause
+in England, as could be procured. It was then to be sent to the committee
+at Paris, who would take it in a body to the place of its destination.
+
+I found great delicacy as a stranger in making my observations upon these
+resolutions, and yet I thought I ought not to pass them over wholly in
+silence, but particularly the last. I therefore rose up, and stated that
+there was one resolution, of which I did not quite see the propriety. But
+this might arise from my ignorance of the customs, as well as of the genius
+and spirit of the French people. It struck me that an application from a
+little committee in England to the National Assembly of France was not a
+dignified measure, nor was it likely to have weight with such a body. It
+was, besides, contrary to all the habits of propriety, in which I had been
+educated. The British Parliament did not usually receive petitions from the
+subjects of other nations. It was this feeling, which had induced me thus
+to speak.
+
+To these observations it was replied, that the National Assembly of France
+would glory in going contrary to the example of other nations in a case of
+generosity and justice, and that the petition in question, if it could be
+obtained, would have an influence there, which the people of England,
+unacquainted with the sentiments of the French nation, would hardly credit.
+
+To this I had only to reply, that I would communicate the measure to the
+committee in London, but that I could not be answerable for the part they
+would take in it.
+
+By an answer received from Mr. Necker, relative to the first of these
+resolutions, it appeared that the desired interview had been obtained: but
+he granted it only for a few minutes, and this principally to show his good
+will to the cause. For he was then so oppressed with business in his own
+department, that he had but little time for any other. He wrote to me
+however the next day, and desired my company to dinner. He then expressed a
+wish to me, that any business relative to the Slave-trade might be managed
+by ourselves as individuals, and that I would take the opportunity of
+dining with him occasionally for this purpose. By this plan, he said, both
+of us would save time. Madame Necker also promised to represent her
+husband, if I should call in his absence, and to receive me, and converse
+with me on all occasions, in which this great cause of humanity and
+religion might be concerned.
+
+With respect to the other resolutions nothing ever came of them; for we
+waited daily for an answer from the president during the whole of his
+presidency, but we never received any; and the committee in London, when
+they had read my letter, desired me unequivocally to say, that they did not
+see the propriety of the petition, which it had been recommended to them to
+obtain.
+
+At the next meeting it was resolved, that a letter should be written to the
+new president for the same purpose as the former. This, it was said, was
+now rendered essentially necessary. For the merchants, planters, and others
+interested in the continuance of the Slave-trade, were so alarmed at the
+enthusiasm of the French people, in favour of the new order of things, and
+of any change recommended to them, which had the appearance of promoting
+the cause of liberty, that they held daily committees to watch and to
+thwart the motions of the Friends of the Negros. It was therefore thought
+proper, that the appeal to the Assembly should be immediate on this
+subject, before the feelings of the people should cool, or, before they,
+who were thus interested, should poison their minds by calculations of loss
+and gain. The silence of the former president was already attributed to the
+intrigues of the planters' committee. No time therefore was to be lost. The
+letter was accordingly written, but as no answer was ever returned to it,
+they attributed this second omission to the same cause.
+
+I do not really know whether interested persons ever did, as was suspected,
+intercept the letters of the committee to the two presidents as now
+surmised; or whether they ever dissuaded them from introducing so important
+a question for discussion when the nation was in such a heated state; but
+certain it is that we had many, and I believe barbarous, enemies to
+encounter. At the very next meeting of the committee, Claviere produced
+anonymous letters, which he had received, and in which it was stated that,
+if the society of the Friends of the Negros did not dissolve itself, he and
+the rest of them would be stabbed. It was said that no less than three
+hundred persons had associated themselves for this purpose. I had received
+similar letters myself; and on producing mine, and comparing the
+hand-writing in both, it appeared that the same persons had written them.
+
+In a few days after this the public prints were filled with the most
+malicious representations of the views of the committee. One of them was,
+that they were going to send twelve thousand muskets to the Negros in St.
+Domingo, in order to promote an insurrection there. This declaration was so
+industriously circulated, that a guard of soldiers was sent to search the
+committee-room; but these were soon satisfied, when they found only two or
+three books and some waste paper. Reports equally unfounded and wicked were
+spread also in the same papers relative to myself. My name was mentioned at
+full length, and the place of my abode hinted at. It was stated at one
+time, that I had proposed such wild and mischievous plans to the committee
+in London relative to the abolition of the Slave-trade, that they had cast
+me out of their own body, and that I had taken refuge in Paris, where I now
+tried to impose equally on the French nation. It was stated at another,
+that I was employed by the British government as a spy, and that it was my
+object to try to undermine the noble constitution, which was then forming
+for France. This latter report at this particular time, when the passions
+of men were so inflamed, and when the stones of Paris had not been long
+purified from the blood of Foulon and Berthier, might have cost me my life;
+and I mentioned it to General la Fayette, and solicited his advice. He
+desired me to make a public reply to it: which I did. He desired me also to
+change my lodging to the Hotel de York, that I might be nearer to him; and
+to send to him if there should be any appearance of a collection of people
+about the hotel, and I should have aid from the military in his quarter. He
+said also, that he would immediately give in my name to the Municipality;
+and that he would pledge himself to them, that my views were strictly
+honourable.
+
+On dining one day at the house of the Marquis de la Fayette, I met the
+deputies of Colour. They had arrived only the preceding day from St.
+Domingo. I was desired to take my seat at dinner in the midst of them. They
+were six in number; of a sallow or swarthy complexion, but yet it was not
+darker than that of some of the natives of the south of France. They were
+already in the uniform of the Parisian National Guards; and one of them
+wore the cross of St. Louis. They were men of genteel appearance and modest
+behaviour. They seemed to be well informed, and of a more solid cast than
+those, whom I was in the habit of seeing daily in this city. The account
+which they gave of themselves was this. The White People of St. Domingo,
+consisting of less than ten thousand persons, had deputies then sitting in
+the National Assembly. The People of Colour in the same island greatly
+exceeded the Whites in number. They amounted to thirty thousand, and were
+generally proprietors of lands. They were equally free by law with the
+former, and paid their taxes to the mother-country in an equal proportion.
+But in consequence of having sprung from slaves they had no legislative
+power, and moreover were treated with great contempt. Believing that the
+mother-country was going to make a change in its political constitution,
+they had called a meeting on the island, and this meeting had deputed them
+to repair to France, and to desire the full rights of citizens, or that the
+free People of Colour might be put upon an equality with the Whites. They
+(the deputies) had come in consequence. They had brought with them a
+present of six millions of livres to the National Assembly, and an
+appointment to General la Fayette to be commander in chief over their
+constituents, as a distinct body. This command, they said, the General had
+accepted, though he had declined similar honours from every town in France,
+except Paris, in order to show that he patronised their cause.
+
+I was now very anxious to know the sentiments which these gentlemen
+entertained on the subject of the Slave-trade. If they were with us, they
+might be very useful to us; not only by their votes in the Assembly, but by
+the knowledge of facts, which they would be able to adduce there in our
+favour. If they were against us, it became me to be upon my guard against
+them, and to take measures accordingly. I therefore stated to them at once
+the nature of my errand to France, and desired their opinion upon it. This
+they gave me without reserve. They broke out into lavish commendations of
+my conduct, and called me their friend. The Slave-trade, they said, was the
+parent of all the miseries in St. Domingo, not only on account of the cruel
+treatment it occasioned to the slaves, but on account of the discord which
+it constantly kept up between the Whites and People of Colour, in
+consequence of the hateful distinctions it introduced. These distinctions
+could never be obliterated while it lasted. Indeed both the trade and the
+slavery must fall before the infamy, now fixed upon a skin of colour, could
+be so done away, that Whites and Blacks could meet cordially, and look with
+respect upon one another. They had it in their instructions, in case they
+should obtain a seat in the Assembly, to propose an immediate abolition of
+the Slave-trade, and an immediate amelioration of the state of slavery
+also, with a view to its final abolition in fifteen years.
+
+But time was flying apace, I had now been nearly seven weeks in Paris; and
+had done nothing. The thought of this made me uneasy, and I saw no
+consoling prospect before me. I found it even difficult to obtain a meeting
+of the Friends of the Negros. The Marquis de la Fayette had no time to
+attend. Those of the committee, who were members of the National Assembly,
+were almost constantly engaged at Versailles. Such of them as belonged to
+the Municipality, had enough to do at the Hotel de Ville. Others were
+employed either in learning the use of arms, or in keeping their daily and
+nightly guards. These circumstances made me almost despair of doing any
+thing for the cause at Paris, at least in any reasonable time. But a new
+circumstance occurred, which distressed me greatly; for I discovered, in
+the most satisfactory manner, that two out of the six at the last committee
+were spies. They had come into the society for no other reason, than to
+watch and report its motions, and they were in direct correspondence with
+the slave-merchants at Havre de Grace. This matter I brought home to them
+afterwards, and I had the pleasure of seeing them excluded from all our
+future meetings.
+
+From this time I thought it expedient to depend less upon the committee and
+more upon my own exertions, and I formed the resolution of going among the
+members of the National Assembly myself, and of learning from their own
+mouths the hope I ought to entertain relative to the decision of our
+question. In the course of my endeavours I obtained a promise from the Duke
+de la Rochefoucauld, the Comte de Mirabeau, the Abbé Syeyes, Monsieur
+Bergasse, and Monsieur Petion de Villeneuve, five of the most approved
+members of the National Assembly, that they would meet me, if I would fix a
+day. I obtained a similar promise from the Marquis de Condorcet, and
+Claviere and Brissot, as members selected from the committee of the Friends
+of the Negros. And Messieurs de Roveray and Du Monde, two Genevese
+gentlemen at Versailles, men of considerable knowledge and interest, and
+who had heard of our intended meeting, were to join us at their own
+request. The place chosen was the house of the Bishop of Chartres at
+Versailles.
+
+I was now in hope that I should soon bring the question to some issue; and
+on the fourth of October I went to dine with the Bishop of Chartres to fix
+the day. We appointed the seventh. But how soon, frequently, do our
+prospects fade! From the conversation which took place at dinner, I began
+to fear that our meeting would not be realized. About three days before,
+the officers of the Guard du Corps had given the memorable banquet,
+recorded in the annals of the revolution, to the officers of the regiment
+of Flanders which then lay at Versailles. This was a topic, on which the
+company present dwelt. They condemned it as a most fatal measure in these
+heated times; and were apprehensive, that something would grow immediately
+out of it, which might endanger the King's safety. In passing afterwards
+through the streets of Versailles my fears increased. I met several of that
+regiment in groups. Some were brandishing their swords. Others were walking
+arm in arm and singing tumultuously. Others were standing and conversing
+earnestly together. Among the latter I heard one declare with great
+vehemence, "that it should not be; that the revolution must go on." On my
+arrival at Paris in the evening the Palais Royale was full of people, and
+there were movements and buzzings among them, as if something was expected
+to happen. The next day, when I went into the streets it was obvious what
+was going to take place. Suffice it to say, that the next evening the King
+and Queen were brought prisoners into Paris. After this, things were in
+such an unsettled state for a few days, and the members of the National
+Assembly were so occupied in the consideration of the event itself, and of
+the consequences which might attend it, that my little meeting, of which it
+had cost me so much time and trouble to procure the appointment, was
+entirely prevented.
+
+I had now to wait patiently till a new opportunity should occur. The Comte
+de Mirabeau, before the departure of the King, had moved and carried the
+resolution that "the Assembly was inseparable from his majesty's person."
+It was expected, therefore, that the National Assembly would immediately
+transfer its sittings to Paris. This took place on the nineteenth. It was
+now more easy for me to bring persons together, than when I had to travel
+backward and forward to Versailles. Accordingly, by watching my
+opportunities, I obtained the promise of another meeting. This was held
+afterward at the Duke de la Rochefoucauld's. The persons before mentioned
+were present; except the Comte de Mirabeau, whose occupations at that
+moment made it utterly impossible for him to attend.
+
+The Duke opened the business in an appropriate manner; and concluded, by
+desiring each person to give his opinion frankly and unequivocally as to
+what might be expected of the National Assembly relative to the great
+measure of the abolition of the Slave-trade.
+
+The Abbé Syeyes rose up, and said, it would probably bring the business
+within a shorter compass, if, instead of discussing this proposition at
+large, I were to put to the meeting my own questions. I accordingly
+accepted this offer; and began by asking those present, "how long it was
+likely that the present National Assembly would sit." After some
+conversation it was replied, that, "it would sit till it had completed the
+constitution, and interwoven such fixed principles into it, that the
+legislature, which should succeed it, might have nothing more to do, than
+to proceed on the ordinary business of the state. Its dissolution would
+probably not take place till the month of March."
+
+I then asked them, "whether it was their opinion, that the National
+Assembly would feel itself authorized to take up such a foreign question
+(if I might be allowed the expression) as that of the abolition of the
+Slave-trade." The answer to this was, "that the object of the National
+Assembly was undoubtedly the formation of a constitution for the French
+people. With respect to foreign possessions, it was very doubtful, whether
+it were the real interest of France to have any colonies at all. But while
+it kept such colonies under its dominion, the Assembly would feel, that it
+had the right to take up this question; and that the question itself would
+naturally spring out of the bill of rights, which had already been adopted
+as the basis of the constitution."
+
+The next question I proposed was, "whether they were of opinion, that the
+National Assembly would do more wisely, in the present situation of things,
+to determine upon the abolition of the Slave-trade now, or to transfer it
+to the legislature, which was to succeed it in the month of March."
+
+This question gave birth to a long discussion; during which much eloquence
+was displayed. But the unanimous answer, with the reasons for it, may be
+conveyed in substance as follows. "It would be most wise, it was said, in
+the present Assembly to introduce the question to the notice of the nation,
+and this as essentially connected with the bill of rights, but to transfer
+the determination of it, in a way the best calculated to ensure success, to
+the succeeding legislature. The revolution was of more importance to
+Frenchmen, than the abolition of the Slave-trade. To secure this was their
+first object, and more particularly, because the other would naturally flow
+from it. But the revolution might be injured by the immediate determination
+of the question. Many persons in the large towns of Bourdeaux, Marseilles,
+Rouen, Nantes, and Havre, who were now friends to it, might be converted
+into enemies. It would also be held up by those, who wished to produce a
+counter-revolution, (and the ignorant and prejudiced might believe it,)
+that the Assembly had made a great sacrifice to England, by thus giving her
+an opportunity of enlarging her trade. The English House of Commons had
+taken up the subject, but had done nothing. And though they, who were then
+present, were convinced of the sincerity of the English minister, who had
+introduced it; and that the trade must ultimately fall in England, yet it
+would not be easy to persuade many bigoted persons in France of these
+truths. It would therefore be most wise in the Assembly only to introduce
+the subject as mentioned; but if extraordinary circumstances should arise,
+such as a decree, that the deputies of Colour should take their seats in
+the Assembly, or that England should have begun this great work, advantage
+might be taken of them, and the abolition of the Slave-trade might be
+resolved upon in the present session."
+
+The last question I proposed was this. "If the determination of this great
+question should be proposed to the next legislature, would it be more
+difficult to carry it then than now."
+
+This question also produced much conversation. But the answer was
+unanimous, "that there would be no greater difficulty in the one than in
+the other case; for that the people would daily, more and more admire their
+constitution; that this constitution would go down to the next legislature,
+from whence would issue solid and fixed principles, which would be resorted
+to as a standard for decision on all occasions. Hence the Slave-trade,
+which would be adjudged by it also, could not possibly stand. Add to which,
+that the most virtuous members in the present would be chosen into the new
+legislature, which, if the constitution were but once fairly established,
+would not regard the murmurs of any town or province." After this, a
+desultory conversation took place, in which some were of opinion that it
+would be proper, on the introduction of the subject into the Assembly, to
+move for a committee of inquiry, which should collect facts and documents
+against the time, when it should be taken up with a view to its final
+discussion.
+
+As it now appeared to me, that nothing material would be done with respect
+to our cause till after the election of the new legislature, I had thoughts
+of returning to England to resume my journey in quest of evidence; but I
+judged it right to communicate first with the Comte de Mirabeau and the
+Marquis de la Fayette, both of whom would have attended the meeting just
+mentioned, if unforeseen circumstances had not prevented them.
+
+On conversing with the first, I found that he differed from those, whom I
+had consulted. He thought that the question, on account of the nature and
+urgency of it, ought to be decided in the present legislature. This was so
+much his opinion, that he had made a determination to introduce it there
+himself; and had been preparing for his motion. He had already drawn up the
+outlines of a speech for the purpose; but was in want of circumstantial
+knowledge to complete it. With this knowledge he desired me to furnish him.
+He then put his speech into my hand; and wished me to take it home and
+peruse it. He wrote down also some questions, and he gave them to me
+directly afterwards, and begged I would answer them at my leisure.
+
+On conversing with the latter, he said, that he believed with those at the
+meeting, that there would be no greater difficulty in carrying the question
+in the succeeding than in the present legislature. But this consideration
+afforded an argument for the immediate discussion of it: for it would make
+a considerable difference to suffering humanity, whether it were to be
+decided now or then. This was the moment to be taken to introduce it; nor
+did he think that they ought to be deterred from doing it, by any supposed
+clamours from some of the towns in France. The great body of the people
+admired the constitution; and would support any decisions, which were made
+in strict conformity to its principles. With respect to any committee of
+inquiry, he deprecated it. The Slave-trade, he said, was not a trade. It
+dishonoured the name of commerce. It was piracy. But if so, the question,
+which it involved, was a question of justice only; and it could not be
+decided with propriety by any other standard. I then informed him, that the
+Comte de Mirabeau had undertaken to introduce it into the Assembly. At this
+he expressed his uneasiness. "Mirabeau," says he, "is a host in himself;
+and I should not be surprised if by his own eloquence and popularity only
+he were to carry it; and yet I regret that he has taken the lead in it. The
+cause is so lovely, that even ambition, abstractedly considered, is too
+impure to take it under its protection, and not to sully it. It should have
+been placed in the hands of the most virtuous man in France. This man is
+the Duc de la Rochefoucauld. But you cannot alter things now. You cannot
+take it out of his hands. I am sure he will be second to no one on this
+occasion."
+
+On my return to my hotel, I perused the outlines of the speech, which the
+Comte de Mirabeau had lent me. It afforded a masterly knowledge of the
+evils of the trade, as drawn from reason only. It was put together in the
+most striking and affecting manner. It contained an almost irresistible
+appeal to his auditors by frequent references to the ancient system of
+things in France, and to their situation and prospects under the new. It
+flowed at first gently like a river in a level country; but it grew
+afterwards into a mountain torrent, and carried every thing before it. On
+looking at the questions, which he had written down for me, I found them
+consist of three. 1. What are the different ways of reducing to slavery the
+inhabitants of that part of Africa, which is under the dominion of France?
+2. What is the state of society there with respect to government, industry,
+and the arts? 3. What are the various evils belonging to the transportation
+of the Africans from their own country?
+
+It was peculiarly agreeable to me to find, on reading the first two
+questions, that I had formed an acquaintance with Monsieur Geoffroy de
+Villeneuve, who had been aide du camp to the Chevalier de Boufflers at
+Goree; but who was then at his father's house in Paris. This gentleman had
+entertained Dr. Spaarman and Mr. Wadstrom; and had accompanied them up the
+Senegal, when under the protection of the French government in Africa. He
+had confirmed to me the testimony, which they had given before the privy
+council. But he had a fund of information on this subject, which went far
+beyond what these possessed, or I had ever yet collected from books or men.
+He had travelled all over the kingdom of Cayor on foot; and had made a map
+of it. His information was so important, that I had been with him for
+almost days together to take it down. I determined therefore to arrange the
+facts, which I had obtained from him, of which I had now a volume, that I
+might answer the two first questions, which had been proposed to me; for it
+was of great importance to the Comte de Mirabeau, that he should be able to
+appeal, in behalf of the statements in his speech to the Assembly, to an
+evidence on the spot.
+
+In the course of my correspondence with the Comte, which continued with but
+little intermission for six weeks, many circumstances took place, which
+were connected with the cause, and which I shall now detail in their order.
+
+On waiting upon Mr. Necker, at his own request, he gave me the pleasing
+intelligence, that the committee of finances, which was then composed of
+members of the National Assembly, had resolved, though they had not yet
+promulgated their resolution, upon a total abolition of all the bounties
+then in existence in favour of the Slave-trade.
+
+The Deputies of Colour now began to visit me at my own hotel. They informed
+me, that they had been admitted, since they had seen me, into the National
+Assembly. On stating their claims, the president assured them, that they
+might take courage; for that the Assembly knew no distinction between
+Blacks and Whites, but considered all men as having equal rights. This
+speech of the president, they said, had roused all the White Colonists in
+Paris. Some of these had openly insulted them. They had held also a meeting
+on the subject of this speech; at which they had worked themselves up so as
+to become quite furious. Nothing but intrigue was now going forward among
+them to put off the consideration of the claims of the free People of
+Colour. They, the deputies, had been flattered by the prospect of a hearing
+no less than six times; and, when the day arrived, something had constantly
+occurred to prevent it.
+
+At a subsequent interview, they appeared to be quite disheartened; and to
+be grievously disappointed as to the object of their mission. They were now
+sure, that they should never be able to make head against the intrigues and
+plots of the White Colonists. Day after day had been fixed as before for
+the hearing of their cause. Day after day it had been deferred in like
+manner. They were now weary with waiting. One of them, Ogé, could not
+contain himself, but broke out with great warmth--"I begin," says he, "not
+to care, whether the National Assembly will admit us or not. But let it
+beware of the consequences. We will no longer continue to be beheld in a
+degraded light. Dispatches shall go directly to St. Domingo; and we will
+soon follow them. We can produce as good soldiers on our estates, as those
+in France. Our own arms shall make us independent and respectable. If we
+are once forced to desperate measures, it will be in vain that thousands
+will be sent across the Atlantic to bring us back to our former state." On
+hearing this, I entreated the deputies to wait with patience. I observed to
+them, that in a great revolution, like that of France, things, but more
+particularly such as might be thought external, could not be discussed
+either so soon or so rapidly as men full of enthusiasm would wish. France
+would first take care of herself. She would then, I had no doubt, extend
+her care to her Colonies. Was not this a reasonable conclusion, when they,
+the deputies, had almost all the first men in the Assembly in their favour?
+I entreated them therefore to wait patiently; as well as upon another
+consideration, which was, that by an imprudent conduct they might not only
+ruin their own cause in France, but bring indescribable misery upon their
+native land.
+
+By this time a large packet, for which I had sent from England, arrived. It
+consisted of above a thousand of the plan and section of a slave-ship, with
+an explanation in French. It contained also about five hundred coloured
+engravings, made from two views, which Mr. Wadstrom had taken in Africa.
+The first of these represented the town of Joal, and the King's military on
+horseback returning to it, after having executed the great pillage, with
+their slaves. The other represented the village of Bain; from whence
+ruffians were forcing a poor woman and her children to sell them to a ship,
+which was then lying in the Roads. Both these scenes Mr. Wadstrom had
+witnessed. I had collected also by this time, one thousand of my Essays on
+the Impolicy of the Slave-trade, which had been translated into the French
+language. These I now wished to distribute, as preparatory to the motion of
+Mirabeau, among the National Assembly. This distribution was afterwards
+undertaken and effected by the Archbishop of Aix, the Bishop of Chartres,
+the Marquis de la Fayette, the Duc de la Rochefoucauld, the Comte de
+Mirabeau, Monsieur Necker, the Marquis de Condorcet, Messieurs Petion de
+Villeneuve, Bergasse, Claviere and Brissot, and by the Marchioness de la
+Fayette, Madame Necker, and Madame de Poivre, the latter of whom was the
+widow of the late Intendant of the Isle of France.
+
+This distribution had not been long begun, before I witnessed its effects.
+The virtuous Abbé Gregoire, and several members of the National Assembly,
+called upon me. The section of the slave-ship, it appeared, had been the
+means of drawing them towards me. They wished for more accurate information
+concerning it. Indeed it made its impression upon all who saw it. The
+Bishop of Chartres once told me, that, when he first espoused our cause, he
+did it at once; for it seemed obvious to him that no one could, under the
+Christian dispensation, hold another as his slave; and it was no less
+obvious where such an unnatural state existed, that there would be great
+abuses; but that, nevertheless, he had not given credit to all the tales
+which had been related of the Slave-trade, till he had seen this plate;
+after which there was nothing so barbarous which might not readily be
+believed. The Archbishop of Aix, when I first showed him the same plate,
+was so struck with horror, that he could scarcely speak: and when Mirabeau
+first saw it, he was so impressed by it, that he ordered a mechanic to make
+a model of it in wood, at a considerable expense. This model he kept
+afterwards in his dining-room. It was a ship in miniature, about a yard
+long, and little wooden men and women, which were painted black to
+represent the slaves, were seen stowed in their proper places.
+
+But while the distribution of these different articles thus contributed to
+make us many friends, it called forth the extraordinary exertions of our
+enemies. The merchants and others interested in the continuance of the
+Slave-trade wrote letters to the Archbishop of Aix, beseeching him not to
+ruin France; which he would inevitably do, if, as then president, he were
+to grant a day for hearing the question of the abolition. Offers of money
+were made to Mirabeau from the same quarter, if he would totally abandon
+his motion. An attempt was made to establish a colonial committee,
+consisting of such planters as were members of the National Assembly; upon
+whom it should devolve to consider and report upon all matters relating to
+the Colonies, before they could be determined there. Books were circulated
+in abundance in opposition to mine. Resort was again had to the public
+papers, as the means of raising a hue and cry against the principles of the
+Friends of the Negros. I was again denounced as a spy; and as one sent by
+the English minister to bribe members in the Assembly to do that in a time
+of public agitation, which in the settled state of France they could never
+have been prevailed upon to accomplish. And as a proof that this was my
+errand, it was requested of every Frenchman to put to himself the following
+question, "How it happened that England, which had considered the subject
+coolly and deliberately for eighteen months, and this in a state of
+internal peace and quietness, had not abolished the Slave-trade?"
+
+The clamour which was now made against the abolition, pervaded all Paris,
+and reached the ears of the King. Mr. Necker had a long conversation with
+him upon it. The latter sent for me immediately. He informed me, that His
+Majesty was desirous of making himself master of the question, and had
+expressed a wish to see my Essay on the Impolicy of the Slave-trade. He
+desired to have two copies of it; one in French, and the other in English;
+and he would then take his choice as to which of them he would read. He
+(Mr. Necker) was to present them. He would take with him also at the same
+time the beautiful specimens of the manufactures of the Africans, which I
+had lent to Madame Necker out of the cabinet of Monsieur Geoffrey de
+Villeneuve and others. As to the section of the slave-ship, he thought it
+would affect His Majesty too much, as he was then indisposed. All these
+articles, except the latter, were at length presented. The King bestowed a
+good deal of time upon the specimens. He admired them; but particularly
+those in gold. He expressed his surprise at the state of some of the arts
+in Africa. He sent them back on the same day on which he had examined them,
+and commissioned Mr. Necker to return me his thanks; and to say that he had
+been highly gratified with what he had seen; and, with respect to the Essay
+on the Impolicy of the Slave-trade, that he would read it with all the
+seriousness, which such a subject deserved.
+
+My correspondence with the Comte de Mirabeau was now drawing near to its
+close. I had sent him a letter every other day for a whole month, which
+contained from sixteen to twenty pages. He usually acknowledged the receipt
+of each. Hence many of his letters came into my possession. These were
+always interesting, on account of the richness of the expressions they
+contained. Mirabeau even in his ordinary discourse was eloquent. It was his
+peculiar talent to use such words, that they who heard them, were almost
+led to believe, that he had taken great pains to cull them for the
+occasion. But this his ordinary language was the language also of his
+letters; and as they show a power of expression, by which the reader may
+judge of the character of the eloquence of one, who was then undoubtedly
+the greatest orator in France, I have thought it not improper to submit one
+of them to his perusal in the annexed note[A]. I could have wished, as far
+as it relates to myself, that it had been less complimentary. It must be
+observed, however, that I had already written to him more than two hundred
+pages with my own hand; and as this was done at no small expense, time and
+trouble, and solely to qualify him for the office of doing good, he could
+not but set some value upon my labours.
+
+[Footnote A: "Je fais toujours mille remercimens plus empressés et plus
+affectueux à Monsieur Clarkson pour la vertueuse profusion de ses lumieres,
+de ses reserches, et de ses travaux. Comme ma motion et tous ses
+developpemens sont entierement prêts, j'attends avec une vive impatience
+ses nouvelles lettres, afin d'achever de classer les faits et les
+raisonnemens de Monsieur Clarkson, et, cette deduction entierement finie,
+de commencer à manoeuvrer en tactique le succès douteux de cette perilleuse
+proposition. J'aurai l'honneur de le recevoir Dimanche depuis onze heures,
+et même dix du matin jusqu'à midi, non seulement avec un vif plaisir, mais
+avec une sensible reconnoissance.
+
+_25 Decembre, 1789_.
+
+LE COMTE DE MIRABEAU."]
+
+When our correspondence was over, I had some conversation with him relative
+to fixing a day for the motion. But he judged it prudent, previously to
+this, to sound some of the members of the Assembly on the subject of it.
+This he did; but he was greatly disappointed at the result. There was not
+one member, out of all those, with whom he conversed, who had not been
+canvassed by the planters' committee. And though most of them had been
+proof against all its intrigues and artifices, yet many of them hesitated
+respecting the abolition at that moment. There was a fear in some that they
+should injure the revolution by adopting it; others, who had no such fears,
+wished for the concurrence of England in the measure, and suggested the
+propriety of a deputation there for that purpose previously to the
+discussion of the question in France. While others maintained, that as
+England had done nothing, after having had it so long under consideration,
+it was fair to presume, that she judged it impolitic to abandon the
+Slave-trade; but if France were to give it up, and England to continue it,
+how would humanity be the gainer?
+
+While the Comte de Mirabeau was continuing his canvass among the members of
+the National Assembly, relative to his motion, attempts were again made in
+the public papers to mislead them. Emancipation was now stated to be the
+object of the Friends of the Negros. This charge I repelled, by addressing
+myself to Monsieur Beauvet. I explained to him the views of the different
+societies, which had taken up the cause of the Africans; and I desired him
+to show my letter to the planters. I was obliged also to answer publicly a
+letter by Monsieur Mosneron de Laung. This writer professed to detail the
+substance of the privy council report. He had the injustice to assert, that
+three things had been distinctly proved there: First, that slavery had
+always existed in Africa; Secondly, that the natives were a bloody people,
+addicted to human sacrifice, and other barbarous customs; and, Thirdly,
+that their soil was incapable of producing any proper articles for
+commerce. From these premises he argued, as if they had been established by
+the unanimous and uncontradicted testimony of the witnesses; and he drew
+the conclusion, that not only had England done nothing in consequence, but
+that she never would do anything, which should affect the existence of this
+trade.
+
+But these letters had only just made their appearance in the public papers,
+when I was summoned to England. Parliament, it appeared, had met; and I was
+immediately to leave Paris. Among those, of whom I had but just time to
+take leave, were the Deputies of Colour. At this, my last conference with
+them, I recommended moderation and forbearance, as the best gifts I could
+leave them; and I entreated them rather to give up their seats in the
+Assembly, than on that account to bring misery on their country; for that
+with patience their cause would ultimately triumph. They replied, that I
+had prescribed to them a most difficult task. They were afraid that neither
+the conduct of the White Colonists nor of the National Assembly could be
+much longer borne. They thanked me, however, for my advice. One of them
+gave me a trinket, by which I might remember him; and as for himself, he
+said, he should never forget one, who had taken such a deep interest in
+the welfare of his mother[A]. I found, however, notwithstanding all I
+said, that there was a spirit of dissatisfaction in them, which nothing
+but a redress of their grievances could subdue; and that, if the planters
+should persevere in their intrigues, and the National Assembly in delay,
+a fire would be lighted up in St. Domingo, which could not easily be
+extinguished. This was afterward realized: for Ogé, in about three months
+from this time, left his companions to report to his constituents in St.
+Domingo the state of their mission; when hearing, on his arrival in that
+island, of the outrageous conduct of the Whites of the committee of Aquin,
+who had begun a persecution of the People of Colour for no other reason
+than that they had dared to seek the common privileges of citizens; and
+of the murder of Ferrand and Labadie, he imprudently armed his slaves.
+With a small but faithful band he rushed upon superior numbers; and was
+defeated. Taking refuge at length in the Spanish part of St. Domingo,
+he was given up; and his enemies, to strike terror into the People of
+Colour, broke him upon the wheel. From this time reconciliation between
+the parties became impossible. A bloody war commenced, and with it all
+those horrors which it has been our lot so frequently to deplore. It must
+be remembered, however, that the Slave-trade, by means of the cruel
+distinctions it occasioned, was the original cause; and though the
+revolution of France afforded the occasion; it was an occasion which
+would have been prevented, if it had not been for the intrigues and
+injustice of the Whites.
+
+[Footnote A: Africa.]
+
+Another, upon whom I had time to call, was the amiable Bishop of Chartres.
+When I left him, the Abbé Syeyes, who was with him, desired to walk with me
+to my hotel. He there presented me with a set of his works, which he sent
+for, while he staid with me; and on parting, he made use of this
+complimentary expression, in allusion, I suppose, to the cause I had
+undertaken,--"I am pleased to have been acquainted with the friend of man."
+
+It was necessary that I should see the Comte de Mirabeau and the Marquis de
+la Fayette, before I left Paris. I had written to each of them to
+communicate the intelligence of my departure, as soon as I received it. The
+Comte, it appeared, had nearly canvassed the Assembly. He could count upon
+three hundred members, who, for the sake of justice, and without any
+consideration of policy or of consequences, would support his motion.
+But alas! what proportion did this number bear to twelve hundred? About
+five hundred more would support him; but only on one condition; which
+was, if England would give an unequivocal proof of her intention to
+abolish the trade. The knowledge of these circumstances, he said, had
+induced him to write a letter to Mr. Pitt. In this he had explained,
+how far he could proceed without his assistance, and how far with it.
+He had frankly developed to him the mind and temper of the Assembly on
+this subject; but his answer must be immediate: for the White Colonists
+were daily gaining such an influence there, that he foresaw it would be
+impossible to carry the measure, if it were long delayed. On taking leave
+of him he desired me to be the bearer of the letter, and to present it
+to Mr. Pitt.
+
+On conversing with the Marquis de la Fayette, he lamented deeply the
+unexpected turn, which the cause of the Negros had lately taken in the
+Assembly. It was entirely owing to the daily intrigues of the White
+Colonists. He feared they would ruin every thing. If the Deputies of Colour
+had been heard on their arrival, their rights would have been acknowledged.
+But now there was little probability that they would obtain them. He
+foresaw nothing but desolation in St. Domingo. With respect to the
+abolition of the Slave-trade, it might be yet carried; but not unless
+England would concur in the measure. On this topic he enlarged with much
+feeling. He hoped the day was near at hand, when two great nations, which
+had been hitherto distinguished only for their hostility, one toward the
+other, would unite in so sublime a measure; and that they would follow up
+their union by another, still more lovely, for the preservation of eternal
+and universal peace. Thus their future rivalships might have the
+extraordinary merit of being rivalships in good. Thus the revolution of
+France, through the mighty aid of England, might become the source of
+civilization, of freedom, and of happiness to the whole world. No other
+nations were sufficiently enlightened for such an union, but all other
+nations might be benefited by it.
+
+The last person whom I saw, was Brissot. He accompanied me to my carriage.
+With him therefore I shall end my French account; and I shall end it in no
+way so satisfactory to myself, as in a very concise vindication of his
+character, from actual knowledge, against the attacks of those who have
+endeavoured to disparage it; but who never knew him. Justice and truth, I
+am convinced, demand some little declaration on this subject at my hands.
+Brissot then was a man of plain and modest appearance. His habits, contrary
+to those of his countrymen in general, were domestic. In his own family he
+set an amiable example, both as a husband and as a father. On all occasions
+he was a faithful friend. He was particularly watchful over his private
+conduct. From the simplicity of his appearance, and the severity of his
+morals, he was called The Quaker; at least in all the circles which I
+frequented. He was a man of deep feeling. He was charitable to the poor as
+far as a slender income permitted him. But his benevolence went beyond the
+usual bounds. He was no patriot in the ordinary acceptation of the word;
+for he took the habitable globe as his country, and wished to consider
+every foreigner as his brother.
+
+I left France, as it maybe easily imagined, much disappointed, that my
+labours, which had been of nearly six months continuance, should have had
+no better success; nor did I see, in looking forward, any circumstances
+that were consoling with respect to the issue of them there; for it was
+impossible that Mr. Pitt, even if he had been inclined to write to
+Mirabeau, circumstanced as matters then were with respect to the hearing of
+evidence, could have given him a promise, at least of a speedy abolition;
+and, unless his answer had been immediate, it would have arrived, seeing
+that the French planters were daily profiting by their intrigues, too late
+to be effectual.
+
+I had but just arrived in England, when Mr. Wilberforce made a new motion
+in the House of Commons on the subject of the, Slave-trade. In referring to
+the transactions of the last sessions, he found that twenty-eight days had
+been allotted to the hearing of witnesses against the abolition, and that
+eleven persons only had been examined in that time. If the examinations
+were to go on in the same manner, they might be made to last for years. He
+resolved therefore to move, that, instead of hearing evidence in future in
+the house at large, members should hear it in an open committee above
+stairs; which committee should sit notwithstanding any adjournment of the
+house itself. This motion he made; and in doing it he took an opportunity
+of correcting an erroneous report; which was, that he had changed his mind
+on this great subject. This was, he said, so far from being the case, that
+the more he contemplated the trade, the more enormous he found it, and the
+more he felt himself compelled to persevere in endeavours for its
+abolition.
+
+One would have thought that a motion, so reasonable and so constitutional,
+would have met with the approbation of all; but it was vehemently opposed
+by Mr. Gascoyne, Alderman Newnham, and others. The plea set up was, that
+there was no precedent for referring a question of such importance to a
+committee. It was now obvious, that the real object of our opponents in
+abandoning decision by the privy council evidence was delay. Unable to meet
+us there, they were glad to fly to any measure, which should enable them to
+put off the evil day. This charge was fixed upon them in unequivocal
+language by Mr. Fox; who observed besides, that if the members of the house
+should then resolve to hear evidence in a committee of the whole house as
+before, it would amount to a resolution, that the question of the abolition
+of the Slave-trade should be put by, or at least that it should never be
+decided by them. After a long debate, the motion of Mr. Wilberforce was
+voted without a division; and the examination of witnesses proceeded in
+behalf of those who were interested in the continuance of the trade.
+
+This measure having been resolved upon, by which dispatch in the
+examinations was promoted, I was alarmed lest we should be called upon for
+our own evidence, before we were fully prepared. The time which I had
+originally allotted for the discovery of new witnesses, had been taken up,
+if not wasted, in France. In looking over the names of the sixteen, who
+were to have been examined by the committee of privy council, if there
+had been time, one had died, and eight, who were sea-faring people,
+were out of the kingdom. It was time therefore to stir immediately
+in this business. Happily, on looking over my letters, which I found
+on my arrival in England, the names of several had been handed to me,
+with the places of their abode, who could give me information on the
+subject of our question. All these I visited with the utmost dispatch.
+I was absent only three weeks. I had travelled a thousand miles in
+this time, had conversed with seventeen persons, and had prevailed
+upon three to be examined.
+
+I had scarcely returned with the addition of these witnesses to my list,
+when I found it necessary to go out again upon the same errand. This second
+journey arose in part from the following circumstances. There was a matter
+in dispute relative to the mode of obtaining slaves in the rivers of
+Calabàr and Bonny. It was usual, when the slave-ships lay there, for a
+number of canoes to go into the inland country. These went in a fleet.
+There might be from thirty to forty armed natives in each of them. Every
+canoe also had a four- or a six-pounder (cannon) fastened to her bow.
+Equipped in this manner they departed; and they were usually absent from
+eight to fourteen days. It was said that they went to fairs, which were
+held on the banks of these rivers, and at which there was a regular show of
+slaves. On their return they usually brought down from eight hundred to a
+thousand of these for the ships. These lay at the bottom of the canoes;
+their arms and legs having been first bound by the ropes of the country.
+Now the question was, how the people, thus going up these rivers, obtained
+their slaves?
+
+It was certainly a very suspicious circumstance, that such a number of
+persons should go out upon these occasions; and that they should be armed
+in such a manner. We presumed therefore, that, though they might buy many
+of the slaves, whom they brought down, at the fairs, which have been
+mentioned, they obtained others by violence, as opportunity offered. This
+inference we pressed upon our opponents; and called upon them to show what
+circumstances made such warlike preparations necessary on these excursions.
+To this they replied readily. The people in the canoes, said they, pass
+through the territories of different petty princes; to each of whom, on
+entering his territory, they pay a tribute or toll. This tribute has been
+long fixed; but attempts frequently have been made to raise it. They who
+follow the trade cannot afford to submit to these unreasonable demands; and
+therefore they arm themselves in case of any determination on the part of
+these petty princes to enforce them.
+
+This answer we never judged to be satisfactory. We tried therefore to throw
+light upon the subject, by inquiring if the natives, who went up on these
+expeditions, usually took with them as many goods, as would amount to the
+number of the slaves they were accustomed to bring back with them. But we
+could get no direct answer, from any actual knowledge, to this question.
+All had seen the canoes go out and return; but no one had seen them loaded,
+or had been on board them. It appeared, however, from circumstantial
+evidence, that, though the natives on these occasions might take some
+articles of trade with them, it was impossible from appearances, that they
+could take them in the proportion mentioned. We maintained then our
+inference as before; but it was still uniformly denied.
+
+How then were we to decide this important question? for it was said, that
+no white man was ever permitted by the natives to go up in these canoes. On
+mentioning accidentally the circumstances of the case, as I have now stated
+them, to a friend, immediately on my return from my last journey, he
+informed me, that he himself had been in company, about a year before, with
+a sailor, a very respectable-looking man, who had been up these rivers. He
+had spent half an hour with him at an inn. He described his person to me.
+But he knew nothing of his name, or of the place of his abode. All he knew
+was, that he was either going, or that he belonged to, some ship of war in
+ordinary; but he could not tell at what port. I might depend upon all these
+circumstances, if the man had not deceived him; and he saw no reason why he
+should.
+
+I felt myself set on fire, as it were, by this intelligence, deficient as
+it was; and I seemed to determine instantly that I would, if it were
+possible, find him out. For if our suspicions were true, that the natives
+frequently were kidnapped in these expeditions, it would be of great
+importance to the cause of the abolition to have them confirmed; for as
+many slaves came annually from these two rivers, as from all the coast of
+Africa besides. But how to proceed on so blind an errand was the question.
+I first thought of trying to trace the man by letter. But this might be
+tedious. The examinations were now going on rapidly. We should soon be
+called upon for evidence ourselves. Besides, I knew nothing of his name. I
+then thought it to be a more effectual way to apply to Sir Charles
+Middleton, as comptroller of the navy, by whose permission I could board
+every ship of war in ordinary in England, and judge for myself. But here
+the undertaking seemed very arduous; and the time it would consume became
+an objection in this respect, that I thought I could not easily forgive
+myself, if I were to fail in it. My inclination, however, preponderated
+this way. At length I determined to follow it; for, on deliberate
+consideration, I found that I could not employ my time more advantageously
+to the cause; for as other witnesses must be found out somewhere, it was
+highly probable that, if I should fail in the discovery of this man, I
+should, by moving among such a number of sea-faring people, find others,
+who could give their testimony in our favour.
+
+I must now inform the reader, that ships of war in ordinary, in one of
+which this man was reported to be, are those, which are out of commission,
+and which are laid up in the different rivers and waters in the
+neighbourhood of the King's dock-yards. Every one of these has a boatswain,
+gunner, carpenter, and assistants on board. They lie usually in divisions
+of ten or twelve; and a master in the navy has a command over every
+division.
+
+At length I began my journey. I boarded all the ships of war lying in
+ordinary at Deptford, and examined the different persons in each. From
+Deptford I proceeded to Woolwich, where I did the same. Thence I hastened
+to Chatham, and then, down the Medway, to Sheerness. I had now boarded
+above a hundred and sixty vessels of war. I had found out two good and
+willing evidences among them. But I could gain no intelligence of him, who
+was the object of my search.
+
+From Chatham, I made the best of my way to Portsmouth-harbour. A very
+formidable task presented itself here. But the masters' boats were ready
+for me; and I continued my pursuit. On boarding the Pegase, on the second
+day, I discovered a very respectable person in the gunner of that ship. His
+name was George Millar. He had been on board the Canterbury slave-ship at
+the dreadful massacre at Calabàr. He was the only disinterested evidence
+living, of whom I had yet heard. He expressed his willingness to give his
+testimony, if his presence should be thought necessary in London. I then
+continued my pursuit for the remainder of the day. On the next day, I
+resumed and finished it for this quarter. I had now examined the different
+persons in more than a hundred vessels in this harbour, but I had not
+discovered the person I had gone to seek.
+
+Matters now began to look rather disheartening, I mean, as far as my grand
+object was concerned. There was but one other port left, and this was
+between two and three hundred miles distant. I determined however to go to
+Plymouth. I had already been more successful in this tour, with respect to
+obtaining general evidence, than in any other of the same length; and the
+probability was, that, as I should continue to move among the same kind of
+people, my success would be in a similar proportion according to the number
+visited. These were great encouragements to me to proceed. At length, I
+arrived at the place of my last hope. On my first day's expedition I
+boarded forty vessels, but found no one in these, who had been on the coast
+of Africa in the Slave-trade. One or two had been there in King's ships;
+but they had never been on shore. Things were now drawing near to a close;
+and, notwithstanding my success as to general evidence in this journey, my
+heart began to beat. I was restless and uneasy during the night. The next
+morning, I felt agitated again between the alternate pressure of hope and
+fear; and in this state I entered my boat. The fifty-seventh vessel, which
+I boarded in this harbour, was the Melampus frigate. One person belonging
+to it, on examining him in the captain's cabin, said he had been two
+voyages to Africa; and I had not long discoursed with him, before I found,
+to my inexpressible joy, that he was the man. I found too, that he
+unravelled the question in dispute precisely as our inferences had
+determined it. He had been two expeditions up the river Calabàr in the
+canoes of the natives. In the first of these, they came within a certain
+distance of a village. They then concealed themselves under the bushes,
+which hung over the water from the banks. In this position they remained
+during day-light. But at night they went up to it armed; and seized all the
+inhabitants, who had not time to make their escape. They obtained
+forty-five persons in this manner. In the second they were out eight or
+nine days; when they made a similar attempt, and with nearly similar
+success. They seized men, women, and children, as they could find them in
+the huts. They then bound their arms, and drove them before them to the
+canoes. The name of the person, thus discovered on board the Melampus, was
+Isaac Parker. On inquiring into his character from the master of the
+division, I found it highly respectable. I found also afterwards, that he
+had sailed with Captain Cook, with great credit to himself, round the
+world. It was also remarkable that my brother, on seeing him in London,
+when he went to deliver his evidence, recognised him as having served on
+board the Monarch man-of-war, and as one of the most exemplary men in that
+ship.
+
+I returned now in triumph. I had been out only three weeks, and I had found
+out this extraordinary person, and five respectable witnesses besides.
+These, added to the three discovered in the last journey, and to those
+provided before, made us more formidable than at any former period; so that
+the delay of our opponents, which we had looked upon as so great an evil,
+proved in the end truly serviceable to our cause.
+
+On going into the committee-room of the House of Commons on my return, I
+found that the examinations were still going on in the behalf of those, who
+were interested in the continuance of the trade; and they went on beyond
+the middle of April, when it was considered that they had closed. Mr.
+Wilberforce moved accordingly on the twenty-third of the same month, that
+Captain Thomas Wilson, of the royal navy, and that Charles Berns Wadstrom
+and Henry Hew Dalrymple, esquires, do attend as witnesses on the behalf of
+the abolition. There was nothing now but clamour from those on the opposite
+side of the question. They knew well, that there were but few members of
+the House of Commons, who had read the privy council report. They knew
+therefore, that, if the question were to be decided by evidence, it must be
+decided by that, which their own witnesses had given before parliament. But
+this was the evidence only on one side. It was certain therefore, if the
+decision were to be made upon this basis, that it must be entirely in their
+favour. Will it then be believed that in an English House of Commons there
+could be found persons, who could move to prevent the hearing of any other
+witnesses on this subject; and, what is more remarkable, that they should
+charge Mr. Wilberforce, because he proposed the hearing of them, with the
+intention solely of delay? Yes. Such persons were found, but, happily, only
+among the friends of the Slave-trade. Mr. Wilberforce, in replying to them,
+could not help observing, that it was rather extraordinary that they, who
+had occasioned the delay of a whole year, should charge him with that, of
+which they themselves had been so conspicuously guilty. He then commented
+for some time on the injustice of their motion. He stated too, that he
+would undertake to remove from disinterested and unprejudiced persons many
+of the impressions, which had been made by the witnesses against the
+abolition; and he appealed to the justice and honour of the house in behalf
+of an injured people; under the hope, that they would not allow a decision
+to be made till they had heard the whole of the case. These observations,
+however, did not satisfy all those, who belonged to the opposite party.
+Lord Penrhyn contended for a decision without a moment's delay. Mr.
+Gascoyne relented; and said, he would allow three weeks to the
+abolitionists, during which their evidence, might be heard. At length the
+debate ended; in the course of which, Mr. Pitt and Mr. Fox powerfully
+supported Mr. Wilberforce; when the motion was negatived without any
+attempt at a division.
+
+The witnesses in behalf of the abolition of the Slave-trade now took
+possession of the ground, which those in favour of it had left. But what
+was our surprise, when only three of them had been heard, to find that Mr.
+Norris should come forward as an evidence! This he did to confirm what he
+had stated to the privy council as to the general question; but he did it
+more particularly, as it appeared afterwards, in the justification of his
+own conduct: for the part, which he had taken at Liverpool, as it related
+to me, had become a subject of conversation with many. It was now well
+known, what assistance he had given me there in my pursuit; how he had even
+furnished me with clauses for a bill for the abolition of the trade; how I
+had written to him, in consequence of his friendly cooperation, to come up
+as an evidence in our favour; and how at that moment he had accepted the
+office of a delegate on the contrary side. The noise, which the relation
+and repetition of these and other circumstances had made, had given him, I
+believe, considerable pain. His friends too had urged some explanation as
+necessary. But how short-sighted are they who do wrong! By coming forward
+in this imprudent manner, he fixed the stain only the more indelibly on
+himself; for he thus imposed upon me the cruel necessity of being examined
+against him; and this necessity was the more afflicting to me, because I
+was to be called upon, not to state facts relative to the trade, but to
+destroy his character as an evidence in its support. I was to be called
+upon, in fact, to explain all those communications, which have been stated
+to have taken place between us on this subject. Glad indeed should I have
+been to have declined this painful interference. But no one would hear of a
+refusal. The Bishop of London, Mr. Pitt, and Mr. Wilberforce, considered my
+appearance on this occasion as an imperious duty to the cause of the
+oppressed. It may be perhaps sufficient to say, that I was examined; that
+Mr. Norris. was present all the time; that I was cross-examined by counsel;
+and that after this time, Mr. Norris seemed to have no ordinary sense of
+his own degradation; for he never afterwards held up his head, or looked
+the abolitionists in the face, or acted with energy as a delegate, as on
+former occasions.
+
+The hearing of evidence continued to go on in behalf of the abolition of
+the trade. No less than twenty-four witnesses, altogether, were heard in
+this session. And here it may not be improper to remark, that, during the
+examination of our own witnesses as well as the cross-examination of those
+of our opponents, no counsel were ever employed. Mr. Wilberforce and Mr.
+William Smith undertook this laborious department; and as they performed it
+with great ability, so they did it with great liberality towards those, who
+were obliged to come under their notice in the course of this fiery ordeal.
+
+The bill of Sir William Dolben was now to be renewed. On this occasion the
+enemies of the abolition became again conspicuous; for on the twenty-sixth
+of May, they availed themselves of a thin house to propose an amendment, by
+which they increased the number of the slaves to the tonnage of the vessel.
+They increased it too, without taking into the account, as had hitherto
+been done, the extent of the superficies of the vessels, which were to
+carry them. This was the third indecorous attempt against what were only
+reasonable and expected proceedings in the present session. But their
+advantage was of no great duration; for, the very next day, the amendment
+was rejected on the report by a majority of ninety-five to sixty-nine, in
+consequence, principally, of the private exertions of Mr. Pitt. Of this
+bill, though it was renewed in other years besides the present, I shall say
+no more in this History; because it has nothing to do with the general
+question. Horrible as it yet left the situation of the poor slaves in their
+transportation, (which the plate has most abundantly shown) it was the best
+bill, which could be then obtained; and it answered to a certain degree the
+benevolent wishes of the worthy baronet, who introduced it: for if we could
+conclude that these voyages were made more comfortable to the injured
+Africans, in proportion as there was less mortality in them, he had
+undoubtedly the pleasure of seeing the end, at least partially, obtained;
+though he must always have felt a great drawback from it, by reflecting
+that the survivors, however their sufferings might have been a little
+diminished, were reserved for slavery.
+
+The session was now near its close; and we had the sorrow to find, though
+we had defeated our opponents in the three instances which have been
+mentioned, that the tide ran decidedly against us, upon the general
+question, in the House of Commons. The same statements, which had struck so
+many members with panic in the former sessions, such as that of
+emancipation, of the ruin and massacre of the planters, and of
+indemnification to the amount of seventy millions, had been industriously
+kept up, and this by a personal canvass among them. But this hostile
+disposition was still unfortunately increased by considerations of another
+sort. For the witnesses of our opponents had taken their ground first. No
+less than eleven of them had been examined in the last sessions. In the
+present, two-thirds of the time had been occupied by others on the same
+side. Hence the impression upon this ground also was against us; and we had
+yet had no adequate opportunity of doing it away. A clamour was also
+raised, where we thought it least likely to have originated. They (the
+planters) it was said, had produced persons in elevated life and of the
+highest character as witnesses; whereas we had been obliged to take up with
+those of the lowest condition. This idea was circulated directly after the
+introduction of Isaac Parker, before mentioned; a simple mariner; and who
+was now contrasted with the admirals on the other side of the question.
+This outcry was not only ungenerous, but unconstitutional. It is the glory
+of the English law, that it has no scale of veracity, which it adapts to
+persons, according to the station, which they may be found to occupy in
+life. In our courts of law the poor are heard as well as the rich; and if
+their reputation be fair, and they stand proof against the
+cross-examinations they undergo, both the judge and the jury must determine
+the matter in dispute by their evidence. But the House of Commons were now
+called upon by our opponents, to adopt the preposterous maxim of attaching
+falsehood to poverty, or of weighing truth by the standard of rank and
+riches.
+
+But though we felt a considerable degree of pain, in finding this adverse
+disposition among so many members of the Lower House, it was some
+consolation to us to know, that our cause had not suffered with their
+constituents, the people. These were still warmly with us. Indeed, their
+hatred of the trade had greatly increased. Many circumstances had occurred
+in this year to promote it. The committee, during my absence in France, had
+circulated the plate of the slave-ship throughout all England. No one saw
+it but he was impressed. It spoke to him in a language, which was at once
+intelligible and irresistible. It brought forth the tear of sympathy in
+behalf of the sufferers, and it fixed their sufferings in his heart. The
+committee too had been particularly vigilant during the whole of the year,
+with respect to the public papers. They had suffered no statement in behalf
+of those interested in the continuance of the trade, to go unanswered. Dr.
+Dickson, the author of the Letters on Slavery before mentioned, had come
+forward again with his services on this occasion, and by his active
+cooperation with a sub-committee appointed for the purpose, the coast was
+so well cleared of our opponents, that, though they were seen the next year
+again, through the medium of the same papers, they appeared only in sudden
+incursions, as it were, during which they darted a few weapons at us; but
+they never afterward ventured upon the plain to dispute the matter, inch by
+inch, or point by point, in an open and manly manner.
+
+But other circumstances occurred to keep up a hatred of the trade among the
+people in this interval, which, trivial as they were, ought not to be
+forgotten. The amiable poet Cowper had frequently made the Slave-trade the
+subject of his contemplation. He had already severely condemned it in his
+valuable poem The Task. But now he had written three little fugitive pieces
+upon it. Of these the most impressive was that, which he called The Negro's
+Complaint, and of which the following is a copy:
+
+  "Forced from home and all its pleasures,
+    Afric's coast I left forlorn,
+  To increase a stranger's treasures,
+    O'er the raging billows borne;
+  Men from England bought and sold me,
+    Paid my price in paltry gold;
+  But, though theirs they have inroll'd me,
+    Minds are never to be sold.
+
+  "Still in thought as free as ever,
+    What are England's rights, I ask.
+  Me from my delights to sever,
+    Me to torture, me to task?
+  Fleecy locks and black complexion
+    Cannot forfeit Nature's claim;
+  Skins may differ, but affection
+    Dwells in black and white the same.
+
+  "Why did all-creating Nature
+    Make the plant, for which we toil?
+  Sighs must fan it, tears must water,
+    Sweat of ours must dress the soil.
+  Think, ye masters, iron-hearted,
+    Lolling at your jovial boards,
+  Think, how many backs have smarted
+    For the sweets your cane affords.
+
+  "Is there, as you sometimes tell us,
+    Is there one, who rules on high;
+  Has he bid you buy and sell us,
+    Speaking from his throne, the sky?
+  Ask him, if your knotted scourges,
+    Fetters, blood-extorting screws,
+  Are the means, which duty urges
+    Agents of his will to use?
+
+  "Hark! he answers. Wild tornadoes,
+    Strewing yonder sea with wrecks,
+  Wasting towns, plantations, meadows,
+    Are the voice with which he speaks.
+  He, foreseeing what vexations
+    Afric's sons should undergo,
+  Fix'd their tyrants' habitations
+    Where his whirlwinds answer--No.
+
+  "By our blood in Afric wasted,
+    Ere our necks received the chain;
+  By the miseries, which we tasted
+    Crossing, in your barks, the main;
+  By our sufferings, since you brought us
+    To the man-degrading mart,
+  All sustain'd by patience, taught us
+    Only by a broken heart.
+
+  "Deem our nation brutes no longer,
+    Till some reason you shall find
+  Worthier of regard, and stronger,
+    Than the colour of our kind.
+  Slaves of gold! whose sordid dealings
+    Tarnish all your boasted powers,
+  Prove that you have human feelings,
+    Ere you proudly question ours."
+
+This little piece, Cowper presented in manuscript to some of his friends in
+London; and these, conceiving it to contain a powerful appeal in behalf of
+the injured Africans, joined in printing it. Having ordered it on the
+finest hot-pressed paper, and folded it up in a small and neat form, they
+gave it the printed title of "A Subject for Conversation at the Tea-table."
+After this, they sent many thousand copies of it in franks into the
+country. From one it spread to another, till it travelled almost over the
+whole island. Falling at length into the hands of the musician, it was set
+to music; and it then found its way into the streets, both of the
+metropolis and of the country, where it was sung as a ballad; and where it
+gave a plain account of the subject, with an appropriate feeling, to those
+who heard it.
+
+Nor was the philanthropy of the late Mr. Wedgwood less instrumental in
+turning the popular feeling in our favour. He made his own manufactory
+contribute to this end. He took the seal of the committee, as exhibited in
+the first volume, for his model; and he produced a beautiful cameo, of a
+less size, of which the ground was a most delicate white, but the Negro,
+who was seen imploring compassion in the middle of it, was in his own
+native colour. Mr. Wedgwood made a liberal donation of these, when
+finished, among his friends. I received from him no less than five hundred
+of them myself. They, to whom they were sent, did not lay them up in their
+cabinets, but gave them away likewise. They were soon, like The Negro's
+Complaint, in different parts of the kingdom. Some had them inlaid in gold
+on the lid of their snuff-boxes. Of the ladies, several wore them in
+bracelets, and others had them fitted up in an ornamental manner as pins
+for their hair. At length, the taste for wearing them became general; and
+thus fashion, which usually confines itself to worthless things, was seen
+for once in the honourable office of promoting the cause of justice,
+humanity, and freedom.
+
+I shall now only state that the committee took as members within its own
+body, in the period of time which is included in this chapter, the Reverend
+Mr. Ormerod, chaplain to the Bishop of London, and Captain James Bowen, of
+the royal navy; that they elected the honourable Nathaniel Curzon (now Lord
+Scarsdale), Dr. Frossard of Lyons, and Benjamin Garlike, esquire, then
+secretary to the English embassy at the Hague, honorary and corresponding
+members; and that they concluded their annual labours with a suitable
+report; in which they noticed the extraordinary efforts of our opponents to
+injure our cause, in the following manner: "In the progress of this
+business a powerful combination of interest has been excited against us.
+The African trader, the planter, and the West India merchant have united
+their forces to defend the fortress, in which their supposed treasures lie.
+Vague calculations and false alarms have been thrown out to the public, in
+order to show, that the constitution and even the existence of this free
+and opulent nation depend on its depriving the inhabitants of a foreign
+country of those rights and of that liberty, which we ourselves so highly
+and so justly prize. Surely in the nature of things and in the order of
+Providence it cannot be so. England existed as a great nation, long before
+the African commerce was known amongst us, and it is not to acts of
+injustice and violence that she owes her present rank in the scale of
+nations."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER III.
+
+_Continuation from July 1790 to July 1791--Author travels again throughout
+the kingdom--Object of his journey--Motion in the House of Commons to
+resume the hearing of evidence in favour of the abolition--List of all
+those examined on this side of the question--Machinations of interested
+persons, and cruel circumstances of the times previously to the day of
+decision--Motion at length made for stopping all further importation of
+Slaves from Africa--debates upon it--motion lost--Resolutions of the
+committee for the Abolition of the Slave-trade--Establishment of the Sierra
+Leone Company._
+
+
+It was a matter of deep affliction to us to think, that the crimes and
+sufferings inseparable from the Slave-trade were to be continued to another
+year. And yet it was our duty, in the present moment, to acquiesce in the
+postponement of the question. This postponement was not now for the purpose
+of delay, but of securing victory. The evidence, on the side of the
+abolition, was, at the end of the last session, but half finished. It was
+impossible, for the sake of Africa, that we could have then closed it. No
+other opportunity might offer in parliament for establishing an indelible
+record in her favour, if we were to neglect the present. It was our duty
+therefore even to wait to complete it, and to procure such a body of
+evidence, as should not only bear us out in the approaching contest, but
+such as, if we were to fail, would bear out our successors also. It was
+possible indeed, if the inhabitants of our islands were to improve in
+civilization, that the poor slaves might experience gradually an improved
+treatment with it; and so far testimony now might not be testimony for
+ever: but it was utterly impossible, while the Slave-trade lasted, and the
+human passions continued to be the same, that there should be any change
+for the better in Africa; or that any modes, less barbarous, should come
+into use for procuring slaves. Evidence therefore, if once collected on
+this subject, would be evidence for posterity. In the midst of these
+thoughts another journey occurred to me as necessary for this purpose; and
+I prayed, that I might have strength to perform it in the most effectual
+manner; and that I might be daily impressed, as I travelled along, with the
+stimulating thought, that the last hope for millions might possibly rest
+upon my own endeavours.
+
+The committee highly approved of this journey. Mr. Wilberforce saw the
+absolute necessity of it also; and had prepared a number of questions, with
+great ingenuity, to be put to such persons, as might have information to
+communicate. These I added to those in the tables, which have been already
+mentioned; and they made together a valuable collection on the subject.
+
+This tour was the most vexatious of any I had yet undertaken; many still
+refused to come forward to be examined, and some on the most frivolous
+pretences; so that I was disgusted, as I journeyed on, to find how little
+men were disposed to make sacrifices for so great a cause. In one part of
+it I went over nearly two thousand miles, receiving repeated refusals. I
+had not secured one witness within this distance. This was truly
+disheartening. I was subject to the whims and the caprice of those, whom I
+solicited on these occasions[A]. To these I was obliged to accommodate
+myself. When at Edinburgh, a person who could have given me material
+information, declined seeing me, though he really wished well to the cause.
+When I had returned southward as far as York, he changed his mind; and he
+would then see me. I went back, that I might not lose him. When I arrived,
+he would give me only private information. Thus I travelled, backwards and
+forwards, four hundred miles to no purpose. At another place a circumstance
+almost similar happened, though with a different issue. I had been for two
+years writing about a person, whose testimony was important. I had passed
+once through the town, in which he lived; but he would not then see me. I
+passed through it now, but no entreaties of his friends could make him
+alter his resolution. He was a man highly respectable as to situation in
+life; but of considerable vanity. I said therefore to my friend, on leaving
+the town, You may tell him that I expect to be at Nottingham in a few days;
+and though it be a hundred and fifty miles distant, I will even come back
+to see him, if he will dine with me on my return. A letter from my friend
+announced to me, when at Nottingham, that his vanity had been so gratified
+by the thought of a person coming expressly to visit him from such a
+distance, that he would meet me according to my appointment. I went back.
+We dined together. He yielded to my request. I was now repaid; and I
+returned towards Nottingham in the night. These circumstances I mention,
+and I feel it right to mention them, that the reader may be properly
+impressed with the great difficulties we found in collecting a body of
+evidence in comparison with our opponents. They ought never to be
+forgotten; for if with the testimony, picked up as it were under all these
+disadvantages, we carried our object against those, who had almost
+numberless witnesses to command, what must have been the merits of our
+cause! No person can indeed judge of the severe labour and trials in these
+journeys. In the present, I was out four months. I was almost over the
+whole island, I intersected it backwards and forwards both in the night and
+in the day. I travelled nearly seven thousand miles in this time, and I was
+able to count upon twenty new and willing evidences.
+
+[Footnote A: Ten or twelve of those, who were examined, much to their
+honour, came forward of their own accord.]
+
+Having now accomplished my object, Mr. Wilberforce moved on the fourth of
+February in the House of Commons, that a committee be appointed to examine
+further witnesses in behalf of the abolition of the Slave-trade. This
+motion was no sooner made, than Mr. Cawthorne rose, to our great surprise,
+to oppose it. He took upon himself to decide, that the house had heard
+evidence enough. This indecent motion was not without its advocates. Mr.
+Wilberforce set forth the injustice of this attempt; and proved, that out
+of eighty-one days, which had been given up to the hearing of evidence, the
+witnesses against the abolition had occupied no less than fifty-seven. He
+was strenuously supported by Mr. Burke, Mr. Martin, and other respectable
+members. At length, the debate ended in favour of the original motion, and
+a committee was appointed accordingly.
+
+The examinations began again on February the seventh, and continued till
+April the fifth, when they were finally closed. In this, as in the former
+session, Mr. Wilberforce and Mr. William Smith principally conducted them;
+and indeed it was necessary that they should have been present at these
+times; for it is perhaps difficult to conceive the illiberal manner, in
+which our witnesses were treated by those on the other side of the
+question. Men, who had left the trade upon principle, and who had come
+forward, against their apparent interest, to serve the cause of humanity
+and justice, were looked upon as mercenaries and culprits, or as men of
+doubtful and suspicious character. They were brow-beaten. Unhandsome
+questions were put to them. Some were kept for four days under examination.
+It was however highly to their honour, that they were found in no one
+instance to prevaricate, nor to waver as to the certainty of their facts.
+
+But this treatment, hard as it was for them to bear, was indeed good for
+the cause; for, coming thus pure out of the fire, they occasioned their own
+testimony, when read, to bear stronger marks of truth than that of the
+generality of our opponents; nor was it less superior, when weighed by
+other considerations. For the witnesses against the abolition were
+principally interested. They who were not, had been hospitably received at
+the planters' tables. The evidence too, which they delivered, was almost
+wholly negative. They had not seen such and such evils. But this was no
+proof that the evils did not exist. The witnesses, on the other hand, who
+came up in favour of the abolition, had no advantage in making their
+several assertions. In some instances they came up against their apparent
+interest; and, to my knowledge, suffered persecution for so doing. The
+evidence also, which they delivered, was of a positive nature. They gave an
+account of specific evils, which had come under their own eyes. These evils
+were never disproved. They stood therefore on a firm basis, as on a tablet
+of brass. Engraved there in affirmative characters; a few of them were of
+more value, than all the negative and airy testimony, which had been
+advanced on the other side of the question.
+
+That the public may judge, in some measure, of the respectability of the
+witnesses in favour of the abolition, and that they may know also to whom
+Africa is so much indebted for her deliverance, I shall subjoin their names
+in the three following lists. The first will contain those, who were
+examined by the privy council only; the second those, who were examined by
+the privy council and the house of commons also; and the third those, who
+were examined by the house of commons only.
+
+
+
+
+LIST I.
+
+Andrew Spaarman, physician, botanist, and successor to Linnaeus, traveller
+  on discovery in Africa for the King of Sweden.
+
+Reverend Isham Baggs, chaplain for two voyages to Africa in H.M. ship,
+  Grampus.
+
+Captain James Bowen, of the royal navy, one voyage to Africa.
+
+Mr. William James, a master in the royal navy, three voyages, as mate of a
+  slave-vessel.
+
+Mr. David Henderson, gunner of H.M. ship Centurion, three voyages to
+  Africa.
+
+Harry Gandy, two voyages to Africa, as captain of a slave-vessel.
+
+Thomas Eldred, two voyages there, as mate.
+
+James Arnold, three voyages there, as surgeon and surgeon's mate.
+
+Thomas Deane, two voyages there, as captain of a wood and ivory ship.
+
+
+
+
+LIST II.
+
+Major-General Rooke, commander of Goree, in Africa.
+
+Henry Hew Dalrymple, esquire, lieutenant of the 75th regiment at Goree, and
+  afterwards in all the West Indian islands.
+
+Thomas Willson, esquire, naval commander at Goree.
+
+John Hills, esquire, captain of H.M. ship Zephyr, on the African station.
+
+Sir George Yonge, two voyages as lieutenant, and two as captain, of a ship
+  of war, on the African station.
+
+Charles Berns Wadstrom, esquire, traveller on discovery in Africa for the
+  King of Sweden.
+
+Reverend John Newton, five voyages to Africa in a slave-vessel, and
+  resident eighteen months there.
+
+Captain John Ashley Hall, in the merchant service, two voyages in a
+  slave-vessel as a mate.
+
+Alexander Falconbridge, four voyages in a slave-vessel as surgeon and
+  surgeon's mate.
+
+Captain John Samuel Smith, of the royal navy, on the West India station.
+
+
+
+
+LIST III.
+
+Anthony Pantaleo How, esquire, employed by Government as a botanist in
+ Africa.
+
+Sir Thomas Bolton Thompson, two voyages as a lieutenant, and two as
+  commander of a ship of war on the African station.
+
+Lieutenant John Simpson, of the marines, two voyages in a ship of war on
+  the African station.
+
+Lieutenant Richard Storey, of the royal navy, four years on the
+  slave-employ all over the coast.
+
+Mr. George Miller, gunner of H.M. ship Pegase, one voyage in a slave-ship.
+
+Mr. James Morley, gunner of H.M. ship Medway, six voyages in a slave-ship.
+
+Mr. Henry Ellison, gunner of H.M. ship Resistance, eleven years in the
+  slave-trade.
+
+Mr. James Towne, carpenter of H.M. ship Syren, two voyages in a slave-ship.
+
+Mr. John Douglas, boatswain of H.M. ship Russel, one voyage in a
+  slave-ship.
+
+Mr. Isaac Parker, shipkeeper of H.M. ship Melampus, two voyages in a
+  slave-ship.
+
+Thomas Trotter, esquire, M.D. one voyage as surgeon of a slave-ship.
+
+Mr. Isaac Wilson, one voyage as surgeon of a slave-ship.
+
+Mr. Ecroyde Claxton, one voyage as surgeon of a slave-ship.
+
+James Kiernan, esquire, resident four years on the banks of the Senegal.
+
+Mr. John Bowman, eleven years in the slave-employ as mate, and as a factor
+  in the interior of Africa.
+
+Mr. William Dove, one voyage for slaves, and afterwards resident in
+  America.
+
+Major-general Tottenham, two years resident in the West Indies.
+
+Captain Giles, 19th regiment, seven years quartered in the West Indies.
+
+Captain Cook, 89th regiment, two years quartered in the West Indies.
+
+Lieutenant Baker Davison, 79th regiment, twelve years quartered in the West
+  Indies.
+
+Captain Hall, of the royal navy, five years on the West India station.
+
+Captain Thomas Lloyd, of the royal navy, one year on the West India
+  station.
+
+Captain Alexander Scott, of the royal navy, one voyage to Africa and the
+  West Indies.
+
+Mr. Ninian Jeffreys, a master in the royal navy, five years mate of a West
+  Indiaman, and for two years afterwards in the Islands in a ship of war.
+
+Reverend Thomas Gwynn Rees, chaplain of H.M. ship Princess Amelia, in the
+  West Indies.
+
+Reverend Robert Boucher Nicholls, dean of Middleham, many years resident in
+  the West Indies.
+
+Hercules Ross, esquire, twenty-one years a merchant in the West Indies.
+
+Mr. Thomas Clappeson, fifteen years in the West Indies as a wharfinger and
+  pilot.
+
+Mr. Mark Cook, sixteen years in the West Indies, first in the planting
+  business; and then as clerk and schoolmaster.
+
+Mr. Henry Coor, a mill-wright for fifteen years in the West Indies.
+
+Reverend Mr. Davies, resident fourteen years in the West Indies.
+
+Mr. William Duncan, four years in the West Indies, first as a clerk and
+  then as an overseer.
+
+Mr. William Fitzmaurice, fifteen years, first as a book-keeper, and then as
+  an overseer, in the West Indies.
+
+Mr. Robert Forster, six years, first in a store, then as second master and
+  pilot of a ship of war in the West Indies.
+
+Mr. Robert Ross, twenty-four years, first as a book-keeper, then as an
+  overseer, and afterwards as a planter, in the West Indies.
+
+Mr. John Terry, fourteen years an overseer or manager in the West Indies.
+
+Mr. Matthew Terry, twelve years resident, first as a book-keeper and
+  overseer, than as a land-surveyor in the King's service, and afterwards,
+  as a colony-surveyor, in the West Indies.
+
+George Woodward, esquire, an owner and mortgagee of property, and
+  occasionally a resident in the West Indies.
+
+Mr. Joseph Woodward, three years resident in the West Indies.
+
+Henry Botham, esquire, a director of sugar-works both in the East and West
+  Indies.
+
+Mr. John Giles, resident twelve years in the West Indies and America.
+
+J. Harrison, esquire, M.D. twenty-three years resident, in the medical
+  line, in the West Indies and America.
+
+Robert Jackson, esquire, M.D. four years resident in the West Indies in the
+  medical line, after which he joined his regiment, in the same profession,
+  in America.
+
+Thomas Woolrich, esquire, twenty years a merchant in the West Indies, but
+  in the interim was twice in America.
+
+Reverend James Stuart, two years in the West Indies, and twenty in America.
+
+George Baillie, esquire, one year in the West Indies, and twenty-five in
+  America.
+
+William Beverley, esquire, eighteen years in America.
+
+John Clapham, esquire, twenty years in America.
+
+Robert Crew, esquire, a native of America, and long resident there.
+
+John Savage, esquire, forty-six years resident in America.
+
+
+
+
+
+The evidence having been delivered on both sides, and then printed, it was
+judged expedient by Mr. Wilberforce, seeing that it filled three folio
+volumes, to abridge it. This abridgement was made by the different friends
+of the cause. William Burgh, esquire, of York; Thomas Babington, esquire,
+of Rothley Temple; the Reverend Thomas Gisborne, of Yoxall Lodge; Mr.
+Campbell Haliburton, of Edinburgh; George Harrison, with one or two others
+of the committee, and myself, were employed upon it. The greater share,
+however, of the labour fell upon Dr. Dickson. That no misrepresentation of
+any person's testimony might be made, Matthew Montagu, esquire, and the
+honourable E.J. Eliott, members of parliament, undertook to compare the
+abridged manuscripts with the original text, and to strike out or correct
+whatever they thought to be erroneous, and to insert whatever they thought
+to have been omitted. The committee, for the abolition, when the work was
+finished, printed it at their own expense. Mr. Wilberforce then presented
+it to the House of Commons, as a faithful abridgement of the whole
+evidence. Having been received as such under the guarantee of Mr. Montagu
+and Mr. Eliott, the committee sent it to every individual member of that
+House.
+
+The book having been thus presented, and a day fixed for the final
+determination of the question, our feelings became almost insupportable:
+for we had the mortification to find, that our cause was going down in
+estimation, where it was then most important that it should have increased
+in favour. Our opponents had taken advantage of the long delay, which the
+examination of evidence had occasioned, to prejudice the minds of many of
+the members of the House of Commons against us. The old arguments of
+emancipation, massacre, ruin, and indemnification, had been kept up; but,
+as the day of final decision approached, they had been increased. Such was
+our situation at this moment; when the current was turned still more
+powerfully against us by the peculiar circumstances of the times. It was
+indeed the misfortune of this great cause to be assailed by every weapon,
+which could be turned against it. At this time Thomas Paine had published
+his Rights of Man. This had been widely circulated. At this time also the
+French revolution had existed nearly two years. The people of England had
+seen, during this interval, a government as it were dissected. They had
+seen an old constitution taken down, and a new one put up, piece by piece,
+in its stead. The revolution, therefore, in conjunction with the book in
+question, had had the effect of producing dissatisfaction among thousands;
+and this dissatisfaction was growing, so as to alarm a great number of
+persons of property in the kingdom, as well as the government itself. Now
+will it be believed that our opponents had the injustice to lay hold of
+these circumstances, at this critical moment, to give a death-blow to the
+cause of the abolition? They represented the committee, though it had
+existed before the French revolution or the Rights of Man were heard of, as
+a nest of Jacobins; and they held up the cause, sacred as it was, and
+though it had the support of the minister, as affording an opportunity of
+meeting for the purpose of overthrowing the state. Their cry succeeded. The
+very book of the abridgment of the evidence was considered by many members
+as poisonous as that of the Rights of Man. It was too profane for many of
+them to touch; and they who discarded it, discarded the cause also.
+
+But these were not the only circumstances which were used as means, at this
+critical moment, to defeat us. News of the revolution, which had commenced
+in St. Domingo in consequence of the disputes between the Whites and the
+People of Colour, had, long before this, arrived in England. The horrible
+scenes which accompanied it, had been frequently published as so many
+arguments against our cause. In January new insurrections were announced as
+having happened in Martinique. The Negros there were described as armed,
+and the planters as having abandoned their estates for fear of massacre.
+Early in the month of March insurrections in the smaller French islands
+were reported. Every effort was then made to represent these as the effects
+of the new principles of liberty, and of the cry for abolition. But what
+should happen, just at this moment, to increase the clamour against us?
+Nothing less than an insurrection in Dominica.--Yes!--An insurrection in a
+British island. This was the very event for our opponents. "All the
+predictions of the planters had now become verified. The horrible massacres
+were now realizing at home." To give this news still greater effect, a
+meeting of our opponents was held at the London Tavern. By a letter read
+there it appeared, that "the ruin of Dominica was now at hand." Resolutions
+were voted, and a memorial presented to government, "immediately to
+dispatch such a military force to the different islands, as might preserve
+the Whites from destruction, and keep the Negros in subjection during the
+present critical state of the slave-bill." This alarm was kept up till the
+seventh of April, when another meeting took place to receive the answer of
+government to the memorial. It was there resolved, that "as it was too late
+to send troops to the islands, the best way of preserving them would be to
+bring the question of the Slave-trade to an immediate issue; and that it
+was the duty of the government, if they regarded the safety of the islands,
+to oppose the abolition of it." Accounts of all these proceedings were
+inserted in the public papers. It is needless to say that they were
+injurious to our cause. Many looked upon the abolitionists as monsters.
+They became also terrified themselves. The idea with these was, that unless
+the discussion on this subject was terminated, all would be lost. Thus,
+under a combination of effects arising from the publication of the Rights
+of Man, the rise and progress of the French revolution, and the
+insurrections of the Negros in the different islands, no one of which
+events had any thing to do with the abolition of the Slave-trade, the
+current was turned against us; and in this unfavourable frame of mind many
+members of parliament went into the House, on the day fixed for the
+discussion, to discharge their duty with respect to this great question.
+
+On the eighteenth of April Mr. Wilberforce made his motion. He began by
+expressing a hope, that the present debate, instead of exciting asperity
+and confirming prejudice, would tend to produce a general conviction of the
+truth of what in fact was incontrovertible; that the abolition of the
+Slave-trade was indispensably required of them, not only by morality and
+religion, but by sound policy. He stated that he should argue the matter
+from evidence. He adverted to the character, situation, and means of
+information of his own witnesses; and having divided his subject into
+parts, the first of which related to the manner of reducing the natives of
+Africa to a state of slavery, he handled it in the following manner.
+
+He would begin, he said, with the first boundary of the trade. Captain
+Wilson and Captain Hills, of His Majesty's navy, and Mr. Dalrymple of the
+land service, had concurred in stating, that in the country contiguous to
+the river Senegal, when slave-ships arrived there, armed parties were
+regularly sent out in the evening, who scoured the country, and brought in
+their prey. The wretched victims were to be seen in the morning bound back
+to back in the huts on shore, whence they were conveyed, tied hand and
+foot, to the slave-ships. The design of these ravages was obvious, because,
+when the Slave-trade was stopped, they ceased. Mr. Kiernan spoke of the
+constant depredations by the Moors to procure slaves. Mr. Wadstrom
+confirmed them. The latter gentleman showed also that they were excited by
+presents of brandy, gunpowder, and such other incentives; and that they
+were not only carried on by one community against another; but that the
+Kings were stimulated to practise them, in their own territories, and on
+their own subjects: and in one instance a chieftain, who, when intoxicated,
+could not resist the demands of the slave-merchants, had expressed, in a
+moment of reason, a due sense of his own crime, and had reproached his
+Christian seducers. Abundant also were the instances of private rapine.
+Individuals were kidnapped, whilst in their fields and gardens. There was
+an universal feeling of distrust and apprehension there. The natives never
+went any distance from home without arms; and when Captain Wilson asked
+them the reason of it, they pointed to a slave-ship then lying within
+sight.
+
+On the windward coast, it appeared from Lieutenant Story and Mr. Bowman,
+that the evils just mentioned existed, if possible, in a still higher
+degree. They had seen the remains of villages, which had been burnt, whilst
+the fields of corn were still standing beside them, and every other trace
+of recent desolation. Here an agent was sent to establish a settlement in
+the country, and to send to the ships such slaves as he might obtain. The
+orders he received from his captain were, that "he was to encourage the
+chieftains by brandy and gunpowder to go to war, to make slaves." This he
+did. The chieftains performed their part in return. The neighbouring
+villages were surrounded and set on fire in the night. The inhabitants were
+seized when making their escape; and, being brought to the agent, were by
+him forwarded to his principal on the coast. Mr. How, a botanist in the
+service of Government, stated, that on the arrival of an order for slaves,
+from Cape Coast Castle, while he was there, a native chief immediately sent
+forth armed parties, who brought in a supply of all descriptions in the
+night.
+
+But he would now mention one or two instances of another sort, and these
+merely on account of the conclusion, which was to be drawn from them. When
+Captain Hills was in the river Gambia, he mentioned accidentally to a Black
+pilot, who was in the boat with him, that he wanted a cabin-boy. It so
+happened that some youths were then on the shore with vegetables to sell.
+The pilot beckoned to them to come on board; at the same time giving
+Captain Hills to understand, that he might take his choice of them; and
+when Captain Hills rejected the proposal with indignation, the pilot seemed
+perfectly at a loss to account for his warmth; and drily observed, that the
+slave-captains would not have been so scrupulous. Again, when General Rooke
+commanded at Goree, a number of the natives, men, women, and children, came
+to pay him a friendly visit. All was gaiety and merriment. It was a scene
+to gladden the saddest, and to soften the hardest heart. But a
+slave-captain was not so soon thrown off his guard. Three English
+barbarians of this description had the audacity jointly to request the
+general, to seize the whole unsuspicious multitude and sell them. For this
+they alleged the precedent of a former governor. Was not this request a
+proof of the frequency of such acts of rapine? for how familiar must such
+have been to slave-captains, when three of them dared to carry to a British
+officer of rank such a flagitious proposal! This would stand in the place
+of a thousand instances. It would give credibility to every other act of
+violence stated in the evidence, however enormous it might appear.
+
+But he would now have recourse for a moment to circumstantial evidence. An
+adverse witness, who had lived on the Gold Coast, had said that the only
+way, in which children could be enslaved, was by whole families being sold
+when the principals had been condemned for witchcraft. But he said at the
+same time, that few were convicted of this crime, and that the younger part
+of a family in these cases was sometimes spared. But if this account were
+true, it would follow that the children in the slave-vessels would be few
+indeed. But it had been proved, that the usual proportion of these was
+never less than a fourth of the whole cargo on that coast, and also, that
+the kidnapping of children was very prevalent there.
+
+All these atrocities, he said, were fully substantiated by the evidence;
+and here he should do injustice to his cause, if he were not to make a
+quotation from the speech of Mr. B. Edwards in the Assembly of Jamaica,
+who, though he was hostile to his propositions, had yet the candour to
+deliver himself in the following manner there. "I am persuaded," says he,
+"that Mr. Wilberforce has been rightly informed as to the manner in which
+slaves are generally procured. The intelligence I have collected from my
+own Negros abundantly confirms his account; and I have not the smallest
+doubt, that in Africa the effects of this trade are precisely such as he
+has represented them. The whole, or the greatest part, of that immense
+continent is a field of warfare and desolation; a wilderness, in which the
+inhabitants are wolves towards each other. That this scene of oppression,
+fraud, treachery, and bloodshed, if not originally occasioned, is in part
+(I will not say wholly) upheld by the Slave-trade, I dare not dispute.
+Every man in the Sugar Islands may be convinced that it is so, who will
+inquire of any African Negros, on their first arrival, concerning the
+circumstances of their captivity. The assertion that it is otherwise, is
+mockery and insult."
+
+But it was not only by acts of outrage that the Africans were brought into
+bondage. The very administration of justice was turned into an engine for
+that end. The smallest offence was punished by a fine equal to the value of
+a slave. Crimes were also fabricated; false accusations were resorted to;
+and persons were sometimes employed to seduce the unwary into practices
+with a view to the conviction and the sale of them.
+
+It was another effect of this trade, that it corrupted the morals of those,
+who carried it on. Every fraud was used to deceive the ignorance of the
+natives by false weights and measures, adulterated commodities, and other
+impositions of a like sort. These frauds were even acknowledged by many,
+who had themselves practised them in obedience to the orders of their
+superiors. For the honour of the mercantile character of the country, such
+a traffic ought immediately to be suppressed.
+
+Yet these things, however clearly proved by positive testimony, by the
+concession of opponents, by particular inference, by general reasoning, by
+the most authentic histories of Africa, by the experience of all countries
+and of all ages,--these things, and (what was still more extraordinary)
+even the possibility of them, were denied by those, who had been brought
+forward on the other side of the question. These, however, were chiefly
+persons, who had been trading governors of forts in Africa; or who had long
+commanded ships in the Slave-trade. As soon as he knew the sort of
+witnesses which was to be called against him, he had been prepared to
+expect much prejudice. But his expectations had been greatly surpassed by
+the testimony they had given. He did not mean to impeach their private
+characters, but they certainly showed themselves under the influence of
+such gross prejudices, as to render them incompetent judges of the subject
+they came to elucidate. They seemed (if he might so say) to be enveloped by
+a certain atmosphere of their own; and to see, as it were, through a kind
+of African medium. Every object, which met their eyes, came distorted and
+turned from its true direction. Even the declarations, which they made on
+other occasions, seemed wholly strange to them. They sometimes not only
+forgot what they had seen, but what they had said; and when to one of them
+his own testimony to the privy council was read, he mistook it for that of
+another, whose evidence he declared to be "the merest burlesque in the
+world."
+
+But the House must be aware that there was not only an African medium, but
+an African logic. It seemed to be an acknowledged axiom in this; that every
+person, who offered a slave for sale, had a right to sell him, however
+fraudulently he might have obtained him. This had been proved by the
+witnesses, who opposed him. "It would have stopped my trade," said one of
+them, "to have asked the broker, how he came by the person he was offering
+me for sale"--"We always suppose," said another, "the broker has a right to
+sell the person he offers us"--"I never heard of such a question being
+asked," said a third; "a man would be thought a fool, who should put such a
+question."--He hoped the House would see the practical utility of this
+logic. It was the key-stone, which held the building together. By means of
+it, slave-captains might traverse the whole coast of Africa, and see
+nothing but equitable practices. They could not, however, be wholly
+absolved, even if they availed themselves of this principle to its fullest
+extent; for they had often committed depredations themselves; especially
+when they were passing by any part of the coast, where they did not mean to
+continue or to go again. Hence it was (as several captains of the navy and
+others had declared on their examination) that the natives, when at sea in
+their canoes, would never come near the men of war, till they knew them to
+be such. But finding this, and that they were not slave-vessels, they laid
+aside their fears, and came and continued on board with unsuspecting
+cheerfulness.
+
+With respect to the miseries of the Middle Passage, he had said so much on
+a former occasion, that he would spare the feelings of the committee as
+much as he could. He would therefore simply state that the evidence, which
+was before them, confirmed all those scenes of wretchedness, which he had
+then described; the same suffering from a state of suffocation by being
+crowded together; the same dancing in fetters; the same melancholy singing;
+the same eating by compulsion; the same despair; the same insanity; and all
+the other abominations which characterized the trade. New instances however
+had occurred, where these wretched men had resolved on death to terminate
+their woes. Some had destroyed themselves by refusing sustenance, in spite
+of threats and punishments. Others had thrown themselves into the sea; and
+more than one, when in the act of drowning, were seen to wave their hands
+in triumph, "exulting" (to use the words of an eye-witness) "that they had
+escaped." Yet these and similar things, when viewed through the African
+medium he had mentioned, took a different shape and colour. Captain Knox,
+an adverse witness, had maintained, that slaves lay during the night in
+tolerable comfort. And yet he confessed, that in a vessel of one hundred
+and twenty tons, in which he had carried two hundred and ninety slaves, the
+latter had not all of them room to lie on their backs. How comfortably then
+must they have lain in his subsequent voyages! for he carried afterwards in
+a vessel of a hundred and eight tons four hundred and fifty and in a vessel
+of one hundred and fifty tons, no less than six hundred slaves. Another
+instance of African deception was to be found in the testimony of Captain
+Frazer, one of the most humane captains in the trade. It had been said of
+him, that he had held hot coals to the mouth of a slave, to compel him to
+eat. He was questioned on this point; but not admitting, in the true spirit
+of African logic, that he who makes another commit a crime, is guilty of it
+himself, he denied the charge indignantly, and defied a proof. But it was
+said to him, "Did you never order such a thing to be done?" His reply was,
+"Being sick in my cabin, I was informed that a man-slave would neither eat,
+drink, nor speak. I desired the mate and surgeon to try to persuade him to
+speak. I desired that the slaves might try also. When I found he was still
+obstinate, not knowing whether it was from sulkiness or insanity, I ordered
+a person to present him with a piece of fire in one hand and a piece of yam
+in the other, and to tell me what effect this had upon him. I learnt that
+he took the yam and began to eat it, but he threw the fire overboard." Such
+was his own account of the matter. This was eating by duresse, if any thing
+could be called so. The captain, however, triumphed in his expedient, and
+concluded by telling the committee, that he sold this very slave at Grenada
+for forty pounds. Mark here the moral of the tale, and learn the nature and
+the cure of sulkiness.
+
+But upon whom did the cruelties, thus arising out of the prosecution of
+this barbarous traffic, fall? Upon a people with feeling and intellect like
+ourselves. One witness had spoken of the acuteness of their understandings;
+another of the extent of their memories; a third of their genius for
+commerce; a fourth of their proficiency in manufactures at home. Many had
+admired their gentle and peaceable disposition; their cheerfulness; and
+their hospitality. Even they, who were nominally slaves in Africa, lived a
+happy life. A witness against the abolition had described them as sitting
+and eating with their masters in the true style of patriarchal simplicity
+and comfort. Were these then a people incapable of civilization? The
+argument that they were an inferior species had been proved to be false.
+
+He would now go to a new part of the subject. An opinion had gone forth
+that the abolition of the trade would be the ruin of the West India
+Islands. He trusted he should prove that the direct contrary was the truth;
+though, had he been unable to do this, it would have made no difference as
+to his own vote. In examining, however, this opinion, he should exclude the
+subject of the cultivation of new lands by fresh importations of slaves.
+The impolicy of this measure, apart from its inhumanity, was indisputably
+clear. Let the committee consider the dreadful mortality, which attended
+it. Let them look to the evidence of Mr. Woolrich, and there see a contrast
+drawn between the slow, but sure progress of cultivation, carried on in the
+natural way, and the attempt to force improvements, which, however
+flattering the prospect at first, soon produced a load of debt, and
+inextricable embarrassments. He might even appeal to the statements of the
+West Indians themselves, who allowed that more than twenty millions were
+owing to the people of this country, to show that no system could involve
+them so deeply as that, on which they had hitherto gone. But he would refer
+them to the accounts of Mr. Irving, as contained in the evidence. Waving
+then the consideration of this part of the subject, the opinion in question
+must have arisen from a notion, that the stock of slaves, now in the
+islands, could not be kept up by propagation; but that it was necessary,
+from time to time, to recruit them with imported Africans. In direct
+refutation of this position he should prove, First, that in the condition
+and treatment of the Negros, there were causes, sufficient to afford us
+reason to expect a considerable decrease, but particularly that their
+increase had not been a serious object of attention; Secondly, that this
+decrease was in fact, notwithstanding, very trifling; or rather, he
+believed, he might declare it had now actually ceased; and, Thirdly, he
+should urge many direct and collateral facts and arguments, constituting on
+the whole an irresistible proof, that even a rapid increase might
+henceforth be expected.
+
+He wished to treat the West Indians with all possible candour; but he was
+obliged to confess, in arguing upon these points, that whatever splendid
+instances there might be of kindness towards their slaves, there were some
+evils of almost universal operation, were necessarily connected with the
+system of slavery. Above all, the state of degradation, to which they were
+reduced, deserved to be noticed; as it produced an utter inattention to
+them as moral agents. They were kept at work under the whip like cattle.
+They were left totally ignorant of morality and religion. There was no
+regular marriage among them. Hence promiscuous intercourse, early
+prostitution, and excessive drinking, were material causes of their
+decrease. With respect to the instruction of the slaves in the principles
+of religion, the happiest effects had resulted, particularly in Antigua,
+where, under the Moravians and Methodists, they had so far profited, that
+the planters themselves confessed their value, as property, had been raised
+one-third by their increased habits of regularity and industry.
+
+Whatever might have been said to the contrary, it was plainly to be
+inferred from the evidence, that the slaves were not protected by law.
+Colonial statutes had indeed been passed; but they were a dead letter;
+since, however ill they were treated, they were not considered as having a
+right to redress. An instance of astonishing cruelty by a Jew had been
+mentioned by Mr. Ross. It was but justice to say, that the man was held in
+detestation for it; but yet no one had ever thought of calling him to a
+legal account. Mr. Ross conceived a master had a right to punish his slave
+in whatever manner he might think proper. The same was declared by
+numberless other witnesses. Some instances, indeed, had lately occurred of
+convictions. A master had wantonly cut the mouth of a child, of six months
+old, almost from ear to ear. But did not the verdict of the jury show, that
+the doctrine of calling masters to an account was entirely novel; as it
+only pronounced him "Guilty, subject to the opinion of the court, if
+immoderate correction of a slave by his master be a crime indictable!" The
+court determined in the affirmative; and what was the punishment of this
+barbarous act?--A fine of forty shillings currency, equivalent to about
+twenty-five shillings sterling.
+
+The slaves were but ill off in point of medical care. Sometimes four or
+five, and even eight or nine thousand of them, were under the care of one
+medical man; which, dispersed on different and distant estates, was a
+greater number than he could possibly attend to.
+
+It was also in evidence, that they were in general under-fed. They were
+supported partly by the produce of their own provision-ground, and partly
+by an allowance of flour and grain from their masters. In one of the
+islands, where provision-ground did not answer one year in three, the
+allowance to a working Negro was but from five to nine pints of grain per
+week: in Dominica, where it never failed, from six to seven quarts: in
+Nevis and St. Christophers, where there was no provision-ground, it was but
+eleven pints. Add to this, that it might be still less, as the
+circumstances of their masters might become embarrassed; and in this case
+both an abridgment of their food, and an increase of their labour, would
+follow.
+
+But the great cause of the decrease of the slaves was in the non-residence
+of the planters. Sir George Yonge, and many others, had said, they had seen
+the slaves treated in a manner, which their owners would have resented, if
+they had known it. Mr. Orde spoke in the strongest terms of the misconduct
+of managers. The fact was, that these in general sought to establish their
+characters by producing large crops at a small immediate expense; too
+little considering how far the slaves might suffer from ill-treatment and
+excessive labour. The pursuit of such a system was a criterion for judging
+of their characters, as both Mr. Long and Mr. Ottley had confessed.
+
+But he must contend, in addition to this, that the object of keeping up the
+stock of slaves by breeding had never been seriously attended to. For this
+he might appeal both to his own witnesses, and to those of his opponents;
+but he would only notice one fact. It was remarkable that, when owners and
+managers were asked about the produce of their estates, they were quite at
+home as to the answer; but when they were asked about the proportion of
+their male and female slaves, and their infants, they knew little about the
+matter. Even medical men were adepts in the art of planting; but when they
+were asked the latter questions, as connected with breeding and rearing,
+they seemed quite amazed; and could give no information upon the subject of
+them.
+
+Persons, however, of great respectability had been called as witnesses, who
+had not seen the treatment of the Negros as he had now described it. He
+knew what was due to their characters; but yet he must enter a general
+protest against their testimony. "I have often," says Mr. Ross, "attended
+both governors and admirals upon tours in the island of Jamaica. But it was
+not likely that these should see much distress upon these occasions. The
+White People and drivers would take care not to harrow up the feelings of
+strangers of distinction by the exercise of the whip, or the infliction of
+punishments, at that particular time; and, even if there were any
+disgusting objects, it was natural to suppose that they would then remove
+them." But in truth these gentlemen had given proofs, that they were under
+the influence of prejudice. Some of them had declared the abolition would
+ruin the West Indies. But this, it was obvious, must depend upon the
+practicability of keeping up the stock without African supplies; and yet,
+when they were questioned upon this point, they knew nothing about it.
+Hence they had formed a conclusion without premises. Their evidence, too,
+extended through a long series of years. They had never seen one instance
+of ill-treatment in the time; and yet, in the same breath, they talked of
+the amended situation of the slaves; and that they were now far better off
+than formerly. One of them, to whom his country owed much, stated that a
+master had been sentenced to death for the murder of his own slave; but his
+recollection must have failed him; for the murder of a slave was not then a
+capital crime. A respectable governor also had delivered an opinion to the
+same effect; but, had he looked into the statute-book of the island, he
+would have found his error.
+
+It had been said that the slaves were in a better state than the peasantry
+of this country. But when the question was put to Mr. Ross, did he not
+answer, "that he would not insult the latter by a comparison?"
+
+It had been said again, that the Negros were happier as slaves, than they
+would be if they were to be made free. But how was this reconcileable with
+facts? If a Negro under extraordinary circumstances had saved money enough,
+did he not always purchase his release from this situation of superior
+happiness by the sacrifice of his last shilling? Was it not also notorious,
+that the greatest reward, which a master thought he could bestow upon his
+slave for long and faithful services, was his freedom?
+
+It had been said again, that Negros, when made free, never returned to
+their own country. But was not the reason obvious? If they could even reach
+their own homes in safety, their kindred and connections might be dead. But
+would they subject themselves to be kidnapped again; to be hurried once
+more on board a slave-ship; and again to endure and survive the horrors of
+the passage? Yet the love of their native country had been proved beyond a
+doubt. Many of the witnesses had heard them talk of it in terms of the
+strongest affection. Acts of suicide too were frequent in the islands,
+under the notion that these afforded them the readiest means of getting
+home. Conformably with this, Captain Wilson had maintained, that the
+funerals, which in Africa were accompanied with lamentations and cries of
+sorrow, were attended, in the West Indies, with every mark of joy.
+
+He had now, he said, made good his first proposition, That in the condition
+of the slaves there were causes, which should lead us to expect, that there
+would be a considerable decrease among them. This decrease in the island of
+Jamaica was but trifling, or, rather, it had ceased some years ago; and if
+there was a decrease, it was only on the imported slaves. It appeared from
+the privy council report, that from 1698 to 1730 the decrease was three and
+a half per cent.; from 1730 to 1755 it was two and a half per cent.; from
+1755 to 1768 it was lessened to one and three quarters; and from 1768 to
+1788 it was not more than one per cent.: this last decrease was not greater
+than could be accounted for from hurricanes and consequent famines, and
+from the number of imported Africans who perished in the seasoning. The
+latter was a cause of mortality, which, it was evident, would cease with
+the importations. This conclusion was confirmed in part by Dr. Anderson,
+who, in his testimony to the Assembly of Jamaica, affirmed, that there was
+a considerable increase on the properties of the island, and particularly
+in the parish in which he resided.
+
+He would now proceed to establish his second proposition, That from
+henceforth a very considerable increase might be expected. This he might
+support by a close reasoning upon the preceding facts. But the testimony of
+his opponents furnished him with sufficient evidence. He could show, that
+wherever the slaves were treated better than ordinary, there was uniformly
+an increase in their number. Look at the estates of Mr. Willock, Mr.
+Ottley, Sir Ralph Payne, and others. In short, he should weary the
+committee, if he were to enumerate the instances of plantations, which were
+stated in the evidence to have kept up their numbers only from a little
+variation in their treatment. A remedy also had been lately found for a
+disorder, by which vast numbers of infants had been formerly swept away.
+Mr. Long also had laid it down, that whenever the slaves should bear a
+certain proportion to the produce, they might be expected to keep up their
+numbers; but this proportion they now exceeded. The Assembly of Jamaica had
+given it also as their opinion, "that when once the sexes should become
+nearly equal in point of number, there was no reason to suppose, that the
+increase of the Negros by generation would fall short of the natural
+increase of the labouring poor in Great Britain." But the inequality, here
+spoken of, could only exist in the case of the African Negros, of whom more
+males were imported than females; and this inequality would be done away
+soon after the trade should cease.
+
+But the increase of the Negros, where their treatment was better than
+ordinary, was confirmed in the evidence by instances in various parts of
+the world. From one end of the continent of America to the other their
+increase had been undeniably established; and this to a prodigious extent,
+though they had to contend with the severe cold of the winter, and in some
+parts with noxious exhalations in the summer. This was the case also in the
+settlement of Bencoolen in the East Indies. It appeared from the evidence
+of Mr. Botham, that a number of Negros, who had been imported there in the
+same disproportion of the sexes as in West India cargoes, and who lived
+under the same disadvantages, as in the Islands, of promiscuous intercourse
+and general prostitution, began, after they had been settled a short time,
+annually to increase.
+
+But to return to the West Indies.--A slave-ship had been many years ago
+wrecked near St. Vincent's. The slaves on board, who escaped to the island,
+were without necessaries; and, besides, were obliged to maintain a war with
+the native Caribbs: yet they soon multiplied to an astonishing number; and,
+according to Mr. Ottley, they were now on the increase. From Sir John
+Dalrymple's evidence it appeared, that the domestic slaves in Jamaica, who
+were less worked than those in the field, increased; and from Mr. Long,
+that the free Blacks and Mulattoes there increased also.
+
+But there was an instance which militated against these facts (and the only
+one in the evidence) which he would now examine. Sir Archibald Campbell had
+heard, that the Maroons in Jamaica in the year 1739 amounted to three
+thousand men fit to carry arms. This supposed their whole number to have
+been about twelve thousand. But in the year 1782, after a real muster by
+himself, he found, to his great astonishment, that the fighting men did not
+then amount to three hundred. Now the fact was, that Sir Archibald
+Campbell's first position was founded upon rumour only; and was not true.
+For according to Mr. Long, the Maroons were actually numbered in 1749; when
+they amounted to about six hundred and sixty in all, having only a hundred
+and fifty men fit to carry arms. Hence, if when mustered by Sir Archibald
+Campbell he found three hundred fighting men, they must from 1749 to 1782
+have actually doubled their population.
+
+Was it possible, after these instances, to suppose that the Negros could
+not keep up their numbers, if their natural increase were made a subject of
+attention? The reverse was proved by sound reasoning. It had been confirmed
+by unquestionable facts. It had been shown, that they had increased In
+every situation, where there was the slightest circumstance in their
+favour. Where there had been any decrease, it was stated to be trifling;
+though no attention appeared to have been paid to the subject. This
+decrease had been gradually lessening; and, whenever a single cause of it
+had been removed (many still remaining), it had altogether ceased. Surely
+these circumstances formed a body of proof, which was irresistible.
+
+He would now speak of the consequences of the abolition of the Slave-trade
+in other points of view; and first, as to its effects upon our marine. An
+abstract of the Bristol and Liverpool muster-rolls had been just laid
+before the House. It appeared from this, that in three hundred and fifty
+slave-vessels, having on board twelve thousand two hundred and sixty-three
+persons, two thousand six hundred and forty-three were lost in twelve
+months; whereas in four hundred and sixty-two West Indiamen, having on
+board seven thousand six hundred and forty persons, one hundred and
+eighteen only were lost in seven months. This rather exceeded the losses
+stated by Mr. Clarkson. For their barbarous usage on board these ships, and
+for their sickly and abject state in the West Indies, he would appeal to
+Governor Parry's letter; to the evidence of Mr. Ross; to the assertion of
+Mr. B. Edwards, an opponent; and to the testimony of Captains Sir George
+Yonge and Thompson, of the Royal Navy. He would appeal also to what Captain
+Hall, of the Navy, had given in evidence. This gentleman, after the action
+of the twelfth of April, impressed thirty hands from a slave-vessel, whom
+he selected with the utmost care from a crew of seventy; and he was
+reprimanded by his admiral, though they could scarcely get men to bring
+home the prizes, for introducing such wretches to communicate disorders to
+the fleet. Captain Smith of the Navy had also declared, that when employed
+to board Guineamen to impress sailors, although he had examined near twenty
+vessels, he never was able to get more than two men, who were fit for
+service; and these turned out such inhuman fellows, although good seamen,
+that he was obliged to dismiss them from the ship.
+
+But he hoped the committee would attend to the latter part of the assertion
+of Captain Smith. Yes:--this trade, while it injured the constitutions of
+our sailors, debased their morals. Of this, indeed, there was a barbarous
+illustration in the evidence. A slaveship had struck on some shoals, called
+the Morant Keys, a few leagues from the east end of Jamaica. The crew
+landed in their boats, with arms and provisions, leaving the slaves on
+board in their irons. This happened in the night. When morning came, it was
+discovered that the Negros had broken their shackles, and were busy in
+making rafts; upon which afterwards they placed the women and children. The
+men attended upon the latter, swimming by their side, whilst they drifted
+to the island where the crew were. But what was the sequel? From an
+apprehension that the Negros would consume the water and provision, which
+had been landed, the crew resolved to destroy them as they approached the
+shore. They killed between three and four hundred. Out of the whole cargo
+only thirty-three were saved, who, on being brought to Kingston, were sold.
+It would, however, be to no purpose, he said, to relieve the Slave-trade
+from this act of barbarity. The story of the Morant Keys was paralleled by
+that of Captain Collingwood; and were you to got rid of these, another, and
+another, would still present itself, to prove the barbarous effects of this
+trade on the moral character.
+
+But of the miseries of the trade there was no end. Whilst he had been
+reading out of the evidence the story of the Morant Keys, his eye had but
+glanced on the opposite page, and it met another circumstance of horror.
+This related to what were called the refuse-slaves. Many people in Kingston
+were accustomed to speculate in the purchase of those, who were left after
+the first day's sale. They then carried them out into the country, and
+retailed them. Mr. Ross declared, that he had seen these landed in a very
+wretched state, sometimes in the agonies of death, and sold as low as for a
+dollar, and that he had known several expire in the piazzas of the
+vendue-master. The bare description superseded the necessity of any remark.
+Yet these were the familiar incidents of the Slave-trade.
+
+But he would go back to the seamen. He would mention another cause of
+mortality, by which many of them lost their lives. In looking over Lloyd's
+list, no less than six vessels were cut off by the irritated natives in one
+year, and the crews massacred. Such instances were not unfrequent. In
+short, the history of this commerce was written throughout in characters of
+blood.
+
+He would next consider the effects of the abolition on those places where
+it was chiefly carried on. But would the committee believe, after all the
+noise which had been made on this subject, that the Slave-trade composed
+but a thirtieth part of the export trade of Liverpool, and that of the
+trade of Bristol it constituted a still less proportion? For the effects of
+the abolition on the general commerce of the kingdom, he would refer them
+to Mr. Irving; from whose evidence it would appear, that the medium value
+of the British manufactures, exported to Africa, amounted only to between
+four and five hundred thousand pounds annually. This was but a trifling
+sum. Surely the superior capital, ingenuity, application, and integrity, of
+the British manufacturer would command new markets for the produce of his
+industry, to an equal amount, when this should be no more. One branch,
+however, of our manufactures, he confessed, would suffer from the
+abolition; and that was the manufacture of gunpowder; of which the nature
+of our connection with Africa drew from us as much as we exported to all
+the rest of the world besides.
+
+He hastened, however, to another part of the argument. Some had said, "We
+wish to put an end to the Slave-trade, but we do not approve of your mode.
+Allow more time. Do not displease the legislatures of the West India
+islands. It is by them that those laws must be passed, and enforced, which
+will secure your object." Now he was directly at issue with these
+gentlemen. He could show, that the abolition was the only certain mode of
+amending the treatment of the slaves, so as to secure their increase; and
+that the mode which had been offered to him, was at once inefficacious and
+unsafe. In the first place, how could any laws, made by these legislatures,
+be effectual, whilst the evidence of Negros was in no case admitted against
+White men? What was the answer from Grenada? Did it not state, "that they
+who were capable of cruelty, would in general be artful enough to prevent
+any but slaves from being witnesses of the fact?" Hence it had arisen, that
+when positive laws had been made, in some of the islands, for the
+protection of the slaves, they had been found almost a dead letter.
+Besides, by what law would you enter into every man's domestic concerns,
+and regulate the interior economy of his house and plantation? This would
+be something more than a general excise. Who would endure such a law? And
+yet on all these and innumerable other minutiae must depend the protection
+of the slaves, their comforts, and the probability of their increase. It
+was universally allowed, that the Code Noir had been utterly neglected in
+the French islands, though there was an officer appointed by the crown to
+see it enforced. The provisions of the Directorio had been but of little
+more avail in the Portuguese settlements, or the institution of a Protector
+of the Indians, in those of the Spaniards. But what degree of protection
+the slaves would enjoy might be inferred from the admission of a gentleman,
+by whom this very plan of regulation had been recommended, and who was
+himself no ordinary person, but a man of discernment and legal resources.
+He had proposed a limitation of the number of lashes to be given by the
+master or overseer for one offence. But, after all, he candidly confessed,
+that his proposal was not likely to be useful, while the evidence of slaves
+continued inadmissible against their masters. But he could even bring
+testimony to the inefficacy of such regulations. A wretch in Barbadoes had
+chained a Negro girl to the floor, and flogged her till she was nearly
+expiring. Captain Cook and Major Fitch, hearing her cries, broke open the
+door and found her. The wretch retreated from their resentment, but cried
+out exultingly, "that he had only given her thirty-nine lashes (the number
+limited by law) at any one time; and that he had only inflicted this number
+three times since the beginning of the night," adding, "that he would
+prosecute them for breaking open his door; and that he would flog her to
+death for all any one, if he pleased; and that he would give her the fourth
+thirty-nine before morning."
+
+But this plan of regulation was not only inefficacious, but unsafe. He
+entered his protest against the fatal consequences, which might result from
+it. The Negros were creatures like ourselves; but they were uninformed, and
+their moral character was debased. Hence they were unfit for civil rights.
+To use these properly they must be gradually restored to that level, from
+which they had been so unjustly degraded. To allow them an appeal to the
+laws, would be to awaken in them a sense of the dignity of their nature.
+The first return of life, after a swoon, was commonly a convulsion,
+dangerous at once to the party himself and to all around him. You should
+first prepare them for the situation, and not bring the situation to them.
+To be under the protection of the law was in fact to be a freeman; and to
+unite slavery and freedom in one condition was impracticable. The
+abolition, on the other hand, was exactly such an agent as the case
+required. All hopes of supplies from the Coast being cut off, breeding
+would henceforth become a serious object of attention; and the care of
+this, as including better clothing and feeding, and milder discipline,
+would extend to innumerable particulars, which an act of assembly could
+neither specify nor enforce. The horrible system, too, which many had gone
+upon, of working out their slaves in a few years, and recruiting their
+gangs with imported Africans, would receive its death-blow from the
+abolition of the trade. The opposite would force itself on the most
+unfeeling heart. Ruin would stare a man in the face, if he were not to
+conform to it. The non-resident owners would then express themselves in the
+terms of Sir Philip Gibbs, "that he should consider it as the fault of his
+manager, if he were not to keep up the number of his slaves." This
+reasoning concerning the different tendencies of the two systems was
+self-evident. But facts were not wanting to confirm it. Mr. Long had
+remarked, that all the insurrections and suicides in Jamaica had been found
+among the imported slaves, who, not having lost the consciousness of civil
+rights, which they had enjoyed in their own country, could not brook the
+indignities to which they were subjected in the West Indies. An instance in
+point was afforded also by what had lately taken place in the island of
+Dominica. The disturbance there had been chiefly occasioned by some runaway
+slaves from the French islands. But what an illustration was it of his own
+doctrine to say, that the slaves of several persons, who had been treated,
+with kindness, were not among the number of the insurgents on that
+occasion!
+
+But when persons coolly talked of putting an end to the Slave-trade through
+the medium of the West India legislatures, and of gradual abolition, by
+means of regulations, they surely forgot the miseries which this horrid
+traffic occasioned in Africa during every moment of its continuance. This
+consideration was conclusive with him, when called upon to decide whether
+the Slave-trade should be tolerated for a while, or immediately abolished.
+The divine law against murder was absolute and unqualified. Whilst we were
+ignorant of all these things, our sanction of them might, in some measure,
+be pardoned. But now, when our eyes were opened, could we tolerate them for
+a moment, unless we were ready at once to determine, that gain should be
+our God, and, like the heathens of old, were prepared to offer up human
+victims at the shrine of our idolatry?
+
+This consideration precluded also the giving heed for an instant to another
+plea, namely, that if we were to abolish the trade it would be
+proportionably taken up by other nations. But, whatever other nations did,
+it became Great Britain, in every point of view, to take a forward part.
+One half of this guilty commerce had been carried on by her subjects. As we
+had been great in our crime, we should be early in our repentance. If
+Providence had showered his blessings upon us in unparalleled abundance, we
+should show ourselves grateful for them by rendering them subservient to
+the purposes for which they were intended. There would be a day of
+retribution, wherein we should have to give an account of all those
+talents, faculties, and opportunities, with which we had been intrusted.
+Let it not then appear, that our superior power had been employed to
+oppress our fellow-creatures, and our superior light to darken the creation
+of God. He could not but look forward with delight to the happy prospects
+which opened themselves to his view in Africa from the abolition of the
+Slave-trade; when a commerce, justly deserving that name, should be
+established with her; not like that, falsely so called, which now
+subsisted, and which all who were interested for the honour of the
+commercial character (though there were no superior principle) should
+hasten to disavow. Had this trade indeed been ever so profitable, his
+decision would have been in no degree affected by that consideration.
+"Here's the smell of blood on the hand still, and all the perfumes of
+Arabia cannot sweeten it."
+
+He doubted, whether it was not almost an act of degrading condescension to
+stoop to discuss the question in the view of commercial interest. On this
+ground, however, he was no less strong than on every other. Africa abounded
+with productions of value, which she would gladly exchange for our
+manufactures, when these were not otherwise to be obtained: and to what an
+extent her demand might then grow exceeded almost the powers of
+computation. One instance already existed of a native king, who being
+debarred by his religion the use of spirituous liquors, and therefore not
+feeling the irresistible temptation to acts of rapine which they afforded
+to his countrymen, had abolished the Slave-trade throughout all his
+dominions, and was encouraging an honest industry.
+
+For his own part, he declared that, interested as he might be supposed to
+be in the final event of the question, he was comparatively indifferent as
+to the present decision of the House upon it. Whatever they might do, the
+people of Great Britain, he was confident, would abolish the Slave-trade
+when, as would then soon happen, its injustice and cruelty should be fairly
+laid before them. It was a nest of serpents, which would never have existed
+so long, but for the darkness in which they lay hid. The light of day would
+now be let in on them, and they would vanish from the sight. For himself,
+he declared he was engaged in a work, which he would never abandon. The
+consciousness of the justice of his cause would carry him forward, though
+he were alone; but he could not but derive encouragement from considering
+with whom he was associated. Let us not, he said, despair. It is a blessed
+cause; and success, ere long, will crown our exertions. Already we have
+gained one victory. We have obtained for these poor creatures the
+recognition of their human nature[A], which, for a while, was most
+shamefully denied them. This is the first fruits of our efforts.
+
+[Footnote A: This point was actually obtained by the evidence before the
+House of Commons; for, after this, we heard no more of them as an inferior
+race.]
+
+Let us persevere, and our triumph will be complete. Never, never, will we
+desist, till we have wiped away this scandal from the Christian name; till
+we have released ourselves from the load of guilt under which we at present
+labour; and till we have extinguished every trace of this bloody traffic,
+which our posterity, looking back to the history of these enlightened
+times, will scarcely believe had been suffered to exist so long, a disgrace
+and a dishonour to our country.
+
+
+He then moved, that the chairman be instructed to move for leave to bring
+in a bill to prevent the further importation of slaves into the British
+colonies in the West Indies.
+
+Colonel Tarleton immediately rose up, and began by giving an historical
+account of the trade from the reign of Elizabeth to the present time. He
+then proceeded to the sanction, which parliament had always given it. Hence
+it could not then be withdrawn without a breach of faith. Hence, also, the
+private property embarked in it was sacred, nor could it be invaded, unless
+an adequate compensation were given in return.
+
+They, who had attempted the abolition of the trade, were led away by a
+mistaken humanity. The Africans themselves had no objection to its
+continuance.
+
+With respect to the Middle Passage, he believed the mortality there to be
+on an average only five in the hundred; whereas in regiments, sent out to
+the West Indies, the average loss in the year was about ten and a half per
+cent.
+
+The Slave-trade was absolutely necessary, if we meant to carry on our West
+India commerce; for many attempts had been made to cultivate the lands in
+the different islands by White labourers; but they had always failed.
+
+It had also the merit of keeping up a number of seamen in readiness for the
+state. Lord Rodney had stated this as one of its advantages on the breaking
+out of a war. Liverpool alone could supply nine hundred and ninety-three
+seamen annually.
+
+He would now advert to the connections dependent upon the African trade. It
+was the duty of the House to protect the planters, whose lives had been,
+and were then, exposed to imminent dangers, and whose property had
+undergone an unmerited depreciation. To what could this depreciation, and
+to what could the late insurrection at Dominica, be imputed, which had been
+saved from horrid carnage and midnight-butchery only by the adventitious
+arrival of two British regiments? They could only be attributed to the long
+delayed question of the abolition of the Slave-trade; and if this question
+were to go much longer unsettled, Jamaica would be endangered also.
+
+To members of landed property he would observe, that the abolition would
+lessen the commerce of the country, and increase the national debt and the
+number of their taxes. The minister, he hoped, who patronized this wild
+scheme, had some new pecuniary resource in store to supply the deficiencies
+it would occasion.
+
+To the mercantile members he would speak thus: "A few ministerial men in
+the house had been gifted with religious inspiration, and this had been
+communicated to other eminent personages in it: these enlightened
+philanthropists had discovered, that it was necessary, for the sake of
+humanity and for the honour of the nation, that the merchants concerned in
+the African trade should be persecuted, notwithstanding the sanction of
+their trade by parliament, and notwithstanding that such persecution must
+aggrandize the rivals of Great Britain." Now how did this language sound?
+It might have done in the twelfth century, when all was bigotry and
+superstition. But let not a mistaken humanity, in these enlightened times,
+furnish a colourable pretext for any injurious attack on property or
+character.
+
+These things being considered, he should certainly oppose the measure in
+contemplation. It would annihilate a trade, whose exports amounted to eight
+hundred thousand pounds annually, and which employed a hundred and sixty
+vessels and more than five thousand seamen. It would destroy also the West
+India trade, which was of the annual value of six millions; and which
+employed one hundred and sixty thousand tons of shipping, and seamen in
+proportion. These were objects of too much importance to the country to be
+hazarded on an unnecessary speculation.
+
+Mr. Grosvenor then rose. He complimented the humanity of Mr. Wilberforce,
+though he differed from him on the subject of his motion. He himself had
+read only the privy council report; and he wished for no other evidence.
+The question had then been delayed two years. Had the abolition been so
+clear a point as it was said to be, it could not have needed either so much
+evidence or time.
+
+He had heard a good deal about kidnapping and other barbarous practices. He
+was sorry for them. But these were the natural consequences of the laws of
+Africa; and it became us as wise men to turn them to our own advantage. The
+Slave-trade was certainly not an amiable trade. Neither was that of a
+butcher; but yet it was a very necessary one.
+
+There was great reason to doubt the propriety of the present motion. He had
+twenty reasons for disapproving it. The first was, that the thing was
+impossible. He needed not therefore to give the rest. Parliament, indeed,
+might relinquish the trade. But to whom? To foreigners, who would continue
+it, and without the humane regulations, which were applied to it by his
+country-men.
+
+He would give advice to the house on this subject in the words, which the
+late Alderman Beckford used on a different occasion: "Meddle not with
+troubled waters: they will be found to be bitter waters, and the waters of
+affliction." He again admitted, that the Slave-trade was not an amiable
+trade; but he would not gratify his humanity at the expense of the
+interests of his country; and he thought we should not too curiously
+inquire into the unpleasant circumstances, which attended it.
+
+Mr. James Martin succeeded Mr. Grosvenor. He said, he had been long aware,
+how much self-interest could pervert the judgment; but he was not apprized
+of the full power of it, till the Slave-trade became a subject of
+discussion. He had always conceived, that the custom of trafficking in
+human beings had been incautiously begun, and without any reflection upon
+it; for he never could believe that any man, under the influence of moral
+principles, could suffer himself knowingly to carry on a trade replete with
+fraud, cruelty, and destruction; with destruction, indeed, of the worst
+kind, because it subjected the sufferers to a lingering death. But he found
+now, that even such a trade as this could be sanctioned.
+
+It was well observed in the petition from the University of Cambridge
+against the Slave-trade, "that a firm belief in the Providence of a
+benevolent Creator assured them that no system, founded on the oppression
+of one part of mankind, could be beneficial to another." He felt much
+concern, that in an assembly of the representatives of a country, boasting
+itself zealous not only for the preservation of its own liberties, but for
+the general rights of mankind, it should be necessary to say a single word
+upon such a subject; but the deceitfulness of the human heart was such, as
+to change the appearances of truth, when it stood in opposition to
+self-interest. And he had to lament that even among those, whose public
+duty it was to cling to the universal and eternal principles of truth,
+justice, and humanity, there were found some, who could defend that which
+was unjust, fraudulent, and cruel.
+
+The doctrines he had heard that evening, ought to have been reserved for
+times the most flagrantly profligate and abandoned. He never expected then
+to learn, that the everlasting laws of righteousness were to give way to
+imaginary, political, and commercial expediency; and that thousands of our
+fellow-creatures were to be reduced to wretchedness, that individuals might
+enjoy opulence, or government a revenue.
+
+He hoped that the house for the sake of its own character would explode
+these doctrines with all the marks of odium they deserved; and that all
+parties would join in giving a death-blow to this execrable trade. The
+royal family would, he expected, from their known benevolence, patronize
+the measure. Both Houses of Parliament were now engaged in the prosecution
+of a gentleman accused of cruelty and oppression in the East. But what were
+these cruelties, even if they could be brought home to him, when compared
+in number and degree to those, which were every day and every hour
+committed in the abominable traffic, which was now under their discussion!
+He considered therefore both Houses of Parliament as pledged upon this
+occasion. Of the support of the bishops he could have no doubt; because
+they were to render Christianity amiable, both by their doctrine and their
+example. Some of the inferior clergy had already manifested a laudable zeal
+in behalf of the injured Africans. The University of Cambridge had
+presented a petition to that house worthy of itself. The Sister-university
+had, by one of her representatives, given sanction to the measure.
+Dissenters of various denominations, but particularly the Quakers, (who to
+their immortal honour had taken the lead in it,) had vied with those of the
+established church in this amiable contest. The first counties, and some of
+the largest trading towns, in the kingdom had espoused the cause. In short,
+there had never been more unanimity in the country, than in this righteous
+attempt.
+
+With such support, and with so good a cause, it would be impossible to
+fail. Let but every man stand forth, who had at any time boasted of himself
+as an Englishman, and success would follow. But if he were to be unhappily
+mistaken as to the result, we must give up the name of Englishmen. Indeed,
+if we retained it, we should be the greatest hypocrites in the world; for
+we boasted of nothing more than of our own liberty; we manifested the
+warmest indignation at the smallest personal insult; we professed liberal
+sentiments towards other nations: but to do these things, and to continue
+such a traffic, would be to deserve the hateful character before mentioned.
+While we could hardly bear the sight of any thing resembling slavery, even
+as a punishment, among ourselves, how could we consistently entail an
+eternal slavery upon others?
+
+It had been frequently, but most disgracefully said, that "we should not be
+too eager in setting the example. Let the French begin it." Such a
+sentiment was a direct libel upon the ancient, noble, and generous
+character of this nation. We ought, on the other hand, under the blessings
+we enjoyed, and under the high sense we entertained of our own dignity as a
+people, to be proudly fearful, lest other nations should anticipate our
+design, and obtain the palm before us. It became us to lead. And if others
+should not follow us, it would belong to them to glory in the shame of
+trampling under foot the laws of reason, humanity, and religion.
+
+This motion, he said, came strongly recommended to them. The honourable
+member, who introduced it, was justly esteemed for his character. He was
+the representative too of a noble county, which had been always ready to
+take the lead in every public measure for the good of the community, or for
+the general benefit of mankind; of a county too, which had had the honour
+of producing a Saville. Had his illustrious predecessor been alive, he
+would have shown the same zeal on the same occasion. The preservation of
+the unalienable rights of all his fellow-creatures was one of the chief
+characteristics of that excellent citizen. Let every member in that house
+imitate him in the purity of their conduct and in the universal rectitude
+of their measures, and they would pay the same tender regard to the rights
+of other countries as to those of their own; and, for his part, he should
+never believe those persons to be sincere, who were loud in their
+professions of love of liberty, if he saw that love confined to the narrow
+circle of one community, which ought to be extended to the natural rights
+of every inhabitant of the globe.
+
+But we should be better able to bring ourselves up to this standard of
+rectitude, if we were to put ourselves into the situation of those, whom we
+oppressed. This was the rule of our religion. What should we think of
+those, who should say, that it was their interest to injure us? But he
+hoped we should not deceive ourselves so grossly as to imagine, that it was
+our real interest to oppress any one. The advantages to be obtained by
+tyranny were imaginary, and deceitful to the tyrant; and the evils they
+caused to the oppressed were grievous, and often insupportable.
+
+Before he sat down, he would apologize, if he had expressed himself too
+warmly on this subject. He did not mean to offend any one. There were
+persons connected with the trade, some of whom he pitied on account of the
+difficulty of their situation. But he should think most contemptibly of
+himself as a man, if he could talk on this traffic without emotion. It
+would be a sign to him of his own moral degradation. He regretted his
+inability to do justice to such a cause; but if, in having attempted to
+forward it, he had shown the weakness of his powers, he must console
+himself with the consideration, that he felt more solid comfort in having
+acted up to sound public principles, than he could have done from the
+exertion of the most splendid talents against the conviction of his
+conscience.
+
+Mr. Burdon rose, and said he was embarrassed to know how to act. Mr.
+Wilberforce had in a great measure met his ideas. Indeed he considered
+himself as much in his hands; but he wished to go gradually to the
+abolition of the trade. He wished to give time to the planters to recruit
+their stocks. He feared the immediate abolition might occasion a monopoly
+among such of them as were rich, to the detriment of the less affluent. We
+ought, like a judicious physician, to follow nature, and to promote a
+gradual recovery.
+
+Mr. Francis rose next. After complimenting Mr. Wilberforce, he stated that
+personal considerations might appear to incline him to go against the side
+which he was about to take, namely, that of strenuously supporting his
+motion. Having himself an interest in the West Indies, he thought that what
+he should submit to the house would have the double effect of evidence and
+argument; and he stated most unequivocally his opinion, that the abolition
+of the Slave-trade would tend materially to the benefit of the West Indies.
+
+The arguments urged by the honourable mover were supported by the facts,
+which he had adduced from the evidence, more strongly than any arguments
+had been supported in any speech be had ever heard. He wished, however,
+that more of these facts had been introduced into the debate; for they were
+apt to have a greater effect upon the mind than mere reasonings, however
+just and powerful. Many had affirmed that the Slave-trade was politic and
+expedient; but it was worthy of remark, that no man had ventured to deny
+that it was criminal. Criminal, however, be declared it to be in the
+highest degree; and he believed it was equally impolitic. Both its
+inexpediency and injustice had been established by the honourable mover. He
+dwelt much on the unhappy situation of the Negros in the West Indies, who
+were without the protection of government or of efficient laws, and subject
+to the mere caprice of men, who were at once the parties, the judges, and
+the executioners.
+
+He instanced an overseer, who, having thrown a Negro into a copper of
+boiling cane-juice for a trifling offence, was punished merely by the loss
+of his place, and by being obliged to pay the value of the slave. He stated
+another instance of a girl of fourteen, who was dreadfully whipped for
+coming too late to her work. She fell down motionless after it; and was
+then dragged along the ground, by the legs, to an hospital; where she died.
+The murderer, though tried, was acquitted by a jury of his peers, upon the
+idea, that it was impossible a master could destroy his own property. This
+was a notorious fact. It was published in the Jamaica Gazette; and it had
+even happened since the question of the abolition had been started.
+
+The only argument used against such cruelties, was the master's interest in
+the slave. But he urged the common cruelty to horses, in which their
+drivers had an actual interest with the drivers of men in the colonies, as
+a proof that this was no security. He had never heard an instance of a
+master being punished for the murder of his slave. The propagation of the
+slaves was so far from being encouraged, that it was purposely checked,
+because it was thought more profitable and less troublesome to buy a full
+grown Negro, than to rear a child. He repeated that his interest might have
+inclined him to the other side of the question; but he did not choose to
+compromise between his interest and his duty; for, if he abandoned his
+duty, he should not be happy in this world; nor should he deserve happiness
+in the next.
+
+Mr. Pitt rose, but he said it was only to move, seeing that justice could
+not be done to the subject this evening, that the further consideration of
+the question might be adjourned to the next.
+
+Mr. Cawthorne and Colonel Tarleton both opposed this motion, and Colonel
+Phipps and Lord Carhampton supported it.
+
+Mr. Fox said, the opposition to the adjournment was uncandid and
+unbecoming. They who opposed it well knew that the trade could not bear
+discussion. Let it be discussed; and, although there were symptoms of
+predetermination in some, the abolition of it must be carried. He would not
+believe that there could be found in the House of Commons men of such hard
+hearts and inaccessible understandings, as to vote an assent to its
+continuance, and then go home to their families, satisfied with their vote,
+after they had been once made acquainted with the subject.
+
+Mr. Pitt agreed with Mr. Fox, that from a full discussion of the subject
+there was every reason to augur, that the abolition would be adopted. Under
+the imputations, with which this trade was loaded, gentlemen should
+remember, they could not do justice to their own characters, unless they
+stood up, and gave their reasons for opposing the abolition of it. It was
+unusual also to force any question of such importance to so hasty a
+decision. For his own part, it was his duty, from the situation in which he
+stood, to state fully his own sentiments on the question; and, however
+exhausted both he and the house might be, he was resolved it should not
+pass without discussion, as long as he had strength to utter a word upon
+it. Every principle, that could bind a man of honour and conscience, would
+impel him to give the most powerful support he could to the motion for the
+abolition.
+
+The motion of Mr. Pitt was assented to, and the house was adjourned
+accordingly.
+
+On the next day the subject was resumed. Sir William Yonge rose, and said,
+that, though he differed from the honourable mover, he had much admired his
+speech of the last evening. Indeed the recollection of it made him only the
+more sensible of the weakness of his own powers; and yet, having what he
+supposed to be irrefragable arguments in his possession, he felt emboldened
+to proceed.
+
+And, first, before he could vote for the abolition, he wished to be
+convinced, that, whilst Britain were to lose, Africa would gain. As for
+himself, he hated a traffic in men, and joyfully anticipated its
+termination at no distant period under a wise system of regulation: but he
+considered the present measure as crude and indolent; and as precluding
+better and wiser measures, which were already in train. A British
+Parliament should attain not only the best ends, but by the wisest means.
+
+Great Britain might abandon her share of this trade, but she could not
+abolish it. Parliament was not an assembly of delegates from the powers of
+Europe, but of a single nation. It could not therefore suppress the trade;
+but would eventually aggravate those miseries incident to it, which every
+enlightened man must acknowledge, and every good man must deplore. He
+wished the traffic for ever closed. But other nations were only waiting for
+our decision, to seize the part we should leave them. The new projects of
+these would be intemperate; and, in the zeal of rivalship, the present
+evils of comparatively sober dealing would be aggravated beyond all
+estimate in this new and heated auction of bidders for life and limb. We
+might indeed by regulation give an example of new principles of policy and
+of justice; but if we were to withdraw suddenly from this commerce, like
+Pontius Pilate, we should wash our hands indeed, but we should not be
+innocent as to the consequences.
+
+On the first agitation of this business, Mr. Wilberforce had spoken
+confidently of other nations following our example. But had not the
+National Assembly of France referred the Slave-trade to a select committee,
+and had not that committee rejected the measure of its abolition? By the
+evidence it appeared, that the French and Spaniards were then giving
+bounties to the Slave-trade; that Denmark was desirous of following it;
+that America was encouraging it; and that the Dutch had recognized its
+necessity, and recommended its recovery. Things were bad enough indeed as
+they were, but he was sure this rivalship would make them worse.
+
+He did not admit the disorders imputed to the trade in all their extent.
+Pillage and kidnapping could not be general, on account of the populousness
+of the country; though too frequent instances of it had been proved. Crimes
+might be falsely imputed. This he admitted; but only partially. Witchcraft,
+he believed, was the secret of poisoning, and therefore deserved the
+severest punishment. That there should be a number of convictions for
+adultery, where polygamy was a custom, was not to be wondered at. But he
+feared, if a sale of these criminals were to be done away, massacre would
+be the substitute.
+
+An honourable member had asked on a former day, "Is it an excuse for
+robbery, to say that another would have committed it?" But the Slave-trade
+did not necessarily imply robbery. Not long since Great Britain sold her
+convicts, indirectly at least, to slavery. But he was no advocate for the
+trade. He wished it had never been begun; and that it might soon terminate.
+But the means were not adequate to the end proposed.
+
+Mr. Burke had said on a former occasion, "that in adopting the measure we
+must prepare to pay the price of our virtue." He was ready to pay his share
+of that price. But the effect of the purchase must be first ascertained. If
+they did not estimate this, it was not benevolence, but dissipation.
+Effects were to be duly appreciated; and though statesmen might rest every
+thing on a plausible manifesto of cause, the humbler moralist, meditating
+peace and goodwill towards men, would venture to call such statesmen
+responsible for consequences.
+
+In regard to the colonies, a sudden abolition would be oppression. The
+legislatures there should be led, and not forced, upon this occasion. He
+was persuaded they would act wisely to attain the end pointed out to them.
+They would see, that a natural increase of their Negros might be effected
+by an improved system of legislation; and that in the result the
+Slave-trade would be no longer necessary.
+
+A sudden abolition, also, would occasion dissatisfaction there. Supplies
+were necessary for some time to come. The Negros did not yet generally
+increase by birth. The gradation of ages was not yet duly filled. These and
+many defects might be remedied, but not suddenly.
+
+It would cause also distress there. The planters, not having their expected
+supplies, could not discharge their debts. Hence their slaves would be
+seized and sold. Nor was there any provision in this case against the
+separation of families, except as to the mother and infant child. These
+separations were one of the chief outrages complained of in Africa. Why
+then should we promote them in the West Indies? The confinement on board a
+slave-ship had been also bitterly complained of; but, under distraint for
+the debt of a master, the poor slave might linger in a gaol twice or thrice
+the time of the Middle Passage.
+
+He again stated his abhorrence of the Slave-trade; but as a resource,
+though he hoped but a temporary one, it was of such consequence to the
+existence of the country, that it could not suddenly be withdrawn. The
+value of the imports and exports between Great Britain and the West Indies,
+including the excise and customs, was between seven and eight millions
+annually; and the tonnage of the ships employed, about an eighth of the
+whole tonnage of these kingdoms.
+
+He complained that in the evidence the West India planters had been by no
+means spared. Cruel stories had been hastily and lightly told against them.
+Invidious comparisons had been made to their detriment. But it was well
+known, that one of our best comic writers, when he wished to show
+benevolence in its fairest colours, had personified it in the character of
+the West Indian. He wished the slave might become as secure as the
+apprentice in this country: but it was necessary that the alarms concerning
+the abolition of the Slave-trade should, in the mean time, be quieted; and
+he trusted that the good sense and true benevolence of the House would
+reject the present motion.
+
+Mr. Matthew Montagu rose, and said a few words in support of the motion;
+and after condemning the trade in the strongest manner, he declared, that
+as long as he had life, he would use every faculty of his body and mind in
+endeavouring to promote its abolition.
+
+Lord John Russell succeeded Mr. Montagu. He said, that although slavery was
+repugnant to his feelings, he must vote against the abolition, as visionary
+and delusive. It was a feeble attempt without the power to serve the cause
+of humanity. Other nations would take up the trade. Whenever a bill of wise
+regulation should be brought forward, no man would be more ready than
+himself to lend his support. In this way the rights of humanity might be
+asserted without injury to others. He hoped he should not incur censure by
+his vote; for, let his understanding be what it might, he did not know that
+he had, notwithstanding the assertions of Mr. Fox, an inaccessible heart.
+
+Mr. Stanley (agent for the islands) rose next. He felt himself called upon,
+he said, to refute the many calumnies, which had for years been propagated
+against the planters, (even through the medium of the pulpit, which should
+have been employed to better purposes,) and which had at length produced
+the mischievous measure, which was now under the discussion of the House. A
+cry had been sounded forth, and from one end of the kingdom to the other;
+as if there had never been a slave from Adam to the present time. But it
+appeared to him to have been the intention of Providence, from the very
+beginning, that one set of men should be slaves to another. This truth was
+as old as it was universal. It was recognized in every history, under every
+government, and in every religion. Nor did the Christian religion itself,
+if the comments of Dr. Halifax, bishop of Gloucester, on a passage in St.
+Paul's epistle to the Corinthians were true, show more repugnance to
+slavery than any other.
+
+He denied that the slaves were procured in the manner which had been
+described. It was the custom of all savages to kill their prisoners; and
+the Africans ought to be thankful that they had been carried safe into the
+British colonies.
+
+As to the tales of misery in the Middle Passage, they were gross
+falsehoods; and as to their treatment in the West Indies, he knew
+personally that it was, in general, indulgent and humane.
+
+With regard to promoting their increase by any better mode of treatment, he
+wished gentlemen would point it out to him. As a planter he would thank
+them for it. It was absurd to suppose that he and others were blind to
+their own interest. It was well known that one Creole slave was worth two
+Africans: and their interest therefore must suggest to them that the
+propagation of slaves was preferable to the purchase of imported Negros, of
+whom one half very frequently died in the seasoning.
+
+He then argued the impossibility of beasts doing the work of the
+plantations. He endeavoured to prove that the number of these, adequate to
+this purpose, could not be supplied with food; and after having made many
+other observations, which, on account of the lowness of his voice, could
+not be heard, he concluded by objecting to the motion.
+
+Mr. William Smith rose. He wondered how the last speaker could have had the
+boldness to draw arguments from scripture in support of the Slave-trade.
+Such arguments could be intended only to impose on those, who never took
+the trouble of thinking for themselves. Could it be thought for a moment,
+that the good sense of the House could be misled by a few perverted or
+misapplied passages, in direct opposition to the whole tenor and spirit of
+Christianity; to the theory, he might say, of almost every religion, which
+had ever appeared in the world? Whatever might have been advanced, every
+body must feel, that the Slave-trade could not exist an hour, if that
+excellent maxim, "to do to others as we would wish that others should do to
+us," had its proper influence on the conduct of men.
+
+Nor was Mr. Stanley more happy in his argument of the antiquity and
+universality of slavery. Because a practice had existed, did it necessarily
+follow that it was just? By this argument every crime might be defended
+from the time of Cain. The slaves of antiquity, however, were in a
+situation far preferable to that of the Negros in the West Indies. A
+passage in Macrobius, which exemplified this in the strongest manner, was
+now brought to his recollection. "Our ancestors," says Macrobius,
+"denominated the master father of the family, and the slave domestic, with
+the intention of removing all odium from the condition of the master, and
+all contempt from that of the servant." Could this language be applied to
+the present state of West India slavery?
+
+It had been complained of by those who supported the trade, that they
+laboured under great disadvantages by being obliged to contend against the
+most splendid abilities which the House could boast. But he believed they
+laboured under one, which was worse, and for which no talents could
+compensate; he meant the impossibility of maintaining their ground fairly
+on any of those principles, which every man within those walls had been
+accustomed, from his infancy, to venerate as sacred. He and his friends too
+laboured under some disadvantages. They had been charged with fanaticism.
+But what had Mr. Long said, when he addressed himself to those planters,
+who were desirous of attempting improvements on their estates?  He advised
+them "not to be diverted by partial views, vulgar prejudices, or the
+ridicule which might spring from weak minds, from a benevolent attention to
+the public good." But neither by these nor by other charges were he or his
+friends to be diverted from the prosecution of their purpose. They were
+convinced of the rectitude and high importance of their object; and were
+determined never to desist from pursuing it, till it should be attained.
+
+But they had to struggle with difficulties far more serious. The West
+Indian interest, which opposed them, was a collected body; of great power,
+affluence, connections, and respectability.
+
+Artifice had also been employed. Abolition and emancipation had been so
+often confounded, and by those who knew better, that it must have been
+purposely done, to throw an odium on the measure which was now before them.
+
+The abolitionists had been also accused as the authors of the late
+insurrection in Dominica. A revolt had certainly taken place in that
+island. But revolts there had occurred frequently before. Mr. Stanley
+himself, in attempting to fix this charge upon them, had related
+circumstances, which amounted to their entire exculpation. He had said,
+that all was quiet there till the disturbances in the French islands; when
+some Negros from the latter had found their way to Dominica, and had
+excited the insurrection in question. He had also said, that the Negros in
+our own islands hated the idea of the abolition; for they thought, as no
+new labourers were to come in, they should be subjected to increased
+hardships. But if they and their masters hated this same measure, how was
+this coincidence of sentiment to give birth to insurrection?
+
+Other fallacies also had been industriously propagated. Of the African
+trade it had been said, that the exports amounted to a million annually;
+whereas, from the report on the table, it had on an average amounted to
+little more than half a million; and this included the articles for the
+purchase of African produce, which were of the value of a hundred and forty
+thousand pounds.
+
+The East Indian trade, also, had been said to depend on the West Indian and
+the African. In the first place, it had but very little connection with the
+former at all. Its connection with the latter was principally on account of
+the saltpetre, which it furnished for making gunpowder. Out of nearly three
+millions of pounds in weight of the latter article, which had been exported
+in a year from this country, one half had been sent to Africa alone; for
+the purposes, doubtless, of maintaining peace, and encouraging civilization
+among its various tribes! Four or five thousand persons were said also to
+depend for their bread in manufacturing guns for the African trade; and
+these, it was pretended, could not make guns of another sort.--But where
+lay the difficulty?--One of the witnesses had unravelled it. He had seen
+the Negros maimed by the bursting of these guns. They killed more from the
+butt than from the muzzle. Another had stated, that on the sea-coast the
+natives were afraid to fire a trade-gun.
+
+In the West Indian commerce two hundred and forty thousand tons of shipping
+were stated to be employed. But here deception intruded itself again. This
+statement included every vessel, great and small, which went from the
+British West Indies to America, and to the foreign islands; and, what was
+yet more unfair, all the repeated voyages of each throughout the year. The
+shipping, which could only fairly be brought into this account, did but
+just exceed half that which had been mentioned.
+
+In a similar manner had the islands themselves been overrated. Their value
+had been computed, for the information of the privy council, at thirty-six
+millions; but the planters had estimated them at seventy. The truth,
+however, might possibly lie between these extremes. He by no means wished
+to depreciate their importance; but he did not like that such palpable
+misrepresentations should go unnoticed.
+
+An honourable member (Colonel Tarleton) had disclaimed every attempt to
+interest the feelings of those present, but had desired to call them to
+reason and accounts. He also desired (though it was a question of feeling,
+if any one ever was,) to draw the attention of the committee to reason and
+accounts--to the voice of reason instead of that of prejudice, and to
+accounts in the place of idle apprehensions. The result, he doubted not,
+would be a full persuasion, that policy and justice were inseparable upon
+this, as upon every other occasion.
+
+The same gentleman had enlarged on the injustice of depriving the Liverpool
+merchants of a business, on which were founded their honour and their
+fortunes. On what part of it they founded their honour he could not
+conjecture, except from those passages in the evidence, where it appeared,
+that their agents in Africa had systematically practised every fraud and
+villainy, which the meanest and most unprincipled cunning could suggest, to
+impose on the ignorance of those with whom they traded.
+
+The same gentleman had also lamented, that the evidence had not been taken
+upon oath. He himself lamented it too. Numberless facts had been related by
+eye-witnesses, called in support of the abolition, so dreadfully atrocious,
+that they appeared incredible; and seemed rather, to use the expression of
+Ossian, like "the histories of the days of other times." These procured for
+the trade a species of acquittal, which it could not have obtained, had the
+committee been authorised to administer an oath. He apprehended also, in
+this case, that some other persons would have been rather more guarded in
+their testimony. Captain Knox would not then perhaps have told the
+committee, that six hundred slaves could have had comfortable room at night
+in his vessel of about one hundred and forty tons; when there could have
+been no more than five feet six inches in length, and fifteen inches in
+breadth, to about two thirds of his number.
+
+The same gentleman had also dwelt upon the Slave-trade as a nursery for
+seamen. But it had appeared by the muster-rolls of the slave-vessels, then
+actually on the table of the House, that more than a fifth of them died in
+the service, exclusive of those who perished when discharged in the West
+Indies; and yet he had been instructed by his constituents to maintain this
+false position. His reasoning, too, was very curious; for, though numbers
+might die, yet as one half, who entered, were landsmen, seamen were
+continually forming. Not to dwell on the expensive cruelty of forming these
+seamen by the yearly destruction of so many hundreds, this very statement
+was flatly contradicted by the evidence. The muster-rolls from Bristol
+stated the proportion of landmen in the trade there at one twelfth, and the
+proper officers of Liverpool itself at but a sixteenth, of the whole
+employed. In the face again of the most glaring facts, others had
+maintained that the mortality in these vessels did not exceed that of other
+trades in the tropical climates. But the same documents, which proved that
+twenty-three per cent, were destroyed in this wasting traffic, proved that
+in West India ships only about one and a half per cent. were lost,
+including every casualty.--But the very men, under whose management this
+dreadful mortality had been constantly occurring, had coolly said, that
+much of it might be avoided by proper regulations. How criminal then were
+they, who, knowing this, had neither publicly proposed, nor in their
+practice adopted, a remedy!
+
+The average loss of the slaves on board, which had been calculated by Mr.
+Wilberforce at twelve and a half per cent., had been denied. He believed
+this calculation, taking in all the circumstances connected with it, to be
+true; but that for years not less than one tenth had so perished, he would
+challenge those concerned in the traffic to disprove. Much evidence had
+been produced on the subject; but the voyages had been generally selected.
+There was only one, who had disclosed the whole account. This was Mr.
+Anderson of London, whose engagements in this trade had been very
+inconsiderable. His loss had only amounted to three per cent.; but,
+unfortunately for the Slave-traders of Liverpool, his vessel had not taken
+above three fourths of that number in proportion to the tonnage which they
+had stated to be necessary to the very existence of their trade.
+
+An honourable member (Mr. Grosvenor) had attributed the protraction of this
+business to those who had introduced it. But from whom did the motion for
+further evidence (when that of the privy council was refused) originate,
+but from the enemies of the abolition? The same gentleman had said, it was
+impossible to abolish the trade; but where was the impossibility of
+forbidding the further importation of slaves into our own colonies? and
+beyond this the motion did not extend.
+
+The latter argument had also been advanced by Sir William Yonge and others.
+But allowing it its full force, would there be no honour in the dereliction
+of such a commerce? Would it be nothing publicly to recognise great and
+just principles? Would our example be nothing?--Yes: every country would
+learn, from our experiment, that American colonies could be cultivated
+without the necessity of continual supplies equally expensive and
+disgraceful.
+
+But we might do more than merely lay down principles or propose examples.
+We might, in fact, diminish the evil itself immediately by no
+inconsiderable part,--by the whole of our own supply: and here he could not
+at all agree with the honourable baronet, in what seemed to him a
+commercial paradox, that the taking away from an open trade by far the
+largest customer, and the lessening of the consumption of the article,
+would increase both the competition and the demand, and of course all those
+mischiefs, which it was their intention to avert.
+
+That the civilization of the Africans was promoted, as had been asserted,
+by their intercourse with the Europeans, was void of foundation, as had
+appeared from the evidence. In manners and dishonesty they had indeed
+assimilated with those who frequented their coasts. But the greatest
+industry and the least corruption of morals were in the interior, where
+they were out of the way of this civilizing connection.
+
+To relieve Africa from famine, was another of the benign reasons which had
+been assigned for continuing the trade. That famines had occurred there, he
+did not doubt; but that they should annually occur, and with such
+arithmetical exactness as to suit the demands of the Slave-trade, was a
+circumstance most extraordinary; so wonderful indeed, that, could it once
+be proved, he should consider it as a far better argument in favour of the
+divine approbation of that trade, than any which had ever yet been
+produced.
+
+As to the effect of the abolition on the West Indies, it would give weight
+to every humane regulation which had been made; by substituting a certain
+and obvious interest, in the place of one depending upon chances and
+calculation. An honourable member (Mr. Stanley) had spoken of the
+impossibility of cultivating the estates there without further importations
+of Negros; and yet, of all the authorities he had brought to prove his
+case, there was scarcely one which might not be pressed to serve more or
+less effectually against him. Almost every planter he had named had found
+his Negros increase under the good treatment he had professed to give them;
+and it was an axiom, throughout the whole evidence, that wherever they were
+well used importations were not necessary. It had been said indeed by some
+adverse witnesses, that in Jamaica all possible means had been used to keep
+up the stock by breeding; but how preposterous was this, when it was
+allowed that the morals of the slaves had been totally neglected, and that
+the planters preferred buying a larger proportion of males than females!
+
+The misfortune was, that prejudice and not reason was the enemy to be
+subdued. The prejudices of the West Indians on these points were numerous
+and inveterate. Mr. Long himself had characterized them on this account, in
+terms which he should have felt diffident in using. But Mr. Long had shown
+his own prejudices also. For he justified the chaining of the Negros on
+board the slave-vessels, on account of "their bloody, cruel, and malicious
+dispositions." But hear his commendation of some of the Aborigines of
+Jamaica, "who had miserably perished in caves, whither they had retired to
+escape the tyranny of the Spaniards. These," says he, "left a glorious
+monument of their having disdained to survive the loss of their liberty and
+their country." And yet this same historian could not perceive that this
+natural love of liberty might operate as strongly and as laudably in the
+African Negro, as in the Indian of Jamaica.
+
+He was concerned to acknowledge that these prejudices were yet further
+strengthened by resentment against those who had taken an active part in
+the abolition of the Slave-trade. But it was never the object of these to
+throw a stigma on the whole body of the West Indians; but to prove the
+miserable effects of the trade. This it was their duty to do; and if, in
+doing this, disgraceful circumstances had come out, it was not their fault;
+and it must never be forgotten that they were true.
+
+That the slaves were exposed to great misery in the islands, was true as
+well from inference as from facts: for what might not be expected from the
+use of arbitrary power, where the three characters of party, judge, and
+executioner were united! The slaves too were more capable on account of
+their passions, than the beasts of the field, of exciting the passions of
+their tyrants. To what a length the ill treatment of them might be carried,
+might be learnt from the instance which General Tottenham mentioned to have
+seen in the year 1780 in the streets of Bridge Town, Barbadoes: "A youth
+about nineteen (to use his own words in the evidence), entirely naked, with
+an iron collar about his neck, having five long projecting spikes. His body
+both before and behind, was covered with wounds. His belly and thighs were
+almost cut to pieces, with running ulcers all over them; and a finger might
+have been laid in some of the weals. He could not sit down, because his
+hinder part was mortified; and it was impossible for him to lie down, on
+account of the prongs of his collar." He supplicated the General for
+relief. The latter asked, who had punished him so dreadfully? The youth
+answered, his master had done it. And because he could not work, this same
+master, in the same spirit of perversion, which extorts from scripture a
+justification of the Slave-trade, had fulfilled the apostolic maxim, that
+he should have nothing to eat. The use he meant to make of this instance
+was to show the unprotected state of the slaves. What must it be, where
+such an instance could pass not only unpunished, but almost unregarded! If,
+in the streets of London, but a dog were to be seen lacerated like this
+miserable man, how would the cruelty of the wretch be execrated, who had
+thus even abused a brute!
+
+The judicial punishments also inflicted upon the Negro showed the low
+estimation, in which, in consequence of the strength of old customs and
+deep-rooted prejudices, they were held. Mr. Edwards, in his speech to the
+Assembly at Jamaica, stated the following case, as one which had happened
+in one of the rebellions there. Some slaves surrounded the dwelling-house
+of their mistress. She was in bed with a lovely infant. They deliberated
+upon the means of putting her to death in torment. But in the end one of
+them reserved her for his mistress; and they killed her infant with an axe
+before her face. "Now," says Mr. Edwards, (addressing himself to his
+audience,) "you will think that no torments were too great for such
+horrible excesses. Nevertheless I am of a different opinion. I think that
+death, unaccompanied with cruelty, should be the utmost exertion of human
+authority over our unhappy fellow-creatures." Torments, however, were
+always inflicted in these cases. The punishment was gibbeting alive, and
+exposing the delinquents to perish by the gradual effects of hunger,
+thirst, and a parching sun; in which situation they were known to suffer
+for nine days, with a fortitude scarcely credible, never uttering a single
+groan. But horrible as the excesses might have been, which occasioned these
+punishments, it muse be remembered, that they were committed by ignorant
+savages, who had been dragged from all they held most dear; whose patience
+had been exhausted by a cruel and loathsome confinement during their
+transportation; and whose resentment had been wound up to the highest pitch
+of fury by the lash of the driver.
+
+But he would now mention another instance, by way of contrast, out of the
+evidence. A child on board a slave-ship, of about ten months old, took sulk
+and would not eat. The captain flogged it with a cat; swearing that he
+would make it eat, or kill it. From this and other ill-treatment the
+child's legs swelled. He then ordered some water to be made hot to abate
+the swelling. But even his tender mercies were cruel; for the cook, on
+putting his hand into the water, said it was too hot. Upon this the captain
+swore at him, and ordered the feet to be put in. This was done. The nails
+and skin came off. Oiled cloths were then put round them. The child was at
+length tied to a heavy log. Two or three days afterwards, the captain
+caught it up again; and repeated that he would make it eat, or kill it. He
+immediately flogged it again, and in a quarter of an hour it died. But,
+after the child was dead, whom should the barbarian select to throw it
+overboard, but the wretched mother? In vain she started from the office. He
+beat her, till he made her take up the child and carry it to the side of
+the vessel. She then dropped it into the sea, turning her head the other
+way that she might not see it. Now it would naturally be asked, Was not
+this captain also gibbered alive? Alas! although the execrable, barbarity
+of the European exceeded that of the Africans before mentioned, almost as
+much as his opportunities of instruction had been greater than theirs, no
+notice whatsoever was taken of this horrible action; and a thousand similar
+cruelties had been committed in this abominable trade with equal impunity:
+but he would say no more. He should vote for the abolition, not only as it
+would do away all the evils complained of in Africa and the Middle Passage;
+but as it would be the most effectual means of ameliorating the condition
+of those unhappy persons, who were still to continue slaves in the British
+colonies.
+
+Mr. Courtenay rose. He said, he could not but consider the assertion of Sir
+William Yonge as a mistake, that the Slave-trade, if abandoned by us, would
+fall into the hands of France. It ought to be recollected, with what
+approbation the motion for abolishing it, made by the late Mirabeau, had
+been received; although the situation of the French colonies might then
+have presented obstacles to carrying the measure into immediate execution.
+He had no doubt, if parliament were to begin, so wise and enlightened a
+body as the National Assembly would follow the example. But even if France
+were not to relinquish the trade, how could we, if justice required its
+abolition, hesitate as to our part of it?
+
+The trade, it had been said, was conducted upon the principles of humanity.
+Yes: we rescued the Africans from what we were pleased to call their
+wretched situation in their own country, and then we took credit for our
+humanity; because, after having killed one half of them in the seasoning,
+we substituted what we were again pleased to call a better treatment than
+that which they would have experienced at home.
+
+
+It had been stated that the principle of war among savages was a general
+massacre. This was not true. They frequently adopted the captives into
+their own families; and, so far from massacring the women and children,
+they often gave them the protection which the weakness of their age and sex
+demanded.
+
+There could be no doubt, that the practice of kidnapping prevailed in
+Africa. As to witchcraft, it had been made a crime in the reign of James
+the First in this country, for the purpose of informations; and how much
+more likely were informations to take place in Africa, under the
+encouragement afforded by the Slave-trade! This trade, it had been said,
+was sanctioned by twenty-six acts of parliament. He did not doubt but
+fifty-six might be found, by which parliament had sanctioned witchcraft; of
+the existence of which we had now no belief whatever.
+
+It had been said by Mr. Stanley, that the pulpit had been used as an
+instrument of attack on the Slave-trade. He was happy to learn it had been
+so well employed; and he hoped the Bishops would rise up in the House of
+Lords, with the virtuous indignation which became them, to abolish a
+traffic so contrary to humanity, justice, and religion.
+
+He entreated every member to recollect, that on his vote that night
+depended the happiness of millions; and that it was then in his power to
+promote a measure, of which the benefits would be felt over one whole
+quarter of the globe; that the seeds of civilization might, by the present
+bill, be sown all over Africa; and the first principles of humanity be
+established in regions, where they had hitherto been excluded by the
+existence of this execrable trade.
+
+Lord Carysfort rose, and said, that the great cause of the abolition had
+flourished by the manner in which it had been opposed. No one argument of
+solid weight has been adduced against it. It had been shown, but never
+disproved, that the colonial laws were inadequate to the protection of the
+slaves; that the punishments of the latter were most unmerciful; that they
+were deprived of the right of self-defence against any White man; and, in
+short, that the system was totally repugnant to the principles of the
+British constitution.
+
+Colonel Phipps followed Lord Carysfort. He denied that this was a question
+in which the rights of humanity and the laws of nature were concerned. The
+Africans became slaves in consequence of the constitution of their own
+governments. These were founded in absolute despotism. Every subject was an
+actual slave. The inhabitants were slaves to the great men; and the great
+men were slaves to the Prince. Prisoners of war, too, were by law subject
+to slavery. Such being the case, he saw no more cruelty in disposing of
+them to our merchants, than to those of any other nation. Criminals also in
+cases of adultery and witchcraft became slaves by the same laws.
+
+It had been said, that there were no regulations in the West Indies for the
+protection of slaves. There were several; though he was ready to admit,
+that more were necessary; and he would go in this respect as far as
+humanity might require. He had passed ten months in Jamaica, where he had
+never seen any such acts of cruelty as had been talked of. Those which he
+had seen were not exercised by the Whites, but by the Blacks. The dreadful
+stories, which had been told, ought no more to fix a general stigma upon
+the planters, than the story of Mrs. Brownrigg to stamp this polished
+metropolis with the general brand of murder. There was once a haberdasher's
+wife (Mrs. Nairne) who locked up her apprentice girl, and starved her to
+death; but did ever any body think of abolishing haberdashery on this
+account? He was persuaded the Negros in the West Indies were cheerful and
+happy. They were fond of ornaments; but it was not the characteristic of
+miserable persons to show a taste for finery. Such a taste, on the
+contrary, implied a cheerful and contented mind. He was sorry to differ
+from his friend Mr. Wilberforce, but he must oppose his motion.
+
+Mr. Pitt rose, and said, that from the first hour of his having had the
+honour to sit in parliament down to the present, among all the questions,
+whether political or personal, in which it had been his fortune to take a
+share, there had never been one in which his heart was so deeply interested
+as in the present; both on account of the serious principles it involved,
+and the consequences connected with it.
+
+The present was not a mere question of feeling. The argument, which ought
+in his opinion to determine the committee, was, that the Slave-trade was
+unjust. It was therefore such a trade as it was impossible for him to
+support, unless it could be first proved to him, that there were no laws of
+morality binding upon nations; and that it was not the duty of a
+legislature to restrain its subjects from invading the happiness of other
+countries, and from violating the fundamental principles of justice.
+
+Several had stated the impracticability of the measure before them. They
+wished to see the trade abolished; but there was some necessity for
+continuing it, which they conceived to exist. Nay, almost every one, he
+believed, appeared to wish, that the further importation of slaves might
+cease; provided it could be made out, that the population of the West
+Indies could be maintained without it. He proposed therefore to consider
+the latter point; for, as the impracticability of keeping up the population
+there appeared to operate as the chief objection, he trusted that, by
+showing it to be ill founded, he should clear away all other obstacles
+whatever; so that, having no ground either of justice or necessity to stand
+upon, there could be no excuse left to the committee for resisting the
+present motion.
+
+He might reasonably, however, hope that they would not reckon any small or
+temporary disadvantage, which might arise from the abolition, to be a
+sufficient reason against it. It was surely not any slight degree of
+expediency, nor any small balance of profit, nor any light shades of
+probability on the one side, rather than on the other, which would
+determine them on this question. He asked pardon even for the supposition.
+The Slave-trade was an evil of such magnitude, that there must be a common
+wish in the committee at once to put an end to it, if there were no great
+and serious obstacles. It was a trade, by which multitudes of unoffending
+nations were deprived of the blessings of civilization, and had their peace
+and happiness invaded. It ought therefore to be no common expediency, it
+ought to be nothing less than the utter ruin of our islands, which it
+became those to plead, who took upon them to defend the continuance of it.
+
+He could not help thinking that the West India gentlemen had manifested an
+over great degree of sensibility as to the point in question; and that
+their alarms had been unreasonably excited upon it. He had examined the
+subject carefully for himself; and he would now detail those reasons, which
+had induced him firmly to believe, not only that no permanent mischief
+would follow from the abolition; but not even any such temporary
+inconvenience, as could be stated to be a reason for preventing the House
+from agreeing to the motion before them; on the contrary, that the
+abolition itself would lay the foundation for the more solid improvement of
+all the various interests of those colonies.
+
+In doing this he should apply his observations chiefly to Jamaica, which
+contained more than half the slaves in the British West Indies; and if he
+should succeed in proving that no material detriment could arise to the
+population there, this would afford so strong a presumption with respect to
+the other islands, that the House could no longer hesitate, whether they
+should, or should not, put a stop to this most horrid trade.
+
+In the twenty years ending in 1788, the annual loss of slaves in Jamaica
+(that is, the excess of deaths above the births,) appeared to be one in the
+hundred. In a preceding period the loss was greater; and, in a period
+before that, greater still; there having been a continual gradation in the
+decrease through the whole time. It might fairly be concluded, therefore,
+that (the average loss of the last period being one per cent.) the loss in
+the former part of it would be somewhat more, and in the latter part
+somewhat less, than one per cent.; insomuch that it might be fairly
+questioned, whether, by this time, the births and deaths in Jamaica might
+not be stated as nearly equal. It was to be added, that a peculiar
+calamity, which swept away fifteen thousand slaves, had occasioned a part
+of the mortality in the last-mentioned period. The probable loss,
+therefore, now to be expected was very inconsiderable indeed.
+
+There was, however, one circumstance to be added, which the West India
+gentlemen, in stating this matter, had entirely overlooked; and which was
+so material, as clearly to reduce the probable diminution in the population
+of Jamaica down to nothing. In all the calculations he had referred to of
+the comparative number of births and deaths, all the Negros in the island
+were included. The newly imported, who died in the seasoning, made a part.
+But these swelled, most materially, the number of the deaths. Now as these
+extraordinary deaths would cease, as soon as the importations ceased, a
+deduction of them ought to be made from his present calculation.
+
+But the number of those, who thus died in the seasoning, would make up of
+itself nearly the whole of that one per cent., which had been stated. He
+particularly pressed an attention to this circumstance; for the complaint
+of being likely to want hands in Jamaica, arose from the mistake of
+including the present unnatural deaths, caused by the seasoning, among the
+natural and perpetual causes of mortality. These deaths, being erroneously
+taken into the calculations, gave the planters an idea, that the numbers
+could not be kept up. These deaths, which were caused merely by the
+Slave-trade, furnished the very ground, therefore, on which the continuance
+of that trade had been thought necessary.
+
+The evidence as to this point was clear; for it would be found in that
+dreadful catalogue of deaths, arising from the seasoning and the passage,
+which the House had been condemned to look into, that one half died. An
+annual mortality of two thousand slaves in Jamaica might be therefore
+charged to the importation; which, compared with the whole number on the
+island, hardly fell short of the whole one per cent. decrease.
+
+Joining this with all the other considerations, he would then ask, Could
+the decrease of the slaves in Jamaica be such--could the colonies be so
+destitute of means--could the planters, when by their own accounts they
+were establishing daily new regulations for the benefit of the
+slaves--could they, under all these circumstances, be permitted to plead
+that total impossibility of keeping up their number, which they had rested
+on, as being indeed the only possible pretext for allowing fresh
+importations from Africa? He appealed therefore to the sober judgment of
+all, whether the situation of Jamaica was such, as to justify a hesitation
+in agreeing to the present motion.
+
+It might be observed also, that, when the importations should stop, that
+disproportion between the sexes, which was one of the obstacles to
+population, would gradually diminish; and a natural order of things be
+established. Through the want of this natural order a thousand grievances
+were created, which it was impossible to define; and which it was in vain
+to think that, under such circumstances, we could cure. But the abolition
+of itself would work this desirable effect. The West Indians would then
+feel a near and urgent interest to enter into a thousand little details,
+which it was impossible for him to describe, but which would have the
+greatest influence on population. A foundation would thus be laid for the
+general welfare of the islands; a new system would rise up, the reverse of
+the old; and eventually both their general wealth and happiness would
+increase.
+
+He had now proved far more than he was bound to do; for, if he could only
+show that the abolition would not be ruinous, it would be enough. He could
+give up, therefore, three arguments out of four, through the whole of what
+he had said, and yet have enough left for his position. As to the Creoles,
+they would undoubtedly increase. They differed in this entirely from the
+imported slaves, who were both a burthen and a curse to themselves and
+others. The measure now proposed would operate like a charm; and, besides
+stopping all the miseries in Africa and the passage, would produce even
+more benefit in the West Indies than legal regulations could effect.
+
+He would now just touch upon the question of emancipation. A rash
+emancipation of the slaves would be mischievous. In that unhappy situation,
+to which our baneful conduct had brought ourselves and them, it would be no
+justice on either side to give them liberty. They were as yet incapable of
+it; but their situation might be gradually amended. They might be relieved
+from every thing harsh and severe; raised from their present degraded
+state; and put under the protection of the law. Till then, to talk of
+emancipation was insanity. But it was the system of fresh importations,
+which interfered with these principles of improvement; and it was only the
+abolition which could establish them. This suggestion had its foundation in
+human nature. Wherever the incentive of honour, credit, and fair profit
+appeared, energy would spring up; and when these labourers should have the
+natural springs of human action afforded them, they would then rise to the
+natural level of human industry.
+
+From Jamaica he would now go to the other islands. In Barbadoes the slaves
+had rather increased. In St. Kitts the decrease for fourteen years had been
+but three fourths per cent.; but here many of the observations would apply,
+which he had used in the case of Jamaica. In Antigua many had died by a
+particular calamity. But for this, the decrease would have been trifling.
+In Nevis and Montserrat there was little or no disproportion of the sexes;
+so that it might well be hoped, that the numbers would be kept up in these
+islands. In Dominica some controversy had arisen about the calculation; but
+Governor Orde had stated an increase of births above the deaths. From
+Grenada and St. Vincents no accurate accounts had been delivered in answer
+to the queries sent them; but they were probably not in circumstances less
+favourable than in the other islands.
+
+On a full review then, of the state of the Negro population in the West
+Indies, was there any serious ground of alarm from the abolition of the
+Slave-trade? Where was the impracticability, on which alone so many had
+rested their objections? Must we not blush at pretending, that it would
+distress our consciences to accede to this measure, as far as the question
+of the Negro population was concerned?
+
+Intolerable were the mischiefs of this trade, both in its origin and
+through every stage of its progress. To say that slaves could be furnished
+us by fair and commercial means was ridiculous. The trade sometimes ceased,
+as during the late war. The demand was more or less according to
+circumstances. But how was it possible, that to a demand so exceedingly
+fluctuating the supply should always exactly accommodate itself? Alas! we
+made human beings the subject of commerce; we talked of them as such; and
+yet we would not allow them the common principle of commerce, that the
+supply must accommodate itself to the consumption. It was not from wars,
+then, that the slaves were chiefly procured. They were obtained in
+proportion as they were wanted. If a demand for slaves arose, a supply was
+forced in one way or other; and it was in vain, overpowered as we then were
+with positive evidence, as well as the reasonableness of the supposition,
+to deny that by the Slave-trade we occasioned all the enormities which had
+been alleged against it.
+
+Sir William Yonge had said, that, if we were not to take the Africans from
+their country, they would be destroyed. But he had not yet read, that all
+uncivilized nations destroyed their captives. We assumed therefore what was
+false. The very selling of them implied this: for, if they would sell their
+captives for profit, why should they not employ them so as to receive a
+profit also? Nay, many of them, while there was no demand from the
+slave-merchants, were often actually so employed. The trade, too, had been
+suspended during the war; and it was never said, or thought, that any such
+consequence had then followed.
+
+The honourable baronet had also said in justification of the Slave-trade,
+that witchcraft commonly implied poison, and was therefore a punishable
+crime; but did he recollect that not only the individual accused, but that
+his whole family, were sold as slaves? The truth was, we stopped the
+natural progress of civilization in Africa. We cut her off from the
+opportunity of improvement. We kept her down in a state of darkness,
+bondage, ignorance and bloodshed. Was not this an awful consideration for
+this country? Look at the map of Africa, and see how little useful
+intercourse had been established on that vast continent! While other
+countries were assisting and enlightening each other, Africa alone had none
+of these benefits. We had obtained as yet only so much knowledge of her
+productions, as to show that there was a capacity for trade, which we
+checked. Indeed, if the mischiefs there were out of the question, the
+circumstance of the Middle Passage alone would, in his mind, be reason
+enough for the abolition. Such a scene as that of the slave-ships passing
+over with their wretched cargoes to the West Indies, if it could be spread
+before the eyes of the House, would be sufficient of itself to make them
+vote in favour of it; but when it could be added, that the interest even of
+the West Indies themselves rested on the accomplishment of this great
+event, he could not conceive an act of more imperious duty, than that,
+which was imposed upon the House, of agreeing to the present motion.
+
+Sir Archibald Edmonstone rose, and asked, whether the present motion went
+so far, as to pledge those who voted for it, to a total and immediate
+abolition.
+
+Mr. Alderman Watson rose next. He defended the Slave-trade as highly
+beneficial to the country, being one material branch of its commerce. But
+he could not think of the African trade without connecting it with the West
+Indian. The one hung upon the other. A third important branch also depended
+upon it; which was the Newfoundland fishery: the latter could not go on, if
+it were not for the vast quantity of inferior fish bought up for the Negros
+in the West Indies; and which was quite unfit for any other market. If
+therefore we destroyed the African, we destroyed the other trades. Mr.
+Turgot, he said, had recommended in the National Assembly of France the
+gradual abolition of the Slave-trade. He would therefore recommend it to
+the House to adopt the same measure, and to soften the rigours of slavery
+by wholesome regulations; but an immediate abolition he could not
+countenance.
+
+Mr. Fox at length rose. He observed that some expressions, which he had
+used on the preceding day, had been complained of as too harsh and severe.
+He had since considered them; but he could not prevail upon himself to
+retract them; because, if any gentleman, after reading the evidence on the
+table, and attending to the debate, could avow himself an abetter of this
+shameful traffic in human flesh, it could only be either from some hardness
+of heart, or some difficulty of understanding, which he really knew not how
+to account for.
+
+Some had considered this question as a question of political, whereas it
+was a question of personal, freedom. Political freedom was undoubtedly a
+great blessing; but, when it came to be compared with personal, it sank to
+nothing. To confound the two, served therefore to render all arguments on
+either perplexing and unintelligible. Personal freedom was the first right
+of every human being. It was a right, of which he who deprived a
+fellow-creature was absolutely criminal in so depriving him, and which he
+who withheld was no less criminal in withholding. He could not therefore
+retract his words with respect to any, who (whatever respect he might
+otherwise have for them) should, by their vote of that night, deprive their
+fellow-creatures of so great a blessing. Nay, he would go further. He would
+say, that if the House, knowing what the trade was by the evidence, did not
+by their vote mark to all mankind their abhorrence of a practice so savage,
+so enormous, so repugnant to all laws human and divine, they would consign
+their character to eternal infamy.
+
+That the pretence of danger to our West Indian islands from the abolition
+of the Slave-trade was totally unfounded, Mr. Wilberforce had abundantly
+proved: but if there were they, who had not been satisfied with that proof,
+was it possible to resist the arguments of Mr. Pitt on the same subject? It
+had been shown, on a comparison of the births and deaths in Jamaica, that
+there was not now any decrease of the slaves. But if there had been, it
+would have made no difference to him in his vote; for, had the mortality
+been ever so great there, he should have ascribed it to the system of
+importing Negros, instead of that of encouraging their natural increase.
+Was it not evident, that the planters thought it more convenient to buy
+them fit for work, than to breed them? Why, then, was this horrid trade to
+be kept up?--To give the planters, truly, the liberty of misusing their
+slaves, so as to check population; for it was from ill-usage only that, in
+a climate so natural to them, their numbers could diminish. The very
+ground, therefore, on which the planters rested the necessity of fresh
+importations, namely, the destruction of lives in the West Indies, was
+itself the strongest argument that could be given, and furnished the most
+imperious call upon parliament for the abolition of the trade.
+
+Against this trade innumerable were the charges. An honourable member, Mr.
+Smith, had done well to introduce those tragical stories, which had made
+such an impression upon the House. No one of these had been yet
+controverted. It had indeed been said, that the cruelty of the African
+captain to the child was too bad to be true; and we had been desired to
+look at the cross-examination of the witness, as if we should find traces
+of the falsehood of his testimony there. But his cross-examination was
+peculiarly honourable to his character; for after he had been pressed, in
+the closest manner, by some able members of the House, the only
+inconsistency they could fix upon him was, whether the fact had happened on
+the same day of the same month of the year 1764 or the year 1765.
+
+But it was idle to talk of the incredibility of such instances. It was not
+denied, that absolute power was exercised by the slave-captains; and if
+this was granted, all the cruelties charged upon them would naturally
+follow. Never did he hear of charges so black and horrible as those
+contained in the evidence on the table. They unfolded such a scene of
+cruelty, that if the House, with all their present knowledge of the
+circumstances, should dare to vote for its continuance, they must have
+nerves, of which he had no conception. We might find instances indeed, in
+history, of men violating the feelings of nature on extraordinary
+occasions. Fathers had sacrificed their sons and daughters, and husbands
+their wives; but to imitate their characters we ought to have not only
+nerves as strong as the two Brutuses, but to take care that we had a cause
+as good; or that we had motives for such a dereliction of our feelings as
+patriotic as those, which historians had annexed to these when they handed
+them to the notice of the world.
+
+But what was our motive in the case before us?--to continue a trade which
+was a wholesale sacrifice of a whole order and race of our
+fellow-creatures; which carried them away by force from their native
+country, in order to subject them to the mere will and caprice, the tyranny
+and oppression, of other human beings, for their whole natural lives, them
+and their posterity for ever!! O most monstrous wickedness! O unparalleled
+barbarity! And, what was more aggravating, this most complicated scene of
+robbery and murder which mankind had ever witnessed, had been honoured by
+the name of--trade.
+
+That a number of human beings should be at all times ready to be furnished
+as fair articles of commerce, just as our occasions might require, was
+absurd. The argument of Mr. Pitt on this head was unanswerable. Our demand
+was fluctuating: it entirely ceased at some times: at others it was great
+and pressing. How was it possible, on every sudden call, to furnish a
+sufficient return in slaves, without resorting to those execrable means of
+obtaining them, which were stated in the evidence? These were of three
+sorts, and he would now examine them.
+
+Captives in war, it was urged, were consigned either to death or slavery.
+This, however, he believed to be false in point of fact. But suppose it
+were true; Did it not become us, with whom it was a custom, founded in the
+wisest policy, to pay the captives a peculiar respect and civility, to
+inculcate the same principles in Africa? But we were so far from doing
+this, that we encouraged wars for the sake of taking, not men's goods and
+possessions, but men themselves; and it was not the war which was the cause
+of the Slave-trade, but the Slave-trade which was the cause of the war. If
+was the practice of the slave-merchants to try to intoxicate the African
+kings in order to turn them to their purpose. A particular instance
+occurred in the evidence of a prince, who, when sober, resisted their
+wishes; but in the moment of inebriety he gave the word for war, attacked
+the next village, and sold the inhabitants to the merchants.
+
+The second mode was kidnapping. He referred the House to various instances
+of this in the evidence: but there was one in particular, from which we
+might immediately infer the frequency of the practice. A Black trader had
+kidnapped a girl and sold her; but he was presently afterwards kidnapped
+and sold himself; and, when he asked the captain who bought him, "What! do
+you buy me, who am a great trader?" the only answer was, "Yes, I will buy
+you, or her, or any body else, provided any one will sell you;" and
+accordingly both the trader and the girl were carried to the West Indies
+and sold for slaves.
+
+The third mode of obtaining slaves was by crimes committed or imputed. One
+of these was adultery. But was Africa the place, where Englishmen, above
+all others, were to go to find out and punish adulterers? Did it become us
+to cast the first stone? It was a most extraordinary pilgrimage for a most
+extraordinary purpose! And yet upon this plea we justified our right of
+carrying off its inhabitants. The offence alleged next was witchcraft. What
+a reproach it was to lend ourselves to this superstition!--Yes: we stood
+by; we heard the trial; we knew the crime to be impossible; and that the
+accused must be innocent: but we waited in patient silence for his
+condemnation; and then we lent our friendly aid to the police of the
+country, by buying the wretched convict, with all his family; whom, for the
+benefit of Africa, we carried away also into perpetual slavery.
+
+With respect to the situation of the slaves in their transportation, he
+knew not how to give the House a more correct idea of the horrors of it,
+than by referring them to the printed section of the slave-ship; where the
+eye might see what the tongue must fall short in describing. On this dismal
+part of the subject he would not dwell. He would only observe, that the
+acts of barbarity, related of the slave-captains in these voyages, were so
+extravagant, that they had been attributed in some instances to insanity.
+But was not this the insanity of arbitrary power? Who ever read the facts
+recorded of Nero without suspecting he was mad? Who would not be apt to
+impute insanity to Caligula--or Domitian--or Caracalla--or Commodus--or
+Heliogabalus? Here were six Roman emperors, not connected in blood, nor by
+descent, who, each of them, possessing arbitrary power, had been so
+distinguished for cruelty, that nothing short of insanity could be imputed
+to them. Was not the insanity of the masters of slave-ships to be accounted
+for on the same principles?
+
+Of the slaves in the West Indies it had been said, that they were taken
+from a worse state to a better. An honourable member, Mr. W. Smith, had
+quoted some instances out of the evidence to the contrary. He also would
+quote one or two others. A slave under hard usage had run away. To prevent
+a repetition of the offence his owner sent for his surgeon, and desired him
+to cut off the man's leg. The surgeon refused. The owner, to render it a
+matter of duty in the surgeon, broke it. "Now," says he, "you must cut it
+off; or the man will die." We might console ourselves, perhaps, that this
+happened in a French island; but he would select another instance, which
+had happened in one of our own. Mr. Ross heard the shrieks of a female
+issuing from an outhouse; and so piercing, that he determined to see what
+was going on. On looking in he perceived a young female tied up to a beam
+by her wrists; entirely naked; and in the act of involuntary writhing and
+swinging; while the author of her torture was standing below her with a
+lighted torch in his hand, which he applied to all the parts of her body as
+it approached him. What crime this miserable woman had perpetrated he knew
+not; but the human mind could not conceive a crime warranting such a
+punishment.
+
+He was glad to see that these tales affected the House. Would they then
+sanction enormities, the bare recital of which made them shudder? Let them
+remember that humanity did not consist in a squeamish ear. It did not
+consist in shrinking and starting at such tales as these; but in a
+disposition of the heart to remedy the evils they unfolded. Humanity
+belonged rather to the mind than to the nerves. But, if so, it should
+prompt men to charitable exertion. Such exertion was necessary in the
+present case. It was necessary for the credit of our jurisprudence at home,
+and our character abroad. For what would any man think of our justice, who
+should see another hanged for a crime, which would be innocence itself, if
+compared with those enormities, which were allowed in Africa and the West
+Indies under the sanction of the British parliament?
+
+It had been said, however, in justification of the trade, that the Africans
+were less happy at home than in the Islands. But what right had we to be
+judges of their condition? They would tell us a very different tale, if
+they were asked. But it was ridiculous to say, that we bettered their
+condition, when we dragged them from every thing dear in life to the most
+abject state of slavery.
+
+One argument had been used, which for a subject so grave was the most
+ridiculous he had ever heard. Mr. Alderman Watson had declared the
+Slave-trade to be necessary on account of its connection with our
+fisheries. But what was this but an acknowledgment of the manner, in which
+these miserable beings were treated? The trade was to be kept up, with all
+its enormities, in order that there might be persons to consume the refuse
+fish from Newfoundland, which was too bad for any body else to eat.
+
+It had been said that England ought not to abolish the Slave-trade, unless
+other nations would also give it up. But what kind of morality was this?
+The trade was defensible upon no other principle than that of a highwayman.
+Great Britain could not keep it upon these terms. Mere gain was not a
+motive for a great country to rest on, as a justification of any measure.
+Honour was its superior; and justice was superior to honour.
+
+With regard to the emancipation of those in slavery, he coincided with Mr.
+Wilberforce and Mr. Pitt; and upon this principle, that it might be as
+dangerous to give freedom at once to a man used to slavery, as, in the case
+of a man who had never seen day-light, to expose him all at once to the
+full glare of a meridian sun.
+
+With respect to the intellect and sensibility of the Africans, it was pride
+only, which suggested a difference between them and ourselves. There was a
+remarkable instance to the point in the evidence, and which he would quote.
+In one of the slave-ships was a person of consequence; a man, once high in
+a military station, and with a mind not insensible to the eminence of his
+rank. He had been taken captive and sold; and was then in the hold,
+confined promiscuously with the rest. Happening in the night to fall
+asleep, he dreamed that he was in his own country; high in honour and
+command; caressed by his family and friends; waited on by his domestics;
+and surrounded with all his former comforts in life. But awaking suddenly,
+and finding where he was, he was heard to burst into the loudest groans and
+lamentations on the miserable contrast of his present state; mixed with the
+meanest of his subjects; and subjected to the insolence of wretches a
+thousand times lower than himself in every kind of endowment. He appealed
+to the House, whether this was not as moving a picture of the miserable
+effects of the Slave-trade, as could be well imagined. There was one way,
+by which they might judge of it. Let them make the case their own. This was
+the Christian rule of judging; and, having mentioned Christianity, he was
+sorry to find that any should suppose, that it had given countenance to
+such a system of oppression. So far was this from being the case, that he
+thought it one of the most splendid triumphs of this religion, that it had
+caused slavery to be so generally abolished on its appearance in the world.
+It had done this by teaching us, among other beautiful precepts, that, in
+the sight of their Maker, all mankind were equal. Its influence appeared to
+have been more powerful in this respect than that of all the ancient
+systems of philosophy; though even in these, in point of theory, we might
+trace great liberality and consideration for human rights. Where could be
+found finer sentiments of liberty than in Demosthenes and Cicero? Where
+bolder assertions of the rights of mankind, than in Tacitus and Thucydides?
+But, alas! these were the holders of slaves! It was not so with those who
+had been converted to Christianity. He knew, however, that what he had been
+ascribing to Christianity had been imputed by others to the advances which
+philosophy had made. Each of the two parties took the merit to itself. The
+philosopher gave it to philosophy, and the divine to religion. He should
+not then dispute with either of them; but, as both coveted the praise, why
+should they not emulate each other by promoting this improvement in the
+condition of the human race?
+
+He would now conclude by declaring, that the whole country, indeed the
+whole civilized world, must rejoice that such a bill as the present had
+been moved for, not merely as a matter of humanity, but as an act of
+justice; for he would put humanity out of the case. Could it be called
+humanity to forbear from committing murder? Exactly upon this ground did
+the present motion stand; being strictly a question of national justice. He
+thanked Mr. Wilberforce for having pledged himself so strongly to pursue
+his object till it was accomplished; and, as for himself, he declared,
+that, in whatever situation he might ever be, he would use his warmest
+efforts for the promotion of this righteous cause.
+
+Mr. Stanley (the member for Lancashire) rose, and declared that, when he
+came into the house, he intended to vote against the abolition; but that
+the impression made both on his feelings and on his understanding was such,
+that he could not persist in his resolution. He was now convinced that the
+entire abolition of the Slave-trade was called for equally by sound policy
+and justice. He thought it right and fair to avow manfully this change in
+his opinion. The abolition, he was sure, could not long fail of being
+carried. The arguments for it were irresistible.
+
+The honourable Mr. Ryder said, that he came to the house, not exactly in
+the same circumstances as Mr. Stanley, but very undecided on the subject.
+He was, however, so strongly convinced by the arguments he had heard, that
+he was become equally earnest for the abolition.
+
+Mr. Smith (member for Pontefract) said, that he should not trouble the
+House at so late an hour, further than to enter his protest, in the most
+solemn manner, against this trade, which he considered as most disgraceful
+to the country, and contrary to all the principles of justice and religion.
+
+Mr. Sumner declared himself against the total, immediate, and unqualified
+abolition, which he thought would wound at least the prejudices of the West
+Indians, and might do mischief; but a gradual abolition should have his
+hearty support.
+
+Major Scott declared there was no member in the house, who would give a
+more independent vote upon this question than himself. He had no concern
+either in the African or West Indian trades; but in the present state of
+the finances of the country, he thought it would be a dangerous experiment
+to risk any one branch of our foreign commerce. As far as regulation would
+go, he would join in the measure.
+
+Mr. Burke said he would use but few words. He declared that he had for a
+long time had his mind drawn towards this great subject. He had even
+prepared a bill for the regulation of the trade, conceiving at that time
+that the immediate abolition of it was a thing hardly to be hoped for; but
+when he found that Mr. Wilberforce had seriously undertaken the work, and
+that his motion was for the abolition, which he approved much more than his
+own, he had burnt his papers; and made an offering of them in honour of his
+nobler proposition, much in the same manner as we read, that the curious
+books were offered up and burnt at the approach of the Gospel. He highly
+applauded the confessions of Mr. Stanley and Mr. Ryder. It would be a
+glorious tale for them to tell their constituents, that it was impossible
+for them, however prejudiced, if sent to hear discussion in that house, to
+avoid surrendering up their hearts and judgments at the shrine of reason.
+
+Mr. Drake said, that he would oppose the abolition to the utmost. We had by
+a want of prudent conduct lost America. The house should be aware of being
+carried away by the meteors with which they had been dazzled. The leaders,
+it was true, were for the abolition; but the minor orators, the dwarfs, the
+pigmies, he trusted, would that night carry the question against them. The
+property of the West Indians was at stake; and, though men might be
+generous with their own property, they should not be so with the property
+of others.
+
+Lord Sheffield reprobated the overbearing language, which had been used by
+some gentlemen towards others, who differed in opinion from them on a
+subject of so much difficulty as the present. He protested against a
+debate, in which he could trace nothing like reason; but, on the contrary,
+downright phrensy, raised perhaps by the most extraordinary eloquence. The
+abolition, as proposed, was impracticable. He denied the right of the
+legislature to pass a law for it. He warned the Chancellor of the Exchequer
+to beware of the day, on which the bill should pass, as the worst he had
+ever seen.
+
+Mr. Milnes declared, that he adopted all those expressions against the
+Slave-trade, which had been thought so harsh; and that the opinion of the
+noble lord had been turned in consequence of having become one of the
+members for Bristol. He quoted a passage from Lord Sheffield's pamphlet;
+and insisted that the separation of families in the West Indies, there
+complained of by himself, ought to have compelled him to take the contrary
+side of the question.
+
+Mr. Wilberforce made a short reply to some arguments in the course of the
+debate; after which, at half past three in the morning, the House divided.
+There appeared for Mr. Wilberforce's motion eighty-eight, and against it
+one hundred and sixty-three; so that it was lost by a majority of
+seventy-five votes.
+
+By this unfavourable division the great contest, in which we had been so
+long engaged, was decided. We were obliged to give way to superior numbers.
+Our fall, however, grievous as it was, was rendered more tolerable by the
+circumstance of having been prepared to expect it. It was rendered more
+tolerable also by other considerations; for we had the pleasure of knowing,
+that we had several of the most distinguished characters in the kingdom,
+and almost all the splendid talents of the House of Commons[A], in our
+favour. We knew too, that the question had not been carried against us
+either by evidence or by argument; but that we were the victims of the
+accidents and circumstances of the times. And as these considerations
+comforted us, when we looked forward to future operations on this great
+question, so we found great consolation as to the past, in believing, that,
+unless human constitutions were stronger then they really were, we could
+not have done more than we had done towards the furtherance of the cause.
+
+[Footnote A: It is a pity that no perfect list was ever made of this or of
+any other division in the House of Commons on this subject. I can give,
+however, the names of the following members, as having voted for Mr.
+Wilberforce's motion at this time.
+
+  Mr. Pitt,            Hon. R. Fitzpatrick,
+  Mr. Fox,             Sir William Dolben,
+  Mr. Burke,           Sir Henry Houghton,
+  Mr. Grey,            Sir Edward Lyttleton,
+  Mr. Windham,         Sir William Scott,
+  Mr. Sheridan,        Mr. Samuel Thornton,
+  Mr. Whitbread,       Mr. Henry Thornton,
+  Mr. Courtenay,       Mr. Robert Thornton,
+  Mr. Francis,         Mr. Duncombe,
+  Mr. Wilberforce,     Mr. Martin,
+  Mr. Ryder,           Mr. Milnes,
+  Mr. William Smith,   Mr. Steele,
+  Mr. John Smyth,      Mr. Coke,
+  Mr. Robert Smith,    Mr. Elliott,
+  Mr. Powys,           Mr. Montagu,
+  Lord Apsley,         Mr. Bastard,
+  Lord Bayham,         Mr. Stanley,
+  Lord Arden,          Mr. Plumer,
+  Lord Carysfort,      Mr. Beaufoy,
+  Lord Muncaster,      Mr. I.H. Browne,
+  Lord Barnard,        Mr. G.N. Edwards,
+  Lord North,          Mr. W.M. Pitt,
+  Lord Euston,         Mr. Bankes.
+  General Burgoyne]
+
+The committee for the abolition held a meeting soon after this our defeat.
+It was the most impressive I ever attended. The looks of all bespoke the
+feelings of their hearts. Little was said previously to the opening of the
+business; and, after it was opened, it was conducted with a kind of solemn
+dignity, which became the occasion. The committee, in the course of its
+deliberations, came to the following resolutions:
+
+That the thanks of this committee be respectfully given to the illustrious
+minority of the House of Commons, who lately stood forth the assertors of
+British justice and humanity, and the enemies of a traffic in the blood of
+man.
+
+
+That our acknowledgements are particularly due to William Wilberforce,
+esquire, for his unwearied exertions to remove this opprobrium of our
+national character; and to the right honourable William Pitt, and the right
+honourable Charles James Fox, for their virtuous and dignified cooperation
+in the same cause.
+
+That the solemn declarations of these gentlemen, and of Matthew Montagu and
+William Smith, esquires, that they will not relinquish, but with life,
+their struggle for the abolition of the Slave-trade, are not only highly
+honourable to themselves as Britons, as Statesmen, and as Christians, but
+must eventually, as the light of evidence shall be more and more diffused,
+be seconded by the good wishes of every man not immediately interested in
+the continuance of that detestable commerce.
+
+And, lastly, that anticipating the opposition they should have to sustain
+from persons trained to a familiarity with the rapine and desolation
+necessarily attendant on the Slave-trade, and sensible also of the
+prejudices which implicitly arise from long-established usages, this
+committee consider the late decision in the House of Commons as a delay,
+rather than a defeat. In addressing a free and enlightened nation on a
+subject, in which its justice, its humanity, and its wisdom are involved,
+they cannot despair of final success; and they do hereby, under an
+increasing conviction of the excellence of their cause, and inconformity to
+the distinguished examples before them, renew their firm protestation, that
+they will never desist from appealing to their countrymen, till the
+commercial intercourse with Africa shall cease to be polluted with the
+blood of its inhabitants.
+
+These resolutions were published, and they were followed by a suitable
+report.
+
+The committee, in order to strengthen themselves for the prosecution of
+their great work, elected Sir William Dolben, baronet, Henry Thornton,
+Lewis Alexander Grant, and Matthew Montagu, esquires, who were members of
+parliament, and Truman Harford, Josiah Wedgwood, jun. esquire, and John
+Clarkson, esquire, of the royal navy, as members of their own body; and
+they elected the Reverend Archdeacon Plymloy (now Corbett) an honorary and
+corresponding member, in consequence of the great services which he had
+rendered their cause in the shires of Hereford and Salop, and the adjacent
+counties of Wales.
+
+The several committees, established in the country, on receiving the
+resolutions and report as before mentioned, testified their sympathy in
+letters of condolence to that of London on the late melancholy occasion;
+and expressed their determination to support it as long as any vestiges of
+this barbarous traffic should remain.
+
+At length the session ended; and though, in the course of it, the
+afflicting loss of the general question had occurred, there was yet an
+attempt made by the abolitionists in parliament, which met with a better
+fate. The Sierra Leone company received the sanction of the legislature.
+The object of this institution was to colonize a small portion of the coast
+of Africa. They, who were to settle there, were to have no concern in the
+Slave-trade, but to discourage it as much as possible. They were to
+endeavour to establish a new species of commerce, and to promote
+cultivation in its neighbourhood by free labour. The persons more generally
+fixed upon for colonists, were such Negros, with their wives and families,
+as chose to abandon their habitations in Nova Scotia. These had followed
+the British arms in America; and had been settled there, as a reward for
+their services, by the British government. My brother, just mentioned to
+have been chosen a member of the committee, and who had essentially served
+the great cause of the abolition on many occasions, undertook a visit to
+Nova Scotia, to see if those in question were willing to undergo the
+change; and in that case to provide transports, and conduct them to Sierra
+Leone. This object he accomplished. He embarked more than eleven hundred
+persons in fifteen vessels, of all which he took the command. On landing
+them he became the first Governor of the new Colony. Having laid the
+foundation of it, he returned to England; when a successor was appointed.
+From that time many unexpected circumstances, but particularly devastations
+by the French in the beginning of the war, took place, which, contributed
+to ruin the trading company, which was attached to it. It is pleasing,
+however, to reflect, that though the object of the institution, as far as
+mercantile profit was concerned, thus failed, the other objects belonging
+to it were promoted. Schools, places of worship, agriculture, and the
+habits of civilized life, were established. Sierra Leone, therefore, now
+presents itself as the medium of civilization for Africa. And, in this
+latter point of view, it is worth all the treasure which has been lost in
+supporting it: for the Slave-trade, which was the great obstacle to this
+civilization, being now happily abolished, there is a metropolis,
+consisting of some hundreds of persons, from which may issue the seeds of
+reformation to this injured continent; and which, when sown, may be
+expected to grow into fruit without interruption. New schools may be
+transplanted from thence into the interior. Teachers, and travellers on
+discovery, may be sent from thence in various directions; who may return to
+it occasionally as to their homes. The natives too, able now to travel in
+safety, may resort to it from various parts. They may see the improvements
+which are going on from time to time. They may send their children to it
+for education. And thus it may become the medium[A] of a great intercourse
+between England and Africa, to the benefit of each other.
+
+[Footnote A: To promote this desirable end an association took place last
+year, called The African Institution, under the patronage of the Duke of
+Gloucester, as president, and of the friends to the African cause,
+particularly of such as were in parliament, and as belonged to the
+committee for the abolition of the Slave-trade.]
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IV.
+
+_Continuation from July 1791 to July 1792--Author travels round the kingdom
+again--Object of his journey--People begin to leave off the use of
+sugar--to form committees--and to send petitions to Parliament--Motion made
+in the House of Commons for the immediate abolition of the trade--Debates
+upon it--Abolition resolved upon, but not to commence till 1796--Resolution
+taken to the Lords--Latter determine upon hearing evidence--Evidence at
+length introduced--Further hearing of it postponed to the next session._
+
+
+The defeat which we had just sustained, was a matter of great triumph to
+our opponents. When they considered the majority in the House of Commons in
+their favour, they viewed the resolutions of the committee, which have been
+detailed, as the last spiteful effort of a vanquished and dying animal, and
+they supposed that they had consigned the question to eternal sleep. The
+committee, however, were too deeply attached to the cause, vanquished as
+they were, to desert it; and they knew also too well the barometer of
+public feeling, and the occasion of its fluctuations, to despair. In the
+year 1787 the members of the House of Commons, as well as the people, were
+enthusiastic in behalf of the abolition of the trade. In the year 1788 the
+fair enthusiasm of the former began to fade. In 1789 it died. In 1790
+prejudice started up as a noxious weed in its place. In 1791 this prejudice
+arrived at its growth. But to what were these changes owing?--To delay;
+during which the mind, having been gradually led to the question as a
+commercial, had been gradually taken from it as a moral object. But it was
+possible to restore the mind to its proper place. Add to which, that the
+nation had never deserted the cause during this whole period.
+
+It is much to the honour of the English people, that they should have
+continued to feel for the existence of an evil which was so far removed
+from their sight. But at this moment their feelings began to be
+insupportable. Many of them resolved, as soon as parliament had rejected
+the bill, to abstain from the use of West Indian produce. In this state of
+things a pamphlet, written by William Bell Crafton, of Tewksbury, and
+called "A Sketch of the Evidence, with a Recommendation on the Subject to
+the Serious Attention of People in general," made its appearance; and
+another followed it, written by William Fox, of London, "On the Propriety
+of abstaining from West India Sugar and Rum." These pamphlets took the same
+ground. They inculcated abstinence from these articles as a moral duty;
+they inculcated it as a peaceable and constitutional measure; and they laid
+before the reader a truth, which was sufficiently obvious, that if each
+would abstain, the people would have a complete remedy for this enormous
+evil in their own power.
+
+While these things were going on, it devolved upon me to arrange all the
+evidence on the part of the abolition under proper heads, and to abridge it
+into one volume. It was intended that a copy of this should be sent into
+different towns of the kingdom, that all might know, if possible, the
+horrors (as far as the evidence contained them) of this execrable trade;
+and as it was possible that these copies might lie in the places where they
+were sent, without a due attention to their contents, I resolved, with the
+approbation of the committee, to take a journey, and for no other purpose
+than personally to recommend that they might be read.
+
+The books, having been printed, were dispatched before me. Of this tour I
+shall give the reader no other account than that of the progress of the
+remedy, which the people were then taking into their own hands. And first I
+may observe, that there was no town, through which I passed, in which there
+was not some one individual who had left off the use of sugar. In the
+smaller towns there were from ten to fifty by estimation, and in the larger
+from two to five hundred, who had made this sacrifice to virtue. These were
+of all ranks and parties. Rich and poor, churchmen and dissenters, had
+adopted the measure. Even grocers had left off trading in the article, in
+some places. In gentlemen's families, where the master had set the example,
+the servants had often voluntarily followed it; and even children, who were
+capable of understanding the history of the sufferings of the Africans,
+excluded, with the most virtuous resolution, the sweets, to which they had
+been accustomed, from their lips. By the best computation I was able to
+make from notes taken down in my journey, no fewer than three hundred
+thousand persons had abandoned the use of sugar.
+
+Having travelled over Wales, and two thirds of England, I found it would be
+impossible to visit Scotland on the same errand. I had already, by moving
+upwards and downwards in parallel lines, and by intersecting these in the
+same manner, passed over six thousand miles. By the best calculation I
+could make, I had yet two thousand to perform. By means of almost incessant
+journeyings night and day, I had suffered much in my health. My strength
+was failing daily. I wrote therefore to the committee on this subject; and
+they communicated immediately with Dr. Dickson, who, on being applied to,
+visited Scotland in my stead. He consulted first with the committee at
+Edinburgh relative to the circulation of the Abridgement of the Evidence.
+He then pursued his journey, and, in conjunction with the unwearied efforts
+of Mr. Campbel Haliburton, rendered essential service to the cause for this
+part of the kingdom.
+
+On my return to London I found that the committee had taken into their own
+body T.F. Forster, B.M. Forster, and James West, esquires, as members; and
+that they had elected Hercules Ross, esquire, an honorary and corresponding
+member, in consequence of the handsome manner in which he had come forward
+as an evidence, and of the peculiar benefit which had resulted from his
+testimony to the cause.
+
+The effects of the two journeys by Dr. Dickson and myself were soon
+visible. The people could not bear the facts, which had been disclosed to
+them by the Abridgement of the Evidence. They were not satisfied, many of
+them, with the mere abstinence from sugar; but began to form committees to
+correspond with that of London. The first of these appeared at Newcastle
+upon Tyne, so early as the month of October. It consisted of the Reverend
+William Turner as chairman, and of Robert Ormston, William Batson, Henry
+Taylor, Ralph Bainbridge, George Brown, Hadwen Bragg, David Sutton, Anthony
+Clapham, George Richardson, and Edward Prowit. It received a valuable
+addition afterwards by the admission of many others. The second was
+established at Nottingham. The Reverend Jeremiah Bigsby became the
+president, and the Rev. G. Walker and J. Smith, and Mess. Dennison, Evans,
+Watson, Hart, Storer, Bott, Hawkesley, Pennington, Wright, Frith, Hall, and
+Wakefield, the committee. The third was formed at Glasgow, under the
+patronage of David Dale, Scott Moncrieff, Robert Graham, Professor Millar,
+and others. Other committees started up in their turn. At length public
+meetings began to take place, and after this petitions to be sent to
+parliament; and these so generally, that there was not a day for three
+months, Sundays excepted, in which five or six were not resolved upon in
+some places or other in the kingdom.
+
+Of the enthusiasm of the nation at this time none can form an opinion but
+they who witnessed it. There never was perhaps a season when so much
+virtuous feeling pervaded all ranks. Great pains were taken by interested
+persons in many places to prevent public meetings. But no efforts could
+avail. The current ran with such strength and rapidity, that it was
+impossible to stem it. In the city of London a remarkable instance
+occurred. The livery had been long waiting for the common council to begin
+a petition. But the lord mayor and several of the aldermen stifled it. The
+former, indignant at this conduct, insisted upon a common hall. A day was
+appointed; and, though the notice given of it was short, the assemblage was
+greater than had ever been remembered on any former occasion. Scarcely a
+liveryman was absent, unless sick, or previously engaged. The petition,
+when introduced, was opposed by those who had prevented it in the common
+council. But their voices were drowned amidst groans and hissings. It was
+shortly after carried; and it had not been signed more than half an hour,
+before it was within the walls of the House of Commons. The reason of this
+extraordinary dispatch was, that it had been kept back by intrigue so late,
+that the very hour, in which it was delivered to the House, was that in
+which Mr. Wilberforce was to make his new motion.
+
+And as no petitions were ever more respectable than those presented on this
+occasion, as far as they breathed the voice of the people, and as far as
+they were founded on a knowledge of the object which they solicited, so
+none were ever more numerous, as far as we have any record of such
+transactions. Not fewer than three hundred and ten were presented from
+England; one hundred and eighty-seven from Scotland; and twenty from Wales.
+Two other petitions also for the abolition came from England, but they were
+too late for delivery. On the other side of the question, one was presented
+from the town of Reading for regulation, in opposition to that for
+abolition from the same place. There were also four against abolition. The
+first of these was from certain persons at Derby in opposition to the other
+from that town. The second was from Stephen Fuller, esquire, as agent for
+Jamaica. The third from J. Dawson, esquire, a slave-merchant at Liverpool.
+And the fourth from the merchants, planters, mortgagees, annuitants, and
+others concerned in the West Indian colonies. Taking in all these
+statements, the account stood thus. For regulation there was one; against
+all abolition there were four; and for the total abolition of the trade
+five hundred and nineteen.
+
+On the second of April Mr. Wilberforce moved the order of the day; which
+having been agreed to, Sir William Dolben was put into the chair.
+
+He then began by soliciting the candid attention of the West Indians to
+what he was going to deliver to the House. However others might have
+censured them indiscriminately, he had always himself made a distinction
+between them and their system. It was the latter only, which he reprobated.
+If aristocracy had been thought a worse form of government than monarchy,
+because the people had many tyrants instead of one, how objectionable must
+be that form of it, which existed in our colonies! Arbitrary power could be
+bought there by any one, who could buy a slave. The fierceness of it was
+doubtless restrained by an elevation of mind in many, as arising from a
+consciousness of superior rank and consequence: but, alas! it was too often
+exercised there by the base and vulgar. The more liberal too of the
+planters were not resident upon their estates. Hence a promiscuous censure
+of them would be unjust, though their system would undoubtedly be odious.
+
+As for the cure of this monstrous evil, he had shown, last year, that
+internal regulations would not produce it. These could have no effect,
+while the evidence of slaves was inadmissible. What would be the situation
+of the bulk of the people of this country, if only gentlemen of five
+hundred a-year were admitted as evidences in our courts of law? Neither was
+the cure of it in the emancipation of the slaves. He did not deny that he
+wished them this latter blessing. But, alas, in their present degraded
+state, they were unfit for it! Liberty was the child of reason and order.
+It was indeed a plant of celestial growth, but the soil must be prepared
+for its reception. He, who would see it flourish and bring forth its proper
+fruit, must not think it sufficient to let it shoot in unrestrained
+licentiousness. But if this inestimable blessing was ever to be imparted to
+them, the cause must be removed, which obstructed its introduction. In
+short, no effectual remedy could be found but in the abolition of the
+Slave-trade.
+
+He then took a copious view of the advantages, which would arise both to
+the master and to the slave, if this traffic were done away; and having
+recapitulated and answered the different objections to such a measure, he
+went to that part of the subject, in which he described himself to be most
+interested.
+
+He had shown, he said, last year, that Africa was exposed to all the
+horrors of war; and that most of these wars had their origin in the
+Slave-trade. It was then said, in reply, that the natural barbarity of the
+natives was alone sufficient to render their country a scene of carnage.
+This was triumphantly instanced in the king of Dahomey. But his honourable
+friend Lord Muncaster, then in the House, had proved in his interesting
+publication, which had appeared since, called Historical Sketches of the
+Slave-trade and of its Effects in Africa, addressed to the People of Great
+Britain, that the very cruelties of this king, on which so much stress had
+been laid, were committed by him in a war, which had been undertaken
+expressly to punish an adjacent people for having stolen some of his
+subjects and sold them for slaves.
+
+He had shown also last year, that kings were induced to seize and sell
+their subjects, and individuals each other, in consequence of the existence
+of the Slave-trade.
+
+He had shown also, that the administration of justice was perverted, so as
+to become a fertile source of supply to this inhuman traffic; that every
+crime was punished by slavery; that false accusations were made, to procure
+convicts; and that even the judges had a profit on the convictions.
+
+He had shown again, that many acts of violence were perpetrated by the
+Europeans themselves. But he would now relate others, which had happened
+since. The captain of an English vessel, lying in the river Cameroons, sent
+his boat with three sailors and a slave to get water. A Black trader seized
+the latter, and took him away. He alleged in his defence, that the captain
+owed him goods to a greater amount than the value of the slave; and that he
+would not pay him.
+
+This being told on board, the captain, and a part of his crew, who were
+compelled to blacken their naked bodies that they might appear like the
+natives, went on shore at midnight, armed with muskets and cutlasses. They
+fired on the trader's dwelling, and killed three of his children on the
+spot. The trader, being badly wounded, died while they were dragging him to
+the boat; and his wife, being wounded also, died in half an hour after she
+was on board the ship. Resistance having been made to these violent
+proceedings, some of the sailors were wounded, and one was killed. Some
+weeks after this affray, a chieftain of the name of Quarmo went on board
+the same vessel to borrow some cutlasses and muskets. He was going, he
+said, into the country to make war; and the captain should have half of his
+booty. So well understood were the practices of the trade, that his request
+was granted. Quarmo, however, and his associates, finding things favourable
+to their design, suddenly seized the captain, threw him overboard, hauled
+him into their canoe, and dragged him to the shore; where another party of
+the natives, lying in ambush, seized such of the crew as were absent from
+the ship. But how did these savages behave, when they had these different
+persons in their power? Did they not instantly retaliate by murdering them
+all? No--they only obliged the captain to give an order on the vessel to
+pay his debts. This fact came out only two months ago in a trial in the
+court of common pleas--not in a trial for piracy and murder--but in the
+trial of a civil suit, instituted by some of the poor sailors, to whom the
+owners refused their wages, because the natives, on account of the
+villanous conduct of their captain, had kept them from their vessel by
+detaining them as prisoners on shore. This instance, he said, proved the
+dreadful nature of the Slave-trade, its cruelty, its perfidy, and its
+effect on the Africans as well as on the Europeans, who carried it on. The
+cool manner, in which the transaction was conducted on both sides, showed
+that these practices were not novel. It showed also the manner of doing
+business in the trade. It must be remembered too, that these transactions
+were carrying on at the very time when the inquiry concerning this trade
+was going forward in Parliament, and whilst the witnesses of his opponents
+were strenuously denying not only the actual, but the possible, existence
+of any such depredations.
+
+But another instance happened only in August last. Six British ships, the
+Thomas, Captain Phillips; the Wasp, Captain Hutchinson; the Recovery,
+Captain Kimber, of Bristol; and the Martha, Captain Houston; the Betsey,
+Captain Doyle; and the Amachree, (he believed,) Captain Lee, of Liverpool;
+were anchored off the town of Calabàr. This place was the scene of a
+dreadful massacre about twenty years before. The captains of these vessels,
+thinking that the natives asked too much for their slaves, held a
+consultation, how they should proceed; and agreed to fire upon the town
+unless their own terms were complied with. On a certain evening they
+notified their determination to the traders; and told them, that, if they
+continued obstinate, they would put it into execution the next morning. In
+this they kept their word. They brought sixty-six guns to bear upon the
+town; and fired on it for three hours. Not a shot was returned. A canoe
+then went off to offer terms of accommodation. The parties however not
+agreeing, the firing recommenced; more damage was done; and the natives
+were forced into submission. There were no certain accounts of their loss.
+Report said that fifty were killed; but some were seen lying badly wounded,
+and others in the agonies of death, by those who went afterwards on shore.
+
+He would now say a few words relative to the Middle Passage, principally to
+show, that regulation could not effect a cure of the evil there. Mr. Isaac
+Wilson had stated in his evidence, that the ship, in which he sailed, only
+three years ago, was of three hundred and seventy tons; and that she
+carried six hundred and two slaves. Of these she lost one hundred and
+fifty-five. There were three or four other vessels in company with her, and
+which belonged to the same owners. One of these carried four hundred and
+fifty, and buried two hundred; another carried four hundred and sixty-six,
+and buried seventy-three; another five hundred and forty-six, and buried
+one hundred and fifty-eight; and from the four together, after the landing
+of their cargoes, two hundred and twenty died. He fell in with another
+vessel, which had lost three hundred and sixty-two; but the number, which
+had been bought, was not specified. Now if to these actual deaths, during
+and immediately after the voyage, we were to add the subsequent loss in the
+seasoning, and to consider that this would be greater than ordinary in
+cargoes which were landed in such a sickly state, we should find a
+mortality, which, if it were only general for a few months, would entirely
+depopulate the globe.
+
+But he would advert to what Mr. Wilson said, when examined, as a surgeon,
+as to the causes of these losses, and particularly on board his own ship,
+where he had the means of ascertaining them. The substance of his reply was
+this--That most of the slaves laboured under a fixed melancholy, which now
+and then broke out into lamentations and plaintive songs, expressive of the
+loss of their relations, friends, and country. So powerfully did this
+sorrow operate, that many of them attempted in various ways to destroy
+themselves, and three actually effected it. Others obstinately refused to
+take sustenance; and when the whip and other violent means were used to
+compel them to eat, they looked up in the face of the officer, who
+unwillingly executed this painful task, and said with a smile, in their own
+language, "Presently we shall be no more." This, their unhappy state of
+mind, produced a general languor and debility, which were increased in many
+instances by an unconquerable aversion to food, arising partly from
+sickness, and partly, to use the language of the slave-captains, from
+sulkiness. These causes naturally produced the flux. The contagion spread;
+several were carried off daily; and the disorder, aided by so many powerful
+auxiliaries, resisted the power of medicine. And it was worth while to
+remark, that these grievous sufferings were not owing either to want of
+care on the part of the owners, or to any negligence or harshness of the
+captain; for Mr. Wilson declared, that his ship was as well fitted out, and
+the crew and slaves as well treated, as any body could reasonably expect.
+
+He would now go to another ship. That, in which Mr. Claxton sailed as a
+surgeon, afforded a repetition of all the horrid circumstances which had
+been described. Suicide was attempted, and effected; and the same barbarous
+expedients were adopted to compel the slaves to continue an existence,
+which they considered as too painful to be endured. The mortality also was
+as great. And yet here again the captain was in no wise to blame. But this
+vessel had sailed since the regulating act. Nay, even in the last year the
+deaths on shipboard would be found to have been between ten and eleven per
+cent. on the whole number exported. In truth, the House could not reach the
+cause of this mortality by all their regulations. Until they could cure a
+broken heart--until they could legislate for the affections, and bind by
+their statutes the passions and feelings of the mind, their labour would be
+in vain.
+
+Such were the evils of the Passage. But evils were conspicuous every where,
+in this trade. Never was there indeed a system so replete with wickedness
+and cruelty. To whatever part of it we turned our eyes, whether to Africa,
+the Middle Passage, or the West Indies, we could find no comfort, no
+satisfaction, no relief. It was the gracious ordinance of Providence, both
+in the natural and moral world, that good should often arise out of evil.
+Hurricanes cleared the air; and the propagation of truth was promoted by
+persecution. Pride, vanity, and profusion contributed often, in their
+remoter consequences, to the happiness of mankind. In common, what was in
+itself evil and vicious was permitted to carry along with it some
+circumstances of palliation. The Arab was hospitable; the robber brave. We
+did not necessarily find cruelty associated with fraud, or meanness with
+injustice. But here the case was far otherwise. It was the prerogative of
+this detested traffic to separate from evil its concomitant good, and to
+reconcile discordant mischiefs. It robbed war of its generosity; it
+deprived peace of its security: we saw in it the vices of polished society,
+without its knowledge or its comforts; and the evils of barbarism without
+its simplicity. No age, no sex, no rank, no condition was exempt from the
+fatal influence of this wide-wasting calamity. Thus it attained to the
+fullest measure of pure, unmixed, unsophisticated wickedness; and, scorning
+all competition and comparison, it stood without a rival in the secure,
+undisputed, possession of its detestable preeminence.
+
+But, after all this, wonderful to relate, this execrable traffic had been
+defended on the ground of benevolence! It had been said, that the slaves
+were captives and convicts, who, if we were not to carry them away, would
+be sacrificed, and many of them at the funerals of people of rank,
+according to the savage custom of Africa. He had shown, however, that our
+supplies of slaves were obtained from other quarters than these. But he
+would wave this consideration for the present. Had it not been acknowledged
+by his opponents, that the custom of ransoming slaves prevailed in Africa?
+With respect to human sacrifices, he did not deny, that there might have
+been some instances of these; but they had not been proved to be more
+frequent than amongst other barbarous nations; and, where they existed,
+being acts of religion, they would not be dispensed with for the sake of
+commercial gain. In fact, they had nothing to do with the Slave-trade; only
+perhaps, if it were abolished, they might, by means of the civilization
+which would follow, be done away.
+
+But, exclusively of these sacrifices, it had been asserted, that it was
+kindness to the inhabitants to take them away from their own country. But
+what said the historians of Africa, long before the question of the
+abolition was started? "Axim," says Bosman, "is cultivated, and abounds
+with numerous large and beautiful villages: its inhabitants are
+industriously employed in trade, fishing, or agriculture."--"The
+inhabitants of Adom always expose large quantities of corn to sale, besides
+what they want for their own use."--"The people of Acron husband their
+grounds and time so well, that every year produces a plentiful harvest."
+Speaking of the Fetu country, he says, "Frequently, when walking through
+it, I have seen it abound with fine well built and populous towns,
+agreeably enriched with vast quantities of corn and cattle, palm-wine and
+oil. The inhabitants all apply themselves without distinction to
+agriculture; some sow corn; others press oil, and draw wine from the
+palm-trees."
+
+Smith, who was sent out by the royal African company in 1726, assures us,
+"that the discerning natives account it their greatest unhappiness, that
+they were ever visited by the Europeans. They say that we Christians
+introduced the traffic of slaves; and that before our coming they lived in
+peace. But, say they, it is observable, wherever Christianity comes, there
+come swords and guns and powder and ball with it."
+
+"The Europeans," says Bruce, "are far from desiring to act as peace-makers
+among them. It would be too contrary to their interests; for the only
+object of their wars is to carry off slaves; and, as these form the
+principal part of their traffic, they would be apprehensive of drying up
+the source of it, were they to encourage the people to live well together."
+
+"The neighbourhood of the Damel and Tin keep them perpetually at war, the
+benefit of which accrues to the Company, who buy all the prisoners made on
+either side; and the more there are to sell, the greater is their profit;
+for the only end of their armaments is to make captives, to sell them to
+the White traders."
+
+Artus, of Dantzic, says that in his time, "those liable to pay fines were
+banished till the fine was paid; when they returned to their houses and
+possessions."
+
+Bosman affirms "that formerly all crimes in Africa were compensated by fine
+or restitution, and, where restitution was impracticable, by corporal
+punishment."
+
+Moore says, "Since this trade has been used, all punishments have been
+changed into slavery. There being an advantage in such condemnation, they
+strain the crimes very hard, in order to get the benefit of selling the
+criminal. Not only murder, theft, and adultery, are punished by selling the
+criminal for a slave, but every trifling crime is punished in the same
+manner."
+
+Loyer affirms that "the King of Sain, on the least pretence, sells his
+subjects for European goods. He is so tyrannically severe, that he makes a
+whole village responsible for the fault of one inhabitant; and on the least
+offence sells them all for slaves."
+
+Such, he said, were the testimonies, not of persons whom he had summoned;
+not of friends of the abolition: but of men who were themselves, many of
+them, engaged in the Slave-trade. Other testimonies might be added; but
+these were sufficient to refute the assertions of his opponents, and to
+show the kind services we had done to Africa by the introduction of this
+trade.
+
+He would just touch upon the argument, so often repeated, that other
+nations would carry on the Slave-trade, if we abandoned it. But how did we
+know this? Had not Denmark given a noble example to the contrary? She had
+consented to abolish the trade in ten years; and had she not done this,
+even though we, after an investigation for nearly five years, had ourselves
+hung back? But what might not be expected, if we were to take up the cause
+in earnest; if we were to proclaim to all nations the injustice of the
+trade, and to solicit their concurrence in the abolition of it! He hoped
+the representatives of the nation would not be less just than the people.
+The latter had stepped forward, and expressed their sense more generally by
+petitions, than in any instance in which they had ever before interfered.
+To see this great cause thus triumphing over distinctions and prejudices
+was a noble spectacle. Whatever might be said of our political divisions,
+such a sight had taught us, that there were subjects still beyond the reach
+of party; that there was a point of elevation, where we ascended above the
+jarring of the discordant elements, which ruffled and agitated the vale
+below. In our ordinary atmosphere clouds and vapours obscured the air, and
+we were the sport of a thousand conflicting winds and adverse currents; but
+here we moved in a higher region, where all was pure and clear, and free
+from perturbation and discomposure.
+
+  "As some tall cliff, that lifts its awful form,
+  Swells from the vale, and midway leaves the storm;
+  Though round its breast the rolling clouds are spread,
+  Eternal sunshine settles on its head."
+
+Here then, on this august eminence, he hoped we should build the Temple of
+Benevolence; that we should lay its foundation deep in Truth and Justice;
+and that we should inscribe upon its gates, "Peace and Goodwill to Men."
+Here we should offer the first-fruits of our benevolence, and endeavour to
+compensate, if possible, for the injuries we had brought upon our
+fellow-men.
+
+He would only now observe, that his conviction of the indispensable
+necessity of immediately abolishing this trade remained as strong as ever.
+Let those who talked of allowing three or four years to the continuance of
+it, reflect on the disgraceful scenes which had passed last year. As for
+himself, he would wash his hands of the blood which would be spilled in
+this horrid interval. He could not, however, but believe, that the hour was
+come, when we should put a final period to the existence of this cruel
+traffic. Should he unhappily be mistaken, he would never desert the cause;
+but to the last moment of his life he would exert his utmost powers in its
+support. He would now move, "That it is the opinion of this committee, that
+the trade carried on by British subjects for the purpose of obtaining
+slaves on the coast of Africa, ought to be abolished."
+
+Mr. Baillie was in hopes that the friends of the abolition would have been
+contented with the innocent blood which had been already shed. The great
+island of St. Domingo had been torn to pieces by insurrections. The most
+dreadful barbarities had been perpetrated there. In the year 1789 the
+imports into it exceeded five millions sterling. The exports from it in the
+same year amounted to six millions; and the trade employed three hundred
+thousand tons of shipping, and thirty thousand seamen. This fine island,
+thus advantageously situated, had been lost in consequence of the agitation
+of the question or the Slave-trade. Surely so much mischief ought to have
+satisfied those who supported it; but they required the total destruction
+of all the West Indian colonies, belonging to Great Britain, to complete
+the ruin.
+
+The honourable gentleman, who had just spoken, had dwelt, upon the
+enormities of the Slave-trade. He was far from denying, that many acts of
+inhumanity might accompany it; but as human nature was much the same every
+where, it would be unreasonable to expect among African traders, or the
+inhabitants of our islands, a degree of perfection in morals, which was not
+to be found in Great Britain itself. Would any man estimate the character
+of the English nation by what was to be read in the records of the Old
+Bailey? He himself, however, had lived sixteen years in the West Indies,
+and he could bear testimony to the general good usage of the slaves.
+
+Before the agitation of this impolitic question the slaves were contented
+with their situation. There was a mutual confidence between them and their
+masters: and this continued to be the case till the new doctrines were
+broached. But now depots of arms were necessary on every estate; and the
+scene was totally reversed. Nor was their religious then inferior to their
+civil state. When the English took possession of Grenada, where his
+property lay, they found them baptized and instructed in the principles of
+the Roman Catholic faith. The priests of that persuasion had indeed been
+indefatigable in their vocation; so that imported Africans generally
+obtained within twelve months a tolerable idea of their religious duties.
+He had seen the slaves there go through the public mass in a manner, and
+with a fervency, which would have done credit to more civilized societies.
+But the case was now altered; for, except where the Moravians had been,
+there was no trace in our islands of an attention to their religious
+interests.
+
+It had been said, that their punishments were severe. There might be
+instances of cruelty; but these were not general. Many of them were
+undoubtedly ill disposed; though not more, according to their number, on a
+plantation, than in a regiment, or in a ship's crew. Had we never heard of
+seamen being flogged from ship to ship, or of soldiers dying in the very
+act of punishment? Had we not also heard, even in this country of boasted
+liberty, of seamen being seized, and carried away, when returning from
+distant voyages, after an absence of many years; and this without even
+being allowed to see their wives and families? As to distressed objects, he
+maintained, that there was more wretchedness and poverty in St. Giles's,
+than in all the West Indian islands belonging to Great Britain.
+
+He would now speak of the African and West Indian trades. The imports and
+exports of these amounted to upwards of ten millions annually; and they
+gave employment to three hundred thousand tons of shipping, and to about
+twenty-five thousand seamen. These trades had been sanctioned by our
+ancestors in parliament. The acts for this purpose might be classed under
+three heads. First, they were such as declared the colonies and the trade
+thereof advantageous to Great Britain, and therefore entitled to her
+protection. Secondly, such as authorised, protected, and encouraged the
+trade to Africa, as advantageous in itself, and necessary to the welfare
+and existence of the sugar colonies: and, Thirdly, such as promoted and
+secured loans of money to the proprietors of the said colonies, either from
+British subjects or from foreigners. These acts[A], he apprehended, ought
+to satisfy every person of the legality and usefulness of these trades.
+They were enacted in reigns distinguished for the production of great and
+enlightened characters. We heard then of no wild and destructive doctrines
+like the present. These were reserved for this age of novelty and
+innovation. But he must remind the House, that the inhabitants of our
+islands had as good a right to the protection of their property, as the
+inhabitants of Great Britain. Nor could it be diminished in any shape
+without full compensation. The proprietors of lands in the ceded islands,
+which were purchased of government under specific conditions of settlement,
+ought to be indemnified. They also (of whom he was one) who had purchased
+the territory granted by the crown to General Monkton in the Island of St.
+Vincent, ought to be indemnified also. The sale of this had gone on
+briskly, till it was known, that a plan was in agitation for the abolition
+of the Slave-trade. Since that period the original purchasers had done
+little or nothing, and they had many hundred acres on hand, which would be
+of no value, if the present question was carried. In fact, they had a right
+to compensation. The planters generally spent their estates in this
+country. They generally educated their children in it. They had never been
+found seditious or rebellious; and they demanded of the Parliament of Great
+Britain that protection, which, upon the principles of good faith, it was
+in duty bound to afford them in common with the rest of his majesty's loyal
+subjects.
+
+[Footnote A: Here he quoted them specifically.]
+
+Mr. Vaughan stated that, being a West Indian by birth and connected with
+the islands, he could speak from his own knowledge. In the early part of
+his life he was strongly in favour of the abolition of the Slave-trade. He
+had been educated by Dr. Priestley and the father of Mrs. Barbauld; who
+were both of them friends to that question. Their sentiments he had
+imbibed: but, although bred at the feet of Gamaliel, he resolved to judge
+for himself, and he left England for Jamaica.
+
+He found the situation of the slaves much better than he had imagined.
+Setting aside liberty, they were as well off as the poor in Europe. They
+had little want of clothes or fuel: they had a house and garden found them;
+were never imprisoned for debts; nor deterred from marrying through fear of
+being unable to support a family; their orphans and widows were taken care
+of, as they themselves were when old and disabled; they had medical
+attendance without expense; they had private property, which no master ever
+took front them; and they were resigned to their situation, and looked for
+nothing beyond it. Perhaps persons might have been prejudiced by living in
+the towns, to which slaves were often sent for punishment; and where there
+were many small proprietors; or by seeing no Negro otherwise than as
+belonging to the labouring poor; but they appeared to him to want nothing
+but liberty; and it was only occasionally that they were abused.
+
+There were two prejudices with respect to the colonies, which he would
+notice. The first was, that cruel usage occasioned the inequality of births
+and deaths among the slaves. But did cruelty cause the excess of deaths
+above births in the city of London? No--this excess had other causes. So it
+had among the slaves. Of these more males were imported than females: they
+were dissolute too in their morals; they had also diseases peculiar to
+themselves. But in those islands where they nearly kept up their numbers,
+there was this difficulty, that the equality was preserved by the increase
+on one estate compensating for the decrease on another. These estates,
+however, would not interchange their numbers; whereas, where freedom
+prevailed, the free labourers circulated from one employer to another, and
+appeared wherever they were wanted.
+
+The second was, that all chastisement of the slaves was cruelty. But this
+was not true. Their owners generally withdrew them from public justice; so
+that they, who would have been publicly executed elsewhere, were often kept
+alive by their masters, and were found punished again and again for
+repeating their faults. Distributive justice occasioned many punishments;
+as one slave was to be protected against every other slave: and, when one
+pilfered from another, then the master interfered. These punishments were
+to be distinguished from such as arose from enforcing labour, or from the
+cruelty of their owners. Indeed he had gone over the islands, and he had
+seen but little ill usage. He had seen none on the estate where he resided.
+The whip, the stocks, and confinement, were all the modes of punishment he
+had observed in other places. Some slaves belonging to his father were
+peculiarly well off. They saved money, and spent it in their own way.
+
+But, notwithstanding all he had said, he allowed that there was room for
+improvement; and particularly for instilling into the slaves the principles
+of religion. Where this should be realized, there would be less punishment,
+more work, more marriages, more issue, and more attachment to masters.
+Other improvements would be the establishment of medical societies; the
+introduction of task-work; and grants of premiums and honorary distinctions
+both to fathers and mothers, according to the number of children which they
+should rear. Besides this, Negro evidence should be allowed in the courts
+of law, it being left to the discretion of the court or jury to take or
+reject it, according to the nature of the case. Cruel masters also should
+be kept in order in various ways. They should be liable to have their
+slaves taken from them, and put in trust. Every instrument of punishment
+should be banished, except the whip. The number of lashes should be
+limited; and the punishment should not be repeated till after intervals.
+These and other improvements should be immediately adopted by the planters.
+The character of the exemplary among them was hurt by being confounded with
+that of lower and baser men. He concluded by stating, that the owners of
+slaves were entitled to compensation, if, by means of the abolition, they
+should not be able to find labourers for the cultivation of their lands[A].
+
+[Footnote A: Mr. Vaughan declared in a future stage of the debate, that he
+wished to see a prudent termination both of the Slave-trade and of slavery;
+and that, though he was the eldest son of his father, he never would, on
+any consideration, become the owner of a slave.]
+
+Mr. Henry Thornton conceived, that the two last speakers had not spoken to
+the point. The first had described the happy state of the slaves in the
+West Indies. The latter had made similar representations; but yet had
+allowed, that much improvement might be made in their condition. But this
+had nothing to do with the question then before them. The manner of
+procuring slaves in Africa was the great evil to be remedied. Africa was to
+be stripped of its inhabitants to supply a population for the West Indies.
+There was a Dutch proverb, which said, "My son, get money, honestly if you
+can--but get money:" or, in other words, "Get slaves, honestly if you
+can--but get slaves." This was the real grievance; and the two honourable
+gentlemen, by confining their observations to the West Indies, had entirely
+overlooked it.
+
+Though this evil had been fully proved, he could not avoid stating to the
+House some new facts, which had come to his knowledge as a director of the
+Sierra Leone Company, and which would still further establish it. The
+consideration, that they had taken place since the discussion of the last
+year on this subject, obliged him to relate them.
+
+Mr. Falconbridge, agent to the Company, sitting one evening in Sierra
+Leone, heard a shout, and immediately afterwards the report of a gun.
+Fearing an attack, he armed forty of the settlers, and rushed with them to
+the place from whence the noise came. He found a poor wretch, who had been
+crossing from a neighbouring village, in the possession of a party of
+kidnappers, who were tying his hands. Mr. Falconbridge, however, dared not
+rescue him, lest, in the defenceless state of his own town, retaliation
+might be made upon him.
+
+At another time a young woman, living half a mile off, was sold, without
+any criminal charge, to one of the slave-ships. She was well acquainted
+with the agent's wife, and had been with her only the day before. Her cries
+were heard; but it was impossible to relieve her.
+
+At another time a young lad, one of the free settlers who went from
+England, was caught by a neighbouring chief, as he was straggling alone
+from home, and sold for a slave. The pretext was, that some one in the town
+of Sierra Leone had committed an offence. Hence the first person belonging
+to it, who could be seized, was to be punished. Happily the free settlers
+saw him in his chains; and they recovered him, before he was conveyed to
+the ship.
+
+To mark still more forcibly the scenes of misery, to which the Slave-trade
+gave birth, he would mention a case stated to him in a letter by King
+Naimbanna. It had happened to this respectable person, in no less than
+three instances, to have some branches of his family kidnapped, and carried
+off to the West Indies. At one time three young men, Corpro, Banna, and
+Marbrour, were decoyed on board a Danish slave-ship, under pretence of
+buying something, and were taken away. At another time another relation
+piloted a vessel down the river. He begged to be put on shore, when he came
+opposite to his own town; but he was pressed to pilot her to the river's
+mouth. The captain then pleaded the impracticability of putting him on
+shore; carried him to Jamaica; and sold him for a slave. Fortunately,
+however, by means of a letter, which was conveyed there, the man, by the
+assistance of the governor, was sent back to Sierra Leone. At another time
+another relation was also kidnapped. But he had not the good fortune, like
+the former, to return.
+
+He would mention one other instance. A son had sold his own father, for
+whom he obtained a considerable price: for, as the father was rich in
+domestic slaves, it was not doubted that he would offer largely for his
+ransom. The old man accordingly gave twenty-two of these in exchange for
+himself. The rest, however, being from that time filled with apprehensions
+of being on some ground or other sold to the slave-ships, fled to the
+mountains of Sierra Leone, where they now dragged on a miserable existence.
+The son himself was sold, in his turn, soon after. In short, the whole of
+that unhappy peninsula, as he learnt from eye-witnesses, had been desolated
+by the trade in slaves. Towns were seen standing without inhabitants all
+over the coast; in several of which the agent of the Company had been.
+There was nothing but distrust among the inhabitants. Every one, if he
+stirred from home, felt himself obliged to be armed.
+
+Such was the nature of the Slave-trade. It had unfortunately obtained the
+name of a trade; and many had been deceived by the appellation. But it was
+war, and not trade. It was a mass of crimes, and not commerce. It was that
+which prevented the introduction of a trade in Africa; for it was only by
+clearing and cultivating the lands, that the climate could be made healthy
+for settlements; but this wicked traffic, by dispersing the inhabitants,
+and causing the lands to remain uncultivated, made the coast unhealthy to
+Europeans. He had found, in attempting to establish a colony there, that it
+was an obstacle, which opposed itself to him in innumerable ways; it
+created more embarrassments than all the natural impediments of the
+country; and it was more hard to contend with, than any difficulties of
+climate, soil, or natural disposition of the people.
+
+We would say a few words relative to the numerous petitions, which were
+then on the table of the House. They had shown, in an extraordinary manner,
+the opinion of the people. He did not wish to turn this into a
+constitutional question; but he would observe, that it was of the utmost
+consequence to the maintenance of the constitution of this country, that
+the reputation of Parliament should be maintained. But nothing could
+prejudice its character so much, as a vote, which should lead the people to
+believe, that the legislative body was the more corrupt part of it, and
+that it was slow to adopt moral principles.
+
+It had been often insinuated that Parliament, by interfering in this trade,
+departed from its proper functions. No idea could be more absurd: for, was
+it not its duty to correct abuses? and what abuses were greater than
+robbery and murder? He was indeed anxious for the abolition. He desired it,
+as a commercial man, on account of the commercial character of the country.
+He desired it for the reputation of Parliament, on which so materially
+depended the preservation of our happy constitution: but most of all he
+prayed for it for the sake of those eternal principles of justice, which it
+was the duty of nations, as well as of individuals, to support.
+
+Colonel Tarleton repeated his arguments of the last year. In addition to
+these he inveighed bitterly against the abolitionists, as a junto of
+sectaries, sophists, enthusiasts, and fanatics. He condemned the abolition
+as useless, unless other nations would take it up. He brought to the
+recollection of the House the barbarous scenes which had taken place in St.
+Domingo, all of which, he said, had originated in the discussion of this
+question. He described the alarms, in which the inhabitants of our own
+islands were kept, lest similar scenes should occur from the same cause. He
+ridiculed the petitions on the table. Itinerant clergymen, mendicant
+physicians, and others, had extorted signatures from the sick, the
+indigent, and the traveller. School-boys were invited to sign them, under
+the promise of a holiday. He had letters to produce, which would prove all
+these things, though he was not authorized to give up the names of those
+who had written them.
+
+Mr. Montagu said, that, in the last session, he had simply entered his
+protest against the trade; but now he could be no longer silent; and as
+there were many, who had conceived regulation to be more desirable than
+abolition, he would confine himself to that subject.
+
+Regulation, as it related to the manner of procuring slaves, was utterly
+impossible: for how could we know the case of each individual, whom we
+forced away into bondage? Could we establish tribunals all along the coast,
+and in every ship, to find it out? What judges could we get for such an
+office? But, if this could not be done upon the coast, how could we
+ascertain the justness of the captivity of by far the greatest number, who
+were brought from immense distances inland?
+
+He would not dwell upon the proof of the inefficiency of regulations, as to
+the Middle Passage. His honourable friend Mr. Wilberforce had shown, that,
+however the mortality might have been lessened in some ships by the
+regulations of Sir William Dolben, yet, wherever a contagious disorder
+broke out, the greatest part of the cargo was swept away. But what
+regulations by the British Parliament could prevent these contagions, or
+remove them suddenly, when they appeared?
+
+Neither would regulations be effectual, as they related to the protection
+of the slaves in the West Indies. It might perhaps be enacted, as Mr.
+Vaughan had suggested, that their punishments should be moderate; and that
+the number of lashes should be limited. But the colonial legislatures had
+already done as much, as the magic of words alone could do, upon this
+subject: yet the evidence upon the table clearly proved, that the only
+protection of slaves was in the clemency of their masters. Any barbarity
+might be exercised with impunity, provided no White person were to see it,
+though it happened in the sight of a thousand slaves. Besides, by splitting
+the offence, and inflicting the punishment at intervals, the law could be
+evaded, although the fact was within the reach of the evidence of a White
+man. Of this evasion, Captain Cook, of the eighty-ninth regiment, had given
+a shocking instance: and Chief Justice Ottley had candidly confessed, that
+"he could devise no method of bringing a master, so offending, to justice,
+while the evidence of the slave continued inadmissible." But perhaps
+councils of protection, and guardians of the slaves, might be appointed.
+This again was an expedient, which sounded well; but which would be
+nugatory and absurd. What person would risk the comfort of his life by the
+exercise of so invidious an interference? But supposing that one or two
+individuals could be found, who would sacrifice all their time, and the
+friendship of their associates, for the good of the slaves; what could they
+effect? Could they be in all places at once? But even if acts of barbarity
+should be related to them, how were they to come at the proof of them?
+
+It appeared then that no regulations could be effectual until the slaves
+were admitted to give their evidence: but to admit them to this privilege
+in their present state would be to endanger the safety and property of
+their masters. Mr. Vaughan had, however, recommended this measure with
+limitations, but it would produce nothing but discontent; for how were the
+slaves to be persuaded, that it was fit they should be admitted to speak
+the truth, and then be disbelieved and disregarded? What a fermentation
+would such a conduct naturally excite in men dismissed with injuries
+unredressed, though abundantly proved, in their apprehension, by their
+testimony! In fact, no regulations would do. There was no cure for these
+evils, but in the abolition of the Slave-trade. He called upon the planters
+to concur with his honourable friend Mr. Wilberforce in this great measure.
+He wished them to consider the progress, which the opinion of the injustice
+of this trade was making in the nation at large, as manifested by the
+petitions; which had almost obstructed the proceedings of the House by
+their perpetual introduction. It was impossible for them to stifle this
+great question. As for himself, he would renew his profession of last year,
+that he would never cease, but with life, to promote so glorious an end.
+
+Mr. Whitbread said, that even if he could conceive, that the trade was, as
+some had asserted it to be, founded on principles of humanity; that the
+Africans were rescued from death in their own country; that, upon being
+carried to the West Indies, they were put under kind masters; that their
+labour there was easy; that at evening they returned cheerful to their
+homes; that in sickness they were attended with care; and that their old
+age was rendered comfortable; even then he would vote for the abolition of
+the Slave-trade; inasmuch as he was convinced, that that, which was
+fundamentally wrong, no practice could justify.
+
+No eloquence could persuade him, that the Africans were torn from their
+country and their dearest connections, merely that they might lead a
+happier life; or that they could be placed under the uncontrolled dominion
+of others without suffering. Arbitrary power would spoil the hearts of the
+best. Hence would arise tyranny on the one side, and a sense of injury on
+the other. Hence the passions would be let loose, and a state of perpetual
+enmity would follow.
+
+He needed only to go to the accounts of those who defended the system of
+slavery, to show that it was cruel. He was forcibly struck last year by an
+expression of an honourable member, an advocate for the trade, who, when
+he came to speak of the slaves, on selling off the stock of a plantation,
+said, that they fetched less than the common price, because they were
+damaged.--Damaged!--What! were they goods and chattels? What an idea was
+this to hold out of our fellow-creatures. We might imagine how slaves were
+treated, if they could be spoken of in such a manner. Perhaps these unhappy
+people had lingered out the best part of their lives in the service of
+their master. Able then to do but little, they were sold for little! and
+the remaining substance of their sinews was to be pressed out by another,
+yet more hardened than the former, and who had made a calculation of their
+vitals accordingly.
+
+As another proof, he would mention a passage in a pamphlet, in which the
+author, describing the happy situation of the slaves, observed, that a good
+Negro never wanted a character. A bad one could always be detected by his
+weals and scars. What was this but to say, that there were instruments in
+use, which left indelible marks behind them; and who would say, that these
+were used justly?
+
+An honourable gentleman, Mr. Vaughan, had said, that setting aside slavery,
+the slaves were better off than the poor in this country. But what was it
+that we wished to abolish? Was it not the Slave-trade, which would destroy
+in time the cruel distinction he had mentioned? The same honourable
+gentleman had also expressed his admiration of their resignation; but might
+it not be that resignation, which was the consequence of despair?
+
+Colonel Tarleton had insinuated, that the petitions on the table had been
+obtained in an objectionable manner. He had the honour to present one from
+his constituents; which he would venture to say had originated with
+themselves; and that there did not exist more respectable names in the
+kingdom, than those of the persons who had signed it. He had also asserted,
+that there was a strong similitude in their tenour and substance, as if
+they had been manufactured by the same persons. This was by no means to be
+wondered at. There was surely but one plain tale to tell; and it was not
+surprising, that it had been clothed in nearly the same expressions. There
+was but one boon to ask, and that was--the abolition of this wicked trade.
+
+It had been said by another, (Mr. Baillie) that the horrible insurrections
+in St. Domingo arose from the discussion of the question of the
+Slave-trade. He denied the assertion; and maintained that they were the
+effect of the trade itself. There was a point of endurance, beyond which
+human nature could not go; at which the mind of man rose by its native
+elasticity with a spring and violence proportioned to the degree to which
+it had been depressed. The calamities in St. Domingo proceeded from the
+Slave-trade alone; and, if it were continued, similar evils were to be
+apprehended in our own islands. The cruelties, which the slaves had
+perpetrated in that unfortunate colony, they had learnt from their masters.
+Had not an African eyes? Had he not ears? Had he not organs, senses, and
+passions? If you pricked him, would he not feel the puncture and bleed? If
+you poisoned him, would he not die? and, if you wronged him, would he not
+revenge? But he had said sufficient; for he feared he could not better the
+instruction.
+
+Mr. Milbank would only just observe, that the policy of the measure of the
+abolition was as great, as its justice was undeniable. Where slavery
+existed, every thing was out of its natural place. All improvement was at
+an end. There must also, from the nature of the human heart, be oppression.
+He warned the planters against the danger of fresh importations, and
+invited their concurrence in the measure.
+
+Mr. Dundas (now Lord Melville) declared, that he had always been a warm
+friend to the abolition of the Slave-trade, though he differed with Mr.
+Wilberforce as to the mode of effecting it.
+
+The abolitionists, and those on the opposite side of the question, had,
+both of them, gone into extremes. The former were for the immediate and
+abrupt annihilation of the trade. The latter considered it as essentially
+necessary to the existence of the West Indian islands, and therefore laid
+it down, that it was to be continued for ever. Such was the vast distance
+between the parties. He would now address himself to each.
+
+He would say first, that he agreed with his honourable friend Mr.
+Wilberforce in very material points. He believed the trade was not founded
+in policy; that the continuation of it was not essential to the
+preservation of our trade with the West Indian islands; and that the slaves
+were not only to be maintained, but increased there, by natural population.
+He agreed, too, as to the propriety of the abolition. But when his
+honourable friend talked of direct and abrupt abolition, he would submit it
+to him, whether he did not run counter to the prejudices of those who were
+most deeply interested in the question; and whether, if he could obtain his
+object without wounding these, it would not be better to do it? Did he not
+also forget the sacred attention, which Parliament had ever shown to the
+private interests and patrimonial rights of individuals?
+
+Whatever idea men might then have of the African trade, certain it was that
+they, who had connected themselves with it, had done it under the sanction
+of Parliament. It might also be well worth while to consider (though the
+conduct of other nations ought not to deter us from doing our duty) whether
+British subjects in the West Indies might not be supplied with slaves under
+neutral flags. Now he believed it was possible to avoid these objections,
+and at the same time to act in harmony with the prejudices which had been
+mentioned. This might be done by regulations, by which we should effect the
+end much more speedily than by the way proposed. By regulations, he meant
+such as would increase the breed of the slaves in the West Indies; such as
+would ensure a moral education to their children; and such as would even in
+time extinguish hereditary slavery. The extinction, however, of this was
+not to be effected by allowing the son of an African slave to obtain his
+freedom on the death of his parent. Such a son should be considered as born
+free. He should then be educated at the expense of the person importing his
+parents; and, when arrived at such a degree of strength as might qualify
+him to labour, he should work for a term of years for the payment of the
+expense of his education and maintenance. It was impossible to emancipate
+the existing slaves at once; nor would such an emancipation be of any
+immediate benefit to themselves: but this observation would not apply to
+their descendants, if trained and educated in the manner he had proposed.
+
+He would now address himself to those who adopted the opposite extreme: and
+he thought he should not assume too much, when he said, that if both
+slavery and the Slave-trade could be abolished with safety to their
+property, it deeply concerned their interests to do it. Such a measure,
+also, would only be consistent with the principles of the British
+Constitution. It was surely strange that we, who were ourselves free,
+should carry on a Slave-trade with Africa; and that we should never think
+of introducing cultivation into the West Indies by free labourers.
+
+That such a measure would tend to their interest he had no doubt. Did not
+all of them agree with Mr. Long, that the great danger in the West Indies
+arose from the importation of the African slaves there? Mr. Long had
+asserted, that all the insurrections there arose from these. If this
+statement were true, how directly it bore upon the present question! But we
+were told also, by the same author, that the Slave-trade gave rise to
+robbery, murder, and all kinds of depredations on the coast of Africa. Had
+this been answered? No: except indeed it had been said, that the slaves
+were such as had been condemned for crimes. Well then: the imported
+Africans consisted of all the convicts, rogues, thieves, and vagabonds in
+Africa. But would the West Indians choose to depend on fresh supplies of
+these for the cultivation of their lands, and the security of their
+islands, when it was also found that every insurrection had arisen from
+them? it was plain the safety of the islands was concerned in this
+question. There would be danger so long as the trade lasted. The Planters
+were, by these importations, creating the engines of their own destruction.
+Surely they would act more to their own interest, if they would concur in
+extinguishing the trade, than by standing up for its continuance.
+
+He would now ask them, what right they had to suppose that Africa would for
+ever remain in a state of barbarism. If once an enlightened prince were to
+rise up there, his first act would be to annihilate the Slave-trade. If the
+light of heaven were ever to descend upon that continent, it would directly
+occasion its downfall. It was their interest then to contrive a mode of
+supplying labour, without trusting to precarious importations from that
+quarter. They might rest assured that the trade could not continue. He did
+not allude to the voice of the people in the petitions then lying on the
+table of the House; but he knew certainly, that an idea not only of the
+injustice but of the impolicy of this trade had been long entertained by
+men of the most enlightened understandings in this country. Was it then a
+prudent thing for them to rest on this commerce for the further improvement
+of their property?
+
+There was a species of slavery, prevailing only a few years ago, in the
+collieries in certain boroughs of Scotland. Emancipation there was thought
+a duty by Parliament: But what an opposition there was to the measure!
+Nothing but ruin would be the consequence of it! After several years
+struggle the bill was carried. Within a year after, the ruin so much talked
+of vanished in smoke, and there was an end of the business. It had also
+been contended that Sir William Dolben's bill would be the ruin of
+Liverpool: and yet one of its representatives had allowed, that this bill
+had been of benefit to the owners of the slave-vessels there. Was he then
+asking too much of the West Indians, to request a candid consideration of
+the real ground of their alarms? He would conclude by stating, that he
+meant to propose a middle way of proceeding. If there was a number of
+members in the House, who thought with him, that this trade ought to be
+ultimately abolished, but yet by moderate measures, which should neither
+invade the property nor the prejudices of individuals; he wished them to
+unite, and they might then reduce the question to its proper limits.
+
+Mr. Addington (the speaker) professed himself to be one of those moderate
+persons called upon by Mr. Dundas. He wished to see some middle measure
+suggested. The fear of doing injury to the property of others, had hitherto
+prevented him from giving an opinion against a system, the continuance of
+which he could not countenance.
+
+He utterly abhorred the Slave-trade. A noble and learned lord, who had now
+retired from the bench, said on a certain occasion, that he pitied the
+loyalty of that man, who imagined that any epithet could aggravate the
+crime of treason. So he himself knew of no language which could aggravate
+the crime of the Slave-trade. It was sufficient for every purpose of
+crimination, to assert, that man thereby was bought and sold, or that he
+was made subject to the despotism of man. But though he thus acknowledged
+the justice due to a whole continent on the one side, he confessed there
+were opposing claims of justice on the other. The case of the West Indians
+deserved a tender consideration also.
+
+He doubted, if we were to relinquish the Slave-trade alone, whether it
+might not be carried on still more barbarously than at present; and
+whether, if we were to stop it altogether, the islands could keep up their
+present stocks. It had been asserted that they could. But he thought that
+the stopping of the importations could not be depended upon for this
+purpose, so much as a plan for providing them with more females.
+
+With the mode suggested by his right honourable friend, Mr. Dundas, he was
+pleased, though he did not wholly agree to it. He could not grant liberty
+to the children born in the islands. He thought also, that the trade ought
+to be permitted for ten or twelve years longer, under such arrangements as
+should introduce a kind of management among the slaves there, favourable to
+their interests, and of course to their future happiness. One species of
+regulation which he should propose, would be greater encouragement to the
+importation of females than of males, by means of a bounty on the former
+till their numbers should be found equal. Rewards also might be given to
+those slaves who should raise a certain number of children; and to those
+who should devise means of lightening negro-labour. If the plan of his
+honourable friend should comprehend these regulations, he would heartily
+concur in it. He wished to see the Slave-trade abolished. Indeed it did not
+deserve the name of a trade. It was not a trade, and ought not to be
+allowed. He was satisfied, that in a few years it would cease to be the
+reproach of this nation and the torment of Africa. But under regulations
+like these, it would cease without any material injury to the interests of
+others.
+
+Mr. Fox said, that after what had fallen from the two last speakers he
+could remain no longer silent. Something so mischievous had come out, and
+something so like a foundation had been laid for preserving, not only for
+years to come, but for ever, this detestable traffic, that he should feel
+himself wanting in his duty, if he were not to deprecate all such
+deceptions and delusions upon the country.
+
+The honourable gentlemen had called themselves moderate men: but upon this
+subject he neither felt, nor desired to feel, any thing like a sentiment of
+moderation. Their speeches had reminded him of a passage in Middleton's
+Life of Cicero. The translation of it was defective, though it would
+equally suit his purpose. He says, "To enter into a man's house, and kill
+him, his wife, and family, in the night, is certainly a most heinous crime,
+and deserving of death; but to break open his house, to murder him, his
+wife, and all his children, in the night, may be still very right, provided
+it be done with moderation." Now, was there any thing more absurd in this
+passage, than to say, that the Slave-trade might be carried on with
+moderation; for, if you could not rob or murder a single man with
+moderation, with what moderation could you pillage and wound a whole
+nation? In fact, the question of the abolition was simply a question of
+justice. It was only, whether we should authorize by law, respecting
+Africa, the commission of crimes, for which, in this country, we should
+forfeit our lives; notwithstanding which, it was to be treated, in the
+opinion of these honourable gentlemen, with moderation.
+
+Mr. Addington had proposed to cure the disproportion of the sexes in the
+islands, by a bounty on the importation of females; or, in other words, by
+offering a premium to any crew of ruffians, who would tear them from their
+native country. He would let loose a banditti against the most weak and
+defenceless of the sex. He would occasion these to kill fathers, husbands,
+and brothers, to get possession of their relatives, the females, who, after
+this carnage, were to be reserved for--slavery. He should like to see the
+man, who would pen such a moderate clause for a British Parliament.
+
+Mr. Dundas had proposed to abolish the Slave-trade, by bettering the state
+of the slaves in the islands, and particularly that of their offspring. His
+plan, with respect to the latter, was not a little curious. They were to
+become free, when born; and then they were to be educated at the expense of
+those to whom their fathers belonged. But it was clear, that they could not
+be educated for nothing. In order, therefore, to repay this expense, they
+were to be slaves for ten or fifteen years. In short, they were to have an
+education, which was to qualify them to become freemen; and, after they had
+been so educated, they were to become slaves. But as this free education
+might possibly unfit them for submitting to slavery; so, after they had
+been made to bow under the yoke for ten or fifteen years, they might then,
+perhaps, be equally unfit to become free; and therefore, might be retained
+as slaves for a few years longer, if not for their whole lives. He never
+heard of a scheme so moderate, and yet so absurd and visionary.
+
+The same honourable gentleman had observed, that the conduct of other
+nations should not hinder us from doing our duty; but yet neutrals would
+furnish our islands with slaves. What was the inference from this moderate
+assertion, but that we might as well supply them ourselves? He hoped, if we
+were yet to be supplied, it would never be by Englishmen. We ought no
+longer to be concerned in such a crime.
+
+An adversary, Mr. Baillie, had said, that it would not be fair to take the
+character of this country from the records of the Old Bailey. He did not at
+all wonder, when the subject of the Slave-trade was mentioned, that the Old
+Bailey naturally occurred to his recollection. The facts which had been
+described in the evidence, were associated in all our minds with the ideas
+of criminal justice. But Mr. Baillie had forgot the essential difference
+between the two cases. When we learnt from these records, that crimes were
+committed in this country, we learnt also, that they were punished with
+transportation and death. But the crimes committed in the Slave-trade were
+passed over with impunity. Nay, the perpetrators were even sent out again
+to commit others.
+
+As to the mode of obtaining slaves, it had been suggested as the least
+disreputable, that they became so in consequence of condemnation as
+criminals. But he would judge of the probability of this mode by the
+reasonableness of it. No less than eighty thousand Africans were exported
+annually by the different nations of Europe from their own country. Was it
+possible to believe, that this number could have been legally convicted of
+crimes, for which they had justly forfeited their liberty? The supposition
+was ridiculous. The truth was, that every enormity was practised to obtain
+the persons of these unhappy people. He referred those present to the case
+in the evidence of the African trader, who had kidnapped and sold a girl,
+and who was afterwards kidnapped and sold himself. He desired them to
+reason upon the conversation which had taken place between the trader and
+the captain of the ship on this occasion. He desired them also to reason
+upon the instance mentioned this evening, which had happened in the river
+Cameroons, and they would infer all the rapine, all the desolation, and all
+the bloodshed, which had been placed to the account of this execrable
+trade.
+
+An attempt had been made to impress the House with the horrible scenes
+which had taken place in St. Domingo, as an argument against the abolition
+of the Slave-trade; but could any more weighty argument be produced in its
+favour? What were the causes of the insurrections there? They were two. The
+first was the indecision of the National Assembly, who wished to compromise
+between that which was right and that which was wrong on this subject. And
+the second was the oppression of the People of Colour, and of the Slaves.
+In the first of the causes we saw something like the moderation of Mr.
+Dundas and Mr. Addington. One day this Assembly talked of liberty, and
+favoured the Blacks. Another day they suspended their measures, and
+favoured the Whites. They wished to steer a middle course; but decision had
+been mercy. Decision even against the Planters would have been a thousand
+times better than indecision and half measures. In the mean time, the
+People of Colour took the great work of justice into their own hands.
+Unable, however, to complete this of themselves, they called in the aid of
+the Slaves. Here began the second cause; for the Slaves, feeling their own
+power, began to retaliate on the Whites. And here it may be observed, that,
+in all revolutions, the clemency or cruelty of the victors will always be
+in proportion to their former privileges, or their oppression. That the
+Slaves then should have been guilty of great excesses was not to be
+wondered at; for where did they learn their cruelty? They learnt it from
+those who had tyrannized over them. The oppression, which they themselves
+had suffered, was fresh in their memories, and this had driven them to
+exercise their vengeance so furiously. If we wished to prevent similar
+scenes in our own islands, we must reject all moderate measures, and at
+once abolish the Slave-trade. By doing this, we should procure a better
+treatment for the Slaves there; and when this happy change of system should
+have taken place, we might depend on them for the defence of the islands as
+much as on the Whites themselves.
+
+Upon the whole, he would give his opinion of this traffic in a few words.
+He believed it to be impolitic--he knew it to be inhuman--he was certain it
+was unjust--he though it so inhuman and unjust, that, if the colonies could
+not be cultivated without it, they ought not to be cultivated at all. It
+would be much better for us to be without them, than not abolish the
+Slave-trade. He hoped therefore that members would this night act the part
+which would do them honour. He declared, that, whether he should vote in a
+large minority or a small one, he would never give up the cause. Whether in
+the House of Parliament or out of it, in whatever situation he might ever
+be, as long as he had a voice to speak, this question should never be at
+rest. Believing the trade to be of the nature of crimes and pollutions,
+which stained the honour of the country, he would never relax his efforts.
+It was his duty to prevent man from preying upon man; and if he and his
+friends should die before they had attained their glorious object, he hoped
+there would never be wanting men alive to their duty, who would continue to
+labour till the evil should be wholly done away. If the situation of the
+Africans was as happy as servitude could make them, he could not consent to
+the enormous crime of selling man to man; nor permit a practice to
+continue, which put an entire bar to the civilization of one quarter of the
+globe. He was sure that the nation would not much longer allow the
+continuance of enormities which shocked human nature. The West Indians had
+no right to demand that crimes should be permitted by this country for
+their advantage; and, if they were wise, they would lend their cordial
+assistance to such measures, as would bring about, in the shortest possible
+time, the abolition of this execrable trade.
+
+Mr. Dundas rose again, but it was only to move an amendment, namely, that
+the word "gradually" should be inserted before the words "to be abolished"
+in Mr. Wilberforce's motion.
+
+Mr. Jenkinson (now Lord Hawkesbury) said, that the opinions of those who
+were averse to the abolition had been unfairly stated. They had been
+described as founded on policy, in opposition to humanity. If it could be
+made out that humanity would be aided by the abolition, he would be the
+last person to oppose it. The question was not, he apprehended, whether the
+trade was founded in injustice and oppression. He admitted it was: nor was
+it, whether it was in itself abstractedly an evil: he admitted this also:
+but whether, under all the circumstances of the case, any considerable
+advantage would arise to a number of our fellow-creatures from the
+abolition of the trade in the manner in which it had been proposed.
+
+He was ready to admit, that the Africans at home were made miserable by the
+Slave-trade, and that, if it were universally abolished, great benefit
+would arise to them. No one, however, would assert, that these miseries
+arose from the trade as carried on by Great Britain only. Other countries
+occasioned as much of the evil as we did; and if the abolition of it by us
+should prove only the transferring of it to those countries, very little
+benefit would result from the measure.
+
+What then was the probability of our example being followed by foreign
+powers? Five years had now elapsed since the question was first started,
+and what had any of them done? The Portuguese continued the trade. The
+Spaniards still gave a bounty to encourage it. He believed there were
+agents from Holland in this country, who were then negotiating with persons
+concerned in it in order to secure its continuance. The abolition also had
+been proposed in the National Assembly of France, and had been rejected
+there. From these circumstances he had a right to infer, that if we gave up
+the trade, we should only transfer it to those countries: but this transfer
+would be entirely against the Africans. The mortality on board English
+ships, previously to the regulating bill, was four and an eighth per cent.
+Since that time it had been reduced to little more than three per cent.[A]
+In French ships it was near ten, and in Dutch ships from five to seven, per
+cent. In Portuguese it was less than either in French or Dutch, but more
+than in English ships since the regulating bill. Thus the deaths of the
+Africans would be more than doubled, if we were to abolish the trade.
+
+[Footnote A: Mr. Wilberforce stated it on the same evening to be between
+ten and eleven per cent. for the last year. The number then exported from
+Africa to our islands was rather more than 22,000, of whom more than 2,300
+died.]
+
+Perhaps it might be replied, that, the importations being stopped in our
+own islands, fewer Africans would experience this misery, because fewer
+would be taken from their own country on this account. But he had a right
+to infer, that as the planters purchased slaves at present, they would
+still think it their interest to have them. The question then was, whether
+they could get them by smuggling. Now it appeared by the evidence, that
+many hundred slaves had been stolen from time to time from Jamaica, and
+carried into Cuba. But if persons could smuggle slaves out of our colonies,
+they could smuggle slaves into them; but particularly when the planters
+might think it to their interest to assist them.
+
+With respect to the slaves there, instances had been related of their
+oppression, which shocked the feelings of all who heard them: But was it
+fair to infer from these their general ill usage? Suppose a person were to
+make a collection of the different abuses, which had happened for a series
+of years under our own happy constitution, and use these as an argument of
+its worthlessness; should we not say to him, that in the most perfect
+system which the human intellect could form, some defects would exist; and
+that it was unfair to draw inferences from such partial facts? In the same
+manner he would argue relative to the alleged treatment of the slaves.
+Evidence had been produced upon this point on both sides. He should not be
+afraid to oppose the authorities of Lord Rodney, and others, against any,
+however respectable, in favour of the abolition. But this was not
+necessary. There was another species of facts, which would answer the same
+end. Previously to the year 1730 the decrease of the slaves in our islands
+was very considerable. From 1730 to 1755 the deaths were reduced to only
+two and a half per cent. above the births: from 1755 to 1768 to only one
+and three fourths; and from 1768 to 1788 to only one per cent. This then,
+on the first view of the subject, would show, that whatever might have been
+the situation of slaves formerly, it had been gradually improved. But if,
+in addition to this, we considered the peculiar disadvantages under which
+they laboured; the small proportion of females to males; and the
+hurricanes, and famines, which had swept away thousands, we should find it
+physically impossible, that they could have increased as related, if they
+had been treated as cruelly as the friends of the abolition had described.
+
+This species of facts would enable him also to draw still more important
+conclusions; namely, that as the slaves in the West Indies had gradually
+increased, they would continue to increase; that very few years would pass,
+not only before the births were equal to the deaths, but before they were
+more numerous than the deaths; and that if this was likely to happen in the
+present state of things, how much more would it happen, if by certain
+regulations the increase of the slaves should be encouraged?
+
+The only question then was, whether it was more advantageous to breed or to
+import. He thought he should prove the former; and if so, then this
+increase was inevitable, and the importations would necessarily cease.
+
+In the first place, the gradual increase of the slaves of late years
+clearly proved, that such increase had been encouraged. But their price had
+been doubled in the last twenty years. The planter therefore must feel it
+his interest to desist from purchasing, if possible. But again, the
+greatest mortality was among the newly imported slaves. The diseases they
+contracted on the passage, and their deaths in the seasoning, all made for
+the same doctrine. Add to this, that slaves bred in the islands were more
+expert at colonial labour, more reconciled to their situation, and better
+disposed towards their masters, than those who were brought from Africa.
+
+But it had been said, that the births and deaths in the islands were now
+equal; and, that therefore no further supply was wanted. He denied the
+propriety of this inference. The slaves were subject to peculiar diseases.
+They were exposed also to hurricanes and consequent famines. That the day,
+however, would come, when the stock there would be sufficient, no person
+who attended to the former part of his argument could doubt. That they had
+gradually increased, were gradually, increasing, and would, by certain
+regulations, increase more and more, must be equally obvious. But these
+were all considerations for continuing the traffic a little longer.
+
+He then desired the House to reflect upon the state of St. Domingo. Had not
+its calamities been imputed by its own deputies to the advocates for the
+abolition? Were ever any scenes of horror equal to those which had passed
+there? And should we, when principles of the same sort were lurking in our
+own islands, expose our fellow-subjects to the same miseries, who, if
+guilty of promoting this trade, had, at least, been encouraged in it by
+ourselves?
+
+That the Slave-trade was an evil, he admitted. That the state of slavery
+itself was likewise an evil, he admitted; and if the question was, not
+whether we should abolish, but whether we should establish these, he would
+be the first to oppose himself to their existence; but there were many
+evils, which we should have thought it our duty to prevent, yet which, when
+they had once arisen, it was more dangerous to oppose than to submit to.
+The duty of a statesman was, to consider abstractedly what was right or
+wrong, but to weigh the consequences which were likely to result from the
+abolition of an evil, against those, which were likely to result from its
+continuance. Agreeing then most perfectly with the abolitionists in their
+end, he differed from them only in the means of accomplishing it. He was
+desirous of doing that gradually, which he conceived they were doing
+rashly. He had therefore drawn up two propositions. The first was, That an
+address be presented to His Majesty, that he would recommend to the
+colonial assemblies to grant premiums to such planters, and overseers, as
+should distinguish themselves by promoting the annual increase of the
+slaves by birth; and likewise freedom to every female slave, who had reared
+five children to the age of seven years. The second was, That a bounty of
+five pounds per head be given to the master of every slave-ship, who should
+import in any cargo a greater number of females than males, not exceeding
+the age of twenty-five years. To bring forward these propositions, he would
+now move that the chairman leave the chair.
+
+Mr. Este wished the debate to be adjourned. He allowed there ware many
+enormities in the trade, which called for regulation. There were two
+propositions before the House: the one for the immediate, and the other for
+the gradual, abolition of the trade. He thought that members should be
+allowed time to compare their respective merits. At present his own opinion
+was, that gradual abolition would answer the end proposed in the least
+exceptionable manner.
+
+Mr. Pitt rejoiced that the debate had taken a turn, which contracted the
+question into such narrow limits. The matter then in dispute was merely as
+to the time at which the abolition should take place. He therefore
+congratulated the House, the country, and the world, that this great point
+had been gained; that we might now consider this trade as having received
+its condemnation; that this curse of mankind was seen in its true light;
+and that the greatest stigma on our national character, which ever yet
+existed, was about to be removed! Mankind, he trusted, were now likely to
+be delivered from the greatest practical evil that ever afflicted the human
+race--from the most severe and extensive calamity recorded in the history
+of the world.
+
+His honourable friend (Mr. Jenkinson) had insinuated, that any act for the
+abolition would be evaded. But if we were to enforce this act with all the
+powers of the country, how could it fail to be effectual? But his
+honourable friend had himself satisfied him upon this point. He had
+acknowledged, that the trade would drop of itself, on account of the
+increasing dearness of the commodity imported. He would ask then, if we
+were to leave to the importer no means of importation but by smuggling; and
+if, besides all the present disadvantages, we were to load him with all the
+charges and hazards of the smuggler, would there be any danger of any
+considerable supply of fresh slaves being poured into the islands through
+this channel? The question under these circumstances, he pronounced, would
+not bear a dispute.
+
+His honourable friend had also maintained, that it would be inexpedient to
+stop the importations immediately, because the deaths and births in the
+islands were as yet not equal. But he (Mr. Pitt) had proved last year, from
+the most authentic documents, that an increase of the births above the
+deaths had already taken place. This then was the time for beginning the
+abolition. But he would now observe, that five years had elapsed since
+these documents were framed; and therefore the presumption was, that the
+Black population was increasing at an extraordinary rate. He had not, to be
+sure, in his consideration of the subject, entered into the dreadful
+mortality arising from the clearing of new lands. Importations for this
+purpose were to be considered, not as carrying on the trade, but as setting
+on foot a Slave-trade, a measure which he believed no one present would
+then support. He therefore asked his honourable friend, whether the period
+he had looked to was now arrived? whether the West Indies, at this hour,
+were not in a state, in which they could maintain their population?
+
+It had been argued, that one or other of these two assertions was false;
+that either the population of the slaves must be decreasing, (which the
+abolitionists denied,) or, if it was increasing, the slaves must have been
+well treated. That their population was rather increasing than otherwise,
+and also that their general treatment was by no means so good as it ought
+to have been, were both points which had been proved by different
+witnesses. Neither were they incompatible with each other. But he would see
+whether the explanation of this seeming contradiction would not refute the
+argument of expediency, as advanced by his honourable friend. Did the
+slaves decrease in numbers?--Yes. Then ill usage must have been the cause
+of it; but if so, the abolition was immediately necessary to restrain it.
+Did they, on the other hand, increase?--Yes. But if so, no further
+importations were wanted: Was their population (to take a middle course)
+nearly stationary, and their treatment neither so good nor so bad as it
+might be?--Yes. But if so, this was the proper period for stopping further
+supplies; for both the population and the treatment would be improved by
+such a measure.
+
+But he would show again the futility of the argument of his honourable
+friend. He himself had admitted, that it was in the power of the colonists
+to correct the various abuses, by which the Negro population was
+restrained. But they could not do this without improving the condition of
+their slaves; without making them approximate towards the rank of citizens;
+without giving them some little interest in their labour, which would
+occasion them to work with the energy of men. But now the Assembly of
+Grenada had themselves stated, "that though the Negros were allowed the
+afternoons of only one day in every week, they would do as much work in
+that afternoon, when employed for their own benefit, as in the whole day,
+when employed in their masters' service." Now after this confession, the
+House might burn all his calculations relative to the Negro population;
+for, if it had not yet quite reached the desirable state which he had
+pointed out, this confession had proved, that further supplies were not
+wanted. A Negro, if he worked for himself, could do double work. By an
+improvement then in the mode of labour, the work in the islands could be
+doubled. But if so, what would become of the argument of his honourable
+friend? for then only half the number of the present labourers were
+necessary.
+
+He would now try this argument of expediency by other considerations. The
+best informed writers on the subject had told us, that the purchase of new
+Negros was injurious to the planters. But if this statement was just, would
+not the abolition be beneficial to them? That it would, was the opinion of
+Mr. Long, their own historian. "If the Slave-trade," says he, "was
+prohibited for four or five years, it would enable them, to retrieve their
+affairs by preventing them from running into debt, either by renting or
+purchasing Negros." To this acknowledgment he would add a fact from the
+evidence, which was, that a North American province, by such a prohibition
+alone for a few years, from being deeply plunged in debt, had become
+independent, rich, and flourishing.
+
+The next consideration was the danger, to which the islands were exposed
+from the newly imported slaves. Mr. Long, with a view of preventing
+insurrections, had advised, that a duty, equal to a prohibition, might be
+laid on the importation of Coromantine slaves. After noticing one
+insurrection, which happened through their means, he speaks of another in
+the following year, in which thirty-three Coromantines, "most of whom had
+been newly imported, murdered and wounded no less than nineteen Whites in
+the space of an hour." To the authority of Mr. Long he would add the
+recorded opinion of a Committee of the House of Assembly of Jamaica, which
+was appointed to inquire into the best means of preventing future
+insurrections. The Committee reported, that "the rebellion had originated,
+like most others, with the Coromantines," and they proposed that a bill
+should be brought in for laying a higher duty on the importation of these
+particular Negros, which should operate as a prohibition. But the danger
+was not confined to the introduction of Coromantines. Mr. Long accounts for
+the frequent insurrections in Jamaica from the greatness of its general
+importations. "In two years and a half," says he, "twenty-seven thousand
+Negros have been imported--No wonder that we have rebellions!" Surely then,
+when his honourable friend spoke of the calamities of St. Domingo, and of
+similar dangers impending over our own islands, it ill became him to be the
+person to cry out for further importations! It ill became him to charges
+upon the abolitionists the crime of stirring up insurrections, who only
+recommended what the Legislature of Jamaica itself had laid down in a time
+of danger with an avowed view to prevent them. It was indeed a great
+satisfaction to himself, that among the many arguments for prohibiting the
+Slave-trade, the security of our West Indian possessions against internal
+commotions, as well as foreign enemies, was among the most prominent and
+forcible. And here he would ask his honourable friend, whether in this part
+of the argument he did not see reason for immediate abolition. Why should
+we any longer persist in introducing those latent principles of
+conflagration, which, if they should once burst forth, might annihilate the
+industry of a hundred years? which might throw the planters back a whole
+century in their profits, in their cultivation, and in their progress
+towards the emancipation of their slaves? It was our duty to vote, that the
+abolition of the Slave-trade should be immediate, and not to leave it to he
+knew not what future time or contingency.
+
+Having now done with the argument of expediency, he would consider the
+proposition of his right honourable friend Mr. Dundas; that, on account of
+some patrimonial rights of the West Indians, the prohibition of the
+Slave-trade would be an invasion of their legal inheritance. He would first
+observe, that, if this argument was worth any thing, it applied just as
+much to gradual as to immediate abolition. He had no doubt, that, at
+whatever period we should say the trade should cease, it would be equally
+set up; for it would certainly be just as good an argument against the
+measure in seventy years hence, as it was against it now. It implied also,
+that Parliament had no right to stop the importations: but had this
+detestable traffic received such a sanction, as placed it more out of the
+jurisdiction of the legislature for ever after, than any other branch of
+our trade? In what a situation did the proposition of his honourable friend
+place the legislature of Great Britain! It was scarcely possible to lay a
+duty on any one article, which might not in some way affect the property of
+individuals. But if the laws respecting the Slave-trade implied a contract
+for its perpetual continuance, the House could never regulate any other of
+the branches of our national commerce.
+
+But any contract for the promotion of this trade must, in his opinion, have
+been void from the beginning: for if it was an outrage upon justice, and
+only another name for fraud, robbery, and murder, What pledge could devolve
+upon the legislature to incur the obligation of becoming principals in the
+commission of such enormities by sanctioning their continuance?
+
+But he would appeal to the acts themselves. That of 23 George II. c. 31,
+was the one upon which the greatest stress was laid. How would the House be
+surprised to hear, that the very outrages committed in the prosecution of
+this trade had been forbidden by that act! "No master of a ship trading to
+Africa," says the act, "shall by fraud, force, or violence, or by any
+indirect practice whatever, take on board or carry away from that coast any
+Negro, or native of that country, or commit any violence on the natives, to
+the prejudice of the said trade; and every person so offending, shall for
+every such offence forfeit one hundred pounds." But the whole trade had
+been demonstrated to be a system of fraud, force, and violence; and
+therefore the contract was daily violated, under which the Parliament
+allowed it to continue.
+
+But why had the trade ever been permitted at all? The preamble of the act
+would show: "Whereas the trade to and from Africa is very advantageous to
+Great Britain, and necessary for supplying the Plantations and Colonies
+thereunto belonging with a sufficient number of Negros at reasonable rates,
+and for that purpose the said trade should be carried on"--Here then we
+might see what the Parliament had in view, when it passed this act. But no
+one of the occasions, on which it grounded its proceedings, now existed. He
+would plead, then, the act itself as an argument for the abolition. If it
+had been proved that, instead of being very advantageous to Great Britain,
+it was the most destructive to her interests--that it was the ruin of her
+seamen--that it stopped the extension of her manufactures;--if it had been
+proved, in the second place, that it was not now necessary for the supply
+of our Plantations with Negros;--if it had been further established, that
+it was from the beginning contrary to the first principles of justice, and
+consequently that a pledge for its continuance, had one been attempted to
+be given, must have been absolutely void--where in this act of parliament
+was the contract to be found, by which Britain was bound, as she was said
+to be, never to listen to her own true interests and to the cries of the
+natives of Africa? Was it not clear, that all argument, founded on the
+supposed pledge of Parliament, made against those who employed it?
+
+But if we were not bound by existing laws to the support of this trade, we
+were doubly criminal in pursuing it: for why ought it to be abolished at
+all? Because it was incurable injustice. Africa was the ground, on which he
+chiefly rested; and there it was, that his two honourable friends, one of
+whom had proposed gradual abolition, and the other regulation, did not
+carry their principles to their full extent. Both had confessed the trade
+to be a moral evil. How much stronger then was the argument for immediate
+than for gradual abolition! If on the ground of a moral evil it was to be
+abolished at last, why ought it not now? Why was injustice to be suffered
+to remain for a single hour? He knew of no evil, which ever had existed,
+nor could he imagine any to exist, worse than the tearing of eighty
+thousand persons annually from their native land, by a combination of the
+most civilized nations, in the most enlightened quarter of the globe; but
+more especially by that nation, which called herself the most free and the
+most happy of them all.
+
+He would now notice the objection, that other nations would not give up the
+Slave-trade, if we were to renounce it. But if the trade were stained but
+by a thousandth part of the criminality, which he and others, after a
+thorough investigation of the subject, charged upon it, the House ought
+immediately to vote its abolition. This miserable argument, if persevered
+in, would be an eternal bar to the annihilation of the evil. How was it
+ever to be eradicated, if every nation was thus prudentially to wait till
+the concurrence of all the world should be obtained? But it applied a
+thousand times more strongly in a contrary way. How much more justly would
+other nations say, "Great Britain, free as she is, just and honourable as
+she is, not only has not abolished, but has refused to abolish, the
+Slave-trade. She has investigated it well. Her senate has deliberated upon
+it. It is plain, then, that she sees no guilt in it." With this argument we
+should furnish the other nations of Europe, if we were again to refuse to
+put an end to this cruel traffic: and we should have from henceforth not
+only to answer for our own, but for their crimes also. Already we had
+suffered one year to pass away; and now, when the question was renewed, not
+only had this wretched argument been revived, but a proposition had been
+made for the gradual abolition of the trade. He knew indeed the difficulty
+of reforming long established abuses: but in the present case, by proposing
+some other period than the present, by prescribing some condition, by
+waiting for some contingency, perhaps till we obtained the general
+concurrence of Europe, (a concurrence which he believed never yet took
+place at the commencement of any one improvement in policy or morals,) he
+feared that this most enormous evil would never be redressed. Was it not
+folly to wait for the stream to run down before we crossed the bed of its
+channel? Alas! we might wait for ever. The river would still flow on. We
+should be no nearer the object, which we had in view, so long as the step,
+which could alone bring us to it, was not taken.
+
+He would now proceed to the civilization of Africa; and as his eye had just
+glanced upon a West Indian law in the evidence upon the table, he would
+begin with an argument, which the sight of it had suggested to him. This
+argument had been ably answered in the course of the evening; but he would
+view it in yet another light. It had been said, that the savage disposition
+of the Africans rendered the prospect of their civilization almost
+hopeless. This argument was indeed of long standing; but, last year, it had
+been supported upon a new ground. Captain Frazer had stated in his
+evidence, that a boy had been put to death at Cabenda, because there were
+those who refused to purchase him as a slave. This single story was deemed
+by him, and had been considered by others, as a sufficient proof of the
+barbarity of the Africans, and of the inutility of abolishing the
+Slave-trade. But they, who had used this fact, had suppressed several
+circumstances relating to it. It appeared, on questioning Captain Frazer
+afterward, that this boy had previously run away from his master three
+several times; that the master had to pay his value, according to the
+custom of the country, every time he was brought back; and that partly from
+anger at the boy for running away so frequently, and partly to prevent a
+repetition of the same expense, he determined to destroy him. Such was the
+explanation of the signal instance, which was to fix barbarity on all
+Africa, as it came out in the cross-examination of Captain Frazer. That
+this African master was unenlightened and barbarous, he freely admitted:
+but what would an enlightened and civilized West Indian have done in a
+similar case? He would quote the law, passed in the West Indies in 1722,
+which he had just cast his eye upon in the book of evidence, by which law
+this very same crime of running away was by the legislature of an island,
+by the grave and deliberate sentence of an enlightened legislature,
+punished with death; and this, not in the case only of the third offence,
+but even in the very first instance. It was enacted, "That, if any Negro or
+other slave should withdraw himself from his master for the term of six
+months; or any slave, who was absent, should not return within that time,
+every such person should suffer death." There was also another West Indian
+law, by which every Negro was armed against his fellow-negro, for he was
+authorized to kill every runaway slave; and he had even a reward held out
+to him for so doing. Let the House now contrast the two cases. Let them ask
+themselves which of the two exhibited the greater barbarity; and whether
+they could possibly vote for the continuance of the Slave-trade, upon the
+principle, that the Africans had shown themselves to be a race of
+incorrigible barbarians?
+
+Something like an opposite argument, but with a like view, had been
+maintained by others on this subject. It had been said, in justification of
+the trade, that the Africans had derived some little civilization from
+their intercourse with us. Yes: we had given them just enough of the forms
+of justice to enable them to add the pretext of legal trials to their other
+modes of perpetrating the most atrocious crimes. We had given them just
+enough of European improvements, to enable them the more effectually to
+turn Africa into a ravaged wilderness. Alas! alas! we had carried on a
+trade with them from this civilized and enlightened country, which, instead
+of diffusing knowledge, had been a check to every laudable pursuit. We had
+carried a poison into their country, which spread its contagious effects
+from one end of it to the other, and which penetrated to its very centre,
+corrupting every part to which it reached. We had there subverted the whole
+order of nature; we had aggravated every natural barbarity, and furnished
+to every man motives for committing, under the name of trade, acts of
+perpetual hostility and perfidy against his neighbour. Thus had the
+perversion of British commerce carried misery instead of happiness to one
+whole quarter of the globe. False to the very principles of trade,
+misguided in our policy, unmindful of our duty, what almost irreparable
+mischief had we done to that continent! How should we hope to obtain
+forgiveness from Heaven, if we refused to use those means, which the mercy
+of Providence had still reserved to us for wiping away the guilt and shame,
+with which we were now covered? If we refused even this degree of
+compensation, how aggravated would be our guilt! Should we delay, then, to
+repair these incalculable injuries? We ought to count the days, nay the
+very hours, which intervened to delay the accomplishment of such a work.
+
+On this great subject, the civilization of Africa, which, he confessed, was
+near his heart, he would yet add a few observations. And first he would
+say, that the present deplorable state of that country, especially when we
+reflected that her chief calamities were to be ascribed to us, called for
+our generous aid, rather than justified any despair, on our part, of her
+recovery, and still less a repetition of our injuries. On what ground of
+theory or history did we act, when we supposed that she was never to be
+reclaimed? There was a time, which it might be now fit to call to
+remembrance, when human sacrifices, and even, this very practice of the
+Slave-trade, existed in our own island. Slaves, as we may read in Henry's
+History of Great Britain, were formerly an established article of our
+exports. "Great numbers," he says, "were exported, like cattle, from the
+British coast, and were to be seen exposed for sale in the Roman
+market."--"Adultery, witchcraft, and debt," says the same historian, "were
+probably some of the chief sources of supplying the Roman market with
+British slaves--prisoners taken in war were added to the number--there
+might be also among them some unfortunate gamesters, who, after having lost
+all their goods, at length, staked themselves, their wives, and their
+children." Now every one of these sources of slavery had been stated to be
+at this hour a source of slavery in Africa. If these practices, therefore,
+were to be admitted as proofs of the natural incapacity of its inhabitants,
+why might they not have been applied to ancient Britain? Why might not then
+some Roman senator, pointing to British barbarians, have predicted with
+equal boldness, that these were a people, who were destined never to be
+free; who were without the understanding necessary for the attainment of
+useful arts; depressed by the hand of Nature below the level of the human
+species; and created to form a supply of slaves for the rest of the world?
+But happily, since that time, notwithstanding what would then have been the
+justness of these predictions, we had emerged from barbarism. We were now
+raised to a situation, which exhibited a striking contrast to every
+circumstance, by which a Roman might have characterized us, and by which we
+now characterized Africa. There was indeed one thing wanting to complete
+the contrast, and to clear us altogether from the imputation of acting even
+to this hour as barbarians; for we continued to this hour a barbarous
+traffic in slaves. We continued it even yet, in spite of all our great
+pretensions. We were once as obscure among the nations of the earth, as
+savage in our manners, as debased in our morals, as degraded in our
+understandings, as these unhappy Africans. But in the lapse of a long
+series of years, by a progression slow, and for a time almost
+imperceptible, we had become rich in a variety of acquirements. We were
+favoured above measure in the gifts of Providence, we were unrivalled in
+commerce, preeminent in arts, foremost in the pursuits of philosophy and
+science, and established in all the blessings of civil society: we were in
+the possession of peace, of liberty, and of happiness: we were under the
+guidance of a mild and a beneficent religion; and we were protected by
+impartial laws, and the purest administration of justice: we were living
+under a system of government, which our own happy experience led us to
+pronounce the best and wisest, and which had become the admiration of the
+world. From all these blessings we must for ever have been excluded, had
+there been any truth in those principles, which some had not hesitated to
+lay down as applicable to the case of Africa; and we should have been at
+this moment little superior, either in morals, knowledge, or refinement, to
+the rude inhabitants of that continent.
+
+If then we felt that this perpetual confinement in the fetters of brutal
+ignorance would have been the greatest calamity which could have befallen
+us; if we viewed with gratitude the contrast between our present and our
+former situation; if we shuddered to think of the misery, which would still
+have overwhelmed us, had our country continued to the present times,
+through some cruel policy, to be the mart for slaves to the more civilized
+nations of the world;--God forbid, that we should any longer subject Africa
+to the same dreadful scourge, and exclude the sight of knowledge from her
+coasts, which had reached every other quarter of the globe!
+
+He trusted we should no longer continue this commerce; and that we should
+no longer consider ourselves as conferring too great a boon on the natives
+of Africa in restoring them to the rank of human beings. He trusted we
+should not think ourselves too liberal, if, by abolishing the Slave-trade,
+we gave them the same common chance of civilization with other parts of the
+world. If we listened to the voice of reason and duty this night, some of
+us might live to see a reverse of that picture, from which we now turned
+our eyes with shame. We might live to behold the natives engaged in the
+calm occupations of industry, and in the pursuit of a just commerce. We
+might behold the beams of science and philosophy breaking in upon their
+land, which at some happy period in still later times might blaze with full
+lustre; and joining their influence to that of pure religion, might
+illuminate and invigorate the most distant extremities of that immense
+continent. Then might we hope, that even Africa (though last of all the
+quarters of the globe) should enjoy at length, in the evening of her days,
+those blessings, which had descended so plentifully upon us in a much
+earlier period of the world. Then also would Europe, participating in her
+improvement and prosperity, receive an ample recompense for the tardy
+kindness (if kindness it could be called) of no longer hindering her from
+extricating herself out of the darkness, which, in other more fortunate
+regions, had been so much more speedily dispelled.
+
+  --Nos primus equis Oriens afflavit anhelis;
+  Illic sera rubens accendit lumina Vesper.
+
+Then might be applied to Africa those words, originally used indeed with a
+different view:
+
+  Hic demum exactis ---- ----
+  Devenere locos laetos, et amoena vireta
+  Fortunatorum nemorum, sedesque beatas;
+  Largior hic campos aether et lumine vestit
+  Purpurco:
+
+It was in this view--it was as an atonement for our long and cruel
+injustice towards Africa, that the measure proposed by his honourable
+friend Mr. Wilberforce most forcibly recommended itself to his mind. The
+great and happy change to be expected in the state of her inhabitants was,
+of all the various benefits of the abolition, in his estimation the most
+extensive and important. He should vote against the adjournment; and he
+should also oppose every proposition, which tended either to prevent, or
+even to postpone for an hour, the total abolition of the Slave-trade.
+
+Mr. Pitt having concluded his speech (at about six in the morning), Sir
+William Dolben, the chairman, proposed the following questions. The first
+was on the motion of Mr. Jenkinson, "that the chairman do now leave the
+chair." This was lost by a majority of two hundred and thirty-four to
+eighty-seven. The second was on the motion of Mr. Dundas, "that the
+abolition should be gradual;" when the votes for gradual exceeded those for
+immediate by one hundred and ninety-three to one hundred and twenty-five.
+He then put the amended question, that "it was the opinion of the
+committee, that the trade ought to be gradually abolished." The committee
+having divided again, the votes for a gradual abolition were two hundred
+and thirty, and those against any abolition were eighty-five.
+
+After this debate, the committee for the abolition of the Slave-trade held
+a meeting. They voted their thanks to Mr. Wilberforce for his motion, and
+to Mr. Pitt, Mr. Fox, and those other members of the House, who had
+supported it. They resolved also, that the House of Commons, having
+determined that the Slave-trade ought to be gradually abolished, had by
+that decision manifested their opinion, that it was cruel and unjust. They
+resolved also, that a gradual abolition of it was not an adequate remedy
+for its injustice and cruelty; neither could it be deemed a compliance with
+the general wishes of the people, as expressed in their numerous and urgent
+petitions to Parliament. And they resolved lastly, that the interval, in
+which the Slave-trade should be permitted to continue, afforded a prospect
+of redoubled cruelties and ravages on the coast of Africa; and that it
+imposed therefore an additional obligation on every friend to the cause to
+use all constitutional means to obtain its immediate abolition.
+
+At a subsequent meeting they voted their thanks to the right honourable
+Lord Muncaster, for the able support he had given to the great object of
+their institution by his Historical Sketches of the Slave-trade, and of its
+Effects in Africa, addressed to the People of Great Britain; and they
+elected the Reverend Richard Gifford and the Reverend Thomas Gisborne
+honorary and corresponding members; the first on account of his excellent
+sermon before mentioned and other services, and the latter on account of
+his truly Christian and seasonable pamphlet, entitled Remarks on the late
+Decision of the House of Commons respecting the Abolition of the
+Slave-trade.
+
+On the twenty-third of April, the House of Commons resolved itself into a
+committee of the whole House, to consider the subject again; and Mr.
+Beaufoy was put into the chair.
+
+Mr. Dundas, upon whom the task of introducing a bill for the gradual
+abolition of the Slave-trade now devolved, rose to offer the outlines of a
+plan for that purpose. He intended, he said, immediately to abolish that
+part of the trade, by which we supplied foreigners with slaves. The other
+part of it was to be continued seven years from the first of January next.
+He grounded the necessity of its continuance till this time upon the
+documents of the Negro-population in the different islands. In many of
+these, slaves were imported, but they were re-exported nearly in equal
+numbers. Now all these he considered to be in a state to go on without
+future supplies from Africa. Jamaica and the ceded islands retained almost
+all the slaves imported into them. This he considered as a proof that these
+had not attained the same desirable state; and it was therefore necessary,
+that the trade should be continued longer on this account.
+
+It was his intention, however, to provide proper punishments, while it
+lasted, for abuses both in Africa and the Middle Passage. He would take
+care, as far as he could, that none but young slaves should be brought from
+the Coast of Africa. He would encourage establishments there for a new
+species of traffic. Foreign nations should be invited to concur in the
+abolition. He should propose a praedial rather than a personal service for
+the West Indies, and institutions, by which the slaves there should be
+instructed in religious duties. He concluded by reading several
+resolutions, which he would leave to the future consideration of the House.
+
+Mr. Pitt then rose. He deprecated the resolutions altogether. He denied
+also the inferences, which Mr. Dundas had drawn from the West-Indian
+documents relative to the Negro-population. He had looked over his own
+calculations from the same documents again and again, and he would submit
+them, with all their data, if it should be necessary, to the House.
+
+Mr. Wilberforce and Mr. Fox held the same language. They contended also,
+that Mr. Dundas had now proved, a thousand times more strongly than ever,
+the necessity of immediate abolition. All the resolutions he had read were
+operative against his own reasoning. The latter observed, that the
+Slave-traders were in future only to be allowed to steal innocent children
+from their disconsolate parents.
+
+After a few observations by Lord Sheffield, Mr. Drake, Colonel Tarleton,
+and Mr. Rolle, the House adjourned.
+
+On the twenty-fifth of April it resumed the consideration of the subject.
+Mr. Dundas then went over his former resolutions, and concluded by moving,
+"that it should not be lawful to import any African Negros into any British
+colonies, in ships owned or navigated by British subjects, at any time
+after the first of January 1800."
+
+Lord Mornington (now Marquis Wellesley) rose to propose an amendment. He
+congratulated his countrymen, that the Slave-trade had received its
+death-wound. This traffic was founded in injustice; and between right and
+wrong there could be no compromise. Africa was not to be sacrificed to the
+apparent good of the West-Indies. He would not repeat those enormities out
+of the evidence, which had made such a deep impression upon the House. It
+had been resolved, that the trade should be abolished. The question then
+was, how long they were to persevere in the crime of its continuance. One
+had said, that they might be unjust for ten years longer; another, only
+till the beginning of the next century. But this diversity of opinion had
+proceeded from an erroneous statement of Mr. Dundas against the clear and
+irrefragable calculations of Mr. Pitt. The former had argued, that, because
+Jamaica and the ceded islands had retained almost all the slaves which had
+been imported into them, they were therefore not yet in a situation to
+support their population without further supplies from Africa. But the
+truth was, that the slaves, so retained, were kept, not to maintain the
+population there, but to clear new land. Now the House had determined, that
+the trade was not to be continued for this purpose. The population,
+therefore, in the islands was sufficient to continue the ordinary
+cultivation of them.
+
+He deprecated the idea, that the Slave-trade had been so sanctioned by the
+acts of former parliaments, that the present could make no alteration in
+it. Had not the House altered the import of foreign sugar into our islands?
+a measure, which at the time affected the property of many. Had they not
+prohibited the exports of provisions from America to the same quarter?
+Again, as to compacts, had the Africans ever been parties to these? It was
+rather curious also, when King James the Second gave a charter to the
+slave-traders, that he should have given them a right to all the south of
+Africa, and authority over every person born therein! But, by doing this,
+it was clear, that he gave them a right which he never possessed himself.
+After many other observations, he concluded by moving, "that the year 1793
+be substituted in the place of the year 1800."
+
+In the course of the debate, which followed, Mr. Burdon stated his
+conviction of the necessity of immediate abolition; but he would support
+the amendment, as the shortest of the terms proposed.
+
+Mr. Robert Thornton would support it also, as the only choice left him. He
+dared not accede to a motion, by which we were to continue for seven years
+to imbrue our hands in innocent blood.
+
+Mr. Ryder would not support the trade for one moment, if he could avoid it.
+He could not hold a balance with gold in one scale, and blood in the other.
+
+Mr. William Smith exposed the wickedness of restricting the trade to
+certain ages. The original motion, he said, would only operate as a
+transfer of cruelty from the aged and the guilty to the young and the
+innocent. He entreated the House to consider, whether, if it related to
+their own children, any one of them would vote for it.
+
+Mr. Windham had hitherto felt a reluctance to speaking, not from the
+abstruseness, but from the simplicity, of the subject; but he could not
+longer be silent, when he observed those arguments of policy creeping again
+out of their lurking-places, which had fled before eloquence and truth. The
+House had clearly given up the policy of the question. They had been
+determined by the justice of it. Why were they then to be troubled again
+with arguments of this nature? These, if admitted, would go to the
+subversion of all public as well as private morality. Nations were as much
+bound as individuals to a system of morals, though a breach in the former
+could not be so easily punished. In private life morality took pretty good
+care of itself. It was a kind of retail article, in which the returns were
+speedy. If a man broke open his neighbour's house, he would feel the
+consequences. There was an ally of virtue, who rendered it the interest of
+individuals to be moral, and he was called the executioner. But as such
+punishment did not always await us in our national concerns, we should
+substitute honour as the guardian of our national conduct. He hoped the
+West-Indians would consider the character of the mother-country, and the
+obligations to national as well as individual justice. He hoped also they
+would consider the sufferings, which they occasioned both in Africa, in the
+passage, and in the West-Indies. In the passage indeed no one was capable
+of describing them. The section of the slave-ship, however, made up the
+deficiency of language, and did away all necessity of argument, on this
+subject. Disease there had to struggle with the new affliction of chains
+and punishment. At one view were the irksomeness of a gaol, and the
+miseries of an hospital; so that the holds of these vessels put him in mind
+of the regions of the damned. The trade, he said, ought immediately to be
+abolished. On a comparison of the probable consequences of the abolition of
+it, he saw on one side only doubtful contingencies, but on the other shame
+and disgrace.
+
+Sir James Johnstone contended for the immediate abolition of the trade. He
+had introduced the plough into his own plantation in the West Indies, and
+he found the land produced more sugar than when cultivated in the ordinary
+way by slaves. Even for the sake of the planters, he hoped the abolition
+would not be long delayed.
+
+Mr. Dundas replied: after which a division took place. The number of votes
+in favour of the original motion were one hundred and fifty-eight, and for
+the amendment one hundred and nine.
+
+On the 27th of April the House resumed the subject. Mr. Dundas moved, as
+before, that the Slave-trade should cease in the year 1800; upon which Lord
+Mornington moved, that the year 1795 should be substituted for the latter
+period.
+
+In the course of the debate, which followed, Mr. Hubbard said, that he had
+voted against the abolition, when the year 1793 was proposed; but he
+thought that, if it were not to take place till 1795, sufficient time would
+be allowed the planters. He would support this amendment; and he
+congratulated the House on the prospect of the final triumph of truth,
+humanity, and justice.
+
+Mr. Addington preferred the year 1796 to the year 1795.
+
+Mr. Alderman Watson considered the abolition in 1796 to be as destructive
+as if it were immediate.
+
+A division having taken place, the number of votes in favour of the
+original motion were one hundred and sixty-one, and in favour of Lord
+Mornington's amendment for the year 1795, one hundred and twenty-one. Sir
+Edward Knatchbull, however, seeing that there was a disposition in the
+House to bring the matter to a conclusion, and that a middle line would be
+preferred, moved that the year 1796 should be substituted for the year
+1800. Upon this the House divided again; when there appeared for the
+original motion only one hundred and thirty-two, but for the amendment one
+hundred and fifty-one.
+
+The gradual abolition having been now finally agreed upon for the year
+1796, a committee was named, which carried the resolution to the Lords.
+
+On the eighth of May, the Lords were summoned to consider it. Lord
+Stormont, after having spoken for some time, moved, that they should hear
+evidence upon it. Lord Grenville opposed the motion on account of the
+delay, which would arise from an examination of the witnesses by the House
+at large: but he moved that such witnesses should be examined by a
+committee of the House. Upon this a debate ensued, and afterwards a
+division; when the original motion was carried by sixty-three against
+thirty-six.
+
+On the 15th of May the Lords met again. Evidence was then ordered to be
+summoned in behalf of those interested in the continuance of the trade. At
+length it was introduced; but on the fifth of June, when only seven persons
+had been examined, a motion was made and carried, that the farther
+examinations should be postponed to the next session.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER V.
+
+_Continuation from July 1792 to July 1793--Author travels round the kingdom
+again--Motion to renew the resolution of the last year in the
+Commons--Motion lost--New Motion in the Commons to abolish the foreign
+Slave-trade--Motion lost--Proceedings of the Lords._
+
+
+The resolution adopted by the Commons, that the trade should cease in 1796,
+was a matter of great joy to many; and several, in consequence of it,
+returned to the use of sugar. The committee, however, for the abolition did
+not view it in the same favourable light. They considered it as a political
+manoeuvre to frustrate the accomplishment of the object. But the
+circumstance, which gave them the most concern, was the resolution of the
+Lords to hear evidence. It was impossible now to say, when the trade would
+cease. The witnesses in behalf of the merchants and planters had obtained
+possession of the ground; and they might keep it, if they chose, even till
+the year 1800, to throw light upon a measure which was to be adopted in
+1796. The committee found too, that they had again the laborious task
+before them of finding out new persons to give testimony in behalf of their
+cause; for some of their former witnesses were dead, and others were out of
+the kingdom; and unless they replaced these, there would be no probability
+of making out that strong case in the Lords, which they had established in
+the Commons. It devolved therefore upon me once more to travel for this
+purpose: but as I was then in too weak a state to bear as much fatigue as
+formerly, Dr. Dickson relieved me, by taking one part of the tour, namely,
+that to Scotland, upon himself.
+
+These journeys we performed with considerable success; during which the
+committee elected Mr. Joseph Townsend of Baltimore, in Maryland, an
+honorary and corresponding member.
+
+Parliament having met, Mr. Wilberforce, in February 1793, moved, that the
+House resolve itself into a committee of the whole House on Thursday next,
+to consider of the circumstances of the Slave-trade. This motion was
+opposed by Sir William Yonge, who moved, that this day six months should be
+substituted for Thursday next. A debate ensued: of this, however, as well
+as of several which followed, I shall give no account; as it would be
+tedious to the reader to hear a repetition of the same arguments. Suffice
+it to say, that the motion was lost by a majority of sixty-one to
+fifty-three.
+
+This sudden refusal of the House of Commons to renew their own vote of the
+former year gave great uneasiness to the friends of the cause. Mr.
+Wilberforce, however, resolved, that the session should not pass without an
+attempt to promote it in another form; and accordingly, on the fourteenth
+of May, he moved for leave to bring in a bill to abolish that part of the
+Slave-trade, by which the British merchants supplied foreigners with
+slaves. This motion was opposed like the former; but was carried by a
+majority of seven. The bill was then brought in; and it passed its first
+and second reading with little opposition; but on the fifth of June,
+notwithstanding the eloquence of Mr. Pitt and of Mr. Fox, and the very able
+speeches of Mr. Francis, Mr. Courtenay, and others, it was lost by a
+majority of thirty-one to twenty-nine.
+
+In the interval between these motions the question experienced in the Lords
+considerable opposition. The Duke of Clarence moved that the House should
+not proceed in the consideration of the Slave-trade till after the Easter
+recess. The Earl of Abingdon was still more hostile afterwards. He
+deprecated the new philosophy. It was as full of mischief as the Box of
+Pandora. The doctrine of the abolition of the Slave-trade was a species of
+it; and he concluded by moving, that all further consideration of the
+subject be postponed. To the epithet, then bestowed upon the abolition of
+it by this nobleman, the Duke of Clarence added those of fanatics and
+hypocrites! among whom he included Mr. Wilberforce by name. All the other
+Lords, however, who were present, manifested such a dislike to the
+sentiments of the Earl of Abingdon, that he withdrew this motion.
+
+After this the hearing of evidence on the resolution of the House of
+Commons was resumed; and seven persons were examined before the close of
+the session.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VI.
+
+_Continuation from July 1793 to July 1794--Author travels round the kingdom
+again--Motion to abolish the foreign Slave-trade renewed in the
+Commons--and carried--but lost in the Lords--further proceedings
+there--Author, on account of his declining health, obliged to retire from
+the cause._
+
+
+The committee for the abolition could not view the proceedings of both
+Houses of Parliament on this subject during the year 1793, without being
+alarmed for the fate of their question. The only two sources of hope, which
+they could discover, were in the disposition then manifested by the peers
+as to the conduct of the Earl of Abingdon, and in their determination to
+proceed in the hearing of evidence. The latter circumstance indeed was the
+more favourable, as the resolution, upon which the witnesses were to be
+examined, had not been renewed by the Commons. These considerations,
+however, afforded no solid ground for the mind to rest upon. They only
+broke in upon it, like faint gleams of sunshine, for a moment, and then
+were gone. In this situation the committee could only console themselves by
+the reflection, that they had done their duty. In looking, however, to
+their future services, one thing, and only one, seemed practicable; and
+this was necessary; namely, to complete the new body of evidence, which
+they had endeavoured to form in the preceding year. The determination to do
+this rendered another journey on my part indispensable; and I undertook it,
+broken down us my constitution then was, beginning it in September 1793,
+and completing it in February 1794.
+
+Mr. Wilberforce, in this interval, had digested his plan of operations; and
+accordingly, early in the session of 1794, he asked leave to renew his
+former bill, to abolish that part of the trade, by means of which British
+merchants supplied foreigners with slaves. This request was opposed by Sir
+William Yonge; but it was granted, on a division of the House, by a
+majority of sixty-three to forty votes.
+
+When the bill was brought in, it was opposed by the same member; upon which
+the House divided; and there appeared for Sir William Yonge's amendment
+thirty-eight votes, but against it fifty-six.
+
+On a motion for the recommitment of the bill, Lord Sheffield divided the
+House, against whose motion there was a majority of forty-two. And, on the
+third reading of it, it was opposed again; but it was at length carried.
+
+The speakers against the bill were; Sir William Yonge, Lord Sheffield,
+Colonel Tarleton, Alderman Newnham, and Mr. Payne, Este, Lechmere,
+Cawthorne, Jenkinson, and Dent. Those who spoke in favour of it were; Mr.
+Pitt, Fox, William Smith, Whitbread, Francis, Burdon, Vaughan, Barham, and
+Serjeants Watson and Adair.
+
+While the foreign Slave-bill was thus passing its stages in the Commons,
+Dr. Horsley, bishop of Rochester, who saw no end to the examinations, while
+the witnesses were to be examined at the bar of the House of Lords, moved,
+that they should be taken in future before a committee above-stairs. Dr.
+Porteus, bishop of London, and the Lords Guildford, Stanhope, and
+Grenville, supported this motion. But the Lord Chancellor Thurlow, aided by
+the Duke of Clarence, and by the Lords Mansfield, Hay, Abingdon, and
+others, negatived it by a majority of twenty-eight.
+
+At length the bill itself was ushered into the House of Lords. On reading
+it a second time, it was opposed by the Duke of Clarence, Lord Abingdon,
+and others. Lord Grenville and the Bishop of Rochester declined supporting
+it. They alleged, as a reason, that they conceived the introduction of it
+to have been improper pending the inquiry on the general subject of the
+Slave-trade. This declaration brought up the Lords Stanhope and Lauderdale,
+who charged them with inconsistency as professed friends of the cause. At
+length the bill was lost. During these discussions the examination of the
+witnesses was resumed by the Lords; but only two of them were heard in this
+session[A].
+
+[Footnote A: After this the examinations wholly dropped in the House of
+Lords.]
+
+After this decision the question was in a desperate state; for if the
+Commons would not renew their own resolution, and the Lords would not
+abolish the foreign part of the Slave-trade, What hope was there, of
+success? It was obvious too, that in the former House, Mr. Pitt and Mr.
+Dundas voted against each other. In the latter, the Lord Chancellor Thurlow
+opposed every motion in favour of the cause. The committee therefore were
+reduced to this;--either they must exert themselves without hope, or they
+must wait till some change should take place in their favour. As far as I
+myself was concerned, all exertion was then over. The nervous system was
+almost shattered to pieces. Both my memory and my hearing failed me. Sudden
+dizziness seized my head. A confused singing in the ears followed me,
+wherever I went. On going to bed the very stairs seemed to dance up and
+down under me, so that, misplacing my foot, I sometimes fell. Talking too,
+if it continued but half an hour, exhausted me, so that profuse
+perspirations followed; and the same effect was produced even by an active
+exertion of the mind for the like time. These disorders had been brought on
+by degrees in consequence of the severe labours necessarily attached to the
+promotion of the cause. For seven years I had a correspondence to maintain
+with four hundred persons with my own hand. I had some book or other
+annually to write in behalf of the cause. In this time I had travelled more
+than thirty-five thousand miles in search of evidence, and a great part of
+these journeys in the night. All this time my mind had been on the stretch.
+It had been bent too to this one subject; for I had not even leisure to
+attend to my own concerns. The various instances of barbarity, which had
+come successively to my knowledge within this period, had vexed, harassed,
+and afflicted it. The wound, which these had produced, was rendered still
+deeper by those cruel disappointments before related, which arose from the
+reiterated refusal of persons to give their testimony, after I had
+travelled hundreds of miles in quest of them. But the severest stroke was
+that inflicted by the persecution, begun and pursued by persons interested
+in the continuance of the trade, of such witnesses as had been examined
+against them; and whom, on account of their dependent situation in life, it
+was most easy to oppress. As I had been the means of bringing these forward
+on these occasions, they naturally came to me, when thus persecuted, as the
+author of their miseries and their ruin. From their supplications and wants
+it would have been ungenerous and ungrateful to have fled[A]. These
+different circumstances, by acting together, had at length brought me into
+the situation just mentioned; and I was therefore obliged, though very
+reluctantly, to be borne out of the field, where I had placed the great
+honour and glory of my life.
+
+[Footnote A: The late Mr. Whitbread, to whom one day in deep affliction on
+this account I related accidentally a circumstance of this kind, generously
+undertook, in order to make my mind easy upon the subject, to make good all
+injuries, which should in future arise to individuals from such
+persecution; and he repaired these, at different times, at a considerable
+expense. I feel it a duty to divulge this circumstance, out of respect to
+the memory of one of the best of men, and of one, whom, if the history of
+his life were written, it would appear to have been an extraordinary honour
+to the country to have produced.]
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VII.
+
+_Continuation from July 1794 to July 1799--Various motions within this
+period._
+
+
+I purpose, though it may seem abrupt after the division which has hitherto
+been made of the contents of this volume, to throw the events of the next
+five years into one chapter.
+
+Mr. Wilberforce and the members of the committee, whose constitutions had
+not suffered like my own, were still left; and they determined to persevere
+in the promotion of their great object; as long as their health and their
+faculties permitted them. The former, accordingly, in the month of February
+1795, moved in the House of Commons for leave to bring in a bill for the
+abolition of the Slave-trade. This motion was then necessary, if, according
+to the resolution of that House, the Slave-trade was to cease in 1796. It
+was opposed, however, by Sir William Yonge, and unfortunately lost by a
+majority of seventy-eight to fifty-seven.
+
+In the year 1796 Mr. Wilberforce renewed his efforts in the Commons. He
+asked leave to bring in a bill for the abolition of the Slave-trade, but in
+a limited time. The motion was opposed as before; but on a division, there
+were for it ninety-three, and against it only sixty-seven.
+
+The bill having been brought in, was opposed in its second reading; but it
+was carried through it by a majority of sixty-four to thirty-one.
+
+In a future stage it was opposed again; but it triumphed by a majority of
+seventy-six to thirty-one. Mr. Eliott was then put into the chair. Several
+clauses were adopted; and the first of March 1797 was fixed for the
+abolition of the trade: but in the next stage of it, after a long speech
+from Mr. Dundas, it was lost by a majority of seventy-four against seventy.
+
+Mr. Francis, who had made a brilliant speech in the last debate,
+considering that nothing effectual had been yet done on this great
+question, and wishing that a practical beginning might be made, brought
+forward soon afterwards, a motion relative to the improvement of the
+condition of the slaves in the West Indies. This, after a short debate, was
+negatived without a division. Mr. William Smith also moved an address to
+His Majesty, that he would be pleased to give directions to lay before the
+House copies of the several acts relative to regulations in behalf of the
+slaves, passed by the different colonial assemblies since the year 1788.
+This motion was adopted by the House. Thus passed away the session of 1796.
+
+In the year 1797, while Mr. Wilberforce was deliberating upon the best
+measure for the advancement of the cause, Mr. C. Ellis came forward with a
+new motion. He began by declaring, that he agreed with the abolitionists as
+to their object; but he differed with them as to the mode of attaining it.
+The Slave-trade he condemned as a cruel and pernicious system; but, as it
+had become an inveterate evil, he feared it could not be done away all at
+once, without injury to the interests of numerous individuals, and even to
+the Negros themselves. He concluded by moving an address to His Majesty,
+humbly requesting, that he would give directions to the governors of the
+West Indian islands, to recommend it to the colonial assemblies to adopt
+such measures as might appear to them best calculated to ameliorate the
+condition of the Negros, and thereby to remove gradually the Slave-trade;
+and likewise to assure His Majesty of the readiness of this House to concur
+in any measure to accelerate this desirable object. This motion was
+seconded by Mr. Barham. It was opposed, however, by Mr. Wilberforce, Mr.
+Pitt, and others; but was at length carried by a majority of ninety-nine to
+sixty-three.
+
+In the year 1798 Mr. Wilberforce asked leave to renew his former bill, to
+abolish the Slave-trade within a limited time. He was supported by Mr.
+Canning, Mr. Hobhouse, Sir Robert Buxton, Mr. Bouverie, and others. Mr.
+Sewell, Bryan Edwards, Henniker, and C. Ellis, took the opposite side of
+the question. Mr. Ellis, however, observed, that he had no objection to
+restricting the Slave-trade to plantations already begun in the colonies;
+and Mr. Barham professed himself a friend to the abolition, if it could be
+accomplished in a reasonable way. On a division, there appeared to be for
+Mr. Wilberforce's motion eighty-three, but against it eighty-seven.
+
+In the year 1799 Mr. Wilberforce, undismayed by these different
+disappointments, renewed his motion. Colonel M. Wood, Mr. Petrie, and
+others, among whom were Mr. Windham and Mr. Dundas, opposed it. Mr. Pitt,
+Fox, W. Smith, Sir William Dolben, Sir R. Milbank, Mr. Hobhouse, and Mr.
+Canning, supported it. Sir R. Milbank contended, that modifications of a
+system fundamentally wrong ought not to be tolerated by the legislature of
+a free nation. Mr. Hobhouse said, that nothing could be so nefarious as
+this traffic in blood. It was unjust in its principle. It was cruel in its
+practice. It admitted of no regulation whatever. The abolition of it was
+called for equally by morality and sound policy. Mr. Canning exposed the
+folly of Mr. Dundas, who had said, that as Parliament had in the year 1787
+left the abolition to the colonial assemblies, it ought not to be taken out
+of their hands. This great event, he observed, could only be accomplished
+in two ways; either by these assemblies, or by the Parliament of England.
+Now the members of the assembly of Jamaica had professed, that they would
+never abolish the trade. Was it not therefore idle to rely upon them for
+the accomplishment of it? He then took a very comprehensive view of the
+arguments, which had been offered in the course of the debate, and was
+severe upon the planters in the House, who, he said, had brought into
+familiar use certain expressions, with no other view than to throw a veil
+over their odious system. Among these was--their right to import labourers.
+But never was the word "labourers" so prostituted, as when it was used for
+slaves. Never was the word "right" so prostituted, not even when The Rights
+of Man were talked of, as when the right to trade in man's blood was
+asserted by the members of an enlightened assembly. Never was the right of
+importing these labourers worse defended than when the antiquity of the
+Slave-trade, and its foundation on antient acts of parliament, were brought
+forward in its support. We had been cautioned not to lay our unhallowed
+hands on the antient institution of the Slave-trade; nor to subvert a
+fabric, raised by the wisdom of our ancestors, and consecrated by a lapse
+of ages. But on what principles did we usually respect the institutions of
+antiquity? We respected them when we saw some shadow of departed worth and
+usefulness; or some memorial of what had been creditable to mankind. But
+was this the case with the Slave-trade? Had it begun in principles of
+justice or national honour, which the changes of the world alone had
+impaired? had it to plead former services and glories in behalf of its
+present disgrace? In looking at it we saw nothing but crimes and sufferings
+from the beginning--nothing but what wounded and convulsed our
+feelings--nothing but what excited indignation and horror. It had not even
+to plead what could often be said in favour of the most unjustifiable wars.
+Though conquest had sometimes originated in ambition, and in the worst of
+motives, yet the conquerors and the conquered were sometimes blended
+afterwards into one people; so that a system of common interest arose out
+of former differences. But where was the analogy of the cases? Was it only
+at the outset that we could trace violence and injustice on the part of the
+Slave-trade? Were the oppressors and the oppressed so reconciled, that
+enmities ultimately ceased?--No. Was it reasonable then to urge a
+prescriptive right, not to the fruits of an antient and forgotten evil, but
+to a series of new violences; to a chain of fresh enormities; to cruelties
+continually repeated; and of which every instance inflicted a fresh
+calamity, and constituted a separate and substantial crime?
+
+The debate being over, the House divided; when it appeared that there were
+for Mr. Wilberforce's motion seventy-four, but against it eighty-two.
+
+The motion for the general abolition of the Slave-trade having been thus
+lost again in the Commons, a new motion was made there soon after, by Mr.
+Henry Thornton, on the same subject. The prosecution of this traffic on
+certain parts of the coast of Africa had become so injurious to the new
+settlement at Sierra Leone, that not only its commercial prospects were
+impeded, but its safety endangered. Mr. Thornton therefore brought in a
+bill to confine the Slave-trade within certain limits. But even this bill,
+though it had for its object only to free a portion of the coast from the
+ravages of this traffic, was opposed by Mr. Gascoyne, Dent, and others.
+Petitions also were presented against it. At length, after two divisions,
+on the first of which there were thirty-two votes to twenty-seven, and on
+the second thirty-eight to twenty-two, it passed through all its stages.
+
+When it was introduced into the Lords the petitions were renewed against
+it. Delay also was interposed to its progress by the examination of
+witnesses. It was not till the fifth of July that the matter was brought to
+issue. The opponents of the bill at that time were, the Duke of Clarence,
+Lord Westmoreland, Lord Thurlow, and the Lords Douglas and Hay, the two
+latter being Earls of Morton and Kinnoul in Scotland. The supporters of it
+were Lord Grenville, who introduced it; Lord Loughborough; Holland; and Dr.
+Horsley, bishop of Rochester. The latter was peculiarly eloquent. He began
+his speech by arraigning the injustice and impolicy of the trade:
+injustice, he said, which no considerations of policy could extenuate;
+impolicy, equal in degree to its injustice.
+
+He well knew that the advocates for the Slave-trade had endeavoured to
+represent the project for abolition as a branch of jacobinism; but they,
+who supported it, proceeded upon no visionary motives of equality or of the
+imprescriptible rights of man. They strenuously upheld the gradations of
+civil society: but they did indeed affirm that these gradations were, both
+ways, both as they ascended and as they descended, limited. There was an
+existence of power, to which no good king would aspire; and there was an
+extreme condition of subjection, to which man could not be degraded without
+injustice; and this they would maintain was the condition of the African,
+who was torn away into slavery.
+
+He then explained the limits of that portion of Africa, which the bill
+intended to set apart as sacred to peace and liberty. He showed that this
+was but one-third of the coast; and therefore that two-thirds were yet left
+for the diabolical speculations of the slave-merchants. He expressed his
+surprise that such witnesses as those against the bill should have been
+introduced at all. He affirmed that their oaths were falsified by their own
+log-books; and that from their own accounts the very healthiest of their
+vessels were little better than pestilential gaols. Mr. Robert Hume, one of
+these witnesses, had made a certain voyage. He had made it in thirty-three
+days. He had shipped two hundred and sixty-five slaves, and he had lost
+twenty-three of them. If he had gone on losing his slaves, all of whom were
+under twenty-five years of age, at this rate, it was obvious, that he would
+have lost two hundred and fifty-three of them, if his passage had lasted
+for a year. Now in London only seventeen would have died, of that age, out
+of one thousand within the latter period.
+
+After having exposed the other voyages of Mr. Hume in a similar manner, he
+entered into a commendation of the views of the Sierra Leone company; and
+then defended the character of the Africans in their own country, as
+exhibited in the Travels of Mr. Mungo Park. He made a judicious
+discrimination with respect to slavery, as it existed among them. He showed
+that this slavery was analogous to that of the heroic and patriarchal ages;
+and contrasted it with the West Indian in an able manner.
+
+He adverted, lastly, to what had fallen from the learned counsel, who had
+supported the petitions of the slave-merchants. One of them had put this
+question to their lordships, "if the Slave-trade were as wicked as it had
+been represented, why was there no prohibition of it in the holy
+scriptures?" He then entered into a full defence of the scriptures on this
+ground, which he concluded by declaring that, as St. Paul had coupled
+men-stealers with murderers, he had condemned the Slave-trade in one of its
+most productive modes, and generally in all its modes:--and here it was
+worthy of remark, that the word used by the apostle on this occasion, and
+which had been translated men-stealers, should have been rendered
+slave-traders. This was obvious from the Scholiast of Aristophanes, whom he
+quoted. It was clear therefore that the Slave-trade, if murder was
+forbidden, had been literally forbidden also.
+
+The learned counsel too had admonished their lordships, to beware how they
+adopted the visionary projects of fanatics. He did not know in what
+direction this shaft was shot; and he cared not. It did not concern him.
+With the highest reverence for the religion of the land, with the firmest
+conviction of its truth, and with the deepest sense of the importance of
+its doctrines, he was proudly conscious, that the general shape and fashion
+of his life bore nothing of the stamp of fanaticism. But he begged leave,
+in his turn, to address a word of serious exhortation to their lordships.
+He exhorted them to beware, how they were persuaded to bury, under the
+opprobrious name of fanaticism, the regard which they owed to the great
+duties of mercy and justice, for the neglect of which (if they should
+neglect them) they would be answerable at that tribunal, where no
+prevarication of witnesses could misinform the judge; and where no subtlety
+of an advocate, miscalling the names of things, putting evil for good and
+good for evil, could mislead his judgement.
+
+At length the debate ended: when the bill was lost by a majority of
+sixty-eight to sixty-one, including personal votes and proxies.
+
+I cannot conclude this chapter without offering a few remarks. And, first,
+I may observe, as the substance of the debates has not been given for the
+period which it contains, that Mr. Wilberforce, upon whom too much praise
+cannot be bestowed for his perseverance from year to year, amidst the
+disheartening circumstances which attended his efforts, brought every new
+argument to bear, which either the discovery of new light or the events of
+the times produced. I may observe also, in justice to the memories of Mr.
+Pitt and Mr. Fox, that there was no debate within this period, in which
+they did not take a part; and in which they did not irradiate others from
+the profusion of their own light: and, thirdly, that in consequence of the
+efforts of the three, conjoined with those of others, the great cause of
+the abolition was secretly gaining ground. Many members who were not
+connected with the trade, but who had yet hitherto supported it, were on
+the point of conversion. Though the question had oscillated backwards and
+forwards, so that an ordinary spectator could have discovered no gleam of
+hope at these times, nothing is more certain, than that the powerful
+eloquence then displayed had smoothed the resistance to it; had shortened
+its vibrations; and had prepared it for a state of rest.
+
+With respect to the West Indians themselves, some of them began to see
+through the mists of prejudice, which had covered them. In the year 1794,
+when the bill for the abolition of the foreign Slave-trade was introduced,
+Mr. Vaughan and Mr. Barham supported it. They called upon the planters in
+the House to give way to humanity, where their own interests could not be
+affected by their submission. This indeed may be said to have been no
+mighty thing; but it was a frank confession of the injustice of the
+Slave-trade, and the beginning of the change which followed, both with
+respect to themselves and others.
+
+With respect to the old friends of the cause, it is with regret I mention,
+that it lost the support of Mr. Windham within this period; and this regret
+is increased by the consideration, that he went off on the avowed plea of
+expediency against moral rectitude; a doctrine, which, at least upon this
+subject, he had reprobated for ten years. It was, however, some
+consolation, as far as talents were concerned, (for there can be none for
+the loss of virtuous feeling,) that Mr. Canning, a new member, should have
+so ably supplied his place.
+
+Of the gradual abolitionists, whom we have always considered as the most
+dangerous enemies of the cause, Mr. Jenkinson (now Lord Hawkesbury), Mr.
+Addington (now Lord Sidmouth), and Mr. Dundas (now Lord Melville),
+continued their opposition during all this time. Of the first two I shall
+say nothing at present; but I cannot pass over the conduct of the latter.
+He was the first person, as we have seen, to propose the gradual abolition
+of the Slave-trade; and he fixed the time for its cessation on the first of
+January 1800. His sincerity on this occasion was doubted by Mr. Fox at the
+very outset; for he immediately rose and said, that "something so
+mischievous had come out, something so like a foundation had been laid for
+preserving, not only for years to come, but for any thing he knew for ever,
+this detestable traffic, that he felt it his duty immediately to deprecate
+all such delusions upon the country." Mr. Pitt, who spoke soon afterwards,
+in reply to an argument advanced by Mr. Dundas, maintained, that "at
+whatever period the House should say that the Slave-trade should actually
+cease, this defence would equally be set up; for it would be just as good
+an argument in seventy years hence, as it was against the abolition then."
+And these remarks Mr. Dundas verified in a singular manner within this
+period: for in the year 1796, when his own bill, as amended in the Commons,
+was to take place, he was one of the most strenuous opposers of it; and in
+the year 1799, when in point of consistency it devolved upon him to propose
+it to the House, in order that the trade might cease on the first of
+January 1800, (which was the time of his own original choice, or a time
+unfettered by parliamentary amendment,) he was the chief instrument of
+throwing out Mr. Wilberforce's bill, which promised even a longer period to
+its continuance: so that it is obvious, that there was no time, within his
+own limits, when the abolition would have suited him, notwithstanding his
+profession, "that he had always been a warm advocate for the measure."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VIII.
+
+_Continuation from July 1799 to July 1805--Various motions within this
+period._
+
+
+The question had now been brought forward in almost every possible way, and
+yet had been eventually lost. The total and immediate abolition had been
+attempted; and then the gradual. The gradual again had been tried for the
+year 1793, then for 1795, and then for 1796, at which period it was
+decreed, but never allowed to be executed. An abolition of a part of the
+trade, as it related to the supply of foreigners with slaves, was the next
+measure proposed; and when this failed, the abolition of another part of
+it, as it related to the making of a certain portion of the coast of Africa
+sacred to liberty, was attempted; but this failed also. Mr. Wilberforce
+therefore thought it prudent, not to press the abolition as a mere annual
+measure, but to allow members time to digest the eloquence, which had been
+bestowed upon it for the last five years, and to wait till some new
+circumstances should favour its introduction. Accordingly he allowed the
+years 1800, 1801, 1802, and 1803 to pass over without any further
+parliamentary notice than the moving for certain papers; during which he
+took an opportunity of assuring the House, that he had not grown cool in
+the cause, but that he would agitate it in a future session.
+
+In the year 1804, which was fixed upon for renewed exertion, the committee
+for the abolition of the Slave-trade elected James Stephen, Zachary
+Macaulay, Henry Brougham, esquires, and William Phillips, into their own
+body. Four other members also, Robert Grant and John Thornton, esquires,
+and William Manser and William Allen, were afterwards added to the list.
+Among the reasons for fixing upon this year one may be assigned, namely,
+that the Irish members, in consequence of the Union which had taken place
+between the two countries, had then all taken their seats in the House of
+Commons; and that most of them were friendly to the cause.
+
+This being the situation of things, Mr. Wilberforce, on the thirtieth of
+March, asked leave to renew his bill for the abolition of the Slave-trade
+within a limited time. Mr. Fuller opposed the motion. A debate ensued.
+Colonel Tarleton, Mr. Devaynes, Mr. Addington, and Mr. Manning spoke
+against it. The latter, however, notwithstanding his connection with the
+West Indies, said he would support it, if an indemnification were offered
+to the planters, in case any actual loss should accompany the measure.
+
+Sir William Geary questioned the propriety of immediate abolition.
+
+Sir Robert Buxton, Mr. Pitt, Fox, and Durham, spoke in favour of the
+motion.
+
+Mr. William Smith rose, when the latter had seated himself, and
+complimented him on this change of sentiment, so honourable to him,
+inasmuch as he had espoused the cause of humanity against his supposed
+interest as a planter. Mr. Leigh said, that he would not tolerate such a
+traffic for a moment. All the feelings of nature revolted at it. Lord de
+Blaquiere observed, "it was the first time the question had been proposed
+to Irishmen as legislators. He believed it would be supported by most of
+them. As to the people of Ireland, he could pledge himself, that they were
+hostile to this barbarous traffic." An amendment having been proposed by
+Mr. Manning, a division took place upon it, when leave was given to bring
+in the bill, by a majority of one hundred and twenty-four to forty-nine.
+
+On the seventh of June, when the second reading of the bill was moved, it
+was opposed by Sir W. Yonge, Dr. Laurence, Mr. C. Brook, Mr. Dent, and
+others. Among these Lord Castlereagh professed himself a friend to the
+abolition of the trade, but he differed as to the mode. Sir J. Wrottesley
+approved of the principle of the bill, but would oppose it in some of its
+details. Mr. Windham allowed the justice, but differed as to the
+expediency, of the measure. Mr. Deverell professed himself to have been a
+friend to it; but he had then changed his mind. Sir Laurence Parsons wished
+to see a plan for the gradual extinction of the trade. Lord Temple
+affirmed, that the bill would seal the death-warrant of every White
+inhabitant of the islands. The second reading was supported by Sir Ralph
+Milbank, Mr. Pitt, Fox, William Smith, Whitbread, Francis, Barham, and by
+Mr. Grenfell, and Sir John Newport. Mr. Grenfell observed, that he could
+not give a silent vote, where the character of the country was concerned.
+When the question of the abolition first came before the public, he was a
+warm friend to it; and from that day to this he had cherished the same
+feelings. He assured Mr. Wilberforce of his constant support. Sir John
+Newport stated that the Irish nation took a virtuous interest in this noble
+cause. He ridiculed the idea, that the trade and manufactures of the
+country would suffer by the measure in contemplation; but, even if they
+should suffer, he would oppose it. "Fiat justitia, ruat coelum." Upon a
+division, there appeared for the second reading one hundred, and against it
+forty-two.
+
+On the twelfth of June, when a motion was made to go into a committee upon
+the bill, it was opposed by Mr. Fuller, C. Brook, C. Ellis, Dent, Deverell,
+and Manning: and it was supported by Sir Robert Buxton, Mr. Barham, and the
+honourable J.S. Cocks. The latter condemned the imprudence of the planters.
+Instead of profiting by the discussions, which had taken place, and making
+wise provisions against the great event of the abolition, which would
+sooner or later take place, they had only thought of new stratagems to
+defeat it. He declared his abhorrence of the trade, which he considered to
+be a national disgrace. The House divided: when there were seventy-nine for
+the motion, and against it twenty.
+
+On the twenty-seventh of June the bill was opposed in its last stage by Sir
+W. Young, Mr. Dickenson, G. Rose, Addington, and Dent: and supported by Mr.
+Pitt, W. Smith, Francis, and Barham; when it was carried by a majority of
+sixty-nine to thirty-six. It was then taken up to the Lords; but on a
+motion of Lord Hawkesbury, then a member of that House, the discussion of
+it was postponed to the next year.
+
+The session being ended, the committee for the abolition of the Slave-trade
+increased its number, by the election of the right honourable Lord
+Teignmouth, Dr. Dickson, and Wilson Birkbeck, as members.
+
+In the year 1805, Mr. Wilberforce renewed his motion of the former year.
+Colonel Tarleton, Sir William Yonge, Mr. Fuller, and Mr. Gascoyne opposed
+it. Leave, however, was given him to introduce his bill.
+
+On the second reading of it a serious opposition took place; and an
+amendment was moved for postponing it till that day six months. The
+amendment was opposed by Mr. Fox and Mr. Huddlestone. The latter could not
+help lifting his voice against this monstrous traffic in the sinews and
+blood of man, the toleration of which had so long been the disgrace of the
+British legislature. He did not charge the enormous guilt resulting from it
+upon the nation at large; for the nation had washed its hands of it by the
+numerous petitions it had sent against it; and it had since been a matter
+of astonishment to all Christendom, how the constitutional guardians of
+British freedom should have sanctioned elsewhere the greatest system of
+cruelty and oppression in the world.
+
+He said that a curse attended this trade even in the mode of defending it.
+By a certain fatality, none but the vilest arguments were brought forward,
+which corrupted the very persons, who used them. Every one of these were
+built on the narrow ground of interest; of pecuniary profit; of sordid
+gain; in opposition to every higher consideration; to every motive that had
+reference to humanity, justice, and religion; or to that great principle,
+which comprehended them all. Place only before the most determined advocate
+of this odious traffic the exact image of himself in the garb and harness
+of a slave, dragged and whipped about like a beast: place this image also
+before him, and paint it as that of one without a ray of hope to cheer him;
+and you would extort from him the reluctant confession, that he would not
+endure for an hour the misery, to which he condemned his fellow-man for
+life. How dared he then to use this selfish plea of interest against the
+voice of the generous sympathies of his nature? But even upon this narrow
+ground the advocates for the traffic had been defeated. If the unhallowed
+argument of expediency was worth any thing when opposed to moral rectitude,
+or if it were to supersede the precepts of Christianity, where was a man to
+stop, or what line was he to draw? For any thing he knew, it might be
+physically true, that human blood was the best manure for the land; but who
+ought to shed it on that account? True expediency, however, was, where it
+ever would be found, on the side of that system, which was most merciful
+and just. He asked how it happened, that sugar could be imported cheaper
+from the East Indies, than from the West, notwithstanding the vast
+difference of the length of the voyages, but on account of the impolicy of
+slavery, or that it was made in the former case by the industry of free
+men, and in the latter by the languid drudgery of slaves.
+
+As he had had occasion to advert to the Eastern part of the world, he would
+make an observation upon an argument, which had been collected from that
+quarter. The condition of the Negros in the West Indies had been lately
+compared with that of the Hindoos. But he would observe that the Hindoo,
+miserable as his hovel was, had sources of pride and happiness, to which
+not only the West Indian slave, but even his master, was a stranger. He was
+to be sure a peasant; and his industry was subservient to the
+gratifications of an European lord. But he was, in his own belief, vastly
+superior to him. He viewed him as one of the lowest cast. He would not on
+any consideration eat from the same plate. He would not suffer his son to
+marry the daughter of his master, even if she could bring him all the West
+Indies as her portion. He would observe too, that the Hindoo-peasant drank
+his water from his native well; that, if his meal were scanty, he received
+it from the hand of her, who was most dear to him; that, when he laboured,
+he laboured for her and his offspring. His daily task being finished, he
+reposed with his family. No retrospect of the happiness of former days,
+compared with existing misery, disturbed his slumber; nor horrid dreams
+occasioned him to wake in agony at the dawn of day. No barbarous sounds of
+cracking whips reminded him, that with the form and image of a man his
+destiny was that of the beast of the field. Let the advocates for the
+bloody traffic state what they had to set off on their side of the question
+against the comforts and independence of the man, with whom they compared
+the slave.
+
+The amendment was supported by Sir William Yonge, Sir William Pulteney,
+Colonel Tarleton, Mr. Gascoyne, C. Brook, and Hiley Addington. On dividing
+the House upon it, there appeared for it seventy-seven, but against it only
+seventy.
+
+This loss of the question, after it had been carried in the last year by so
+great a majority, being quite unexpected, was a matter of severe
+disappointment; and might have discouraged the friends of the cause in this
+infancy of their renewed efforts, if they had not discovered the reason of
+its failure. After due consideration it appeared, that no fewer than nine
+members, who had never been absent once in sixteen years when it was
+agitated, gave way to engagements on the day of the motion, from a belief
+that it was safe. It appeared also, that out of the great number of Irish
+members, who supported it in the former year, only nine were in the House,
+when it was lost. It appeared also that, previously to this event, a
+canvass, more importunate than had been heard of on any former occasion,
+had been made among the latter by those interested in the continuance of
+the trade. Many of these, unacquainted with the detail of the subject, like
+the English members, admitted the dismal representations, which were then
+made to them. The desire of doing good on the one hand, and the fear of
+doing injury on the other, perplexed them; and in this dubious state they
+absented themselves at the time mentioned.
+
+The causes of the failure having been found accidental, and capable of a
+remedy, it was resolved, that an attempt should be made immediately in the
+House in a new form. Accordingly Lord Henry Petty signified his intention
+of bringing in a bill for the abolition of the foreign part of the
+Slave-trade; but the impeachment of Lord Melville, and other weighty
+matters coming on, the notice was not acted upon in that session.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IX.
+
+_Continuation from July 1805 to July 1806--Author returns to his duty in
+the committee--travels again round the Kingdom--Death of Mr. Pitt--his
+character, an it related to the question--Motion for the abolition of the
+foreign Slave-trade--resolution to take measures for the total abolition of
+it--Address to the King to negotiate with foreign powers for their
+concurrence in it--Motion to prevent any new vessel going into the
+trade--these carried through both houses of parliament._
+
+
+It was now almost certain, to the inexpressible joy of the committee, that
+the cause, with proper vigilance, could be carried in the next session in
+the House of Commons. It became them therefore to prepare to support it. In
+adverting to measures for this purpose, it occurred to them, that the House
+of Lords, if the question should be then carried to them from the Commons,
+might insist upon hearing evidence on the general subject. But, alas, even
+the body of witnesses, which had been last collected, was broken by death
+or dispersion! It was therefore to be formed again. In this situation it
+devolved upon me, as I had now returned to the committee after an absence
+of nine years, to take another journey for this purpose.
+
+This journey I performed with extraordinary success. In the course of it I
+had also much satisfaction on another account. I found the old friends of
+the cause still faithful to it. It was remarkable, however, that the youth
+of the rising generation knew but little about the question. For the last
+eight or nine years the committee had not circulated any books; and the
+debates in the Commons during that time had not furnished them with the
+means of an adequate knowledge concerning it. When, however, I conversed
+with these, as I travelled along, I discovered a profound attention to what
+I said; an earnest desire to know more of the subject; and a generous
+warmth in favour of the injured Africans, which I foresaw could soon be
+turned into enthusiasm. Hence I perceived that the cause furnished us with
+endless sources of rallying; and that the ardour, which we had seen with so
+much admiration in former years, could be easily renewed.
+
+I had scarcely finished my journey, when Mr. Pitt died. This event took
+place in January 1806. I shall stop therefore to make a few observations
+upon his character, as it related to this cause. This I feel myself bound
+in justice to do, because his sincerity towards it has been generally
+questioned.
+
+The way, in which Mr. Pitt became acquainted with this question, has
+already been explained. A few doubts having been removed, when it was first
+started, he professed himself a friend to the abolition. The first proof,
+which he gave of his friendship to it is known but to few; but it is,
+nevertheless, true, that so early as in 1788, he occasioned a communication
+to be made to the French government, in which he recommended an union of
+the two countries for the promotion of the great measure. This proposition
+seemed to be then new and strange to the court of France; and the answer
+was not favourable.
+
+From this time his efforts were reduced within the boundaries of his own
+power.
+
+As far, however, as he had scope, he exerted them. If we look at him in his
+parliamentary capacity, it must be acknowledged by all, that he took an
+active, strenuous, and consistent part, and this year after year, by which
+he realized his professions. In my own private communications with him,
+which were frequent, he never failed to give proofs of a similar
+disposition. I had always free access to him. I had no previous note or
+letter to write for admission. Whatever papers I wanted, he ordered. He
+exhibited also in his conversation with me on these occasions marks of a
+more than ordinary interest in the welfare of the cause. Among the
+subjects, which were then started, there was one, which was always near his
+heart. This was the civilization of Africa. He looked upon this great work
+as a debt due to that continent for the many injuries we had inflicted upon
+it: and had the abolition succeeded sooner, as in the infancy of his
+exertions he had hoped, I know he had a plan, suited no doubt to the
+capaciousness of his own mind, for such establishments in Africa, as he
+conceived would promote in due time this important end.
+
+I believe it will be said, notwithstanding what I have advanced, that if
+Mr. Pitt had exerted himself as the minister of the country in behalf of
+the abolition, he could have carried it. This brings the matter to an
+issue; for unquestionably the charge of insincerity, as it related to this
+great question, arose from the mistaken notion, that, as his measures in
+parliament were supported by great majorities, he could do as he pleased
+there. But, they who hold this opinion, must be informed, that there were
+great difficulties, against which he had to struggle on this subject. The
+Lord Chancellor Thurlow ran counter to his wishes almost at the very
+outset. Lord Liverpool and Mr. Dundas did the same. Thus, to go no further,
+three of the most powerful members of the cabinet were in direct opposition
+to him. The abolition then, amidst this difference of opinion, could never
+become a cabinet measure; but if so, then all his parliamentary efforts in
+this case wanted their usual authority, and he could only exert his
+influence as a private man[A].
+
+[Footnote A: This he did with great effect on one or two occasions. On the
+motion of Mr. Cawthorne in 1791, the cause hung as it were by a thread; and
+would have failed that day, to my knowledge, but for his seasonable
+exertions.]
+
+But a difficulty, still more insuperable, presented itself, in an
+occurrence which took place in the year 1791, but which is much too
+delicate to be mentioned. The explanation of it, however, would convince
+the reader, that all the efforts of Mr. Pitt from that day were rendered
+useless, I mean as to bringing the question, as a minister of state, to a
+favourable issue.
+
+But though Mr. Pitt did not carry this great question, he was yet one of
+the greatest supporters of it. He fostered it in its infancy. If, in his
+public situation, he had then set his face against it, where would have
+been our hope? He upheld it also in its childhood; and though in this state
+of its existence it did not gain from his protection all the strength which
+it was expected it would have acquired, he yet kept it from falling, till
+his successors, in whose administration a greater number of favourable
+circumstances concurred to give it vigour, brought it to triumphant
+maturity.
+
+Lord Grenville and Mr. Fox, having been called to the head of the executive
+government on the death of Mr. Pitt, the cause was ushered into parliament
+under new auspices. In a former year His Majesty had issued a proclamation,
+by which British merchants were forbidden (with certain defined exceptions)
+to import slaves into the colonies, which had been conquered by the British
+arms in the course of the war. This circumstance afforded an opportunity of
+trying the question in the House of Commons with the greatest hope of
+success. Accordingly Sir A. Pigott, the attorney-general, as an officer of
+the crown; brought in a bill on the thirty-first of March 1806, the first
+object of which was, to give effect to the proclamation now mentioned. The
+second was, to prohibit British subjects from being engaged in importing
+slaves into the colonies of any foreign power, whether hostile or neutral.
+And the third was, to prohibit British subjects and British capital from
+being employed in carrying on a Slave-trade in foreign ships; and also to
+prevent the outfit of foreign ships from British ports.
+
+Sir A. Pigott, on the introduction of this bill, made an appropriate
+speech. The bill was supported by Mr. Fox, Sir William Yonge, Mr. Brook,
+and Mr. Bagwell; but opposed by Generals Tarleton and Gascoyne, Mr. Rose,
+Sir Robert Peele, and Sir Charles Price. On the third reading a division
+being called for, there appeared for it thirty-five, and against it only
+thirteen.
+
+On the seventh of May it was introduced into the Lords. The supporters of
+it there were, the Duke of Gloucester, Lord Grenville, the Bishops of
+London and St. Asaph, the Earl of Buckinghamshire, and the Lords Holland,
+Lauderdale, Auckland, Sidmouth, and Ellenborough. The opposers were, the
+Dukes of Clarence and Sussex, the Marquis of Sligo, the Earl of
+Westmoreland, and the Lords Eldon and Sheffield. At length a division took
+place, when there appeared to be in favour of it forty-three, and against
+it eighteen.
+
+During the discussions, to which this bill gave birth, Lord Grenville and
+Mr. Fox declared in substance, in their respective Houses of Parliament,
+that they felt the question of the Slave-trade to be one, which involved
+the dearest interests of humanity, and the most urgent claims of policy,
+justice, and religion; and that, should they succeed in effecting its
+abolition, they would regard that success as entailing more true glory on
+their administration, and more honour and advantage on their country, than
+any other measure, in which they could be engaged. The bill having passed
+(the first, which dismembered this cruel trade,) it was thought proper to
+follow it up in a prudent manner; and, as there was not then time in the
+advanced period of the session to bring in another for the total extinction
+of it, to move a resolution, by which both Houses should record those
+principles, on which the propriety of the latter measure was founded. It
+was judged also expedient that Mr. Fox, as the prime minister in the House
+of Commons, should introduce it there.
+
+On the tenth of June Mr. Fox rose. He began by saying that the motion, with
+which he should conclude, would tend in its consequences to effect the
+total abolition of the Slave-trade; and he confessed that, since he had sat
+in that House (a period of between thirty and forty years), if he had done
+nothing else, but had only been instrumental in carrying through this
+measure, he should think his life well spent; and should retire quite
+satisfied, that he had not lived in vain.
+
+In adverting to the principle of the trade, he noticed some strong
+expressions of Mr. Burke concerning it. "To deal in human flesh and blood,"
+said that great man, "or to deal, not in the labour of men, but in men
+themselves, was to devour the root, instead of enjoying the fruit of human
+diligence."
+
+Mr. Fox then took a view of the opinions of different members of the House
+on this great question; and showed that, though many had opposed the
+abolition, all but two or three, among whom were the members for Liverpool,
+had confessed, that the trade ought to be done away. He then went over the
+different resolutions of the House on the subject, and concluded from
+thence, that they were bound to support his motion.
+
+He combated the argument, that the abolition would ruin the West-Indian
+Islands. In doing this he paid a handsome compliment to the memory of Mr.
+Pitt, whose speech upon this particular point was, he said, the most
+powerful and convincing of any he had ever heard. Indeed they, who had not
+heard it, could have no notion of it. It was a speech, of which he would
+say with the Roman author, reciting the words of the Athenian orator, "Quid
+esset, si ipsum audivissetis!" It was a speech no less remarkable for
+splendid eloquence, than for solid sense and convincing reason; supported
+by calculations founded on facts, and conclusions drawn from premises, as
+correctly as if they had been mathematical propositions; all tending to
+prove that, instead of the West Indian plantations suffering an injury,
+they would derive a material benefit by the abolition of the Slave-trade.
+He then called upon the friends of this great man to show their respect for
+his memory by their votes; and he concluded with moving, "that this House,
+considering the African Slave-trade to be contrary to the principles of
+justice, humanity, and policy, will, with all practicable expedition, take
+effectual measures for the abolition of the said trade, in such a manner,
+and at such a period, as may be deemed advisable."
+
+Sir Ralph Milbank rose, and seconded the motion.
+
+General Tarleton rose next. He deprecated the abolition, on account of the
+effect which it would have on the trade and revenue of the country.
+
+Mr. Francis said the merchants of Liverpool were at liberty to ask for
+compensation; but he, for one, would never grant it for the loss of a
+trade, which had been declared to be contrary to humanity and justice. As
+an uniform friend to this great cause, he wished Mr. Fox had not introduced
+a resolution, but a real bill for the abolition of the Slave-trade. He
+believed that both Houses were then disposed to do it away. He wished the
+golden opportunity might not be lost.
+
+Lord Castlereagh thought it a proposition, on which no one could entertain
+a doubt, that the Slave-trade was a great evil in itself; and that it was
+the duty and policy of Parliament to extirpate it; but he did not think the
+means offered were adequate to the end proposed. The abolition, as a
+political question, was a difficult one. The year 1796 had been once fixed
+upon by the House, as the period when the trade was to cease; but, when the
+time arrived, the resolution was not executed. This was a proof, either
+that the House did not wish for the event, or that they judged it
+impracticable. It would be impossible, he said, to get other nations to
+concur in the measure; and, even if they were to concur, it could not be
+effected. We might restrain the subjects of the parent-state from following
+the trade; but we could not those in our colonies. A hundred frauds would
+be committed by those, which we could not detect. He did not mean by this,
+that the evil was to go on for ever. Had a wise plan been proposed at
+first, it might have been half-cured by this time. The present resolution
+would do no good. It was vague, indefinite, and unintelligible. Such
+resolutions were only the Slave-merchants' harvests. They would go for more
+slaves than usual in the interim. He should have advised a system of duties
+on fresh importations of slaves, progressively increasing to a certain
+extent; and that the amount of these duties should be given to the
+planters, as a bounty to encourage the Negro-population upon their estates.
+Nothing could be done, unless we went hand in hand with the latter. But he
+should deliver himself more fully on this subject, when any thing specific
+should be brought forward in the shape of a bill.
+
+Sir S. Romilly, the solicitor-general, differed from Lord Castlereagh; for
+he thought the resolution of Mr. Fox was very simple and intelligible. If
+there was a proposition vague and indefinite, it was that, advanced by the
+noble lord, of a system of duties on fresh importations, rising
+progressively, and this under the patronage and cooperation of the
+planters. Who could measure the space between the present time and the
+abolition of the trade, if that measure were to depend upon the approbation
+of the colonies?
+
+The cruelty and injustice of the Slave-trade had been established by
+evidence beyond a doubt. It had been shown to be carried on by rapine,
+robbery, and murder; by fomenting and encouraging wars; by false
+accusations; and imaginary crimes. The unhappy victims were torn away not
+only in the time of war, but of profound peace. They were then carried
+across the Atlantic, in a manner too horrible to describe; and afterwards
+subjected to eternal slavery. In support of the continuance of such a
+traffic, he knew of nothing but assertions already disproved, and arguments
+already refuted. Since the year 1796, when it was to cease by a resolution
+of Parliament, no less than three hundred and sixty thousand Africans had
+been torn away from their native land. What an accumulation was this to our
+former guilt!
+
+General Gascoyne made two extraordinary assertions: First, that the trade
+was defensible on Scriptural ground.--"Both thy bondmen and thy bondmaids,
+which thou shalt have, shall be of the heathen, that are round about thee;
+of them shall you have bondmen and bondmaids. And thou shalt take them as
+an heritance for thy children after thee to inherit them for a possession;
+they shall be thy bondmen for ever." Secondly, that the trade had been so
+advantageous to this country, that it would have been advisable even to
+institute a new one, if the old had not existed.
+
+Mr. Wilberforce replied to General Gascoyne. He then took a view of the
+speech of Lord Castlereagh, which he answered point by point. In the course
+of his observations he showed, that the system of duties progressively
+increasing, as proposed by the noble lord, would be one of the most
+effectual modes of perpetuating the Slave-trade. He exposed also the false
+foundation of the hope of any reliance on the cooperation of the colonists.
+The House, he said, had on the motion of Mr. Ellis in the year 1797, prayed
+His Majesty to consult with the colonial legislatures to take such
+measures, as might conduce to the gradual abolition of the African
+Slave-trade. This address was transmitted to them by Lord Melville. It was
+received in some of the islands with a declaration, "that they possibly
+might, in some instances, endeavour to improve the condition of their
+slaves; but they should do this, not with any view to the abolition of the
+Slave-trade; for they considered that trade as their birth-right, which
+could not be taken from them; and that we should deceive ourselves by
+supposing, that they would agree to such a measure." He desired to add to
+this the declaration of General Prevost in his public letter from Dominica.
+Did he not say, when asked what steps had been taken there in consequence
+of the resolution of the House in 1797, "that the act of the legislature,
+entitled an act for the encouragement, protection, and better government of
+slaves, appeared to him to have been considered, from the day it was passed
+until this hour, as a political measure to avert the interference of the
+mother-country in the management of the slaves."
+
+Sir William Yonge censured the harsh language of Sir Samuel Romilly, who
+had applied the terms rapine, robbery, and murder to those, who were
+connected with the Slave-trade. He considered the resolution of Mr. Fox as
+a prelude to a bill for the abolition of that traffic, and this bill as a
+prelude to emancipation, which would not only be dangerous in itself, but
+would change the state of property in the islands.
+
+Lord Henry Petty, after having commented on the speeches of Sir S. Romilly
+and Lord Castlereagh, proceeded to state his own opinion on the trade;
+which was, that it was contrary to justice, humanity, and sound policy, all
+of which he considered to be inseparable. On its commencement in Africa the
+wickedness began. It produced there fraud and violence, robbery and murder.
+It gave birth to false accusations, and a mockery of justice. It was the
+parent of every crime, which could at once degrade and afflict the human
+race. After spreading vice and misery all over this continent, it doomed
+its unhappy victims to hardships and cruelties which were worse than death.
+The first of these was conspicuous in their transportation. It was found
+there, that cruelty begat cruelty; that the system, wicked in its
+beginning, was equally so in its progress; and that it perpetuated its
+miseries wherever it was carried on. Nor was it baneful only to the
+objects, but to the promoters of it. The loss of British seamen in this
+traffic was enormous. One fifth of all, who were employed in it, perished;
+that is, they became the victims of a system, which was founded on fraud,
+robbery, and murder; and which procured to the British nation nothing but
+the execration of mankind. Nor had we yet done with the evils, which
+attended it; for it brought in its train the worst of all moral effects,
+not only as it respected the poor slaves, when transported to the colonies,
+but as it respected those, who had concerns with them there. The arbitrary
+power, which it conferred, afforded men of bad dispositions full scope for
+the exercise of their passions; and it rendered men, constitutionally of
+good dispositions, callous to the misery of others. Thus it depraved the
+nature of all, who were connected with it. These considerations had made
+him a friend to the abolition from the time he was capable of reasoning
+upon it. They were considerations also, which determined the House in the
+year 1782 to adopt a measure of the same kind as the present. Had any thing
+happened to change the opinion of members since? On the contrary, they had
+now the clearest evidence, that all the arguments then used against the
+abolition were fallacious; being founded not upon truth, but on assertions
+devoid of all truth, and derived from ignorance or prejudice.
+
+Having made these remarks, he proved by a number of facts the folly of the
+argument, that the Africans laboured under such a total degradation of
+mental and moral faculties, that they were made for slavery.
+
+He then entered into the great subject of population. He showed that in all
+countries, where there were no unnatural hardships, mankind would support
+themselves. He applied this reasoning to the Negro-population in the West
+Indies; which he maintained could not only be kept up, but increased,
+without any further importations from Africa.
+
+He then noticed the observations of Sir W. Yonge on the words of Sir S.
+Romilly; and desired him to reserve his indignation for those, who were
+guilty of acts of rapine, robbery, and murder, instead of venting it on
+those, who only did their duty in describing them. Never were accounts more
+shocking than those lately sent to government from the West Indies. Lord
+Seaforth, and the Attorney-general, could not refrain, in explaining them,
+from the use of the words murder and torture. And did it become members of
+that House (in order to accommodate the nerves of the friends of the
+Slave-trade) to soften down their expressions, when they were speaking on
+that subject; and to desist from calling that murder and torture, for which
+a governor, and the attorney-general, of one of the islands could find no
+better name?
+
+After making observations relative to the cooperation of foreign powers in
+this great work, he hoped that the House would not suffer itself to be
+drawn, either by opposition or by ridicule, to the right or to the left;
+but that it would, advance straight forward to the accomplishment of the
+most magnanimous act of justice, that was ever achieved by any legislature
+in the world.
+
+Mr. Rose declared, that on the very first promulgation of this question, he
+had proposed to the friends of it the very plan of his noble friend Lord
+Castlereagh; namely, a system of progressive duties, and of bounties for
+the promotion of the Negro-population. This he said to show that he was
+friendly to the principle of the measure. He would now observe, that he did
+not wholly like the present resolution. It was too indefinite. He wished
+also, that something had been said on the subject of compensation. He was
+fearful also, lest the abolition should lead to the dangerous change of
+emancipation. The Negros, he said, could not be in a better state, or more
+faithful to their masters, than they were. In three attacks made by the
+enemy on Dominica, where he had a large property, arms had been put into
+their hands; and every one of them had exerted himself faithfully. With
+respect to the cruel acts in Barbadoes, an account of which had been sent
+to government by Lord Seaforth and the Attorney-general of Barbadoes, he
+had read them; and never had he read any thing on this subject with more
+horror. He would agree to the strongest measures for the prevention of such
+acts in future. He would even give up the colony, which should refuse to
+make the wilful murder of a slave felony. But as to the other, or common,
+evils complained of, he thought the remedy should be gradual; and such also
+as the planters would concur in. He would nevertheless not oppose the
+present resolution.
+
+Mr. Barham considered compensation but reasonable, where losses were to
+accrue from the measure, when it should be put in execution; but he
+believed that the amount of it would be much less than was apprehended. He
+considered emancipation, though so many fears had been expressed about it,
+as forming no objection to the abolition, though he had estates in the West
+Indies himself. Such a measure, if it could be accomplished successfully,
+would be an honour to the country, and a blessing to the planters; but
+preparation must be made for it by rendering the slaves fit for freedom,
+and by creating in them an inclination to free labour. Such a change could
+only be the work of time.
+
+Sir John Newport said that the expressions of Sir S. Romilly, which had
+given such offence, had been used by others; and would be used with
+propriety, while the trade lasted. Some slave-dealers of Liverpool had
+lately attempted to prejudice certain merchants of Ireland in their favour.
+But none of their representations answered; and it was remarkable, that the
+reply made to them was in these words. "We will have no share in a traffic,
+consisting in rapine, blood, and murder." He then took a survey of a system
+of duties progressively increasing, and showed, that it would be utterly
+inefficient; and that there was no real remedy for the different evils
+complained of, but in the immediate prohibition of the trade.
+
+Mr. Canning renewed his professions of friendship to the cause. He did not
+like the present resolution; yet he would vote for it. He should have been
+better pleased with a bill, which would strike at once at the root of this
+detestable commerce.
+
+Mr. Manning wished the question to be deferred to the next session. He
+hoped, compensation would then be brought forward as connected with it.
+Nothing, however, effectual could be done without the concurrence of the
+planters.
+
+Mr. William Smith noticed, in a striking manner, the different
+inconsistencies in the arguments of those, who contended for the
+continuance of the trade.
+
+Mr. Windham deprecated not only the Slave-trade, but slavery also. They
+were essentially connected with each other. They were both evils, and ought
+both of them to be done away. Indeed, if emancipation would follow the
+abolition, he should like the latter measure the better. Rapine, robbery,
+and murder were the true characteristics of this traffic. The same epithets
+had not indeed been applied to slavery, because this was a condition, in
+which some part of the human race had been at every period of the history
+of the world. It was, however, a state, which ought not to be allowed to
+exist. But, notwithstanding all these confessions, he should weigh well the
+consequences of the abolition before he gave it his support. It would be on
+a balance between the evils themselves and the consequences of removing
+them, that he should decide for himself on this question.
+
+Mr. Fox took a view of all the arguments, which had been advanced by the
+opponents of the abolition; and having given an appropriate answer to each,
+the House divided, when there appeared for the resolution one hundred and
+fourteen, and against it but fifteen.
+
+Immediately after this division Mr. Wilberforce moved an address to His
+Majesty, "praying that he would be graciously pleased, to direct a
+negotiation to be entered into, by which foreign powers should be invited
+to cooperate with His Majesty in measures to be adopted for the abolition
+of the African Slave-trade."
+
+This address was carried without a division. It was also moved and carried,
+that "these resolutions be communicated to the Lords; and that their
+concurrence should be desired therein."
+
+On the twenty-fourth of June the Lords met to consider of the resolution
+and address. The Earl of Westmoreland proposed, that both counsel and
+evidence should be heard against them; but his proposition was overruled.
+
+Lord Grenville then read the resolution of the Commons. This resolution, he
+said, stated first, that the Slave-trade was contrary to humanity, justice,
+and sound policy. That it was contrary to humanity was obvious; for
+humanity might be said to be sympathy for the distress of others, or a
+desire to accomplish benevolent ends by good means. But did not the
+Slave-trade convey ideas the very reverse of this definition? It deprived
+men of all those Comforts, in which it pleased the Creator to make the
+happiness of his creatures to consist,--of the blessings of society,--of
+the charities of the dear relationships of husband, wife, father, son, and
+kindred,--of the due discharge of the relative duties of these,--and of
+that freedom, which in its pure and natural sense was one of the greatest
+gifts of God to man.
+
+It was impossible to read the evidence, as it related to this trade,
+without acknowledging the inhumanity of it, and our own disgrace. By what
+means was it kept up in Africa? By wars instigated, not by the passions of
+the natives, but by our avarice. He knew it would be said in reply to this,
+that the slaves, who were purchased by us, would be put to death, if we
+were not to buy them. But what should we say, if it should turn out, that
+we were the causes of those very cruelties, which we affected to prevent?
+But, if it were not so, ought the first nation in the world to condescend
+to be the executioner of savages?
+
+Another way of keeping up the Slave-trade was by the practice of
+man-stealing. The evidence was particularly clear upon this head. This
+practice included violence, and often bloodshed. The inhumanity of it
+therefore could not be doubted.
+
+The unhappy victims, being thus procured, were conveyed, he said, across
+the Atlantic in a manner which justified the charge of inhumanity again.
+Indeed the suffering here was so great, that neither the mind could
+conceive nor the tongue describe it. He had said on a former occasion, that
+in their transportation there was a greater portion of misery condensed
+within a smaller space, than had ever existed in the known world. He would
+repeat his words; for he did not know, how he could express himself better
+on the subject. And, after all these horrors, what was their destiny? It
+was such, as justified the charge in the resolution again: for, after
+having survived the sickness arising from the passage, they were doomed to
+interminable slavery.
+
+We had been, he said, so much accustomed to words, descriptive of the
+cruelty of this traffic, that we had almost forgotten their meaning. He
+wished that some person, educated as an Englishman, with suitable powers of
+eloquence, but now for the first time informed of all the horrors of it,
+were to address their lordships upon it, and he was sure, that they would
+instantly determine that it should cease. But the continuance of it had
+rendered cruelty familiar to us; and the recital of its horrors had been so
+frequent, that we could now hear them stated without being affected as we
+ought to be. He intreated their lordships, however, to endeavour to
+conceive the hard case of the unhappy victims of it; and as he had led them
+to the last stage of their miserable existence, which was in the colonies,
+to contemplate it there. They were there under the arbitrary will of a
+cruel task-master from morning till night. When they went to rest, would
+not their dreams be frightful? When they awoke, would they not awake,
+
+          ----"only to discover sights of woe,
+  Regions of sorrow, doleful shades, where peace
+  And rest can never dwell, hope never comes
+  That comes to all; but torture without end
+  Still urges?"----
+
+They knew no change, except in the humour of their masters, to whom their
+whole destiny was entrusted. We might perhaps flatter ourselves with
+saying, that they were subject to the will of Englishmen. But Englishmen
+were not better than others, when in possession of arbitrary power. The
+very fairest exercise of it was a never-failing corrupter of the heart. But
+suppose it were allowed, that self-interest might operate some little
+against cruelty; yet where was the interest of the overseer or the driver?
+But he knew it would be said, that the evils complained of in the colonies
+had been mitigated. There might be instances of this; but they could never
+be cured, while slavery existed. Slavery took away more than half of the
+human character. Hence the practice, where it existed, of rejecting the
+testimony of the slave: but, if his testimony was rejected, where could be
+his redress against his oppressor?
+
+Having shown the inhumanity, he would proceed to the second point in the
+resolution, or the injustice, of the trade. We had two ideas of justice,
+first, as it belonged to society by virtue of a social compact; and,
+secondly, as it belonged to men, not as citizens of a community, but as
+beings of one common nature. In a state of nature, man had a right to the
+fruit of his own labour absolutely to himself; and one of the main
+purposes, for which he entered into society, was, that he might be better
+protected in the possession of his rights. In both cases therefore it was
+manifestly unjust, that a man should be made to labour during the whole of
+his life, and yet have no benefit from his labour. Hence the Slave-trade
+and the Colonial slavery were a violation of the very principle, upon which
+all law for the protection of property was founded. Whatever benefit was
+derived from that trade to an individual, it was derived from dishonour and
+dishonesty. He forced from the unhappy victim of it that, which the latter
+did not wish to give him; and he gave to the same victim that, which he in
+vain attempted to show was an equivalent to the thing he took, it being a
+thing for which there was no equivalent; and which, if he had not obtained
+by force, he would not have possessed at all. Nor could there be any answer
+to this reasoning, unless it could be proved, that it had pleased God to
+give to the inhabitants of Britain a property in the liberty and life of
+the natives of Africa. But he would go further on this subject. The
+injustice complained of was not confined to the bare circumstance of
+robbing them of the right to their own labour. It was conspicuous
+throughout the system. They, who bought them, became guilty of all the
+crimes which had been committed in procuring them; and, when they possessed
+them, of all the crimes which belonged to their inhuman treatment. The
+injustice in the latter case amounted frequently to murder. For what was it
+but murder to pursue a practice, which produced untimely death to thousands
+of innocent and helpless beings? It was a duty, which their lordships owed
+to their Creator, if they hoped for mercy, to do away this monstrous
+oppression.
+
+With respect to the impolicy of the trade (the third point in the
+resolution), he would say at once, that whatever was inhuman and unjust
+must be impolitic. He had, however, no objection to argue the point upon
+its own particular merits; and, first, he would observe, that a great man,
+Mr. Pitt, now no more, had exerted his vast powers on many subjects to the
+admiration of his hearers; but on none more successfully than on the
+subject of the abolition of the Slave-trade. He proved, after making an
+allowance for the price paid for the slaves in the West Indies, for the
+loss of them in the seasoning, and for the expense of maintaining them
+afterwards, and comparing these particulars with the amount in value of
+their labour there, that the evils endured by the victims of the traffic
+were no gain to the master, in whose service they took place. Indeed Mr.
+Long had laid it down in his History of Jamaica, that the best way to
+secure the planters from ruin would be to do that, which the resolution
+recommended. It was notorious, that when any planter was in distress, and
+sought to relieve himself by increasing the labour on his estate by means
+of the purchase of new slaves, the measure invariably tended to his
+destruction. What then was the importation of fresh Africans but a system,
+tending to the general ruin of the islands?
+
+But it had often been said, that without fresh importations the population
+of the slaves could not be supported in the islands. This, however, was a
+mistake. It had arisen from reckoning the deaths of the imported Africans,
+of whom so many were lost in the seasoning, among the deaths of the
+Creole-slaves. He did not mean to say, that under the existing degree of
+misery the population would greatly increase; but he would maintain, that,
+if the deaths and the births were calculated upon those, who were either
+born, or who had been a long time in the islands, so as to be considered as
+natives, it would be found that the population had not only been kept up,
+but that it had been increased.
+
+If it was true, that the labour of a free man was cheaper than that of a
+slave; and also that the labour of a long imported slave was cheaper than
+that of a fresh imported one; and again, that the chances of mortality were
+much more numerous among the newly imported slaves in the West Indies, than
+among those of old standing there (propositions, which he took to be
+established), we should see new arguments for the impolicy of the trade.
+
+It might be stated also, that the importation of vast bodies of men, who
+had been robbed of their rights, and grievously irritated on that account,
+into our colonies (where their miserable condition opened new sources of
+anger and revenge), was the importation only of the seeds of insurrection
+into them. And here he could not but view with astonishment the reasoning
+of the West Indian planters, who held up the example of St. Domingo as a
+warning against the abolition of the Slave-trade; because the continuance
+of it was one of the great causes of the insurrections and subsequent
+miseries in that devoted island. Let us but encourage importations in the
+same rapid progression of increase every year, which took place in St.
+Domingo, and we should witness the same effect in our own islands.
+
+To expose the impolicy of the trade further, he would observe, that it was
+an allowed axiom, that as the condition of man was improved, he became more
+useful. The history of our own country, in very early times, exhibited
+instances of internal slavery, and this to a considerable extent. But we
+should find that precisely in proportion as that slavery was ameliorated,
+the power and prosperity of the country flourished. This was exactly
+applicable to the case in question. There could be no general amelioration
+of slavery in the West Indies, while the Slave-trade lasted: but, if we
+were to abolish it, we should make it the interest of every owner of slaves
+to do that, which would improve their condition; and which indeed would
+lead ultimately to the annihilation of slavery itself. This great event,
+however, could not be accomplished at once. It could only be effected in a
+course of time.
+
+It would be endless, he said, to go into all the cases, which would
+manifest the impolicy of this odious traffic. Inhuman as it was, unjust as
+it was, he believed it to be equally impolitic; and if their lordships
+should be of this opinion also, he hoped they would agree to that part of
+the resolution, in which these truths were expressed. With respect to the
+other part of it, or that they would proceed to abolish the trade, he
+observed, that neither the time nor the manner of doing it were specified.
+Hence if any of them should differ as to these particulars, they might yet
+vote for the resolution; as they were not pledged to any thing definite in
+these respects; provided they thought that the trade should be abolished at
+some time or other; and he did not believe, that there was any one of them,
+who would sanction its continuance for ever.
+
+Lord Hawkesbury said, that he did not mean to discuss the question on the
+ground of justice and humanity, as contradistinguished from sound policy.
+If it could fairly be made out, that the African Slave-trade was contrary
+to justice and humanity, it ought to be abolished. It did not, however,
+follow, because a great evil subsisted, that therefore it should be
+removed; for it might be comparatively a less evil, than that which would
+accompany the attempt to remove it. The noble lord, who had just spoken,
+had exemplified this: for though slavery was a great evil in itself, he was
+of opinion, that it could not be done away but in a course of time.
+
+A state of slavery, he said, had existed in Africa from the earliest time;
+and, unless other nations would concur with England in the measure of the
+abolition, we could not change it for the better.
+
+Slavery had existed also throughout all Europe. It had now happily in a
+great measure been done away. But how? Not by acts of parliament; for these
+might have retarded the event; but by the progress of civilization, which
+removed the evil in a gradual and rational manner.
+
+He then went over the same ground of argument, as when a member of the
+Commons in 1792. He said that the inhumanity of the abolition was visible
+in this, that not one slave less would be taken from Africa; and that such,
+as were taken from it, would suffer more than they did now, in the hands of
+foreigners. He maintained also, as before, that the example of St. Domingo
+afforded one of the strongest arguments against the abolition of the trade.
+And he concluded by objecting to the resolution, inasmuch as it could do no
+good; for the substance of it would be to be discussed again in a future
+session.
+
+The Bishop of London (Dr. Porteus) began by noticing the concession of the
+last speaker, namely, that, if the trade was contrary to humanity and
+justice, it ought to be abolished. He expected, he said, that the noble
+lord would have proved, that it was not contrary to these great principles,
+before he had supported its continuance; but not a word had he said to
+show, that the basis of the resolution in these respects was false. It
+followed then, he thought, that as the noble lord had not disproved the
+premises, he was bound to abide by the conclusion.
+
+The ways, he said, in which the Africans were reduced to slavery in their
+own country, were by wars, many of which were excited for the purpose; by
+the breaking up of villages; by kidnapping; and by convictions for a
+violation of their own laws. Of the latter class many were accused falsely,
+and of crimes which did not exist. He then read a number of extracts from
+the evidence examined before the privy council, and from the histories of
+those, who, having lived in Africa, had thrown light upon this subject,
+before the question was agitated. All these, he said, (and similar
+instances could be multiplied,) proved the truth of the resolution, that
+the African Slave-trade was contrary to the principles of humanity,
+justice, and sound policy.
+
+It was moreover, he said, contrary to the principles of the religion we
+professed. It was not superfluous to say this, when it had been so
+frequently asserted, that it was sanctioned both by the Jewish and the
+Christian dispensations. With respect to the Jews he would observe, that
+there was no such thing as perpetual slavery among them. Their slaves were
+of two kinds, those of their own nation, and those from the country round
+about them. The former were to be set free on the seventh year; and the
+rest, of whatever nation, on the fiftieth, or on the year of Jubilee. With
+respect to the Christian dispensation, it was a libel to say, that it
+countenanced such a traffic. It opposed it both in its spirit and in its
+principle. Nay, it opposed it positively; for it classed men-stealers, or
+slave-traders, among the murderers of fathers and mothers and the most
+profane criminals upon earth.
+
+The antiquity of slavery in Africa, which the noble lord had glanced at,
+afforded, he said, no argument for its continuance. Such a mode of defence
+would prevent for ever the removal of any evil. It would justify the
+practice of the Chinese, who exposed their infants in the streets to
+perish. It would also justify piracy; for that practice existed long before
+we knew any thing of the African Slave-trade.
+
+He then combated the argument, that we did a kindness to the Africans by
+taking them from their homes; and concluded, by stating to their lordships,
+that, if they refused to sanction the resolution, they would establish
+these principles, "that though individuals might not rob and murder, yet
+that nations might--that though individuals incurred the penalties of death
+by such practices, yet that bodies of men might commit them with impunity
+for the purposes of lucre,--and that for such purposes they were not only
+to be permitted, but encouraged."
+
+The Lord Chancellor (Erskine) confessed, that he was not satisfied with his
+own conduct on this subject. He acknowledged with deep contrition, that,
+during the time he was a member of the other House, he had not once
+attended, when this great question was discussed.
+
+In the West Indies he could say personally, that the slaves were well
+treated, where he had an opportunity of seeing them. But no judgement was
+to be formed there with respect to the evils complained of. They must be
+appreciated as they existed in the trade. Of these he had also been an
+eye-witness. It was on this account that he felt contrition for not having
+attended the House on this subject; for there were some cruelties in this
+traffic which the human imagination could not aggravate. He had witnessed
+such scenes over the whole coast of Africa: and he could say, that, if
+their lordships could only have a sudden glimpse of them, they would be
+struck with horror; and would be astonished, that they could ever have been
+permitted to exist. What then would they say to their continuance year
+after year, and from age to age?
+
+From information, which he could not dispute, he was warranted in saying,
+that on this continent husbands were fraudulently and forcibly severed from
+their wives, and parents from their children; and that all the ties of
+blood and affection were torn up by the roots. He had himself seen the
+unhappy natives put together in heaps in the hold of a ship, where, with
+every possible attention to them, their situation must have been
+intolerable. He had also heard proved, in courts of justice, facts still
+more dreadful than those which he had seen. One of these he would just
+mention. The slaves on board a certain ship rose in a mass to liberate
+themselves; and having advanced far in the pursuit of their object, it
+became necessary to repel them by force. Some of them yielded; some of them
+were killed in the scuffle; but many of them actually jumped into the sea
+and were drowned; thus preferring death to the misery of their situation;
+while others hung to the ship, repenting of their rashness, and bewailing
+with frightful noises their horrid fate. Thus the whole vessel exhibited
+but one hideous scene of wretchedness. They, who were subdued, and secured
+in chains, were seized with the flux, which carried many of them off. These
+things were proved in a trial before a British jury, which had to consider,
+whether this was a loss, which fell within the policy of insurance, the
+slaves being regarded as if they had been only a cargo of dead matter. He
+could mention other instances, but they were much too shocking to be
+described. Surely their lordships could never consider such a traffic to be
+consistent with humanity or justice. It was impossible.
+
+That the trade had long subsisted there was no doubt; but this was no
+argument for its continuance. Many evils of much longer standing had been
+done away; and it was always our duty to attempt to remove them. Should we
+not exult in the consideration, that we, the inhabitants of a small island,
+at the extremity of the globe, almost at its north pole, were become the
+morning-star to enlighten the nations of the earth, and to conduct them out
+of the shades of darkness into the realms of light; thus exhibiting to an
+astonished and an admiring world the blessings of a free constitution? Let
+us then not allow such a glorious opportunity to escape us.
+
+It had been urged that we should suffer by the abolition of the
+Slave-trade. He believed we should not suffer. He believed that our duty
+and our interest were inseparable: and he had no difficulty in saying, in
+the face of the world, that his own opinion was, that the interests of a
+nation would be best preserved by its adherence to the principles of
+humanity, justice, and religion.
+
+The Earl of Westmoreland said, that the African Slave-trade might be
+contrary to humanity and justice, and yet it might be politic; at least, it
+might be inconsistent with humanity, and yet be not inconsistent with
+justice: this was the case, when we executed a criminal, or engaged in war.
+
+It was, however, not contrary to justice; for justice in this case must be
+measured by the law of nations. But the purchase of slaves was not contrary
+to this law. The Slave-trade was a trade with the consent of the
+inhabitants of two nations, and procured by no terror, nor by any act of
+violence whatever. Slavery had existed from the first ages of the world,
+not only in Africa, but throughout the habitable globe; among the Persians,
+Greeks, and Romans; and he could compare, with great advantage to his
+argument, the wretched condition of the slaves in these ancient states with
+that of those in our colonies. Slavery too had been allowed in a nation,
+which was under the especial direction of Providence. The Jews were allowed
+to hold the heathen in bondage. He admitted, that what the learned prelate
+had said relative to the emancipation of the latter in the year of jubilee
+was correct; but he denied that his quotation relative to the stealers of
+men referred to the Christian religion. It was a mere allusion to that,
+which was done contrary to the law of nations, which was the only measure
+of justice between states.
+
+With respect to the inhumanity of the trade, he would observe, that if
+their lordships, sitting there as legislators, were to set their faces
+against every thing which appeared to be inhuman, much of the security on
+which their lives and property depended, might be shaken, if not totally
+destroyed. The question was, not whether there was not some evil attending
+the Slave-trade, but whether by the measure now before them they should
+increase or diminish the quantum of human misery in the world. He believed,
+for one, considering the internal state of Africa, and the impossibility of
+procuring the concurrence of foreign nations in the measure, that they
+would not be able to do any good by the adoption of it.
+
+As to the impolicy of the trade, the policy of it, on the other hand, was
+so great, that he trembled at the consequences of its abolition. The
+property connected with this question amounted to a hundred millions. The
+annual produce of the islands was eighteen millions, and it yielded a
+revenue of four millions annually. How was this immense property and income
+to be preserved? Some had said it would be preserved, because the Black
+population in the islands could be kept up without further supplies. But
+the planters denied this assertion; and they were the best judges of the
+subject.
+
+He condemned the resolution as a libel upon the wisdom of the law of the
+land, and upon the conduct of their ancestors. He condemned it also,
+because, if followed up, it would lead to the abolition of the trade, and
+the abolition of the trade to the emancipation of the slaves in our
+colonies.
+
+The Bishop of St. Asaph (Dr. Horsley) said, that, allowing the slaves in
+the West Indies even to be pampered with delicacies, or to be put to rest
+on a bed of roses, they could not be happy, for--a slave would be still a
+slave. The question, however, was not concerning the alteration of their
+condition, but whether we should abolish the practice, by which they were
+put in that condition? Whether it was humane, just, and politic in us so to
+place them? This question was easily answered; for he found it difficult to
+form any one notion of humanity, which did not include a desire of
+promoting the happiness of others; and he knew of no other justice than
+that, which was founded on the principle of doing to others, as we should
+wish they should do to us. And these principles of humanity and justice
+were so clear, that he found it difficult to make them clearer. Perhaps no
+difficulty was greater than that of arguing a self-evident proposition, and
+such he took to be the character of the proposition, that the Slave-trade
+was inhuman and unjust.
+
+It had been said, that slavery had existed from the beginning of the world.
+He would allow it. But had such a trade as the Slave-trade ever existed
+before? Would the noble Earl, who had talked of the slavery of ancient Rome
+and Greece, assert, that in the course of his whole reading, however
+profound it might have been, he had found any thing resembling such a
+traffic? Where did it appear in history, that ships were regularly fitted
+out to fetch away tens of thousands of persons annually, against their
+will, from their native land; that these were subject to personal
+indignities and arbitrary punishments during their transportation; and that
+a certain proportion of them, owing to suffocation and other cruel causes,
+uniformly perished? He averred, that nothing like the African Slave-trade
+was ever practised in any nation upon earth.
+
+If the trade then was repugnant, as he maintained it was, to justice and
+humanity, he did not see how, without aiding and abetting injustice and
+inhumanity, any man could sanction it: and he thought that the noble baron
+(Hawkesbury) was peculiarly bound to support the resolution; for he had
+admitted that if it could be shown, that the trade was contrary to these
+principles, the question would be at an end. Now this contrariety had been
+made apparent, and his lordship had not even attempted to refute it.
+
+He would say but little on the subject of revealed religion, as it related
+to this question, because the reverend prelate, near him, had spoken so
+fully upon it. He might observe, however, that at the end of the sixth
+year, when the Hebrew slave was emancipated, he was to be furnished
+liberally from the flock, the floor, and the wine-press of his master.
+
+Lord Holland lamented the unfaithfulness of the noble baron (Hawkesbury) to
+his own principles, and the inflexible opposition of the noble earl
+(Westmoreland), from both which circumstances he despaired for ever of any
+assistance from them to this glorious cause. The latter wished to hear
+evidence on the subject, for the purpose, doubtless, of delay. He was sure,
+that the noble earl did not care what the evidence would say on either
+side; for his mind was made up, that the trade ought not to be abolished.
+
+The noble earl had made a difference between humanity, justice, and sound
+policy. God forbid, that we should ever admit such distinctions in this
+country! But he had gone further, and said, that a thing might be inhuman,
+and yet not unjust; and he put the case of the execution of a criminal in
+support of it. Did he not by this position confound all notions of right
+and wrong in human institutions? When a criminal was justly executed, was
+not the execution justice to him who suffered, and humanity to the body of
+the people at large?
+
+The noble earl had said also, that we should do no good by the abolition,
+because other nations would not concur in it. He did not know what other
+nations would do; but this he knew, that we ourselves ought not to be
+unjust because they should refuse to be honest. It was, however,
+self-obvious, that, if we admitted no more slaves into our colonies, the
+evil would be considerably diminished.
+
+Another of his arguments did not appear to be more solid; for surely the
+Slave-trade ought not to be continued, merely because the effect of the
+abolition might ultimately be that of the emancipation of the slaves; an
+event, which would be highly desirable in its due time.
+
+The noble lord had also said, that the planters were against the abolition,
+and that without their consent it could never be accomplished. He differed
+from him in both these points: for, first, he was a considerable planter
+himself, and yet he was a friend to the measure: secondly, by cutting off
+all further supplies, the planters would be obliged to pay more attention
+to the treatment of their slaves, and this treatment would render the trade
+unnecessary.
+
+The noble earl had asserted also, that the population in the West Indies
+could not be kept up without further importations; and this was the opinion
+of the planters, who were the best judges of the subject. As a planter he
+differed from his lordship again. If indeed all the waste lands were to be
+brought into cultivation, the present population would be insufficient. But
+the government had already determined, that the trade should not be
+continued for such a purpose. We were no longer to continue pirates, or
+executioners for every petty tyrant in Africa, in order that every holder
+of a bit of land in our islands might cultivate the whole of his allotment;
+a work, which might require centuries. Making this exception, he would
+maintain, that no further importations were necessary. Few or no slaves had
+been imported into Antigua for many years; and he believed, that even some
+had been exported from it. As to Jamaica, although in one year fifteen
+thousand died in consequence of a hurricane and famine, the excess of
+deaths over the births during the twenty years preceding 1788 was only one
+per cent. Deducting, however, the mortality of the newly imported slaves,
+and making the calculation upon the Negros born in the island or upon those
+who had been long there, he believed the births and the deaths would be
+found equal. He had a right therefore to argue that the Negros, with better
+treatment (which the abolition would secure), would not only maintain but
+increase their population, without any aid from Africa. He would add, that
+the newly imported Africans brought with them not only disorders, which
+ravaged the plantations, but danger from the probability of insurrections.
+He wished most heartily for the total abolition of the trade. He was
+convinced, that it was both inhuman, unjust, and impolitic. This had always
+been his opinion as an individual since he was capable of forming one. It
+was his opinion then as a legislator. It was his opinion as a colonial
+proprietor; and it was his opinion as an Englishman, wishing for the
+prosperity of the British empire.
+
+The Earl of Suffolk contended, that the population of the slaves in the
+islands could be kept up by good treatment, so as to be sufficient for
+their cultivation. He entered into a detail of calculations from the year
+1772 downwards in support of this statement. He believed all the miseries
+of St. Domingo arose from the vast importation of Africans. He had such a
+deep sense of the inhumanity and injustice of the Slave-trade, that, if
+ever he wished any action of his life to be recorded, it would be that of
+the vote he should then give in support of the resolution.
+
+Lord Sidmouth said, that he agreed to the substance of the resolution, but
+yet he could not support it. Could he be convinced that the trade would be
+injurious to the cause of humanity and justice, the question with him would
+be decided; for policy could not be opposed to humanity and justice. He had
+been of opinion for the last twenty years, that the interests of the
+country and those of numerous individuals were so deeply blended with this
+traffic, that we should be very cautious how we proceeded. With respect to
+the cultivation of new lands, he would not allow a single Negro to be
+imported for such a purpose; but he must have a regard to the old
+plantations. When he found a sufficient increase in the Black population to
+continue the cultivation already established there, then, but not till
+then, he would agree to an abolition of the trade.
+
+Earl Stanhope said he would not detain their lordships long. He could not,
+however, help expressing his astonishment at what had fallen from the last
+speaker; for he had evidently confessed that the Slave-trade was inhuman
+and unjust, and then he had insinuated, that it was neither inhuman nor
+unjust to continue it. A more paradoxical or whimsical opinion, he
+believed, was never entertained, or more whimsically expressed in that
+house. The noble viscount had talked of the interests of the planters: but
+this was but a part of the subject; for surely the people of Africa were
+not to be forgotten. He did not understand the practice of complimenting
+the planters with the lives of men, women, and helpless children by
+thousands for the sake of their pecuniary advantage; and they, who adopted
+it, whatever they might think of the consistency of their own conduct,
+offered an insult to the sacred names of humanity and justice.
+
+The noble earl (Westmoreland) had asked what would be the practical effect
+of the abolition of the Slave-trade. He would inform him. It would do away
+the infamous practices, which took place in Africa; it would put an end to
+the horrors of the passage; it would save many thousands of our
+fellow-creatures from the miseries of eternal slavery; it would oblige the
+planters to treat those better, who were already in that unnatural state;
+it would increase the population of our islands; it would give a death-blow
+to the diabolical calculations, whether it was cheaper to work the Negros
+to death and recruit the gangs by fresh importations, or to work them
+moderately and to treat them kindly. He knew of no event, which would be
+attended with so many blessings.
+
+There was but one other matter, which he would notice. The noble baron
+(Hawkesbury) had asserted, that all the horrors of St. Domingo were the
+consequence of the speculative opinions, which were current in a
+neighbouring kingdom on the subject of liberty. They had, he said, no such
+origin. They were owing to two causes; first, to the vast number of Negros
+recently imported into that island; and, secondly, to a scandalous breach
+of faith by the French legislature. This legislature held out the idea not
+only of the abolition of the Slave-trade, but also of all slavery; but it
+broke its word. It held forth the rights of man to the whole human race,
+and then, in practice, it most infamously abandoned every article in these
+rights; so that it became the scorn of all the enlightened and virtuous
+part of mankind. These were the great causes of the miseries of St.
+Domingo, and not the speculative opinions of France.
+
+Earl Grosvenor could not but express the joy he felt at the hope, after all
+his disappointments, that this wicked trade would be done away. He hoped
+that His Majesty's ministers were in earnest, and that they would, early in
+the next session, take this great question up with a determination to go
+through with it; so that another year should not pass, before we extended
+the justice and humanity of the country to the helpless and unhappy
+inhabitants of Africa.
+
+Earl Fitzwilliam said he was fearful, lest the calamities of St. Domingo
+should be brought home to our own islands. We ought not, he thought, too
+hastily to adopt the resolution on that account. He should therefore
+support the previous question.
+
+Lord Ellenborough said, he was sorry to differ from his noble friend (Lord
+Sidmouth), and yet he could not help saying that if after twenty years,
+during which this question had been discussed by both Houses of Parliament,
+their Lordships' judgments were not ripe for its determination, he could
+not look with any confidence to a time, when they would be ready to decide
+it.
+
+The question then before them was short and plain. It was, whether the
+African Slave-trade was inhuman, unjust, and impolitic. If the premises
+were true, we could not too speedily bring it to a conclusion.
+
+The subject had been frequently brought before him in a way, which had
+enabled him to become acquainted with it; and he was the more anxious on
+that account to deliver his sentiments upon it as a peer of Parliament,
+without reference to any thing he had been called upon to do in the
+discharge of his professional duty. When he looked at the mode in which
+this traffic commenced, by the spoliation of the rights of a whole quarter
+of the globe; by the misery of whole nations of helpless Africans; by
+tearing them from their homes, their families, and their friends; when he
+saw the unhappy victims carried away by force; thrust into a dungeon in the
+hold of a ship, in which the interval of their passage from their native to
+a foreign land was filled up with misery, under every degree of debasement,
+and in chains; and when he saw them afterwards consigned to an eternal
+slavery; he could not but contemplate the whole system with horror. It was
+inhuman in its beginning, inhuman in its progress, and inhuman to the very
+end.
+
+Nor was it more inhuman than it was unjust. The noble earl, (Westmoreland)
+in adverting to this part of the question, had considered it as a question
+of justice between two nations. But it was a moral question. Although the
+natives of Africa might be taken by persons authorized by their own laws to
+take and dispose of them, and the practice therefore might be said to be
+legal as it respected them, yet no man could doubt, whatever ordinances
+they might have to sanction it, that it was radically, essentially, and in
+principle, unjust; and therefore there could be no excuse for us in
+continuing it. On the general principle of natural justice, which was
+paramount to all ordinances of men, it was quite impossible to defend this
+traffic; and he agreed with the noble baron (Hawkesbury) that, having
+decided that it was inhuman and unjust, we should not inquire whether it
+was impolitic. Indeed, the inquiry itself would be impious; for it was the
+common ordinance of God, that that, which was inhuman and unjust, should
+never be for the good of man. Its impolicy therefore was included in its
+injustice and its inhumanity. And he had no doubt, when the importations
+were stopped, that the planters would introduce a change of system among
+their slaves, which would increase their population, so as to render any
+further supplies from Africa unnecessary. It had been proved indeed, that
+the Negro-population in some of the islands was already in this desirable
+state. Many other happy effects would follow. As to the losses which would
+arise from the abolition of the Slave-trade, they, who were interested in
+the continuance of it, had greatly over-rated, them. When pleading formerly
+in his professional capacity for the merchants of Liverpool at their
+lordships' bar, he had often delivered statements, which he had received
+from them; and which he afterward discovered to be grossly incorrect. He
+could say from his own knowledge, that the assertion of the noble earl
+(Westmoreland), that property to the amount of a hundred millions would be
+endangered, was wild and fanciful. He would not however deny, that some
+loss might accompany the abolition; but there could be no difficulty in
+providing for it. Such a consideration ought not to be allowed to impede
+their progress in getting rid of an horrible injustice.
+
+But it had been said, that we should do but little in the cause of humanity
+by abolishing the Slave-trade; because other nations would continue it. He
+did not believe they would. He knew that America was about to give it up.
+He believed the states of Europe would give it up. But, supposing that they
+were all to continue it, would not our honour be the greater? Would not our
+virtue be the more signal? for then,
+
+                  ----"faithful we
+  Among the faithless found"----
+
+to which he would add, that undoubtedly we should diminish the evil, as far
+as the number of miserable beings was concerned, which was accustomed to be
+transported to our own colonies.
+
+Earl Spencer agreed with the noble viscount (Sidmouth) that the
+amelioration of the condition of the slaves was an object, which might be
+effected in the West Indies; but he was certain, that the most effectual
+way of improving it would be by the total and immediate abolition of the
+Slave-trade; and for that reason he would support the resolution. Had the
+resolution held out emancipation to them, it would not have had his assent;
+for it would have ill become the character of this country, if it had been
+once promised, to have withheld it from them. It was to such deception that
+the horrors of St. Domingo were to be attributed. He would not enter into
+the discussion of the general subject at present. He was convinced that the
+trade was what the resolution stated it to be, inhuman, unjust, and
+impolitic. He wished therefore, most earnestly indeed, for its abolition.
+As to the mode of effecting it, it should be such, as would be attended
+with the least inconvenience to all parties. At the same time he would not
+allow small inconveniences to stand in the way of the great claims of
+humanity, justice, and religion.
+
+The question was then put on the resolution, and carried by a majority of
+forty-one to twenty. The same address also to His Majesty, which had been
+agreed upon by the Commons, was directly afterward moved. This also was
+carried, but without the necessity of a division.
+
+The resolution and the motion having passed both Houses, one other
+parliamentary measure was yet necessary to complete the proceedings of this
+session. It was now almost universally believed, in consequence of what had
+already taken place there, that the Slave-trade had received its
+death-wound; and that it would not long survive it. It was supposed
+therefore, that the slave-merchants would, in the interim, fit out not only
+all the vessels they had, but even buy others, to make what might be called
+their last harvest. Hence extraordinary scenes of rapine, and murder, would
+be occasioned in Africa. To prevent these a new bill was necessary. This
+was accordingly introduced into the Commons. It enacted, but with one
+exception, that from and after the first of August 1806, no vessel should
+clear out for the Slave-trade, unless it should have been previously
+employed by the same owner or owners in the said trade, or should be proved
+to have been contracted for previously to the tenth of June 1806, for the
+purpose of being employed in that trade. It may now be sufficient to say
+that this bill also passed both houses of parliament; soon after which the
+session ended.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER X.
+
+_Continuation from July 18O6 to March 18O7--Death of Mr. Fox--Bill for the
+total abolition of the Slave-trade carried in the House of Lords--sent from
+thence to the Commons--amended and passed there--carried back, and passed
+with its amendments by the Lords--receives the royal assent--Reflections on
+this great event._
+
+
+It was impossible for the committee to look back to the proceedings of the
+last session, as they related to the great question under their care,
+without feeling a profusion of joy, as well as of gratitude to those, by
+whose virtuous endeavours they had taken place. But, alas, how few of our
+earthly pleasures come to us without alloy! a melancholy event succeeded.
+We had the painful intelligence, in the month of October 1806, that one of
+the oldest and warmest friends of the cause was then numbered with the
+dead.
+
+Of the character of Mr. Fox, as it related to this cause, I am bound to
+take notice. And, first, I may observe, that he professed an attachment to
+it almost as soon as it was ushered into the world. Early in the year 1788,
+when he was waited upon by a deputation of the committee, his language was,
+as has appeared in the first volume, "that he would support their object to
+its fullest extent, being convinced that there was no remedy for the evil
+but in the total abolition of the trade."
+
+His subsequent conduct evinced the sincerity of his promises. He was
+constant in his attendance in Parliament whenever the question was brought
+forward; and he never failed to exert his powerful eloquence in its favour.
+The countenance, indeed, which he gave it, was of the greatest importance
+to its welfare; for most of his parliamentary friends, who followed his
+general political sentiments, patronized it also. By the aid of these,
+joined to that of the private friends of Mr. Pitt, and of other members,
+who espoused it without reference to party, it was always so upheld, that
+after the year 1791 no one of the defeats, which it sustained, was
+disgraceful. The majority on the side of those interested in the
+continuance of the trade was always so trifling, that the abolitionists
+were preserved a formidable body, and their cause respectable.
+
+I never heard whether Mr. Fox, when he came into power, made any
+stipulations with His Majesty on the subject of the Slave-trade: but this I
+know, that he determined upon the abolition of it, if it were practicable,
+as the highest glory of his administration, and as the greatest earthly
+blessing which it was in the power of the Government to bestow; and that he
+took considerable pains to convince some of his colleagues in the cabinet
+of the propriety of the measure.
+
+When the resolution, which produced the debates in parliament, as detailed
+in the last chapter, was under contemplation, it was thought expedient that
+Mr. Fox, as the minister of state in the House of Commons, should introduce
+it himself. When applied to for this purpose he cheerfully undertook the
+office, thus acting in consistency with his public declaration in the year
+1791, "that in whatever situation he might ever be, he would use his
+warmest efforts for the promotion of this righteous cause."
+
+Before the next measure, or the bill to prevent the sailing of any new
+vessel in the trade after the first of August, was publicly disclosed, it
+was suggested to him, that the session was nearly over; that he might
+possibly weary both Houses by another motion on the subject; and that, if
+he were to lose it, or to experience a diminution of his majorities in
+either, he might injure the cause; which was then in the road to triumph.
+To this objection he replied, "that he believed both Houses were disposed
+to get rid of the trade; that his own life was precarious; that if he
+omitted to serve the injured Africans on this occasion, he might have no
+other opportunity of doing it; and that he dared not, under these
+circumstances, neglect so great a duty."
+
+This prediction relative to himself became unfortunately verified; for his
+constitution, after this, began to decline, till at length his mortal
+destiny, in the eyes of his medical attendants, was sealed. But even then,
+when removed by pain and sickness from the discussion of political
+subjects, he never forgot this cause. In his own sufferings he was not
+unmindful of those of the injured Africans. "Two things," said he, on his
+death-bed, "I wish earnestly to see accomplished--peace with Europe,--and
+the abolition of the Slave-trade." But knowing well, that we could much
+better protect ourselves against our own external enemies, than this
+helpless people against their oppressors, he added, "but of the two I wish
+the latter." These sentiments he occasionally repeated, so that the subject
+was frequently in his thoughts in his last illness. Nay, "the very hope of
+the abolition (to use the expression of Lord Howick in the House of
+Commons) quivered on his lips in the last hour of it." Nor is it
+improbable, if earthly scenes ever rise to view at that awful crisis, and
+are perceptible, that it might have occupied his mind in the last moment of
+his existence. Then indeed would joy ineffable, from a conviction of having
+prepared the way for rescuing millions of human beings from misery, have
+attended the spirit on its departure from the body; and then also would
+this spirit, most of all purified when in the contemplation of peace,
+good-will, and charity upon earth, be in the fittest state, on gliding from
+its earthly cavern, to commix with the endless ocean of benevolence and
+love.
+
+At length the session of 1807 commenced. It was judged advisable by Lord
+Grenville, that the expected motion on this subject should, contrary to the
+practice hitherto adopted, be agitated first in the Lords. Accordingly, on
+the second of January he presented a bill, called an act for the abolition
+of the Slave-trade; but he then proposed only to print it, and to let it
+lie on the table, that it might be maturely considered, before it should be
+discussed.
+
+On the fourth no less than four counsel were heard against the bill.
+
+On the fifth the debate commenced. But of this I shall give no detailed
+account; nor, indeed, of any of those, which followed it. The truth is,
+that the subject has been exhausted. They, who spoke in favour of the
+abolition, said very little that was new concerning it. They, who spoke
+against it, brought forward, as usual, nothing but negative assertions and
+fanciful conjectures. To give therefore, what was said by both parties at
+these times, would be but useless repetition[A]. To give, on the other
+hand, that which was said on one side only would appear partial. Hence I
+shall offer to the reader little more than a narrative of facts upon these
+occasions.
+
+[Footnote A: The different debates in both Houses on this occasion would
+occupy the half of another volume. This is another circumstance, which
+reconciles me to the omission. But that, which reconciles me the most is,
+that they will be soon published. In these debates justice has been done to
+every individual concerned in them.]
+
+Lord Grenville opened the debate by a very luminous speech. He was
+supported by the Duke of Glocester, the Bishop of Durham (Dr. Barrington),
+the Earls Moira, Selkirk, and Roslyn, and the Lords Holland, King, and
+Hood. The opponents of the bill were the Duke of Clarence, the Earls
+Westmoreland and St. Vincent, and the Lords Sidmouth, Eldon, and
+Hawkesbury.
+
+
+The question being called for at four o'clock in the morning, it appeared
+that the personal votes and proxies in favour of Lord Grenville's motion
+amounted to one hundred, and those against it to thirty-six. Thus passed
+the first bill in England, which decreed, that the African Slave-trade
+should cease. And here I cannot omit paying to his Highness the Duke of
+Glocester the tribute of respect, which is due to him, for having opposed
+the example of his royal relations on this subject in behalf of an helpless
+and oppressed people. The sentiments too, which he delivered on this
+occasion, ought not to be forgotten. "This trade," said he, "is contrary to
+the principles of the British constitution. It is, besides, a cruel and
+criminal traffic in the blood of my fellow-creatures. It is a foul stain on
+the national character. It is an offence to the Almighty. On every ground
+therefore on which a decision can be made; on the ground of policy, of
+liberty, of humanity, of justice, but, above all, on the ground of
+religion, I shall vote for its immediate extinction."
+
+On the tenth of February the bill was carried to the House of Commons. On
+the twentieth, counsel were heard against it; after which, by agreement,
+the second reading of it took place. On the twenty-third the question being
+put for the commitment of it, Lord Viscount Howick (now Earl Grey) began an
+eloquent speech. After he had proceeded in it some way, he begged leave to
+enter his protest against certain principles of relative justice, which had
+been laid down. "The merchants and planters," said he, "have an undoubted
+right, in common with other subjects of the realm, to demand justice at our
+hands. But that, which they denominate justice, does not correspond with
+the legitimate character of that virtue; for they call upon us to violate
+the rights of others, and to transgress our own moral duties. That, which
+they distinguish as justice, involves in itself the greatest injury to
+others. It is not in fact justice, which they demand, but--favour--and
+favour to themselves at the expense of the most grievous oppression of
+their fellow-creatures."
+
+He then argued the question upon the ground of policy. He showed by a
+number of official documents, how little this trade had contributed to the
+wealth of the nation, being but a fifty-fourth part of its export trade;
+and he contended that as four-sevenths of it had been cut off by His
+Majesty's proclamation, and the passing of the foreign Slave-bill in a
+former year, no detriment of any consequence would arise from the present
+measure.
+
+He entered into an account of the loss of seamen, and of the causes of the
+mortality, in this trade.
+
+He went largely into the subject of the Negro-population in the islands
+from official documents, giving an account of it up to the latest date. He
+pointed out the former causes of its diminution, and stated how the
+remedies for these would follow.
+
+He showed how, even if the quantity of colonial produce should be
+diminished for a time, this disadvantage would, in a variety of instances,
+be more than counterbalanced by advantages, which would not only be great
+in themselves, but permanent.
+
+He then entered into a refutation of the various objections which had been
+made to the abolition, in an eloquent and perspicuous manner; and concluded
+by appealing to the great authorities of Mr. Pitt and Mr. Fox in behalf of
+the proposed measure. "These precious ornaments, he said, of their age and
+country had examined the subject with all the force of their capacious
+minds. On this question they had dismissed all animosity--all difference of
+opinion--and had proceeded in union;--and he believed, that the best
+tribute of respect we could show, or the most splendid monument we could
+raise, to their memories, Would be by the adoption of the glorious measure
+of the abolition of the Slave-trade."
+
+Lord Howick was supported by Mr. Roscoe, who was then one of the members
+for Liverpool; by Mr. Lushington, Mr. Fawkes, Lord Mahon, Lord Milton, Sir
+John Doyle, Sir Samuel Romilly, Mr. Wilberforce, and Earl Percy, the latter
+of whom wished that a clause might be put into the bill, by which all the
+children of slaves, born after January 1810, should be made free. General
+Gascoyne and Mr. Hibbert opposed the bill. Mr. Manning hoped that
+compensation would be made to the planters in case of loss. Mr. Bathurst
+and Mr. Hiley Addington preferred a plan for gradual abolition to the
+present mode. These having spoken, it appeared on a division that there
+were for the question two hundred and eighty-three, and against it only
+sixteen.
+
+Of this majority I cannot but remark, that it was probably the largest that
+was ever announced on any occasion, where the House was called upon to
+divide. I must observe also, that there was such an enthusiasm among the
+members at this time, that there appeared to be the same kind and degree of
+feeling, as manifested itself within the same walls in the year 1788, when
+the question was first started. This enthusiasm too, which was of a moral
+nature, was so powerful, that it seemed even to extend to a conversion of
+the heart: for several of the old opponents of this righteous cause went
+away, unable to vote against it; while others of them staid in their
+places, and voted in its favour.
+
+On the twenty-seventh of February Lord Howick moved, that the House resolve
+itself into a committee on the bill for the abolition of the Slave-trade.
+Sir C. Pole, Mr. Hughan, Brown, Bathurst, Windham, and Fuller opposed the
+motion; and Sir R. Milbank, and Mr. Wynne, Barham, Courtenay, Montague,
+Jacob, Whitbread, and Herbert (of Kerry), supported it. At length the
+committee was allowed to sit _pro forma_, and Mr. Hobhouse was put into the
+chair. The bill then went through it, and, the House being resumed, the
+report was received and read.
+
+On the sixth of March, when the committee sat again, Sir C. Pole moved,
+that the year 1812 be substituted for the year 1807, as the time when the
+trade should be abolished. This amendment produced a long debate, which was
+carried on by Sir C. Pole, Mr. Fuller, Hiley Addington, Rose, Gascoyne, and
+Bathurst on one side; and by Mr. Ward, Sir P. Francis, General Vyse, Sir T.
+Turton, Mr. Whitbread, Lord Henry Petty, Mr. Canning, Stanhope, Perceval,
+and Wilberforce on the other. At length, on a division, there appeared to
+be one hundred and twenty-five against the amendment, and for it only
+seventeen. The chairman then read the bill, and it was agreed that he
+should report it with the amendments on Monday. The bill enacted, that no
+vessel should clear out for slaves from any port within the British
+dominions after the first of May 1807, and that no slave should be landed
+in the colonies after the first of March 1808.
+
+On the sixteenth of March, on the motion of Lord Henry Petty, the question
+was put, that the bill be read a third time. Mr. Hibbert, Captain Herbert,
+Mr. T.W. Plomer, Mr. Windham, and Lord Castlereagh spoke against the
+motion. Sir P. Francis, Mr. Lyttleton, Mr. H. Thornton, and Mr. Barham,
+Sheridan, and Wilberforce supported it. After this the bill was passed
+without a division[A].
+
+[Footnote A: S. Lushington, esq. M.P. for Yarmouth, gave his voluntary
+attendance and assistance to the Committee, during all these motions, and
+J. Bowdler, esquire, was elected a member of it.]
+
+On Wednesday, the eighteenth, Lord Howick, accompanied by Mr. Wilberforce
+and others, carried the bill to the Lords. Lord Grenville, on receiving it,
+moved that it should be printed, and that, if this process could be
+finished by Monday, it should be taken into consideration on that day. The
+reason of this extraordinary haste was, that His Majesty, displeased with
+the introduction of the Roman-catholic officers' bill into the Commons, had
+signified his intention to the members of the existing administration, that
+they were to be displaced.
+
+The uneasiness, which, a few days before, had sprung up among the friends
+of the abolition, on the report that this event was probable, began now to
+show itself throughout the kingdom. Letters were written from various
+parts, manifesting the greatest fear and anxiety on account of the state of
+the bill, and desiring answers of consolation. Nor was this state of the
+mind otherwise than what might have been expected upon such an occasion;
+for the bill was yet to be printed--Being an amended one, it was to be
+argued again in the Lords--It was then to receive the royal assent--All
+these operations implied time; and it was reported that the new ministry[A]
+was formed; among whom were several, who had shown a hostile disposition to
+the cause.
+
+[Footnote A: The only circumstance, which afforded comfort at this time,
+was that the honourable Spencer Perceval and Mr. Canning were included in
+it, who were warm patrons of this great measure.]
+
+On Monday, the twenty-third, the House of Lords met. Such extraordinary
+diligence had been used in printing the bill, that it was then ready. Lord
+Grenville immediately brought it forward. The Earl of Westmoreland and the
+Marquis of Sligo opposed it. The Duke of Norfolk and the Bishop of Llandaff
+(Dr. Watson) supported it. The latter said, that this great act of justice
+would be recorded in heaven. The amendments were severally adopted without
+a division. But here an omission of three words was discovered, namely,
+"country, territory, or place," which, if not rectified, might defeat the
+purposes of the bill. An amendment was immediately proposed and carried.
+Thus the bill received the last sanction of the Peers. Lord Grenville then
+congratulated the House on the completion, on its part, of the most
+glorious measure, that had ever been adopted by any legislative body in the
+world.
+
+The amendment, now mentioned, occasioned the bill to be sent back to the
+Commons. On the twenty-fourth, on the motion of Lord Howick, it was
+immediately taken into consideration there, and agreed to; and it was
+carried back to the Lords, as approved of, on the same day.
+
+But though the bill had now passed both houses, there was an awful fear
+throughout the kingdom, lest it should not receive the royal assent before
+the ministry was dissolved. This event took place the next day; for on
+Wednesday the twenty-fifth, at half past eleven in the morning; His
+Majesty's message was delivered to the different members of it, that they
+were then to wait upon him to deliver up the seals of their offices. It
+then appeared that a commission for the royal assent to this bill among
+others had been obtained. This commission was instantly opened by the Lord
+Chancellor (Erskine), who was accompanied by the Lords Holland and
+Auckland; and as the clock struck twelve, just when the sun was in its
+meridian splendour to witness this august Act, this establishment of a
+Magna Charta for Africa in Britain, and to sanction it by its most vivid
+and glorious beams, it was completed. The ceremony being over, the seals of
+the respective offices were delivered up; so that the execution of this
+commission was the last act of the administration of Lord Grenville; an
+administration, which, on account of its virtuous exertions in behalf of
+the oppressed African race, will pass to posterity, living through
+successive generations, in the love and gratitude of the most virtuous of
+mankind.
+
+Thus ended one of the most glorious contests, after a continuance for
+twenty years, of any ever carried on in any age or country. A contest, not
+of brutal violence, but of reason. A contest between those, who felt deeply
+for the happiness and the honour of their fellow-creatures, and those, who,
+through vicious custom and the impulse of avarice, had trampled under-foot
+the sacred rights of their nature, and had even attempted to efface all
+title to the divine image from their minds.
+
+Of the immense advantages of this contest I know not how to speak. Indeed,
+the very agitation of the question, which it involved, has been highly
+important. Never was the heart of man so expanded. Never were its generous
+sympathies so generally and so perseveringly excited. These sympathies,
+thus called into existence, have been useful in the preservation of a
+national virtue. For any thing we know, they may have contributed greatly
+to form a counteracting balance against the malignant spirit, generated by
+our almost incessant wars during this period, so as to have preserved us
+from barbarism.
+
+It has been useful also in the discrimination of moral character. In
+private life it has enabled us to distinguish the virtuous from the more
+vicious part of the community[A]. It has shown the general philanthropist.
+It has unmasked the vicious in spite of his pretension to virtue. It has
+afforded us the same knowledge in public life. It has separated the moral
+statesman from the wicked politician. It has shown us who, in the
+legislative and executive offices of our country are fit to save, and who
+to destroy, a nation.
+
+[Footnote A: I have had occasion to know many thousand persons in the
+course of my travels on this subject; and I can truly say, that the part,
+which these took on this great question, was always a true criterion of
+their moral character. Some indeed opposed the abolition, who seemed to be
+so respectable, that it was difficult to account for their conduct; but it
+invariably turned out in a course of time, either that they had been
+influenced by interested motives, or that they were not men of steady moral
+principle. In the year 1792, when the national enthusiasm was so great, the
+good were as distinguishable from the bad, according to their disposition
+to this great cause, as if the divine Being had marked them; or, as a
+friend of mine the other day observed, as we may suppose the sheep to be
+from the goats on the day of judgment.]
+
+It has furnished us also with important lessons. It has proved what a
+creature man is! how devoted he is to his own interest! to what a length of
+atrocity he can go, unless fortified by religious principle! But as if this
+part of the prospect would be too afflicting, it has proved to us, on the
+other hand, what a glorious instrument he may become in the hands of his
+Maker; and that a little virtue, when properly leavened, is made capable of
+counteracting the effects of a mass of vice!
+
+With respect to the end obtained by this contest, or the great measure of
+the abolition of the Slave-trade as it has now passed, I know not how to
+appreciate its importance. To our own country, indeed, it is invaluable. We
+have lived, in consequence of it, to see the day, when it has been recorded
+as a principle in our legislation, that commerce itself shall have its
+moral boundaries. We have lived to see the day, when we are likely to be
+delivered from the contagion of the most barbarous opinions. They, who
+supported this wicked traffic, virtually denied, that man was a moral
+being. They substituted the law of force for the law of reason. But the
+great Act now under our consideration, has banished the impious doctrine,
+and restored the rational creature to his moral rights. Nor is it a matter
+of less pleasing consideration, that, at this awful crisis, when the
+constitutions of kingdoms are on the point of dissolution, the stain of the
+blood of Africa is no longer upon us, or that we have been freed (alas, if
+it be not too late!) from a load of guilt, which has long hung like a
+mill-stone about our necks, ready to sink us to perdition.
+
+In tracing the measure still further, or as it will affect other lands, we
+become only the more sensible of its importance: for can we pass over to
+Africa; can we pass over to the numerous islands, the receptacles of
+miserable beings from thence; and can we call to mind the scenes of misery,
+which have been passing in each of these regions of the earth, without
+acknowledging, that one of the greatest sources of suffering to the human
+race has, as far as our own power extends, been done away? Can we pass over
+to these regions again, and contemplate the multitude of crimes, which the
+agency necessary for keeping up the barbarous system produced, without
+acknowledging, that a source of the most monstrous and extensive wickedness
+has been removed also? But here, indeed, it becomes us peculiarly to
+rejoice; for though nature shrinks from pain, and compassion is engendered
+in us when we see it become the portion of others, yet what is physical
+suffering compared with moral guilt? The misery of the oppressed is, in the
+first place, not contagious like the crime of the oppressor. Nor is the
+mischief, which it generates, either so frightful or so pernicious. The
+body, though under affliction, may retain its shape; and, if it even
+perish, what is the loss of it but of worthless dust? But when the moral
+springs of the mind are poisoned, we lose the most excellent part of the
+constitution of our nature, and the divine image is no longer perceptible
+in us. Nor are the two evils of similar duration. By a decree of
+Providence, for which we cannot be too thankful, we are made mortal. Hence
+the torments of the oppressor are but temporary; whereas the immortal part
+of us, when once corrupted, may carry its pollutions with it into another
+world.
+
+But independently of the quantity of physical suffering and the innumerable
+avenues to vice in more than a quarter of the globe, which this great
+measure will cut off, there are yet blessings, which we have reason to
+consider as likely to flow from it. Among these we cannot overlook the
+great probability, that Africa, now freed from the vicious and barbarous
+effects of this traffic, may be in a better state to comprehend and receive
+the sublime truths of the Christian religion. Nor can we overlook the
+probability, that, a new system of treatment necessarily springing up in
+our islands, the same bright sun of consolation may visit her children
+there. But here a new hope rises to our view. Who knows but that
+emancipation, like a beautiful plant, may, in its due season, rise out of
+the ashes of the abolition of the Slave-trade, and that, when its own
+intrinsic value shall be known, the seed of it may be planted in other
+lands? And looking at the subject in this point of view, we cannot but be
+struck with the wonderful concurrence of events as previously necessary for
+this purpose, namely, that two nations, England and America, the mother and
+the child, should, in the same month of the same year, have abolished this
+impious traffic; nations, which at this moment have more than a million of
+subjects within their jurisdiction to partake of the blessing; and one of
+which, on account of her local situation and increasing power, is likely in
+time to give, if not law, at least a tone to the manners and customs of the
+great continent, on which she is situated.
+
+Reader! Thou art now acquainted with the history of this contest! Rejoice
+in the manner of its termination! And, if thou feelest grateful for the
+event, retire within thy closet, and pour out thy thanksgivings to the
+Almighty for this his unspeakable act of mercy to thy oppressed
+fellow-creatures.
+
+
+
+
+THE END.
+
+
+
+
+TABLE OF CONTENTS.
+
+
+
+
+VOL. I.
+
+
+CHAP. 1. INTRODUCTION--Estimate of the evil of the Slave-trade--and of the
+blessing of the Abolition of it--Usefulness of the contemplation of this
+subject
+
+CHAP. 2. Those, who favoured the cause of the Africans previously to 1787,
+were so many necessary forerunners in it--Cardinal Ximenes--and others
+
+CHAP. 3. Forerunners continued to 1787--divided now into four
+classes--First consists of persons in England of various descriptions,
+Godwyn, Baxter, and others
+
+CHAP. 4. Second, of the Quakers in England, George Fox, and his religious
+descendants
+
+CHAP. 5. Third, of the Quakers in America--Union of these with individuals
+of other religious denominations in the same cause
+
+CHAP. 6. Facility of junction between the members of these three different
+classes
+
+CHAP. 7. Fourth consists of Dr. Peckard--then of the Author--Author wishes
+to embark in the cause--falls in with several of the members of these
+classes
+
+CHAP. 8. Fourth class continued--Langton--Baker--and others--Author now
+embarks in the cause as a business of his life
+
+CHAP. 9. Fourth class continued--Sheldon--Mackworth--and others--Author
+seeks for further information on the subject--and visits Members of
+Parliament
+
+CHAP. 10. Fourth class continued--Author enlarges his knowledge--Meeting at
+Mr. Wilberforce's--Remarkable junction of all the four classes, and a
+Committee formed out of them, in May 1787, for the Abolition of the
+Slave-trade
+
+CHAP. 11. History of the preceding classes, and of their junction, shown by
+means of a map
+
+CHAP. 12. Author endeavours to do away the charge of ostentation in
+consequence of becoming so conspicuous in this work
+
+CHAP. 13. Proceedings of the Committee--Emancipation declared to be no part
+of its object--Wrongs of Africa by Mr. Roscoe
+
+CHAP. 14. Author visits Bristol to collect information--Ill usage of seamen
+in the Slave-trade--Articles of African produce--Massacre at Calebàr
+
+CHAP. 15. Mode of procuring and paying seamen in that trade--their
+mortality in it--Construction and admeasurement of Slave-ships--Difficulty
+of procuring evidence--Cases of Gardiner and Arnold
+
+CHAP. 16. Author meets with Alexander Falconbridge--visits ill-treated and
+disabled seamen--takes a mate out of one of the Slave-vessels--and puts
+another in prison for murder
+
+CHAP. 17. Visits Liverpool--Specimens of African
+produce--Dock-duties--Iron-instruments used in the traffic--His
+introduction to Mr. Norris
+
+CHAP. 18. Manner of procuring and paying seamen at Liverpool in the
+Slave-trade--their treatment and mortality--Murder of Peter
+Green--Dangerous situation of the Author in consequence of his inquiries
+
+CHAP. 19. Author proceeds to Manchester--delivers a discourse there on the
+subject of the Slave-trade--revisits Bristol--New and difficult
+situation--suddenly crosses the Severn at night--returns to London
+
+CHAP. 20. Labours of the Committee during the Author's journey--Mr. Sharp
+elected chairman--Seal engraved--Letters from different correspondents to
+the Committee
+
+CHAP. 21. Further labours of the Committee to February 1788--List of new
+Correspondents
+
+CHAP. 22. Progress of the cause to the middle of May--Petitions to
+Parliament--Author's interviews with Mr. Pitt and Mr. Grenville--Privy
+council inquire into the subject--examine Liverpool-delegates--Proceedings
+of the Committee for the abolition--Motion and debate in the House of
+Commons--Discussion of the general question postponed to the next session
+
+CHAP. 23. Progress to the middle of July--Bill to diminish the horrors of
+the Middle Passage--Evidence examined against it--Debates--Bill passed
+through both Houses--Proceedings of the Committee, and effects of them.
+
+
+
+
+VOL. II.
+
+
+CHAP. 1. Continuation from June 1758 to July 1739--Author travels in search
+of fresh evidence--Privy council resume their examinations--prepare their
+report--Proceedings of the Committee for the abolition--and of the Planters
+and others--Privy council report laid on the table of the House of
+Commons--Debate upon it--Twelve propositions--Opponents refuse to argue
+from the report--Examine new evidence of their own in the House of
+Commons--Renewal of the Middle Passage-Bill--Death and character of Ramsay
+
+CHAP. 2. Continuation from July 1789 to July 1790--Author travels to Paris
+to promote the abolition in France--His proceedings there--returns to
+England--Examination of opponents' evidence resumed in the Commons--Author
+travels in quest of new evidence on the side of the abolition--This, after
+great opposition, introduced--Renewal of the Middle Passage-Bill--Section
+of the Slave-ship--Cowper's Negro's Complaint--Wedgwood's Cameos.
+
+CHAP. 3. Continuation from July 1790 to July 1791--Author travels
+again--Examinations on the side of the abolition resumed in the
+Commons--List of those examined--Cruel circumstances of the times--Motion
+for the abolition of the trade--Debates--Motion lost--Resolutions of the
+Committee--Sierra Leone Company established
+
+CHAP. 4. Continuation from July 1791 to July 1792--Author travels
+again--People begin to leave off sugar--Petition Parliament--Motion renewed
+in the Commons--Debates--Abolition resolved upon, but not to commence till
+1796--The Lords determine upon hearing evidence on the resolution--This
+evidence introduced--Further hearing of it postponed to the next session
+
+CHAP. 5. Continuation from July 1792 to July 1793--Author travels
+again--Motion to renew the Resolution of the last year in the
+Commons--Motion lost--New motion to abolish the foreign Slave-trade--Motion
+lost--Proceedings of the Lords
+
+CHAP. 6. Continuation from July 1793 to July 1794--Author travels
+again--Motion to abolish the foreign Slave-trade renewed and carried--but
+lost in the Lords--Further proceedings there--Author, on account of
+declining health, obliged to retire from the cause
+
+CHAP. 7. Continuation from July 1794 to July 1799--Various motions within
+this period
+
+CHAP. 8. Continuation from July 1799 to July 18O5--Various motions within
+this period
+
+CHAP. 9. Continuation from July 1805 to July 1806--Author, restored, joins
+the Committee again--Death of Mr. Pitt--Foreign Slave-trade
+abolished--Resolution to take measures for the total abolition of the
+trade--Address to the King to negotiate with foreign powers for their
+concurrence in it--Motion to prevent new vessels going into the trade--all
+these carried through both Houses of Parliament
+
+CHAP. 10. Continuation from July 1806 to July 1807--Death of Mr. Fox--Bill
+for the total abolition carried in the Lords--Sent from thence to the
+Commons--amended, and passed there, and sent back to the Lords--receives
+the royal assent--Reflections on this great event
+
+
+
+
+
+End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The History of the Rise, Progress and
+Accomplishment of the Abolition of the African Slave Trade by the British Parliament (1808), by Thomas Clarkson
+
+*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ABOLITION OF THE SLAVE TRADE V.2. ***
+
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+The Project Gutenberg EBook of The History of the Rise, Progress and
+Accomplishment of the Abolition of the African Slave Trade by the British Parliament (1808), by Thomas Clarkson
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: The History of the Rise, Progress and Accomplishment of the Abolition of the African Slave Trade by the British Parliament (1808)
+       Vol. II
+
+Author: Thomas Clarkson
+
+Release Date: June 3, 2004 [EBook #12507]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ASCII
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ABOLITION OF THE SLAVE TRADE V.2. ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Carlo Traverso, Robert Morse and PG Distributed
+Proofreaders. This file was produced from images generously made
+available by the Bibliotheque nationale de France (BnF/Gallica) at
+http://gallica.bnf.fr.
+
+
+
+
+
+THE
+HISTORY
+OF THE
+RISE, PROGRESS, AND ACCOMPLISHMENT
+OF
+THE ABOLITION
+OF
+THE AFRICAN SLAVE-TRADE
+BY THE
+BRITISH PARLIAMENT.
+
+BY THOMAS CLARKSON, M.A.
+
+1808.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER I.
+
+_Continuation from June 1788 to July 1789--Author travels to collect
+further evidence--great difficulties in obtaining it--forms committees on
+his tour--Privy council resume the examinations--inspect cabinet of African
+productions--obliged to leave many of the witnesses in behalf of the
+abolition unexamined--prepare their report--Labours of the committee in the
+interim--Proceedings of the planters and others--Report laid on the table
+of the House of Commons--Introduction of the question, and debate
+there--twelve propositions deduced from the report and reserved for future
+discussion--day of discussion arrives--opponents refuse to argue from the
+report--require new evidence--this granted and introduced--further
+consideration of the subject deferred to the next session--Renewal of Sir
+William Dolben's bill--Death and character of Ramsay._
+
+
+Matters had now become serious. The gauntlet had been thrown down and
+accepted. The combatants had taken their stations, and the contest was to
+be renewed, which was to be decided soon on the great theatre of the
+nation. The committee by the very act of their institution had pronounced
+the Slave-trade to be criminal. They, on the other hand, who were concerned
+in it, had denied the charge. It became the one to prove, and the other to
+refute it, or to fall in the ensuing session.
+
+The committee, in this perilous situation, were anxious to find out such
+other persons, as might become proper evidences before the privy council.
+They had hitherto sent there only nine or ten, and they had then only
+another, whom they could count upon for this purpose, in their view. The
+proposal of sending persons to Africa, and the West Indies, who might come
+back and report what they had witnessed, had been already negatived. The
+question then was, what they were to do. Upon this they deliberated, and
+the result was an application to me to undertake a journey to different
+parts of the kingdom for this purpose.
+
+When this determination was made I was at Teston, writing a long letter to
+the privy council on the ill usage and mortality of the seamen employed in
+the Slave-trade, which it had been previously agreed should be received as
+evidence there. I thought it proper, however, before I took my departure,
+to form a system of questions upon the general subject. These I divided
+into six tables. The first related to the productions of Africa, and the
+disposition and manners of the natives. The second, to the methods of
+reducing them to slavery. The third, to the manner of bringing them to the
+ships, their value, the medium of exchange, and other circumstances. 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 ships 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 Dorsetshire 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 instituted 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 assertion 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 assertion 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 consequent 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 a 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 principal 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 establishing a committee there. This was
+afterwards effected; and Mr. Milford, who, at a general meeting of the
+inhabitants of Exeter, on the tenth 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
+circumstances affected many. When I took out my pen and ink to put down the
+information, which a person was giving me, he became evidently embarrassed
+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 any thing 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 pronounced, 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
+grass, and fancifully coloured; ornaments made of the same materials; ropes
+made from a species of aloes, and others, remarkably strong, from grass 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 the former volume, 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 that all of them might be examined. I 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 Lordships, they had agreed to meet on the Saturday next, and
+on the Tuesday following, for the purpose of receiving the evidence of some
+of the gentlemen named in it. And it was their Lordships' desire that I
+would give notice to any three of them (whose information I might consider
+as 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 then 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 Mr. 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 volume, who had promised me, when I was in Bristol,
+in the year 1787, that they would keep a journal of facts for me during the
+voyages they were then going to perform. They had both of them 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 circumstances,
+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
+circumstances, 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 of ten
+or twelve daily became necessary.
+
+But the contents of these letters afforded the circumstances, which gave
+birth to so much suffering. They contained usually some affecting tale of
+woe. At Bristol my feelings had been harassed 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 proceed. 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 harassed: 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 passed over on these occasions.
+
+The disappointments too, which I frequently experienced in these 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 noble 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 spacious 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 an 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
+nobler part of it ought not to be forgotten. While I passed 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 institution. 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, esquire, on Sir William Dolben's Bill, of which an extract was
+given in the first volume; Notes by a Planter on the two Reports from the
+Committee of the honourable House of Assembly of Jamaica; Observations on
+the Slave-trade by Mr. Wadstrom; and Dickson'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 reverend Mr. Gifford, 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, esquires, into their own
+body, and Alexander Jaffray, esquire, the reverend Charles Symmons of
+Haverfordwest, and the reverend T. Burgess (now bishop of St. David's), 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 Shields; William Proud, of Hull; the
+reverend T. Gisborne, of Yoxall Lodge; and William Ellford, esquire, of
+Plymouth. The latter, as chairman of the Plymouth committee, sent up for
+inspection an engraving of a plan and section of a slave-ship, 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, esquire, of West Bromwich;
+the reverend T. Clarke, of Hull; S.P. Wolferstan, esquire, of Stafford near
+Tamworth; Edmund Lodge, esquire, of Halifax; the reverend 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 institution 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 Dickson, John Erskine, John Campbell, Archibald Gibson,
+Archibald Fletcher, and Horatius Canning, esquires, as the committee.
+
+The others were, the reverend J. Bidlake, of Plymouth; Joseph Storrs, of
+Chesterfield; William Fothergill, of Carr End, Yorkshire; 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 reverend 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 institution 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 (now Lord Auckland), 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 Bourdeaux; 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 assistance in my power. I have for a long time taken
+an interest in the general alarm on this occasion, and in the noble
+alliance of the friends of humanity in favour of the injured Africans.
+Such an attempt throws a new lustre 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 nineteenth 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 twenty-third of April, for
+this purpose. This motion was agreed to; after which he moved for certain
+official documents, necessary to throw light upon the subject in the course
+of its discussion.
+
+This motion, by means of which the great day of trial was now fixed, seemed
+to be the signal for the planters, merchants, and other interested persons
+to begin a furious opposition. Meetings were accordingly called by
+advertisement. At these meetings much warmth and virulence were manifested
+in debate, and propositions breathing a spirit of anger were adopted. It
+was suggested there, in the vehemence of passion, that the Islands could
+exist independently of the Mother-country; nor were even threats withheld
+to intimidate government from effecting the abolition.
+
+From this time, also, the public papers began to be filled with such
+statements as were thought most likely to influence the members of the
+House of Commons, previously to the discussion of the question.
+
+The first impression attempted to be made upon them was with respect to the
+slaves themselves. It was contended, and attempted to be shown by the
+revival of the old argument of human sacrifices in Africa, that these were
+better off in the islands than in their own country. It was contended also,
+that they were people of very inferior capacities, and but little removed
+from the brute creation; whence an inference was drawn, that their
+treatment, against which so much clamour had arisen, was adapted to their
+intellect and feelings.
+
+The next attempt was to degrade the abolitionists in the opinion of the
+house, by showing the wildness and absurdity of their schemes. It was again
+insisted upon that emancipation was the real object of the former; so that
+thousands of slaves would be let loose in the islands to rob or perish, and
+who could never be brought back again into habits of useful industry.
+
+An attempt was then made to excite their pity in behalf of the planters.
+The abolition, it was said, would produce insurrections among the slaves.
+But insurrections would produce the massacre of their masters; and, if any
+of these should happily escape from butchery, they would be reserved only
+for ruin.
+
+An appeal was then made to them on the ground of their own interest and of
+that of the people, whom they represented. It was stated that the ruin of
+the islands would be the ruin of themselves and of the country. Its revenue
+would be half annihilated. Its naval strength would decay. Merchants,
+manufacturers and others would come to beggary. But in this deplorable
+situation they would expect to be indemnified for their losses.
+Compensation indeed must follow. It could not be withheld. But what would
+be the amount of it? The country would have no less than from eighty to a
+hundred millions to pay the sufferers; and it would be driven to such
+distress in paying this sum us it had never before experienced.
+
+The last attempt was to show them that a regulation of the trade was all
+that was now wanted. While this would remedy the evils complained of, it
+would prevent the mischief which would assuredly follow the abolition. The
+planters had already done their part. The assemblies of the different
+islands had most of them made wholesome laws upon the subject. The very
+bills passed for this purpose in Jamaica and Grenada had arrived in
+England, and might be seen by the public: the great grievances had
+been redressed: no slave could now be mutilated or wantonly killed
+by his owner; one man could not now maltreat, or bruise, or wound
+the slave of another; the aged could not now be turned off to perish
+by hunger. There were laws also relative to the better feeding and
+clothing of the slaves. It remained only that the trade to Africa
+should be put under as wise and humane regulations as the slavery in
+the islands had undergone.
+
+These different statements, appearing now in the public papers from day to
+day, began, in this early stage of the question, when the subject in all
+its bearings was known but to few, to make a considerable impression upon
+those, who were soon to be called to the decision of it. But that, which
+had the greatest effect upon them, was the enormous amount of the
+compensation, which, it was said, must be made. This statement against the
+abolition was making its way so powerfully, that Archdeacon Paley thought
+it his duty to write, and to send to the committee, a little treatise
+called Arguments against the unjust Pretensions of Slave-dealers and
+Holders, to be indemnified by pecuniary Allowances at the public Expense in
+case the Slave-trade should be abolished. This treatise, when the substance
+of it was detailed in the public papers, had its influence upon several
+members of the House of Commons. But there were others, who had been as it
+were panic-struck by the statement. These in their fright seemed to have
+lost the right use of their eyes, or to have looked through a magnifying
+glass. With these the argument of emancipation, which they would have
+rejected at another time as ridiculous, obtained now easy credit. The
+massacres too and the ruin, though only conjectural, they admitted also.
+Hence some of them deserted our cause wholly, while others, wishing to do
+justice as far as they could to the slaves on the one hand, and to their
+own countrymen on the other, adopted a middle line of conduct, and would go
+no further than the regulation of the trade.
+
+While these preparations were making by our opponents to prejudice the
+minds of those, who were to be the judges in this contest, Mr. Pitt
+presented the privy council report at the bar of the House of Commons; and
+as it was a large folio volume, and contained the evidence upon which the
+question was to be decided, it was necessary that time should be given to
+the members to peruse it. Accordingly the twelfth of May was appointed,
+instead of the twenty-third of April, for the discussion of the question.
+
+This postponement of the discussion of the question gave time to all
+parties to prepare themselves further. The merchants and planters availed
+themselves of it to collect petitions to parliament from interested persons
+against the abolition of the trade, to wait upon members of parliament by
+deputation, in order to solicit their attendance in their favour, and to
+renew their injurious paragraphs in the public papers. The committee for
+the abolition availed themselves of it to reply to these; and here Dr.
+Dickson, who had been secretary to Governor Hey, in Barbadoes, and who had
+offered the committee his Letters on Slavery before mentioned and his
+services also, was of singular use. Many members of parliament availed
+themselves of it to retire into the country to read the report. Among the
+latter were Mr. Wilberforce and Mr. Pitt. In this retirement they
+discovered, notwithstanding the great disadvantages under which we had
+laboured with respect to evidence, that our cause was safe, and that, as
+far as it was to be decided by reason and sound policy, it would triumph.
+It was in this retirement that Mr. Pitt made those able calculations, which
+satisfied him for ever after, as the minister of the country, as to the
+safety of the great measure of the abolition of the Slave-trade; for he had
+clearly proved, that not only the islands could go on in a flourishing
+state without supplies from the coast of Africa, but that they were then in
+a condition to do it.
+
+At length, the twelfth of May arrived. Mr. Wilberforce rose up in the
+Commons, and moved the order of the day for the house to resolve itself
+into a committee of the whole house, to take into consideration the
+petitions, which had been presented against the Slave-trade.
+
+This order having been read, he moved that the report of the committee of
+privy council; that the acts passed in the islands relative to slaves; that
+the evidence adduced last year on the Slave-trade; that the petitions
+offered in the last session against the Slave-trade; and that the accounts
+presented to the house, in the last and present session, relative to the
+exports and imports to Africa, be referred to the same committee.
+
+These motions having been severally agreed to, the house immediately
+resolved itself into a committee of the whole house, and Sir William Dolben
+was put into the chair.
+
+Mr. Wilberforce began by declaring, that, when he considered how much
+discussion the subject, which he was about to explain to the committee, had
+occasioned not only in that house but throughout the kingdom, and
+throughout Europe; and when he considered the extent and importance of it,
+the variety of interests involved in it, and the consequences which might
+arise, he owned he had been filled with apprehensions, lest a subject of
+such magnitude, and a cause of such weight, should suffer from the weakness
+of its advocate; but when he recollected that in the progress of his
+inquiries he had every where been received with candour, that most people
+gave him credit for the purity of his motives, and that, however many of
+these might then differ from him, they were all likely to agree in the end,
+he had dismissed his fears and marched forward with a firmer step in this
+cause of humanity, justice and religion. He could not, however, but lament
+that the subject had excited so much warmth. He feared that too many on
+this account were but ill prepared to consider it with impartiality. He
+entreated all such to endeavour to be calm and composed. A fair and cool
+discussion was essentially necessary. The motion he meant to offer was as
+reconcileable to political expediency as to national humanity. It belonged
+to no party-question. It would in the end be found serviceable to all
+parties; and to the best interests of the country. He did not come forward
+to accuse the West India planter, or the Liverpool merchant, or indeed any
+one concerned in this traffic; but, if blame attached any where, to take
+shame to himself, in common indeed with the whole parliament of Great
+Britain, who, having suffered it to be carried on under their own
+authority, were all of them participators in the guilt.
+
+In endeavouring to explain the great business of the day, he said he should
+call the attention of the house only to the leading features of the
+Slave-trade. Nor should he dwell long upon these. Every one might imagine
+for himself, what must be the natural consequence of such a commerce with
+Africa. Was it not plain that she must suffer from it? that her savage
+manners must be rendered still more ferocious? and that a trade of this
+nature, carried on round her coasts, must extend violence and desolation to
+her very centre? It was well known that the natives of Africa were sold as
+goods, and that numbers of them were continually conveyed away from their
+country by the owners of British vessels. The question then was, which way
+the latter came by them. In answer to this question the privy council
+report, which was then on the table, afforded evidence the most
+satisfactory and conclusive. He had found things in it, which had confirmed
+every proposition he had maintained before, whether this proposition had
+been gathered from living information of the best authority, or from the
+histories he had read. But it was unnecessary either to quote the report,
+or to appeal to history on this occasion. Plain reason and common sense
+would point out how the poor Africans were obtained. Africa was a country
+divided into many kingdoms, which had different governments and laws. In
+many parts the princes were despotic. In others they had a limited rule.
+But in all of them, whatever the nature of the government was, men were
+considered as goods and property, and, as such, subject to plunder in the
+same manner as property in other countries. The persons in power there were
+naturally fond of our commodities; and to obtain them (which could only be
+done by the sale of their countrymen) they waged war on one another, or
+even ravaged their own country, when they could find no pretence for
+quarrelling with their neighbours; in their courts of law many poor
+wretches, who were innocent, were condemned; and, to obtain these
+commodities in greater abundance, thousands were kidnapped and torn from
+their families and sent into slavery. Such transactions, he said, were
+recorded in every history of Africa, and the report on the table confirmed
+them. With respect, however, to these he should make but one or two
+observations. If we looked into the reign of Henry the Eighth, we should
+find a parallel for one of them. We should find that similar convictions
+took place; and that penalties followed conviction.
+
+With respect to wars, the kings of Africa were never induced to engage in
+them by public principles, by national glory, and least of all by the love
+of their people. This had been stated by those most conversant in the
+subject, by Dr. Spaarman and Mr. Wadstrom. They had conversed with these
+princes, and had learned from their own mouths, that to procure slaves was
+the object of their hostilities. Indeed, there was scarcely a single person
+examined before the privy council, who did not prove that the Slave-trade
+was the source of the tragedies acted upon that extensive continent. Some
+had endeavoured to palliate this circumstance; but there was not one who
+did not more or less admit it to be true. By one the Slave-trade was called
+the concurrent cause, by the majority it was acknowledged to be the
+principal motive of the African wars. The same might be said with respect
+to those instances of treachery and injustice, in which individuals were
+concerned. And here he was sorry to observe that our own countrymen were
+often guilty. He would only at present advert to the tragedy at Calabar,
+where two large African villages, having been for some time at war, made
+peace. This peace was to have been ratified by intermarriages; but some of
+our captains, who were there, seeing their trade would be stopped for a
+while, sowed dissension again between them. They actually set one village
+against the other, took a share in the contest, massacred many of the
+inhabitants, and carried others of them away as slaves. But shocking as
+this transaction might appear, there was not a single history of Africa to
+be read, in which scenes of as atrocious a nature were not related. They,
+he said, who defended this trade, were warped and blinded by their own
+interests, and would not be convinced of the miseries they were daily
+heaping on their fellow-creatures. By the countenance they gave it, they
+had reduced the inhabitants of Africa to a worse state than that of the
+most barbarous nation. They had destroyed what ought to have been the bond
+of union and safety among them: they had introduced discord and anarchy
+among them: they had set kings against their subjects, and subjects against
+each other: they had rendered every private family wretched: they had, in
+short, given birth to scenes of injustice and misery not to be found in any
+other quarter of the globe.
+
+Having said thus much on the subject of procuring slaves in Africa, he
+would now go to that of the transportation of them. And here he had fondly
+hoped, that when men with affections and feelings like our own had been
+torn from their country, and every thing dear to them, he should have found
+some mitigation of their sufferings; but the sad reverse was the case. This
+was the most wretched part of the whole subject. He was incapable of
+impressing the house with what he felt upon it. A description of their
+conveyance was impossible. So much misery condensed in so little room was
+more than the human imagination had ever before conceived. Think only of
+six hundred persons linked together, trying to get rid of each other,
+crammed in a close vessel with every object that was nauseous and
+disgusting, diseased, and struggling with all the varieties of
+wretchedness. It seemed impossible to add any thing more to human misery.
+Yet shocking as this description must be felt to be by every man, the
+transportation had been described by several witnesses from Liverpool to be
+a comfortable conveyance. Mr. Norris had painted the accommodations on
+board a slave-ship in the most glowing colours. He had represented them in
+a manner which would have exceeded his attempts at praise of the most
+luxurious scenes. Their apartments, he said, were fitted up as
+advantageously for them as circumstances could possibly admit: they had
+several meals a day; some, of their own country provisions, with the best
+sauces of African cookery; and, by way of variety, another meal of pulse,
+according to the European taste. After breakfast they had water to wash
+themselves, while their apartments were perfumed with frankincense and
+lime-juice. Before dinner they were amused after the manner of their
+country; instruments of music were introduced: the song and the dance were
+promoted: games of chance were furnished them: the men played and sang,
+while the women and girls made fanciful ornaments from beads, with which
+they were plentifully supplied. They were indulged in all their little
+fancies, and kept in sprightly humour. Another of them had said, when the
+sailors were flogged, it was out of the hearing of the Africans, lest it
+should depress their spirits. He by no means wished to say that such
+descriptions were wilful misrepresentations. If they were not, it proved
+that interest of prejudice was capable of spreading a film over the eyes
+thick enough to occasion total blindness.
+
+Others, however, and these men of the greatest veracity, had given a
+different account. What would the house think, when by the concurring
+testimony of these the true history was laid open? The slaves who had been
+described as rejoicing in their captivity, were so wrung with misery at
+leaving their country, that it was the constant practice to set sail in the
+night, lest they should know the moment of their departure. With respect to
+their accommodation, the right ancle of one was fastened to the left ancle
+of another by an iron fetter; and if they were turbulent, by another on the
+wrists. Instead of the apartments described, they were placed in niches,
+and along the decks, in such a manner, that it was impossible for any one
+to pass among them, however careful he might be, without treading upon
+them. Sir George Yonge had testified, that in a slave-ship, on board of
+which he went, and which had not completed her cargo by two hundred and
+fifty, instead of the scent of frankincense being perceptible to the
+nostrils, the stench was intolerable. The allowance of water was so
+deficient, that the slaves were frequently found gasping for life, and
+almost suffocated. The pulse with which they had been said to be favoured,
+were absolutely English horse-beans. The legislature of Jamaica had stated
+the scantiness both of water and provisions, as a subject which called for
+the interference of parliament. As Mr. Norris had said, the song and the
+dance were promoted, he could not pass over these expressions without
+telling the house what they meant. It would have been much more fair if he
+himself had explained the word _promoted_. The truth was, that, for the
+sake of exercise, these miserable wretches, loaded with chains and
+oppressed with disease, were forced to dance by the terror of the lash, and
+sometimes by the actual use of it. "I," said one of the evidences, "was
+employed to dance the men, while another person danced the women." Such
+then was the meaning of the word _promoted_; and it might also be observed
+with respect to food, that instruments were sometimes carried out, in order
+to force them to eat; which was the same sort of proof, how much they
+enjoyed themselves in this instance also. With respect to their singing, it
+consisted of songs of lamentation for the loss of their country. While they
+sung they were in tears: so that one of the captains, more humane probably
+than the rest, threatened a woman with a flogging because the mournfulness
+of her song was too painful for his feelings. Perhaps he could not give a
+better proof of the sufferings of these injured people during their
+passage, than by stating the mortality which accompanied it. This was a
+species of evidence which was infallible on this occasion. Death was a
+witness which could not deceive them; and the proportion of deaths would
+not only confirm, but, if possible, even aggravate our suspicion of the
+misery of the transit. It would be found, upon an average of all the ships,
+upon which evidence had been given, that, exclusively of such as perished
+before they sailed from Africa, not less than twelve and a half per cent
+died on their passage: besides these, the Jamaica report stated that four
+and a half per cent died while in the harbours, or on shore before the day
+of sale, which was only about the space of twelve or fourteen days after
+their arrival there; and one third more died in the seasoning: and this in
+a climate exactly similar to their own, and where, as some of the witnesses
+pretended, they were healthy and happy. Thus, out of every lot of one
+hundred, shipped from Africa, seventeen died in about nine weeks, and not
+more than fifty lived to become effective labourers in our islands.
+
+Having advanced thus far in his investigation, he felt, he said, the
+wickedness of the Slave-trade to be so enormous, so dreadful, and
+irremediable, that he could stop at no alternative short of its abolition.
+A trade founded on iniquity, and carried on with such circumstances of
+horror, must be abolished, let the policy of it be what it might; and he
+had from this time determined, whatever were the consequences, that he
+would never rest till he had effected that abolition. His mind had indeed
+been harassed by the objections of the West India planters, who had
+asserted, that the ruin of their property must be the consequence of such a
+measure. He could not help, however, distrusting their arguments. He could
+not believe that the Almighty Being, who had forbidden the practice of
+rapine and bloodshed, had made rapine and bloodshed necessary to any part
+of his universe. He felt a confidence in this persuasion, and took the
+resolution to act upon it. Light indeed soon broke in upon him. The
+suspicion of his mind was every day confirmed by increasing information,
+and the evidence he had now to offer upon this point was decisive and
+complete. The principle upon which he founded the necessity of the
+abolition was not policy, but justice: but, though justice were the
+principle of the measure, yet he trusted he should distinctly prove it to
+be reconcileable with our truest political interest.
+
+In the first place, he asserted that the number of the slaves in our West
+India islands might be kept up without the introduction of recruits from
+Africa; and to prove this, he would enumerate the different sources of
+their mortality. The first was the disproportion of the sexes, there being,
+upon an average, about five males imported to three females: but this evil,
+when the Slave-trade was abolished, would cure itself. The second consisted
+in the bad condition in which they were brought to the islands, and the
+methods of preparing them for sale. They arrived frequently in a sickly and
+disordered state, and then they were made up for the market by the
+application of astringents, washes, mercurial ointments, and repelling
+drugs, so that their wounds and diseases might be hid. These artifices were
+not only fraudulent but fatal: but these, it was obvious, would of
+themselves fall with the trade. A third was, excessive labour joined with
+improper food; and a fourth was, the extreme dissoluteness of their
+manners. These also would both of them be counteracted by the impossibility
+of getting further supplies: for owners, now unable to replace those slaves
+whom they might lose, by speedy purchases in the markets, would be more
+careful how they treated them in future, and a better treatment would be
+productive of better morals. And here he would just advert to an argument
+used against those who complained of cruelty in our islands, which was,
+that it was the interest of masters to treat their slaves with humanity:
+but surely it was immediate and present, not future and distant, interest,
+which was the great spring of action in the affairs of mankind. Why did we
+make laws to punish men? It was their interest to be upright and virtuous:
+but there was a present impulse continually breaking in upon their better
+judgment, and an impulse, which was known to be contrary to their permanent
+advantage. It was ridiculous to say that men would be bound by their
+interest, when gain or ardent passion urged them. It might as well be
+asserted that a stone could not be thrown into the air, or a body move from
+place to place, because the principle of gravitation bound them to the
+surface of the earth. If a planter in the West Indies found himself reduced
+in his profits, he did not usually dispose of any part of his slaves; and
+his own gratifications were never given up, so long as there was a
+possibility of making any retrenchment in the allowance of his slaves.--But
+to return to the subject which he had left: He was happy to state, that as
+all the causes of the decrease which he had stated might be remedied, so,
+by the progress of light and reformation, these remedies had been gradually
+coming into practice; and that, as these had increased, the decrease of
+slaves had in an equal proportion been lessened. By the gradual adoption of
+these remedies, he could prove from the report on the table, that the
+decrease of slaves in Jamaica had lessened to such a degree, that from the
+year 1774 to the present it was not quite one in a hundred, and that in
+fact they were at present in a state of increase; for that the births in
+that island, at this moment, exceeded the deaths by one thousand or eleven
+hundred per annum. Barbadoes, Nevis, Antigua, and the Bermudas, were, like
+Jamaica, lessening their decrease, and holding forth an evident and
+reasonable expectation of a speedy state of increase by natural population.
+But allowing the number of negros even to decrease for a time, there were
+methods which would ensure the welfare of the West India islands. The lands
+there might be cultivated by fewer hands, and this to greater advantage to
+the proprietors and to this country, by the produce of cinnamon, coffee,
+and cotton, than by that of sugar. The produce of the plantations might
+also be considerably increased, even in the case of sugar, with less hands
+than were at present employed, if the owners of them would but introduce
+machines of husbandry. Mr. Long himself, long resident as a planter, had
+proved, upon his own estate, that the plough, though so little used in the
+West Indies, did the service of a hundred slaves, and caused the same
+ground to produce three hogsheads of sugar, which, when cultivated by
+slaves, would only produce two. The division of work, which, in free and
+civilized countries, was the grand source of wealth, and the reduction of
+the number of domestic servants, of whom not less than from twenty to forty
+were kept in ordinary families, afforded other resources for this purpose.
+But, granting that all these suppositions should be unfounded, and that
+every one of these substitutes should fail for a time, the planters would
+be indemnified, as is the case in all transactions of commerce, by the
+increased price of their produce in the British market. Thus, by contending
+against the abolition, they were defeated in every part of the argument.
+But he would never give up the point, that the number of the slaves could
+be kept up by natural population, and without any dependence whatever on
+the Slave-trade. He therefore called upon the house again to abolish it as
+a criminal waste of life--it was utterly unnecessary--he had proved it so
+by documents contained in the report. The merchants of Liverpool, indeed,
+had thought otherwise, but he should be cautious how he assented to their
+opinions. They declared last year that it was a losing trade at two slaves
+to a ton, and yet they pursued it when restricted to five slaves to three
+tons. He believed, however, that it was upon the whole a losing concern; in
+the same manner as the lottery would be a losing adventure to any company
+who should buy all the tickets. Here and there an individual gained a large
+prize, but the majority of adventurers gained nothing. The same merchants,
+too, had asserted that the town of Liverpool would be ruined by the
+abolition. But Liverpool did not depend for its consequence upon the
+Slave-trade. The whole export-tonnage from that place amounted to no less
+than 170,000 tons; whereas the export part of it to Africa amounted only to
+13,000. Liverpool, he was sure, owed its greatness to other and very
+different causes; the Slave-trade bearing but a small proportion to its
+other trades.
+
+Having gone through that part of the subject which related to the slaves,
+he would now answer two objections which he had frequently heard started.
+The first of these was, that the abolition of the Slave-trade would operate
+to the total ruin of our navy, and to the increase of that of our rivals.
+For an answer to these assertions, he referred, to what he considered to be
+the most valuable part of the report, and for which the house and the
+country were indebted to the indefatigable exertions of Mr. Clarkson. By
+the report it appeared, that, instead of the Slave-trade being a nursery
+for British seamen, it was their grave. It appeared that more seamen died
+in that trade in one year than in the whole remaining trade of the country
+in two. Out of 910 sailors in it, 216 died in the year, while upon a fair
+average of the same number of men employed in the trades to the East and
+West Indies, Petersburgh, Newfoundland, and Greenland, no more than 87
+died. It appeared also, that out of 3170, who had left Liverpool in the
+slave-ships in the year 1787, only 1428 had returned. And here, while he
+lamented the loss which the country thus annually sustained in her seamen,
+he had additionally to lament the barbarous usage which they experienced,
+and which this trade, by its natural tendency to harden the heart,
+exclusively produced. He would just read an extract of a letter from
+Governor Parrey, of Barbadoes, to Lord Sydney, one of the secretaries of
+state. The Governor declared he could no longer contain himself on account
+of the ill treatment, which the British sailors endured at the hands of
+their savage captains. These were obliged to have their vessels strongly
+manned, not only on account of the unhealthiness of the climate of Africa,
+but of the necessity of guarding the slaves, and preventing and suppressing
+insurrections; and when they arrived in the West Indies, and were out of
+all danger from the latter, they quarrelled with their men on the most
+frivolous pretences, on purpose to discharge them, and thus save the
+payment of supernumerary wages home. Thus many were left in a diseased and
+deplorable state; either to perish by sickness, or to enter into foreign
+service; great numbers of whom were for ever lost to their country. The
+Governor concluded by declaring, that the enormities attendant on this
+trade were so great, as to demand the immediate interference of the
+legislature.
+
+
+The next objection to the abolition was, that if we were to relinquish the
+Slave-trade, our rivals, the French, would take it up; so that, while we
+should suffer by the measure, the evil would still go on, and this even to
+its former extent. This was, indeed, a very weak argument; and, if it would
+defend the continuance of the Slave-trade, might equally be urged in favour
+of robbery, murder, and every species of wickedness, which, if we did not
+practise, others would commit. But suppose, for the sake of argument, that
+they were to take it up. What good would it do them? What advantages, for
+instance, would they derive from this pestilential commerce to their
+marine? Should not we, on the other hand, be benefited by this change?
+Would they not be obliged to come to us, in consequence of the cheapness of
+our manufactures, for what they wanted for the African market? But he would
+not calumniate the French nation so much as to suppose that they would
+carry on the trade if we were to relinquish it. He believed, on the other
+hand, that they would abolish it also. Mr. Necker, the present minister of
+France, was a man of religious principle; and, in his work upon the
+administration of the finances, had recorded his abhorrence of this trade.
+He was happy also to relate an anecdote of the present King of France,
+which proved that he was a friend to the abolition; for, being petitioned
+to dissolve a society, formed at Paris, for the annihilation of the
+Slave-trade, his majesty answered, that he would not, and was happy to hear
+that so humane an association was formed in his dominions. And here, having
+mentioned the society in Paris, he could not help paying a due compliment
+to that established in London for the same purpose, which had laboured with
+the greatest assiduity to make this important subject understood, and which
+had conducted itself with so much judgment and moderation as to have
+interested men of all religions, and to have united them in their cause.
+
+There was another topic which he would submit to the notice of the house
+before he concluded. They were perhaps not aware, that a fair and
+honourable trade might be substituted in the natural productions of Africa,
+so that our connection with that continent in the way of commercial
+advantage need not be lost. The natives had already made some advances in
+it; and if they had not appeared so forward in raising and collecting their
+own produce for sale as in some other countries, it was to be imputed to
+the Slave-trade: but remove the cause, and Africa would soon emerge from
+her present ignorant and indolent state. Civilization would go on with her
+as well as with other nations. Europe three or four centuries ago was in
+many parts as barbarous as Africa at present, and chargeable with as bad
+practices. For, what would be said, if, so late as the middle of the
+thirteenth century, he could find a parallel there for the
+Slave-trade?--Yes. This parallel was to be found even in England. The
+people of Bristol, in the reign of Henry the Seventh, had a regular market
+for children, which were bought by the Irish: but the latter having
+experienced a general calamity, which they imputed as a judgment from
+Heaven on account of this wicked traffic, abolished it. The only thing,
+therefore, which he had to solicit of the house, was to show that they were
+now as enlightened as the Irish were four centuries back, by refusing to
+buy the children of other nations. He hoped they would do it. He hoped,
+too, they would do it in an unqualified manner. Nothing less than a total
+abolition of the trade would do away the evils complained of. The
+legislature of Jamaica, indeed, had thought that regulations might answer
+the purpose. Their report had recommended, that no person should be
+kidnapped, or permitted to be made a slave, contrary to the customs of
+Africa. But might he not be reduced to this state very unjustly, and yet by
+no means contrary to the African laws? Besides, how could we distinguish
+between those who were justly or unjustly reduced to it? Could we discover
+them by their physiognomy?--But if we could, Who would believe that the
+British captains would be influenced by any regulations made in this
+country, to refuse to purchase those who had not been fairly, honestly, and
+uprightly enslaved? They who were offered to us for sale were brought, some
+of them, three or four thousand miles, and exchanged like cattle from one
+hand to another, till they reached the coast. But who could return these to
+their homes, or make them compensation for their sufferings during their
+long journeyings? He would now conclude by begging pardon of the house for
+having detained them so long. He could indeed have expressed his own
+conviction in fewer words. He needed only to have made one or two short
+statements, and to have quoted the commandment, "Thou shalt do no murder."
+But he thought it his duty to lay the whole of the case, and the whole of
+its guilt, before them. They would see now that no mitigations, no
+palliatives, would either be efficient or admissible. Nothing short of an
+absolute abolition could be adopted. This they owed to Africa: they owed
+it, too, to their own moral characters. And he hoped they would follow up
+the principle of one of the repentant African captains, who had gone before
+the committee of privy council as a voluntary witness, and that they would
+make Africa all the atonement in their power for the multifarious injuries
+she had received at the hands of British subjects. With respect to these
+injuries, their enormity and extent, it might be alleged in their excuse,
+that they were not fully acquainted with them till that moment, and
+therefore not answerable for their former existence: but now they could no
+longer plead ignorance concerning them. They had seen them brought directly
+before their eyes, and they must decide for themselves, and must justify to
+the world and their own consciences the facts and principles upon which
+their decision was formed.
+
+Mr. Wilberforce having concluded his speech, which lasted three hours and a
+half, read, and laid on the table of the house, as subjects for their
+future discussion, twelve propositions, which he had deduced from the
+evidence contained in the privy council report, and of which the following
+is the abridged substance:
+
+1. That the number of slaves annually carried from the coast of Africa, in
+British vessels, was about 38,000, of which, on an average, 22,500 were
+carried to the British islands, and that of the latter only 17,500 were
+retained there.
+
+2. That these slaves, according to the evidence on the table, consisted,
+First, of prisoners of war; Secondly, of free persons sold for debt, or on
+account of real or imputed crimes, particularly adultery and witchcraft; in
+which cases they were frequently sold with their whole families, and
+sometimes for the profit of those by whom they were condemned; Thirdly, of
+domestic slaves sold for the profit of their masters, in some places at the
+will of the masters, and in others, on being condemned by them for real or
+imputed crimes; Fourthly, of persons made slaves by various acts of
+oppression, violence, or fraud, committed either by the princes and chiefs
+of those countries on their subjects, or by private individuals on each
+other;--or, lastly, by Europeans engaged in this traffic.
+
+3. That the trade so carried on had necessarily a tendency to occasion
+frequent and cruel wars among the natives; to produce unjust convictions
+and punishments for pretended or aggravated crimes; to encourage acts of
+oppression, violence, and fraud, and to obstruct the natural course of
+civilization and improvement in those countries.
+
+4. That Africa in its present state furnished several valuable articles of
+commerce which were partly peculiar to itself, but that it was adapted to
+the production of others, with which we were now either wholly or in great
+part supplied by foreign nations. That an extensive commerce with Africa
+might be substituted in these commodities, so as to afford a return for as
+many articles as had annually been carried thither in British vessels: and,
+lastly, that such a commerce might reasonably be expected to increase by
+the progress of civilization there.
+
+5. That the Slave-trade was peculiarly destructive to the seamen employed
+in it; and that the mortality there had been much greater than in any
+British vessels employed upon the same coast in any other service or trade.
+
+6. That the mode of transporting the slaves from Africa to the West Indies
+necessarily exposed them to many and grievous sufferings, for which no
+regulations could provide an adequate remedy; and that in consequence
+thereof a large proportion had annually perished during the voyage.
+
+7. That a large proportion had also perished in the harbours in the West
+Indies, from the diseases contracted in the voyage and the treatment of the
+same, previously to their being sold, and that this loss amounted to four
+and a half per cent. of the imported slaves.
+
+8. That the loss of the newly imported slaves, within the three first years
+after their importation, bore a large proportion to the whole number
+imported.
+
+9. That the natural increase of population among the slaves in the islands,
+appeared to have been impeded principally by the following causes:--First,
+By the inequality of the sexes in the importations from Africa. Secondly,
+By the general dissoluteness of manners among the slaves, and the want of
+proper regulations for the encouragement of marriages and of rearing
+children among them. Thirdly, By the particular diseases which were
+prevalent among them, and which were in some instances to be attributed to
+too severe labour, or rigorous treatment, and in others to insufficient or
+improper food. Fourthly, By those diseases, which affected a large
+proportion of negro-children in their infancy, and by those, to which the
+negros newly imported from Africa had been found to be particularly liable.
+
+10. That the whole number of the slaves in the island of Jamaica in 1768
+was about 167,000, in 1774 about 193,000, and in 1787 about 256,000: that
+by comparing these numbers with the numbers imported and retained in the
+said island during all these years, and making proper allowances, the
+annual excess of deaths above births was in the proportion of about
+seven-eighths per cent.; that in the first six years of this period it was
+in the proportion of rather more than one on every hundred; that in the
+last thirteen years of the same it was in the proportion of about
+three-fifths on every hundred; and that a number of slaves, amounting to
+fifteen thousand, perished during the latter period in consequence of
+repeated hurricanes, and of the want of foreign supplies of provisions.
+
+11. That the whole number of slaves in the island of Barbadoes was in the
+year 1764 about 70,706; in 1774 about 74,874; in 1780 about 68,270; in
+1781, after the hurricane, about 63,248, and in 1786 about 62,115: that by
+comparing these numbers with the number imported into this island (not
+allowing for any re-exportation), the annual excess of deaths above births
+in the ten years from 1764 to 1774 was in the proportion of about five on
+every hundred; that in the seven years from 1774 to 1780 it was in the
+proportion of about one and one-third on every hundred; that between the
+year 1780 and 1781 there had been a decrease in the number of slaves of
+about five thousand; that in the six years from 1781 to 1786 the excess of
+deaths was in the proportion of rather less than seven-eighths on every
+hundred; that in the four years from 1783 to 1786 it was in the proportion
+of rather less than one-third on every hundred; and that, during the whole
+period, there was no doubt that some had been exported from the island, but
+considerably more in the first part of this period than in the last.
+
+12. That the accounts from the Leeward Islands, and from Dominica, Grenada,
+and St. Vincent's, did not furnish sufficient grounds for comparing the
+state of population in the said islands at different periods with the
+number of slaves, which had been from time to time imported there and
+exported therefrom; but that from the evidence which had been received
+respecting the present state of these islands, as well as that of Jamaica
+and Barbadoes, and from a consideration of the means of obviating the
+causes, which had hitherto operated to impede the natural increase of the
+slaves, and of lessening the demand for manual labour, without diminishing
+the profit of the planters, no considerable or permanent inconvenience
+would result from discontinuing the further importation of African slaves.
+
+These propositions having been laid upon the table of the house, Lord
+Penrhyn rose in behalf of the planters, and, next after him, Mr. Gascoyne
+(both members for Liverpool) in behalf of the merchants concerned in the
+latter place. They both predicted the ruin and misery, which would
+inevitably follow the abolition of the trade. The former said, that no less
+than seventy millions were mortgaged upon lands in the West Indies, all of
+which would be lost. Mr. Wilberforce therefore should have made a motion to
+pledge the house to the repayment of this sum, before he had brought
+forward his propositions. Compensation ought to have been agreed upon as a
+previously necessary measure. The latter said, that in consequence of the
+bill of last year many ships were laid up and many seamen out of employ.
+His constituents had large capitals engaged in the trade, and, if it were
+to be wholly done away, they would suffer from not knowing where to employ
+them. They both joined in asserting, that Mr. Wilberforce had made so many
+misrepresentations in all the branches of this subject, that no reliance
+whatever was to be placed on the picture, which he had chosen to exhibit.
+They should speak however more fully to this point, when the propositions
+were discussed.
+
+The latter declaration called up Mr. Wilberforce again, who observed, that
+he had no intention of misrepresenting any fact. He did not know that he
+had done it in any one instance; but, if he had, it would be easy to
+convict him out of the report upon the table.
+
+Mr. Burke then rose. He would not, he said, detain the committee long.
+Indeed he was not able, weary and indisposed as he then felt himself, even
+if he had an inclination to do it; but as, on account of his other
+parliamentary duty, he might not have it in his power to attend the
+business now before them in its course, he would take that opportunity of
+stating his opinion upon it.
+
+
+And, first, the house, the nation, and all Europe were under great
+obligations to Mr. Wilberforce for having brought this important subject
+forward. He had done it in a manner the most masterly, impressive, and
+eloquent. He had laid down his principles so admirably, and with so much
+order and force, that his speech had equalled any thing he had ever heard
+in modern oratory, and perhaps it had not been excelled by any thing to be
+found in ancient times. As to the Slave-trade itself, there could not be
+two opinions about it where men were not interested. A trade, begun in
+savage war, prosecuted with unheard-of barbarity, continued during the
+transportation with the most loathsome imprisonment, and ending in
+perpetual exile and slavery, was a trade so horrid in all its
+circumstances, that it was impossible to produce a single argument in its
+favour. On the ground of prudence, nothing could be said in defence of it;
+nor could it be justified by necessity. It was necessity alone, that could
+be brought to justify inhumanity; but no case of necessity could be made
+out strong enough to justify this monstrous traffic. It was therefore the
+duty of the house to put an end to it, and this without further delay. This
+conviction, that it became them to do it immediately, made him regret (and
+it was the only thing he regretted in the admirable speech he had heard)
+that his honourable friend should have introduced propositions on this
+subject. He could have wished that the business had been brought to a
+conclusion at once, without voting the propositions, which had been read to
+them. He was not over fond of abstract propositions. They were seldom
+necessary; and often occasioned great difficulty, embarrassment, and delay.
+There was besides no occasion whatever to assign detailed reasons for a
+vote, which Nature herself dictated, and which Religion enforced. If it
+should happen, that the propositions were not carried in that house or the
+other, such a complication of mischiefs might follow, as might occasion
+them heartily to lament that they were ever introduced. If the ultimate
+resolution should happen to be lost, he was afraid the propositions would
+pass as waste paper, if not be injurious to the cause at a future time.
+
+And now, as the house must bring this matter to an issue, he would beg
+their attention to a particular point. He entreated them to look further
+than the present moment, and to ask themselves, if they had fortified their
+minds sufficiently to bear the consequences, which might arise from the
+abolition of the Slave-trade, supposing they should decide upon it. When
+they abandoned it, other foreign powers might take it up, and clandestinely
+supply our islands with slaves. Had they virtue enough to see another
+country reaping profits, which they themselves had given up; and to abstain
+from that envy natural to rivals, and firmly to adhere to their
+determination? If so, let them thankfully proceed to vote the immediate
+abolition of the Slave-trade. But if they should repent of their virtue
+(and he had known miserable instances of such repentance), all hopes of
+future reformation of this enormous evil would be lost. They would go back
+to a trade they had abandoned with redoubled attachment, and would adhere
+to it with a degree of avidity and shameless ardour, to their own
+humiliation, and to the degradation and disgrace of the nation in the eyes
+of all Europe. These were considerations worth regarding, before they took
+a decisive step in a business, in which they ought not to move with any
+other determination than to abide by the consequences at all hazards. The
+honourable gentleman (who to his eternal honour had introduced this great
+subject to their notice) had in his eloquent oration knocked at every door,
+and appealed to every passion, well knowing that mankind were governed by
+their sympathies. But there were other passions to be regarded. Men were
+always ready to obey their sympathies, when it cost them nothing. But were
+they prepared to pay the price of their virtue on this great occasion? This
+was the question. If they were, they would do themselves immortal honour,
+and would have the satisfaction of having done away a commerce, which,
+while it was productive of misery not to be described, most of all hardened
+the heart, and vitiated the human character.
+
+With respect to the consequences mentioned by the two members for
+Liverpool, he had a word or two to offer upon them. Lord Penrhyn had talked
+of millions to be lost and paid for. But seeing no probability of any loss
+ultimately, he could see no necessity for compensation. He believed, on the
+other hand, that the planters would be great gainers by those wholesome
+regulations, which they would be obliged to make, if the Slave-trade were
+abolished. He did not however flatter them with the idea that this gain
+would be immediate. Perhaps they might experience inconveniences at first,
+and even some loss. But what then? With their loss, their virtue would be
+the greater. And in this light he hoped the house would consider the
+matter; for, if they were called upon to do an act of virtuous energy and
+heroism, they ought to think it right to submit to temporary disadvantages
+for the sake of truth, justice, humanity, and the prospect of greater
+happiness.
+
+The other member, Mr. Gascoyne, had said, that his constituents, if the
+trade were abolished, could not employ their capitals elsewhere. But
+whether they could or not, it was the duty of that house, if they put them
+into a traffic, which was shocking to humanity and disgraceful to the
+nation, to change their application, and not to allow them to be used to a
+barbarous purpose. He believed, however, that the merchants of Liverpool
+would find no difficulty on this head. All capitals required active motion.
+It was in their nature not to remain passive and unemployed. They would
+soon turn them into other channels. This they had done themselves during
+the American war; for the Slave-trade was then almost wholly lost, and
+yet they had their ships employed, either as transports in the service
+of Government, or in other ways.
+
+And as he now called upon the house not to allow any conjectural losses to
+become impediments in the way of the abolition of the Slave-trade, so he
+called upon them to beware how they suffered any representations of the
+happiness of the state of slavery in our islands to influence them against
+so glorious a measure. Admiral Barrington had said in his testimony, that
+he had often envied the condition of the slaves there. But surely, the
+honourable admiral must have meant, that, as he had often toiled like a
+slave in the defence of his country, (as his many gallant actions had
+proved,) so he envied the day, when he was to toil in a similar manner in
+the same cause. If, however, his words to be taken literally, his
+sensations could only be accounted for by his having seen the negros in the
+hour of their sports, when a sense of the misery of their condition was
+neither felt by themselves nor visible to others. But their appearance on
+such occasions did by no means disprove their low and abject state. Nothing
+made a happy slave but a degraded man. In proportion as the mind grows
+callous to its degradation, and all sense of manly pride is lost, the slave
+feels comfort. In fact, he is no longer a man. If he were to define a man,
+he would say with Shakespeare,
+
+  "Man is a being holding large discourse, Looking before and after."
+
+But a slave was incapable of looking before and after. He had no motive to
+do it. He was a mere passive instrument in the hands of others, to be used
+at their discretion. Though living, he was dead as to all voluntary agency.
+Though moving amidst the creation with an erect form, and with the shape
+and semblance of a human being, he was a nullity as a man.
+
+Mr. Pitt thanked his honourable friend Mr. Wilberforce for having at length
+introduced this great and important subject to the consideration of the
+house. He thanked him also for the perspicuous, forcible, and masterly
+manner, in which he had treated it. He was sure that no argument,
+compatible with any idea of justice, could be assigned for the continuation
+of the Slave-trade. And, at the same time that he was willing to listen
+with candour and attention to every thing, that could be urged on the other
+side of the question, he was sure that the principles from which his
+opinion was deduced were unalterable. He had examined the subject with the
+anxiety which became him, where the happiness and interests of so many
+thousands were concerned, and with the minuteness which would be expected
+of him, on account of the responsible situation which he held; and he
+averred, that it was sophistry, obscurity of ideas, and vagueness of
+reasoning, which alone could have hitherto prevented all mankind (those
+immediately interested in the question excepted) from agreeing in one and
+the same opinion upon the subject. With respect to the propriety of
+introducing the individual propositions, which had been offered, he
+differed with Mr. Burke, and he thanked his honourable friend Mr.
+Wilberforce for having chosen the only way, in which it could be made
+obvious to the world, that they were warranted on every ground of reason
+and of fact in coming to that vote, which he trusted would be the end of
+their proceeding. The grounds for the attainment of this end were
+distinctly stated in the propositions. Let the propositions be brought
+before the house, one by one, and argued from the evidence; and it would
+then be seen, that they were such as no one, who was not deaf to the
+language of reason, could deny. Let them be once entered upon the journals
+of that house, and it was almost impossible they should fail. The abolition
+must be voted. As to the mode of it, or how it should be effected, they
+were not at present to discuss it; but he trusted it would be such, as
+would not invite foreign powers to supply our islands with slaves by a
+clandestine trade. After a debt, founded on the immutable principles of
+justice, was found to be due, it was impossible but the country had means
+to cause it to be paid. Should such an illicit proceeding be attempted, the
+only language which it became us to adopt was, that Great Britain had
+resources to enable her to protect her islands, and to prevent that traffic
+from being clandestinely carried on by them, which she had thought fit from
+a regard to her character to abandon. It was highly becoming Great Britain
+to take the lead of other nations in such a virtuous and magnificent
+measure, and he could not but have confidence, that they would be inclined
+to share the honour with us, or be pleased to follow us as their example.
+If we were disposed to set about this glorious work in earnest, they might
+be invited to concur with us by a negotiation to be immediately opened for
+that purpose. He would only now observe, before he sat down, in answer to
+certain ideas thrown out, that he could by no means acquiesce in any
+compensation for losses, which might be sustained by the people of
+Liverpool, or by others in any other part of the kingdom, in the execution
+of this just and necessary undertaking.
+
+Sir William Yonge said, he wanted no inducement to concur with the
+honourable mover of the propositions, provided the latter could be fairly
+established, and no serious mischiefs were to arise from the abolition. But
+he was apprehensive that many evils might follow, in the case of any sudden
+or unlooked-for decrease in the slaves. They might be destroyed by
+hurricanes. They might be swept off by many fatal disorders. In these
+cases, the owners of them would not be able to fill up their places, and
+they who had lent money upon the lands, where the losses had happened,
+would foreclose their mortgages. He was fearful also that a clandestine
+trade would be carried on, and then the sufferings of the Africans, crammed
+up in small vessels, which would be obliged to be hovering about from day
+to day, to watch an opportunity of landing, would be ten times greater than
+any which they now experienced in the legal trade. He was glad, however, as
+the matter was to be discussed, that it had been brought forward in the
+shape of distinct propositions, to be grounded upon the evidence in the
+privy council report.
+
+Mr. Fox observed, that he did not like, where he agreed as to the substance
+of a measure, to differ with respect to the form of it. If, however, he
+differed in any thing in the present case, it was with a view rather to
+forward the business than to injure it, or to throw any thing like an
+obstacle in its way. Nothing like either should come from him. What he
+thought was, that all the propositions were not necessary to be voted
+previously to the ultimate decision, though some of them undoubtedly were.
+He considered them as of two classes: the one, alleging the grounds upon
+which it was proper to proceed to the abolition; such as that the trade was
+productive of inexpressible misery, in various ways, to the innocent
+natives of Africa; that it was the grave of our seamen; and so on: the
+other, merely answering objections which might be started, and where there
+might be a difference of opinion. He was however glad that the propositions
+were likely to be entered upon the journals; since, if from any misfortune
+the business should be deferred, it might succeed another year. Sure he was
+that it could not fail to succeed sooner or later. He highly approved of
+what Mr. Pitt had said, relative to the language it became us to hold out
+to foreign powers in case of a clandestine trade. With respect, however, to
+the assertion of Sir William Yonge, that a clandestine trade in slaves
+would be worse than a legal one, he could not admit it. Such a trade, if it
+existed at all, ought only to be clandestine. A trade in human flesh and
+sinews was so scandalous, that it ought not openly to be carried on by any
+government whatever, and much less by that of a Christian country. With
+regard to the regulation of the Slave-trade, he knew of no such thing as a
+regulation of robbery and murder. There was no medium. The legislature must
+either abolish it, or plead guilty of all the wickedness which had been
+shown to attend it. He would now say a word or two with respect to the
+conduct of foreign nations on this subject. It was possible that these,
+when they heard that the matter had been discussed in that house, might
+follow the example, or they might go before us and set one themselves. If
+this were to happen, though we might be the losers, humanity would be the
+gainer. He himself had been thought sometimes to use expressions relative
+to France, which were too harsh, and as if he could only treat her as the
+enemy of this country. Politically speaking, France was our rival. But he
+well knew the distinction between political enmity and illiberal prejudice.
+If there was any great and enlightened nation in Europe, it was France,
+which was as likely as any country upon the face of the globe to catch a
+spark from the light of our fire, and to act upon the present subject with
+warmth and enthusiasm. France had often been improperly stimulated by her
+ambition; and he had no doubt but that, in the present instance, she would
+readily follow its honourable dictates.
+
+Mr. (now Lord) Grenville would not detain the house by going into a
+question, which had been so ably argued; but he should not do justice to
+his feelings, if he did not express publicly to his honourable friend, Mr.
+Wilberforce, the pleasure he had received from one of the most masterly and
+eloquent speeches he had ever heard,--a speech, which, while it did honour
+to him, entitled him to the thanks of the house, of the people of England,
+of all Europe, and of the latest posterity. He approved of the
+propositions, as the best mode of bringing this great question to a happy
+issue. He was pleased also with the language which had been held out with
+respect to foreign nations, and with our determination to assert our right
+of preventing our colonies from carrying on any trade, which we had thought
+it our duty to abandon.
+
+Aldermen Newnham, Sawbridge, and Watson, though they wished well to the
+cause of humanity, could not, as representatives of the city of London,
+give their concurrence to a measure, which would injure it so essentially
+as that of the abolition of the Slave-trade. This trade might undoubtedly
+be put under wholesome regulations, and made productive of great commercial
+advantages. But, if it were abolished, it would render the city of London
+one scene of bankruptcy and ruin. It became the house to take care, while
+they were giving way to the goodness of their hearts, that they did not
+contribute to the ruin of the mercantile interests of their country.
+
+Mr. Martin stated, that he was so well satisfied with the speech of the
+honourable gentleman, who had introduced the propositions, and with the
+language held out by other distinguished members on this subject, that he
+felt himself more proud than ever of being an Englishman. He hoped and
+believed, that the melancholy predictions of the worthy aldermen would not
+prove true, and that the citizens of London would have too much public
+spirit to wish that a great national object (which comprehended the great
+duties of humanity, and justice) should be set aside, merely out of
+consideration to their own private interests.
+
+Mr. Dempster expected, notwithstanding all he had heard, that the first
+proposition submitted to them, would have been to make good out of the
+public purse all the losses individuals were liable to sustain from an
+abolition of the Slave-trade. This ought to have been, as Lord Penrhyn had
+observed, a preliminary measure. He did not like to be generous out of the
+pockets of others. They were to abolish the trade, it was said, out of a
+principle of humanity. Undoubtedly they owed humanity to all mankind. But
+they also owed justice to those, who were interested in the event of the
+question, and had embarked their fortunes on the faith of parliament. In
+fact, he did not like to see men introducing even their schemes of
+benevolence to the detriment of other people; and much less did he like to
+see them going to the colonies, as it were upon their estates, and
+prescribing rules to them for their management. With respect to his own
+speculative opinion, as it regarded cultivation, he had no objection to
+give it. He was sure that sugar could be raised cheaper by free men than by
+slaves. This the practice in China abundantly proved. But yet neither he
+nor any other person had a right to force a system upon others. As to the
+trade itself, by which the present labourers were supplied, it had been
+considered by that house as so valuable, that they had preferred it to all
+others, and had annually voted a considerable sum towards carrying it on.
+They had hitherto deemed it an essential nursery for our seamen. Had it
+really been such as had been represented, our ancestors would scarcely have
+encouraged it; and therefore, upon these and other considerations, he could
+not help thinking that they would be wanting in their duty, if they
+abolished it altogether.
+
+Mr. William Smith would not detain the house long at that late hour upon
+this important subject; but he could not help testifying the great
+satisfaction he felt at the manner, in which the honourable gentleman who
+opened the debate (if it could be so called) had treated it. He approved of
+the propositions as the best mode of bringing the decision to a happy
+issue. He gave Mr. Fox great credit for the open and manly way, in which he
+had manifested his abhorrence of this trade, and for the support he meant
+to give to the total and unqualified abolition of it; for he was satisfied,
+that the more it was inquired into, the more it would be found that nothing
+short of abolition would cure the evil. With respect to certain assertions
+of the members for Liverpool, and certain melancholy predictions about the
+consequences of such an event, which others had held out, he desired to lay
+in his claim for observation upon them, when the great question should come
+before the house.
+
+Soon after this the house broke up; and the discussion of the propositions,
+which was the next parliamentary measure intended, was postponed to a
+future day, which was sufficiently distant to give all the parties
+concerned time to make the necessary preparations for it.
+
+Of this interval the committee for the abolition availed themselves to
+thank Mr. Wilberforce for the very able and satisfactory manner, in which
+he had stated to the house his propositions for the abolition of the
+Slave-trade, and for the unparalleled assiduity and perseverance, with
+which he had all along endeavoured to accomplish this object, as well as to
+take measures themselves for the further promotion of it. Their opponents
+availed themselves of this interval also. But that, which now embarrassed
+them, was the evidence contained in the privy council report. They had no
+idea, considering the number of witnesses they had sent to be examined,
+that this evidence, when duly weighed, could by right reasoning have given
+birth to the sentiments, which had been displayed in the speeches of the
+most distinguished members of the House of Commons, or to the contents of
+the propositions, which had been laid upon their table. They were
+thunder-struck as it were by their own weakness; and from this time they
+were determined, if possible, to get rid of it as a standard for decision,
+or to interpose every parliamentary delay in their power.
+
+On the twenty-first of May, the subject came again before the attention of
+the house. It was ushered in, as was expected, by petitions collected in
+the interim, and which were expressive of the frightful consequences, which
+would attend the abolition of the Slave-trade. Alderman Newnham presented
+one from certain merchants in London; Alderman Watson another from certain
+merchants, mortgagees, and creditors of the sugar-islands; Lord Maitland
+another from the planters of Antigua; Mr. Blackburne another from certain
+manufacturers of Manchester; Mr. Gascoyne another from the corporation of
+Liverpool; and Lord Penrhyn others from different interested bodies in the
+same town.
+
+Mr. Wilberforce then moved the order of the day, for the house to go into a
+committee of the whole house on the report of the privy council, and the
+several matters of evidence already upon the table relative to the
+Slave-trade.
+
+Mr. Alderman Sawbridge immediately arose, and asked Mr. Wilberforce, if he
+meant to adduce any other evidence, besides that in the privy council
+report, in behalf of his propositions, or to admit other witnesses, if such
+could be found, to invalidate them. Mr. Wilberforce replied, that he was
+quite satisfied with the report on the table. It would establish all his
+propositions. He should call no witnesses himself: as to permission to
+others to call them, that must be determined by the house.
+
+This question and this answer gave birth immediately to great disputes upon
+the subject. Aldermen Sawbridge, Newnham, and Watson; Lords Penrhyn and
+Maitland; Mr. Gascoyne, Marsham, and others spoke against the admission of
+the evidence, which had been laid upon the table. They contended, that it
+was insufficient, defective, and contradictory; that it was _ex parte_
+evidence; that it had been manufactured by ministers; that it was founded
+chiefly on hearsay, and that the greatest part of it was false; that it had
+undergone no cross-examination; that it was unconstitutional; and that, if
+they admitted it, they would establish a dangerous precedent, and abandon
+their rights. It was urged on the other hand by Mr. Courtenay, that it
+could not be _ex parte_ evidence, because it contained testimony on both
+sides of the question. The circumstance also of its being contradictory,
+which had been alleged against it, proved that it was the result of an
+impartial examination. Mr. Fox observed, that it was perfectly admissible.
+He called upon those, who took the other side of the question, to say why,
+if it was really inadmissible, they had not opposed it at first. It had
+now been a long time on the table, and no fault had been found with it.
+The truth was, it did not suit them, and they were determined by a
+side-wind as it were to put an end to the inquiry. Mr. Pitt observed
+that, if parliament had previously resolved to receive no evidence
+on a given subject but from the privy council, such a resolution
+indeed would strike at the root of the privileges of the House of
+Commons; but it was absurd to suppose that the house could upon
+no occasion receive evidence, taken where it was most convenient
+to take it, and subject throughout to new investigation, if any
+one doubted its validity. The report of the privy council consisted, first,
+of calculations and accounts from the public offices, and, next, of written
+documents on the subject; both of which were just as authentic, as if they
+had been laid upon the table of that house. The remaining part of it
+consisted of the testimony of living witnesses, all of whose names were
+published, so that if any one doubted their veracity, it was open to him to
+reexamine all or each of them. It had been said by adversaries that the
+report on the table was a weak and imperfect report, but would not these
+have the advantage of its weakness and imperfection? It was strange, when
+his honourable friend, Mr. Wilberforce, had said, "Weak and imperfect as
+the report may be thought to be, I think it strong enough to bear me out in
+all my propositions," that they, who objected to it, should have no better
+reason to give than this, "We object, because the ground of evidence on
+which you rest is too weak to support your cause." Unless it were meant to
+say (and the meaning seemed to be but thinly disguised) that the house
+ought to abandon the inquiry, he saw no reason whatever for not going
+immediately into a committee; and he wished gentlemen to consider whether
+it became the dignity of their proceedings to obstruct the progress of an
+inquiry, which the house had pledged itself to undertake. Their conduct
+indeed seemed extraordinary on this occasion. It was certainly singular
+that, while the report had been five weeks upon the table, no argument had
+been brought against its sufficiency; but that on the moment when the house
+was expected to come to an ultimate vote upon the subject, it should be
+thought defective, contradictory, unconstitutional, and otherwise
+objectionable. These objections, he was satisfied, neither did nor could
+originate with the country gentlemen; but they were brought forward, for
+purposes not now to be concealed, by the avowed enemies of this noble
+cause.
+
+In the course of the discussion, which arose upon this subject, every
+opportunity was taken to impress the house with the dreadful consequences
+of the abolition. Mr. Henniker read a long letter from the King of Dahomey
+to George the First; which had been found among the papers of James, first
+Duke of Chandos, and which had remained in the family till that time. In
+this, the King of Dahomey boasted of his victory over the King of Ardrah,
+and how he had ornamented the pavement and walls of his palace with the
+heads of the vanquished. These cruelties, Mr. Henniker said, were not
+imputable to the Slave-trade. They showed the Africans to be naturally a
+savage people, and that we did them a great kindness by taking them from
+their country. Alderman Sawbridge maintained that, if the abolition passed,
+the Africans, who could not be sold as slaves, would be butchered at home;
+while those, who had been carried to our islands, would be no longer under
+control. Hence insurrections, and the manifold evils which belonged to
+them. Alderman Newnham was certain that the abolition would be the ruin of
+the trade of the country. It would affect even the landed interest, and the
+funds. It would be impossible to collect money to diminish the national
+debt. Every man in the kingdom would feel the abolition come home to him.
+Alderman Watson maintained the same argument, and pronounced the trade
+under discussion to be a merciful and humane trade.
+
+Compensation was also insisted upon by Mr. Drake, Alderman Newnham, Mr.
+Henniker, Mr. Cruger, and others. This was resisted by Mr. Burke; who said
+that compensation in such a case would be contrary to every principle of
+legislation. Government gave encouragement to any branch of commerce, while
+it was regarded as conducive to the welfare of the community, or compatible
+with humanity and justice. But they were competent to withdraw their
+countenance from it, when it was found to be immoral, and injurious, and
+disgraceful to the state. They, who engaged in it, knew the terms under
+which they were placed, and adopted it with all the risks with which it was
+accompanied; and of consequence it was but just, that they should be
+prepared to abide by the loss which might accrue, when the public should
+think it right no longer to support it. But such a trade as this it was
+impossible any longer to support. Indeed it was not a trade. It was a
+system of robbery. It was a system, too, injurious to the welfare of other
+nations.
+
+How could Africa ever be civilized under it? While we continued to purchase
+the natives, they must remain in a state of barbarism. It was impossible to
+civilize slaves. It was contrary to the system of human nature. There was
+no country placed under such disadvantageous circumstances, into which the
+shadow of improvement had ever been introduced.
+
+Great pains were taken to impress the house with the propriety of
+regulation. Sir Grey Cooper; Aldermen Sawbridge, Watson, and Newnham; Mr.
+Marsham, and Mr. Cruger, contended strenuously for it, instead of
+abolition. It was also stated that the merchants would consent to any
+regulation of the trade, which might be offered them.
+
+In the course of the debate much warmth of temper was manifested on both
+sides. The expression of Mr. Fox in a former debate, "that the Slave-trade
+could not be regulated, because there could be no regulation of robbery and
+murder," was brought up, and construed by planters in the house as a charge
+of these crimes upon themselves. Mr. Fox, however, would not retract the
+expression. He repeated it. He had no notion, however, that any individual
+would have taken it to himself. If it contained any reflection at all, it
+was on the whole parliament, who had sanctioned such a trade. Mr. Molyneux
+rose up, and animadverted severely on the character of Mr. Ramsay, one of
+the evidences in the privy council report, during his residence in the West
+Indies. This called up Sir William Dolben and Sir Charles Middleton in his
+defence, the latter of whom bore honourable testimony to his virtues from
+an intimate acquaintance with him, and a residence in the same village with
+him, for twenty years. Mr. Molyneux spoke also in angry terms of the
+measure of abolition. To annihilate the trade, he said, and to make no
+compensation on account of it, was an act of swindling. Mr. Macnamara
+called the measure hypocritical, fanatic, and methodistical. Mr. Pitt was
+so irritated at the insidious attempt to set aside the privy council
+report, when no complaint had been alleged against it before, that he was
+quite off his guard, and he thought it right afterwards to apologize for
+the warmth into he had been betrayed. The Speaker too was obliged
+frequently to interfere. On this occasion no less than thirty members
+spoke. And there had probably been few seasons, when so much disorder had
+been discoverable in that house.
+
+The result of the debate was, a permission to those interested in the
+continuance of the Slave-trade to bring counsel to the bar on the
+twenty-sixth of May, and then to introduce such witnesses, as might throw
+further light on the propositions in the shortest time: for Mr. Pitt only
+acquiesced in this new measure on a supposition, "that there would be no
+unnecessary delay, as he could, by no means submit to the ultimate
+procrastination of so important a business." He even hoped (and in this
+hope he was joined by Mr. Fox) that those concerned would endeavour to
+bring the whole of the evidence they meant to offer at the first
+examination.
+
+On the day appointed, the house met for the purposes now specified; when
+Alderman Newnham, thinking that such an important question should not be
+decided but in a full assembly of the representatives of the nation, moved
+for a call of the house on that day fortnight. Mr. Wilberforce stated that
+he had no objection to such a measure; believing the greater the number
+present the more favourable it would be to his cause. This motion, however,
+produced a debate and a division, in which it appeared that there were one
+hundred and fifty-eight in favour of it, and twenty-eight against it. The
+business of the day now commenced. The house went into a committee, and Sir
+William Dolben was put into the chair. Mr. Serjeant Le Blanc was then
+called in. He made an able speech in behalf of his clients; and introduced
+John Barnes, esquire, as his first witness, whose examination took up the
+remainder of the day. By this step they, who were interested in the
+continuance of the trade, attained their wishes, for they had now got
+possession of the ground with their evidence; and they knew they could keep
+it, almost as long as they pleased, for the purposes of delay. Thus they,
+who boasted, when the privy council examinations began, that they would
+soon do away all the idle tales, which had been invented against them, and
+who desired the public only to suspend their judgment till the report
+should come out, when they would see the folly and wickedness of all our
+allegations, dared not abide by the evidence, which they themselves had
+taught others to look up to as the standard by which they were desirous of
+being judged: thus they, who had advantages beyond measure in forming a
+body of evidence in their own favour, abandoned that, which they had
+collected. And here it is impossible for me not to make a short comparative
+statement on this subject, if it were only to show how little can be made
+out, with the very best opportunities, against the cause of humanity and
+religion. With respect to ourselves, we had almost all our witnesses to
+seek. We had to travel after them for weeks together. When we found them,
+we had scarcely the power of choice. We were obliged to take them as they
+came. When we found them, too, we had generally to implore them to come
+forward in our behalf. Of those so implored three out of four refused, and
+the plea for this refusal was a fear lest they should injure their own
+interests. The merchants, on the other hand, had their witnesses ready on
+the spot. They had always ships in harbour containing persons, who had a
+knowledge of the subject. They had several also from whom to choose. If one
+man was favourable to their cause in three of the points belonging to it,
+but was unfavourable in the fourth, he could be put aside and replaced.
+When they had thus selected them, they had not to entreat, but to command,
+their attendance. They had no fear, again, when they thus commanded, of a
+refusal on the ground of interest; because these were promoting their
+interest by obliging those who employed them. Viewing these and other
+circumstances, which might be thrown into this comparative statement, it
+was some consolation to us to know, amidst the disappointment which this
+new measure occasioned, and our apparent defeat in the eyes of the public,
+that we had really beaten our opponents at their own weapons, and that, as
+this was a victory in our own private feelings, so it was the presage to us
+of a future triumph.
+
+On the twenty-ninth of May, Mr. Tierney made a motion to divide the
+consideration of the Slave-trade into two heads, by separating the African
+from the West Indian part of the question. This he did for the more clear
+discussion of the propositions, as well as to save time. This motion,
+however, was overruled by Mr. Pitt.
+
+At length, on the ninth of June, by which time it was supposed that new
+light, and this in sufficient quantity, would have been thrown upon the
+propositions, it appeared that only two witnesses had been fully heard. The
+examinations, therefore, were continued, and they went on till the
+twenty-third. On this day, the order for the call of the house, which had
+been prolonged, standing unrepealed, there was a large attendance of
+members. A motion was then made to get rid of the business altogether, but
+it failed. It was now seen, however, that it was impossible to bring the
+question to a final decision in this session, for they, who were interested
+in it, affirmed that they had yet many important witnesses to introduce.
+Alderman Newnham, therefore, by the consent of Mr. Wilberforce, moved, that
+"the further consideration of the subject be deferred to the next session."
+On this occasion, Mr. William Smith remarked, that though the decision on
+the great question was thus to be adjourned, he hoped the examinations, at
+least, would be permitted to go on. He had not heard any good reason, why
+they might not be carried on for some weeks longer. It was known that the
+hearing of evidence was at all times thinly attended. If therefore the few
+members, who did attend, were willing to give up their time a little
+longer, why should other members complain of an inconvenience in the
+suffering of which they took no share? He thought that by this proceeding
+the examination of witnesses on the part of the merchants might be
+finished, and of consequence the business brought into a very desirable
+state of forwardness against the ensuing session. These observations had
+not the desired effect, and the motion of Mr. Alderman Newnham was carried
+without a division. Thus the great question, for the elucidation of which
+all the new evidences were to be heard at the very first examination, in
+order that it might be decided by the ninth of June, was by the intrigue of
+our opponents deferred to another year.
+
+The order of the day for going into the further consideration of the
+Slave-trade having been discharged, Sir William Dolben rose, to state, that
+it was his intention to renew his bill of the former year, relative to the
+conveyance of the unhappy Africans from their own country to the West
+Indies, and to propose certain alterations in it. He made a motion
+accordingly, which was adopted; and he and Mr. Wilberforce were desired to
+prepare the same.
+
+This bill he introduced soon afterwards, and it passed; but not without
+opposition. It was a matter, however, of great pleasure to find that the
+worthy baronet was enabled by the assistance of Captain (afterwards
+Admiral) Macbride, and other naval officers in the house, to carry such
+clauses, as provided in some degree for the comfort of the poor seamen, who
+were seduced into this wicked trade. They could not indeed provide against
+the barbarity of their captains; but they secured them a space under the
+half deck in which to sleep. They prescribed a form of muster-rolls, which
+they were to see and sign in the presence of the clearing officer. They
+regulated their food both as to kind and quantity; and they preserved them
+from many of the impositions, to which they had been before exposed.
+
+From the time when Mr. Wilberforce gave his first notice this session to
+the present, I had been variously employed, but more particularly in the
+composition of a new work. It was soon perceived to be the object of our
+opponents, to impress upon the public the preference of regulation to
+abolition. I attempted therefore to show the fallacy and wickedness of this
+notion. I divided the evils belonging to the Slave-trade into two kinds.
+These I enumerated in their order. With respect to those of the first kind,
+I proved that they were never to be remedied by any acts of the British
+parliament. Thus, for instance, what bill could alter the nature of the
+human passions? What bill could prevent fraud and violence in Africa, while
+the Slave-trade existed there? What bill could prevent the miserable
+victims of the trade from rising, when on board the ships, if they saw an
+opportunity, and felt a keen sense of their oppression? Those of the second
+I stated to admit of a remedy, and, after making accurate calculations on
+the subject of each, I showed that those merchants, who were to do them
+away effectually, would be ruined by their voyages. The work was called An
+Essay on the comparative Efficiency of Regulation or Abolition as applied
+to the Slave-trade.
+
+The committee also in this interval brought out their famous print of the
+plan and section of a slave-ship; which was designed to give the spectator
+an idea of the sufferings of the Africans in the Middle Passage, and this
+so familiarly, that he might instantly pronounce upon the miseries
+experienced there. The committee at Plymouth had been the first to suggest
+the idea; but that in London had now improved it. As this print seemed
+to make an instantaneous impression of horror upon all who saw it, and
+as it was therefore very instrumental, in consequence of the wide
+circulation given it, in serving the cause of the injured Africans,
+I have given the reader a copy of it in the annexed plate, and I will
+now state the ground or basis, upon which it was formed.
+
+[Illustration]
+
+[Illustration]
+
+[Illustration]
+
+It must be obvious that it became the committee to select some one ship,
+which had been engaged in the Slave-trade, with her real dimensions, if
+they meant to make a fair representation of the manner of the
+transportation. When Captain Parrey, of the royal navy, returned from
+Liverpool, to which place Government had sent him, he brought with him the
+admeasurement of several vessels, which had been so employed, and laid them
+on the table of the House of Commons. At the top of his list stood the ship
+Brookes. The committee therefore, in choosing a vessel on this occasion,
+made use of the ship Brookes; and this they did, because they thought it
+less objectionable to take the first that came, than any other. The vessel
+then in the plate is the vessel now mentioned, and the following is her
+admeasurement as given in by Captain Parrey.
+
+                                                          Ft.  In.
+Length of the lower deck, gratings, and bulkheads
+  included at A A,                                       100    0
+Breadth of beam on the lower deck inside, B B,            25    0
+Depth of hold O O O, from ceiling to ceiling,             10    0
+Height between decks from deck to deck,                    5    0
+Length of the men's room, C C, on the lower deck,         46    0
+Breadth of the men's room, C C, on the lower deck,        25    4
+Length of the platform, D D, in the men's room,           46    0
+Breadth of the platform, in the men's room, on
+  each side,                                               6    0
+Length of the boys' room, E E,                            13    0
+Breadth of the boys' room,                                25    0
+Breadth of platform, F F, in boys' room,                   6    0
+Length of women's room, G G,                              28    6
+Breadth of women's room,                                  23    6
+Length of platform, H H, in women's room,                 28    6
+Breadth of platform in women's room,                       6    0
+Length of the gun-room, I I, on the lower deck,           10    6
+Breadth of the gun-room on the lower deck,                12    0
+Length of the quarter deck, K K,                          33    6
+Breadth of the quarter deck,                              19    6
+Length of the cabin, L L,                                 14    0
+Height of the cabin,                                       6    2
+Length of the half deck, M M,                             16    6
+Height of the half deck,                                   6    2
+Length of the platform, N N, on the half deck,            16    6
+Breadth of the platform on the half deck,                  6    0
+Upper deck, P P,
+
+The committee, having proceeded thus far, thought that they should now
+allow certain dimensions for every man, woman, and child; and then see, how
+many persons, upon such dimensions and upon the admeasurements just given,
+could be stowed in this vessel. They allowed, accordingly, to every man
+slave six feet by one foot four inches for room, to every woman five feet
+by one foot four, to every boy five feet by one foot two, and to every girl
+four feet six by one foot. They then stowed them, and found them as in the
+annexed plate, that is, they found (deducting the women stowed in Z of
+figures 6 and 7, which spaces, being half of the half deck, were allowed by
+Sir William Dolben's last bill to the seamen) that only four hundred and
+fifty could be stowed in her; and the reader will find, if he should think
+it worth while to count the figures in the plate, that, on making the
+deduction mentioned, they will amount to this number.
+
+The committee then thought it right to inquire how many slaves, the act of
+Sir William Dolben allowed this vessel to carry, and they found the number
+to be one hundred and fifty-four; that is, they found it allowed her to
+carry four more than could be put in without trespassing upon the room
+allotted to the rest; for we see that the bodies of the slaves, except just
+at the head of the vessel, already touch each other, and that no deduction
+has been made for tubs or stanchions to support the platforms and decks.
+
+Such was the picture, which the committee were obliged to draw, if they
+regarded mathematical accuracy, of the room allotted to the slaves in this
+vessel. By this picture was exhibited the nature of the Elysium, which Mr.
+Norris and others had invented for them during their transportation from
+their own country. By this picture were seen also the advantages of Sir
+William Dolben's bill; for many, on looking at the plate, considered the
+regulation itself as perfect barbarism. The advantages however obtained by
+it were considerable; for the Brookes was now restricted to four hundred
+and fifty slaves, whereas it was proved that she carried six hundred and
+nine in a former voyage.
+
+The committee, at the conclusion of the session of parliament, made a
+suitable report. It will be unnecessary to detail this for obvious reasons.
+There was, however, one thing contained in it, which ought not to be
+omitted. It stated, with appropriate concern, the death of the first
+controversial writer, and of one of the most able and indefatigable
+labourers, in their cause. Mr. Ramsay had been for some time indisposed.
+The climate of the West Indies, during a residence of twenty years, and the
+agitation in which his mind had been kept for the last four years of his
+life, in consequence of the virulent attacks on his word and character by
+those interested in the continuance of the trade, had contributed to
+undermine his constitution. During his whole illness he was cheerful and
+composed; nor did he allow it to hinder him, severe as it was, from taking
+any opportunity which offered of serving those unhappy persons, for whose
+injuries he had so deeply felt. A few days only before he died, I received
+from him probably the last letter he ever wrote, of which the following is
+an extract:
+
+"My health has certainly taken a most alarming turn; and if some
+considerable alteration does not take place for the better in a very little
+time, it will be all over with me; I mean as to the present life. I have
+lost all appetite; and suffer grievously from an almost continual pain in
+my stomach, which leaves me no enjoyment of myself, but such as I can
+collect from my own reflections, and the comforts of religion. I am glad
+the bill for the abolition is in such forwardness. Whether it goes through
+the House or not, the discussion attending it will have a most beneficial
+effect. The whole of this business I think now to be in such a train, as to
+enable me to bid farewell to the present scene with the satisfaction of not
+having lived in vain, and of having done something towards the improvement
+of our common nature; and this at no little expense of time and reputation.
+The little I have now written is my utmost effort; yet yesterday I thought
+it necessary to write an answer to a scurrilous libel in The Diary by one
+Scipio. On my own account he should have remained unnoticed, but our great
+cause must be kept unsullied."
+
+Mr. Ramsay was a man of active habit, of diligence and perseverance in his
+undertakings, and of extraordinary application. He was of mild and humble
+manners. He possessed a strong understanding, with great coolness and
+courage. Patriotism and public spirit were striking traits in his
+character. In domestic life he was amiable: in the ministry, exemplary and
+useful; and he died to the great regret of his parishioners, but most of
+all to that of those, who moved with him in his attempts to bring about the
+important event of the abolition of the Slave-trade.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER II.
+
+_Continuation from July 1789 to July 1790--Author travels to Paris to
+promote the abolition in France--attends the committees of the Friends of
+the Negros--Counter attempts of the committee of White Colonists--An
+account of the deputies of Colour--Meeting at the Duke de la
+Rochefoucauld's--Mirabeau espouses the cause--canvasses the National
+Assembly--Distribution of the section of the slave-ship there--Character of
+Brissot--Author leaves Paris and returns to England--Examination of
+merchants' and planters' evidence resumed in the House of Commons--Author
+travels in search of evidence in favour of the abolition--Opposition to the
+hearing of it--This evidence is at length introduced--Renewal of Sir
+William Dolben's bill--Distribution of the section of the slave-ship in
+England--and of Cowper's Negro's Complaint--and of Wedgewood's Cameos._
+
+
+We usually find, as we give ourselves up to reflection, some little
+mitigation of the afflictions we experience; and yet of the evils which
+come upon us, some are often so heavy as to overpower the sources of
+consolation for a time, and to leave us wretched. This was nearly our
+situation at the close of the last session of parliament. It would be idle
+not to confess that circumstances had occurred, which wounded us deeply.
+Though we had foiled our opponents at their own weapons, and had
+experienced the uninterrupted good wishes and support of the public, we had
+the great mortification to see the enthusiasm of members of parliament
+beginning to cool; to see a question of humanity and justice (for such it
+was, when it was delivered into their hands) verging towards that of
+commercial calculation; and finally to see regulation, as it related to it
+in the way of being substituted for abolition. But most of all were we
+affected, knowing as we did the nature and the extent of the sufferings
+belonging to Slave-trade, that these should be continued to another year.
+This last consideration almost overpowered me. It had fallen to my lot,
+more than to that of any other person, to know these evils, and I seemed
+almost inconsolable at the postponement of the question. I wondered how
+members of parliament, and these Englishmen, could talk as they did on this
+subject; how they could bear for a moment to consider their fellow-man as
+an article of trade; and how they should not count even the delay of an
+hour, which occasioned so much misery to continue, as one of the most
+criminal actions of their lives.
+
+It was in vain, however, to sink under our burthens. Grief could do no
+good; and if our affairs had taken an unfavourable turn, the question was,
+how to restore them. It was sufficiently obvious that, if our opponents
+were left to themselves, or, without any counteracting evidence, they would
+considerably soften down the propositions, if not invalidate them in the
+minds of many. They had such a power of selection of witnesses, that they
+could bring men forward, who might say with truth, that they had seen but
+very few of the evils complained of, and these in an inferior degree. We
+knew also from the example of the Liverpool delegates, how interest and
+prejudice could blind the eyes, and how others might be called upon to give
+their testimony, who would dwell upon the comforts of the Africans, when
+they came into our power; on the sprinkling of their apartments with
+frankincense; on the promotion of music and the dance among them; and on
+the health and festivity of their voyages. It seemed therefore necessary,
+that we should again be looking out for evidence on the part of the
+abolition. Nor did it seem to me to be unreasonable, if our opponents were
+allowed to come forward in a new way, because it was more constitutional,
+that we should be allowed the same privilege. By these means the evidence,
+of which we had now lost the use, might be restored; indifference might be
+fanned into warmth; commercial calculation might be overpowered by justice;
+and abolition, rising above the reach of the cry of regulation, might
+eventually triumph.
+
+I communicated my ideas to the committee, and offered to go round the
+kingdom to accomplish this object. The committee had themselves been
+considering what measures to take, and as each in his own mind had come to
+conclusions similar with my own, my proposal was no sooner made, than
+adopted.
+
+I had not been long upon this journey, when I was called back. Mr.
+Wilberforce, always solicitous for the good of this great cause, was of
+opinion, that, as commotions had taken place in France, which then aimed at
+political reforms, it was possible that the leading persons concerned in
+them might, if an application were made to them judiciously, be induced to
+take the Slave-trade into their consideration, and incorporate it among the
+abuses to be done away. Such a measure, if realized, would not only lessen
+the quantity of human suffering, but annihilate a powerful political
+argument against us. He had a conference therefore with the committee on
+this subject; and, as they accorded with his opinion, they united with him
+in writing a letter to me, to know if I would change my journey, and
+proceed to France.
+
+As I had no object in view but the good of the cause, it was immaterial to
+me where I went, if I could but serve it; and therefore, without any
+further delay, I returned to London.
+
+As accounts had arrived in England of the excesses which had taken place in
+the city of Paris, and of the agitated state of the provinces through which
+I was to pass, I was desired by several of my friends to change my name. To
+this I could not consent; and, on consulting the committee, they were
+decidedly against it.
+
+I was introduced as quickly as possible, on my arrival at Paris, to the
+friends of the cause there, to the Duke de la Rochefoucald, the Marquis de
+Condorcet, Messieurs Petion de Villeneuve, Claviere, and Brissot, and to
+the Marquis de la Fayette. The latter received me with peculiar marks of
+attention. He had long felt for the wrongs of Africa, and had done much to
+prevent them. He had a plantation in Cayenne, and had devised a plan, by
+which the labourers upon it should pass by degrees from slavery to freedom.
+With this view he had there laid it down as a principle, that all crimes
+were equal, whether they were committed by Blacks or Whites, and ought
+equally to be punished. As the human mind is of such a nature, as to be
+acted upon by rewards as well as punishments, he thought it unreasonable,
+that the slaves should have no advantage from a stimulus from the former.
+He laid it down therefore as another principle, that temporal profits
+should follow virtuous action. To this he subjoined a reasonable education
+to be gradually given. By introducing such principles, and by making
+various regulations for the protection and comforts of the slaves, he
+thought he could prove to the planters, that there was no necessity for the
+Slave-trade; that the slaves upon all their estates would increase
+sufficiently by population; that they might be introduced gradually, and
+without detriment, to a state of freedom; and that then the real interests
+of all would be most promoted. This system he had begun to act upon two
+years before I saw him. He had also, when the society was established in
+Paris, which took the name of The Friends of the Negros, enrolled himself a
+member of it.
+
+The first public steps taken after my arrival in Paris were at a committee
+of the Friends of the Negros, which was but thinly attended. None of those
+mentioned, except Brissot, were present. It was resolved there, that the
+committee should solicit an audience of Mr. Necker; and that I should wait
+upon him, accompanied by a deputation consisting of the Marquis de
+Condorcet, Monsieur de Bourge, and Brissot de Warwille; Secondly, that the
+committee should write to the president of the National Assembly, and
+request the favour of him to appoint a day for hearing the cause of the
+Negros; and, Thirdly, that it should be recommended to the committee in
+London to draw up a petition to the National Assembly of France, praying
+for the abolition of the Slave-trade by that country. This petition, it was
+observed, was to be signed by as great a number of the friends to the cause
+in England, as could be procured. It was then to be sent to the committee
+at Paris, who would take it in a body to the place of its destination.
+
+I found great delicacy as a stranger in making my observations upon these
+resolutions, and yet I thought I ought not to pass them over wholly in
+silence, but particularly the last. I therefore rose up, and stated that
+there was one resolution, of which I did not quite see the propriety. But
+this might arise from my ignorance of the customs, as well as of the genius
+and spirit of the French people. It struck me that an application from a
+little committee in England to the National Assembly of France was not a
+dignified measure, nor was it likely to have weight with such a body. It
+was, besides, contrary to all the habits of propriety, in which I had been
+educated. The British Parliament did not usually receive petitions from the
+subjects of other nations. It was this feeling, which had induced me thus
+to speak.
+
+To these observations it was replied, that the National Assembly of France
+would glory in going contrary to the example of other nations in a case of
+generosity and justice, and that the petition in question, if it could be
+obtained, would have an influence there, which the people of England,
+unacquainted with the sentiments of the French nation, would hardly credit.
+
+To this I had only to reply, that I would communicate the measure to the
+committee in London, but that I could not be answerable for the part they
+would take in it.
+
+By an answer received from Mr. Necker, relative to the first of these
+resolutions, it appeared that the desired interview had been obtained: but
+he granted it only for a few minutes, and this principally to show his good
+will to the cause. For he was then so oppressed with business in his own
+department, that he had but little time for any other. He wrote to me
+however the next day, and desired my company to dinner. He then expressed a
+wish to me, that any business relative to the Slave-trade might be managed
+by ourselves as individuals, and that I would take the opportunity of
+dining with him occasionally for this purpose. By this plan, he said, both
+of us would save time. Madame Necker also promised to represent her
+husband, if I should call in his absence, and to receive me, and converse
+with me on all occasions, in which this great cause of humanity and
+religion might be concerned.
+
+With respect to the other resolutions nothing ever came of them; for we
+waited daily for an answer from the president during the whole of his
+presidency, but we never received any; and the committee in London, when
+they had read my letter, desired me unequivocally to say, that they did not
+see the propriety of the petition, which it had been recommended to them to
+obtain.
+
+At the next meeting it was resolved, that a letter should be written to the
+new president for the same purpose as the former. This, it was said, was
+now rendered essentially necessary. For the merchants, planters, and others
+interested in the continuance of the Slave-trade, were so alarmed at the
+enthusiasm of the French people, in favour of the new order of things, and
+of any change recommended to them, which had the appearance of promoting
+the cause of liberty, that they held daily committees to watch and to
+thwart the motions of the Friends of the Negros. It was therefore thought
+proper, that the appeal to the Assembly should be immediate on this
+subject, before the feelings of the people should cool, or, before they,
+who were thus interested, should poison their minds by calculations of loss
+and gain. The silence of the former president was already attributed to the
+intrigues of the planters' committee. No time therefore was to be lost. The
+letter was accordingly written, but as no answer was ever returned to it,
+they attributed this second omission to the same cause.
+
+I do not really know whether interested persons ever did, as was suspected,
+intercept the letters of the committee to the two presidents as now
+surmised; or whether they ever dissuaded them from introducing so important
+a question for discussion when the nation was in such a heated state; but
+certain it is that we had many, and I believe barbarous, enemies to
+encounter. At the very next meeting of the committee, Claviere produced
+anonymous letters, which he had received, and in which it was stated that,
+if the society of the Friends of the Negros did not dissolve itself, he and
+the rest of them would be stabbed. It was said that no less than three
+hundred persons had associated themselves for this purpose. I had received
+similar letters myself; and on producing mine, and comparing the
+hand-writing in both, it appeared that the same persons had written them.
+
+In a few days after this the public prints were filled with the most
+malicious representations of the views of the committee. One of them was,
+that they were going to send twelve thousand muskets to the Negros in St.
+Domingo, in order to promote an insurrection there. This declaration was so
+industriously circulated, that a guard of soldiers was sent to search the
+committee-room; but these were soon satisfied, when they found only two or
+three books and some waste paper. Reports equally unfounded and wicked were
+spread also in the same papers relative to myself. My name was mentioned at
+full length, and the place of my abode hinted at. It was stated at one
+time, that I had proposed such wild and mischievous plans to the committee
+in London relative to the abolition of the Slave-trade, that they had cast
+me out of their own body, and that I had taken refuge in Paris, where I now
+tried to impose equally on the French nation. It was stated at another,
+that I was employed by the British government as a spy, and that it was my
+object to try to undermine the noble constitution, which was then forming
+for France. This latter report at this particular time, when the passions
+of men were so inflamed, and when the stones of Paris had not been long
+purified from the blood of Foulon and Berthier, might have cost me my life;
+and I mentioned it to General la Fayette, and solicited his advice. He
+desired me to make a public reply to it: which I did. He desired me also to
+change my lodging to the Hotel de York, that I might be nearer to him; and
+to send to him if there should be any appearance of a collection of people
+about the hotel, and I should have aid from the military in his quarter. He
+said also, that he would immediately give in my name to the Municipality;
+and that he would pledge himself to them, that my views were strictly
+honourable.
+
+On dining one day at the house of the Marquis de la Fayette, I met the
+deputies of Colour. They had arrived only the preceding day from St.
+Domingo. I was desired to take my seat at dinner in the midst of them. They
+were six in number; of a sallow or swarthy complexion, but yet it was not
+darker than that of some of the natives of the south of France. They were
+already in the uniform of the Parisian National Guards; and one of them
+wore the cross of St. Louis. They were men of genteel appearance and modest
+behaviour. They seemed to be well informed, and of a more solid cast than
+those, whom I was in the habit of seeing daily in this city. The account
+which they gave of themselves was this. The White People of St. Domingo,
+consisting of less than ten thousand persons, had deputies then sitting in
+the National Assembly. The People of Colour in the same island greatly
+exceeded the Whites in number. They amounted to thirty thousand, and were
+generally proprietors of lands. They were equally free by law with the
+former, and paid their taxes to the mother-country in an equal proportion.
+But in consequence of having sprung from slaves they had no legislative
+power, and moreover were treated with great contempt. Believing that the
+mother-country was going to make a change in its political constitution,
+they had called a meeting on the island, and this meeting had deputed them
+to repair to France, and to desire the full rights of citizens, or that the
+free People of Colour might be put upon an equality with the Whites. They
+(the deputies) had come in consequence. They had brought with them a
+present of six millions of livres to the National Assembly, and an
+appointment to General la Fayette to be commander in chief over their
+constituents, as a distinct body. This command, they said, the General had
+accepted, though he had declined similar honours from every town in France,
+except Paris, in order to show that he patronised their cause.
+
+I was now very anxious to know the sentiments which these gentlemen
+entertained on the subject of the Slave-trade. If they were with us, they
+might be very useful to us; not only by their votes in the Assembly, but by
+the knowledge of facts, which they would be able to adduce there in our
+favour. If they were against us, it became me to be upon my guard against
+them, and to take measures accordingly. I therefore stated to them at once
+the nature of my errand to France, and desired their opinion upon it. This
+they gave me without reserve. They broke out into lavish commendations of
+my conduct, and called me their friend. The Slave-trade, they said, was the
+parent of all the miseries in St. Domingo, not only on account of the cruel
+treatment it occasioned to the slaves, but on account of the discord which
+it constantly kept up between the Whites and People of Colour, in
+consequence of the hateful distinctions it introduced. These distinctions
+could never be obliterated while it lasted. Indeed both the trade and the
+slavery must fall before the infamy, now fixed upon a skin of colour, could
+be so done away, that Whites and Blacks could meet cordially, and look with
+respect upon one another. They had it in their instructions, in case they
+should obtain a seat in the Assembly, to propose an immediate abolition of
+the Slave-trade, and an immediate amelioration of the state of slavery
+also, with a view to its final abolition in fifteen years.
+
+But time was flying apace, I had now been nearly seven weeks in Paris; and
+had done nothing. The thought of this made me uneasy, and I saw no
+consoling prospect before me. I found it even difficult to obtain a meeting
+of the Friends of the Negros. The Marquis de la Fayette had no time to
+attend. Those of the committee, who were members of the National Assembly,
+were almost constantly engaged at Versailles. Such of them as belonged to
+the Municipality, had enough to do at the Hotel de Ville. Others were
+employed either in learning the use of arms, or in keeping their daily and
+nightly guards. These circumstances made me almost despair of doing any
+thing for the cause at Paris, at least in any reasonable time. But a new
+circumstance occurred, which distressed me greatly; for I discovered, in
+the most satisfactory manner, that two out of the six at the last committee
+were spies. They had come into the society for no other reason, than to
+watch and report its motions, and they were in direct correspondence with
+the slave-merchants at Havre de Grace. This matter I brought home to them
+afterwards, and I had the pleasure of seeing them excluded from all our
+future meetings.
+
+From this time I thought it expedient to depend less upon the committee and
+more upon my own exertions, and I formed the resolution of going among the
+members of the National Assembly myself, and of learning from their own
+mouths the hope I ought to entertain relative to the decision of our
+question. In the course of my endeavours I obtained a promise from the Duke
+de la Rochefoucauld, the Comte de Mirabeau, the Abbe Syeyes, Monsieur
+Bergasse, and Monsieur Petion de Villeneuve, five of the most approved
+members of the National Assembly, that they would meet me, if I would fix a
+day. I obtained a similar promise from the Marquis de Condorcet, and
+Claviere and Brissot, as members selected from the committee of the Friends
+of the Negros. And Messieurs de Roveray and Du Monde, two Genevese
+gentlemen at Versailles, men of considerable knowledge and interest, and
+who had heard of our intended meeting, were to join us at their own
+request. The place chosen was the house of the Bishop of Chartres at
+Versailles.
+
+I was now in hope that I should soon bring the question to some issue; and
+on the fourth of October I went to dine with the Bishop of Chartres to fix
+the day. We appointed the seventh. But how soon, frequently, do our
+prospects fade! From the conversation which took place at dinner, I began
+to fear that our meeting would not be realized. About three days before,
+the officers of the Guard du Corps had given the memorable banquet,
+recorded in the annals of the revolution, to the officers of the regiment
+of Flanders which then lay at Versailles. This was a topic, on which the
+company present dwelt. They condemned it as a most fatal measure in these
+heated times; and were apprehensive, that something would grow immediately
+out of it, which might endanger the King's safety. In passing afterwards
+through the streets of Versailles my fears increased. I met several of that
+regiment in groups. Some were brandishing their swords. Others were walking
+arm in arm and singing tumultuously. Others were standing and conversing
+earnestly together. Among the latter I heard one declare with great
+vehemence, "that it should not be; that the revolution must go on." On my
+arrival at Paris in the evening the Palais Royale was full of people, and
+there were movements and buzzings among them, as if something was expected
+to happen. The next day, when I went into the streets it was obvious what
+was going to take place. Suffice it to say, that the next evening the King
+and Queen were brought prisoners into Paris. After this, things were in
+such an unsettled state for a few days, and the members of the National
+Assembly were so occupied in the consideration of the event itself, and of
+the consequences which might attend it, that my little meeting, of which it
+had cost me so much time and trouble to procure the appointment, was
+entirely prevented.
+
+I had now to wait patiently till a new opportunity should occur. The Comte
+de Mirabeau, before the departure of the King, had moved and carried the
+resolution that "the Assembly was inseparable from his majesty's person."
+It was expected, therefore, that the National Assembly would immediately
+transfer its sittings to Paris. This took place on the nineteenth. It was
+now more easy for me to bring persons together, than when I had to travel
+backward and forward to Versailles. Accordingly, by watching my
+opportunities, I obtained the promise of another meeting. This was held
+afterward at the Duke de la Rochefoucauld's. The persons before mentioned
+were present; except the Comte de Mirabeau, whose occupations at that
+moment made it utterly impossible for him to attend.
+
+The Duke opened the business in an appropriate manner; and concluded, by
+desiring each person to give his opinion frankly and unequivocally as to
+what might be expected of the National Assembly relative to the great
+measure of the abolition of the Slave-trade.
+
+The Abbe Syeyes rose up, and said, it would probably bring the business
+within a shorter compass, if, instead of discussing this proposition at
+large, I were to put to the meeting my own questions. I accordingly
+accepted this offer; and began by asking those present, "how long it was
+likely that the present National Assembly would sit." After some
+conversation it was replied, that, "it would sit till it had completed the
+constitution, and interwoven such fixed principles into it, that the
+legislature, which should succeed it, might have nothing more to do, than
+to proceed on the ordinary business of the state. Its dissolution would
+probably not take place till the month of March."
+
+I then asked them, "whether it was their opinion, that the National
+Assembly would feel itself authorized to take up such a foreign question
+(if I might be allowed the expression) as that of the abolition of the
+Slave-trade." The answer to this was, "that the object of the National
+Assembly was undoubtedly the formation of a constitution for the French
+people. With respect to foreign possessions, it was very doubtful, whether
+it were the real interest of France to have any colonies at all. But while
+it kept such colonies under its dominion, the Assembly would feel, that it
+had the right to take up this question; and that the question itself would
+naturally spring out of the bill of rights, which had already been adopted
+as the basis of the constitution."
+
+The next question I proposed was, "whether they were of opinion, that the
+National Assembly would do more wisely, in the present situation of things,
+to determine upon the abolition of the Slave-trade now, or to transfer it
+to the legislature, which was to succeed it in the month of March."
+
+This question gave birth to a long discussion; during which much eloquence
+was displayed. But the unanimous answer, with the reasons for it, may be
+conveyed in substance as follows. "It would be most wise, it was said, in
+the present Assembly to introduce the question to the notice of the nation,
+and this as essentially connected with the bill of rights, but to transfer
+the determination of it, in a way the best calculated to ensure success, to
+the succeeding legislature. The revolution was of more importance to
+Frenchmen, than the abolition of the Slave-trade. To secure this was their
+first object, and more particularly, because the other would naturally flow
+from it. But the revolution might be injured by the immediate determination
+of the question. Many persons in the large towns of Bourdeaux, Marseilles,
+Rouen, Nantes, and Havre, who were now friends to it, might be converted
+into enemies. It would also be held up by those, who wished to produce a
+counter-revolution, (and the ignorant and prejudiced might believe it,)
+that the Assembly had made a great sacrifice to England, by thus giving her
+an opportunity of enlarging her trade. The English House of Commons had
+taken up the subject, but had done nothing. And though they, who were then
+present, were convinced of the sincerity of the English minister, who had
+introduced it; and that the trade must ultimately fall in England, yet it
+would not be easy to persuade many bigoted persons in France of these
+truths. It would therefore be most wise in the Assembly only to introduce
+the subject as mentioned; but if extraordinary circumstances should arise,
+such as a decree, that the deputies of Colour should take their seats in
+the Assembly, or that England should have begun this great work, advantage
+might be taken of them, and the abolition of the Slave-trade might be
+resolved upon in the present session."
+
+The last question I proposed was this. "If the determination of this great
+question should be proposed to the next legislature, would it be more
+difficult to carry it then than now."
+
+This question also produced much conversation. But the answer was
+unanimous, "that there would be no greater difficulty in the one than in
+the other case; for that the people would daily, more and more admire their
+constitution; that this constitution would go down to the next legislature,
+from whence would issue solid and fixed principles, which would be resorted
+to as a standard for decision on all occasions. Hence the Slave-trade,
+which would be adjudged by it also, could not possibly stand. Add to which,
+that the most virtuous members in the present would be chosen into the new
+legislature, which, if the constitution were but once fairly established,
+would not regard the murmurs of any town or province." After this, a
+desultory conversation took place, in which some were of opinion that it
+would be proper, on the introduction of the subject into the Assembly, to
+move for a committee of inquiry, which should collect facts and documents
+against the time, when it should be taken up with a view to its final
+discussion.
+
+As it now appeared to me, that nothing material would be done with respect
+to our cause till after the election of the new legislature, I had thoughts
+of returning to England to resume my journey in quest of evidence; but I
+judged it right to communicate first with the Comte de Mirabeau and the
+Marquis de la Fayette, both of whom would have attended the meeting just
+mentioned, if unforeseen circumstances had not prevented them.
+
+On conversing with the first, I found that he differed from those, whom I
+had consulted. He thought that the question, on account of the nature and
+urgency of it, ought to be decided in the present legislature. This was so
+much his opinion, that he had made a determination to introduce it there
+himself; and had been preparing for his motion. He had already drawn up the
+outlines of a speech for the purpose; but was in want of circumstantial
+knowledge to complete it. With this knowledge he desired me to furnish him.
+He then put his speech into my hand; and wished me to take it home and
+peruse it. He wrote down also some questions, and he gave them to me
+directly afterwards, and begged I would answer them at my leisure.
+
+On conversing with the latter, he said, that he believed with those at the
+meeting, that there would be no greater difficulty in carrying the question
+in the succeeding than in the present legislature. But this consideration
+afforded an argument for the immediate discussion of it: for it would make
+a considerable difference to suffering humanity, whether it were to be
+decided now or then. This was the moment to be taken to introduce it; nor
+did he think that they ought to be deterred from doing it, by any supposed
+clamours from some of the towns in France. The great body of the people
+admired the constitution; and would support any decisions, which were made
+in strict conformity to its principles. With respect to any committee of
+inquiry, he deprecated it. The Slave-trade, he said, was not a trade. It
+dishonoured the name of commerce. It was piracy. But if so, the question,
+which it involved, was a question of justice only; and it could not be
+decided with propriety by any other standard. I then informed him, that the
+Comte de Mirabeau had undertaken to introduce it into the Assembly. At this
+he expressed his uneasiness. "Mirabeau," says he, "is a host in himself;
+and I should not be surprised if by his own eloquence and popularity only
+he were to carry it; and yet I regret that he has taken the lead in it. The
+cause is so lovely, that even ambition, abstractedly considered, is too
+impure to take it under its protection, and not to sully it. It should have
+been placed in the hands of the most virtuous man in France. This man is
+the Duc de la Rochefoucauld. But you cannot alter things now. You cannot
+take it out of his hands. I am sure he will be second to no one on this
+occasion."
+
+On my return to my hotel, I perused the outlines of the speech, which the
+Comte de Mirabeau had lent me. It afforded a masterly knowledge of the
+evils of the trade, as drawn from reason only. It was put together in the
+most striking and affecting manner. It contained an almost irresistible
+appeal to his auditors by frequent references to the ancient system of
+things in France, and to their situation and prospects under the new. It
+flowed at first gently like a river in a level country; but it grew
+afterwards into a mountain torrent, and carried every thing before it. On
+looking at the questions, which he had written down for me, I found them
+consist of three. 1. What are the different ways of reducing to slavery the
+inhabitants of that part of Africa, which is under the dominion of France?
+2. What is the state of society there with respect to government, industry,
+and the arts? 3. What are the various evils belonging to the transportation
+of the Africans from their own country?
+
+It was peculiarly agreeable to me to find, on reading the first two
+questions, that I had formed an acquaintance with Monsieur Geoffroy de
+Villeneuve, who had been aide du camp to the Chevalier de Boufflers at
+Goree; but who was then at his father's house in Paris. This gentleman had
+entertained Dr. Spaarman and Mr. Wadstrom; and had accompanied them up the
+Senegal, when under the protection of the French government in Africa. He
+had confirmed to me the testimony, which they had given before the privy
+council. But he had a fund of information on this subject, which went far
+beyond what these possessed, or I had ever yet collected from books or men.
+He had travelled all over the kingdom of Cayor on foot; and had made a map
+of it. His information was so important, that I had been with him for
+almost days together to take it down. I determined therefore to arrange the
+facts, which I had obtained from him, of which I had now a volume, that I
+might answer the two first questions, which had been proposed to me; for it
+was of great importance to the Comte de Mirabeau, that he should be able to
+appeal, in behalf of the statements in his speech to the Assembly, to an
+evidence on the spot.
+
+In the course of my correspondence with the Comte, which continued with but
+little intermission for six weeks, many circumstances took place, which
+were connected with the cause, and which I shall now detail in their order.
+
+On waiting upon Mr. Necker, at his own request, he gave me the pleasing
+intelligence, that the committee of finances, which was then composed of
+members of the National Assembly, had resolved, though they had not yet
+promulgated their resolution, upon a total abolition of all the bounties
+then in existence in favour of the Slave-trade.
+
+The Deputies of Colour now began to visit me at my own hotel. They informed
+me, that they had been admitted, since they had seen me, into the National
+Assembly. On stating their claims, the president assured them, that they
+might take courage; for that the Assembly knew no distinction between
+Blacks and Whites, but considered all men as having equal rights. This
+speech of the president, they said, had roused all the White Colonists in
+Paris. Some of these had openly insulted them. They had held also a meeting
+on the subject of this speech; at which they had worked themselves up so as
+to become quite furious. Nothing but intrigue was now going forward among
+them to put off the consideration of the claims of the free People of
+Colour. They, the deputies, had been flattered by the prospect of a hearing
+no less than six times; and, when the day arrived, something had constantly
+occurred to prevent it.
+
+At a subsequent interview, they appeared to be quite disheartened; and to
+be grievously disappointed as to the object of their mission. They were now
+sure, that they should never be able to make head against the intrigues and
+plots of the White Colonists. Day after day had been fixed as before for
+the hearing of their cause. Day after day it had been deferred in like
+manner. They were now weary with waiting. One of them, Oge, could not
+contain himself, but broke out with great warmth--"I begin," says he, "not
+to care, whether the National Assembly will admit us or not. But let it
+beware of the consequences. We will no longer continue to be beheld in a
+degraded light. Dispatches shall go directly to St. Domingo; and we will
+soon follow them. We can produce as good soldiers on our estates, as those
+in France. Our own arms shall make us independent and respectable. If we
+are once forced to desperate measures, it will be in vain that thousands
+will be sent across the Atlantic to bring us back to our former state." On
+hearing this, I entreated the deputies to wait with patience. I observed to
+them, that in a great revolution, like that of France, things, but more
+particularly such as might be thought external, could not be discussed
+either so soon or so rapidly as men full of enthusiasm would wish. France
+would first take care of herself. She would then, I had no doubt, extend
+her care to her Colonies. Was not this a reasonable conclusion, when they,
+the deputies, had almost all the first men in the Assembly in their favour?
+I entreated them therefore to wait patiently; as well as upon another
+consideration, which was, that by an imprudent conduct they might not only
+ruin their own cause in France, but bring indescribable misery upon their
+native land.
+
+By this time a large packet, for which I had sent from England, arrived. It
+consisted of above a thousand of the plan and section of a slave-ship, with
+an explanation in French. It contained also about five hundred coloured
+engravings, made from two views, which Mr. Wadstrom had taken in Africa.
+The first of these represented the town of Joal, and the King's military on
+horseback returning to it, after having executed the great pillage, with
+their slaves. The other represented the village of Bain; from whence
+ruffians were forcing a poor woman and her children to sell them to a ship,
+which was then lying in the Roads. Both these scenes Mr. Wadstrom had
+witnessed. I had collected also by this time, one thousand of my Essays on
+the Impolicy of the Slave-trade, which had been translated into the French
+language. These I now wished to distribute, as preparatory to the motion of
+Mirabeau, among the National Assembly. This distribution was afterwards
+undertaken and effected by the Archbishop of Aix, the Bishop of Chartres,
+the Marquis de la Fayette, the Duc de la Rochefoucauld, the Comte de
+Mirabeau, Monsieur Necker, the Marquis de Condorcet, Messieurs Petion de
+Villeneuve, Bergasse, Claviere and Brissot, and by the Marchioness de la
+Fayette, Madame Necker, and Madame de Poivre, the latter of whom was the
+widow of the late Intendant of the Isle of France.
+
+This distribution had not been long begun, before I witnessed its effects.
+The virtuous Abbe Gregoire, and several members of the National Assembly,
+called upon me. The section of the slave-ship, it appeared, had been the
+means of drawing them towards me. They wished for more accurate information
+concerning it. Indeed it made its impression upon all who saw it. The
+Bishop of Chartres once told me, that, when he first espoused our cause, he
+did it at once; for it seemed obvious to him that no one could, under the
+Christian dispensation, hold another as his slave; and it was no less
+obvious where such an unnatural state existed, that there would be great
+abuses; but that, nevertheless, he had not given credit to all the tales
+which had been related of the Slave-trade, till he had seen this plate;
+after which there was nothing so barbarous which might not readily be
+believed. The Archbishop of Aix, when I first showed him the same plate,
+was so struck with horror, that he could scarcely speak: and when Mirabeau
+first saw it, he was so impressed by it, that he ordered a mechanic to make
+a model of it in wood, at a considerable expense. This model he kept
+afterwards in his dining-room. It was a ship in miniature, about a yard
+long, and little wooden men and women, which were painted black to
+represent the slaves, were seen stowed in their proper places.
+
+But while the distribution of these different articles thus contributed to
+make us many friends, it called forth the extraordinary exertions of our
+enemies. The merchants and others interested in the continuance of the
+Slave-trade wrote letters to the Archbishop of Aix, beseeching him not to
+ruin France; which he would inevitably do, if, as then president, he were
+to grant a day for hearing the question of the abolition. Offers of money
+were made to Mirabeau from the same quarter, if he would totally abandon
+his motion. An attempt was made to establish a colonial committee,
+consisting of such planters as were members of the National Assembly; upon
+whom it should devolve to consider and report upon all matters relating to
+the Colonies, before they could be determined there. Books were circulated
+in abundance in opposition to mine. Resort was again had to the public
+papers, as the means of raising a hue and cry against the principles of the
+Friends of the Negros. I was again denounced as a spy; and as one sent by
+the English minister to bribe members in the Assembly to do that in a time
+of public agitation, which in the settled state of France they could never
+have been prevailed upon to accomplish. And as a proof that this was my
+errand, it was requested of every Frenchman to put to himself the following
+question, "How it happened that England, which had considered the subject
+coolly and deliberately for eighteen months, and this in a state of
+internal peace and quietness, had not abolished the Slave-trade?"
+
+The clamour which was now made against the abolition, pervaded all Paris,
+and reached the ears of the King. Mr. Necker had a long conversation with
+him upon it. The latter sent for me immediately. He informed me, that His
+Majesty was desirous of making himself master of the question, and had
+expressed a wish to see my Essay on the Impolicy of the Slave-trade. He
+desired to have two copies of it; one in French, and the other in English;
+and he would then take his choice as to which of them he would read. He
+(Mr. Necker) was to present them. He would take with him also at the same
+time the beautiful specimens of the manufactures of the Africans, which I
+had lent to Madame Necker out of the cabinet of Monsieur Geoffrey de
+Villeneuve and others. As to the section of the slave-ship, he thought it
+would affect His Majesty too much, as he was then indisposed. All these
+articles, except the latter, were at length presented. The King bestowed a
+good deal of time upon the specimens. He admired them; but particularly
+those in gold. He expressed his surprise at the state of some of the arts
+in Africa. He sent them back on the same day on which he had examined them,
+and commissioned Mr. Necker to return me his thanks; and to say that he had
+been highly gratified with what he had seen; and, with respect to the Essay
+on the Impolicy of the Slave-trade, that he would read it with all the
+seriousness, which such a subject deserved.
+
+My correspondence with the Comte de Mirabeau was now drawing near to its
+close. I had sent him a letter every other day for a whole month, which
+contained from sixteen to twenty pages. He usually acknowledged the receipt
+of each. Hence many of his letters came into my possession. These were
+always interesting, on account of the richness of the expressions they
+contained. Mirabeau even in his ordinary discourse was eloquent. It was his
+peculiar talent to use such words, that they who heard them, were almost
+led to believe, that he had taken great pains to cull them for the
+occasion. But this his ordinary language was the language also of his
+letters; and as they show a power of expression, by which the reader may
+judge of the character of the eloquence of one, who was then undoubtedly
+the greatest orator in France, I have thought it not improper to submit one
+of them to his perusal in the annexed note[A]. I could have wished, as far
+as it relates to myself, that it had been less complimentary. It must be
+observed, however, that I had already written to him more than two hundred
+pages with my own hand; and as this was done at no small expense, time and
+trouble, and solely to qualify him for the office of doing good, he could
+not but set some value upon my labours.
+
+[Footnote A: "Je fais toujours mille remercimens plus empresses et plus
+affectueux a Monsieur Clarkson pour la vertueuse profusion de ses lumieres,
+de ses reserches, et de ses travaux. Comme ma motion et tous ses
+developpemens sont entierement prets, j'attends avec une vive impatience
+ses nouvelles lettres, afin d'achever de classer les faits et les
+raisonnemens de Monsieur Clarkson, et, cette deduction entierement finie,
+de commencer a manoeuvrer en tactique le succes douteux de cette perilleuse
+proposition. J'aurai l'honneur de le recevoir Dimanche depuis onze heures,
+et meme dix du matin jusqu'a midi, non seulement avec un vif plaisir, mais
+avec une sensible reconnoissance.
+
+_25 Decembre, 1789_.
+
+LE COMTE DE MIRABEAU."]
+
+When our correspondence was over, I had some conversation with him relative
+to fixing a day for the motion. But he judged it prudent, previously to
+this, to sound some of the members of the Assembly on the subject of it.
+This he did; but he was greatly disappointed at the result. There was not
+one member, out of all those, with whom he conversed, who had not been
+canvassed by the planters' committee. And though most of them had been
+proof against all its intrigues and artifices, yet many of them hesitated
+respecting the abolition at that moment. There was a fear in some that they
+should injure the revolution by adopting it; others, who had no such fears,
+wished for the concurrence of England in the measure, and suggested the
+propriety of a deputation there for that purpose previously to the
+discussion of the question in France. While others maintained, that as
+England had done nothing, after having had it so long under consideration,
+it was fair to presume, that she judged it impolitic to abandon the
+Slave-trade; but if France were to give it up, and England to continue it,
+how would humanity be the gainer?
+
+While the Comte de Mirabeau was continuing his canvass among the members of
+the National Assembly, relative to his motion, attempts were again made in
+the public papers to mislead them. Emancipation was now stated to be the
+object of the Friends of the Negros. This charge I repelled, by addressing
+myself to Monsieur Beauvet. I explained to him the views of the different
+societies, which had taken up the cause of the Africans; and I desired him
+to show my letter to the planters. I was obliged also to answer publicly a
+letter by Monsieur Mosneron de Laung. This writer professed to detail the
+substance of the privy council report. He had the injustice to assert, that
+three things had been distinctly proved there: First, that slavery had
+always existed in Africa; Secondly, that the natives were a bloody people,
+addicted to human sacrifice, and other barbarous customs; and, Thirdly,
+that their soil was incapable of producing any proper articles for
+commerce. From these premises he argued, as if they had been established by
+the unanimous and uncontradicted testimony of the witnesses; and he drew
+the conclusion, that not only had England done nothing in consequence, but
+that she never would do anything, which should affect the existence of this
+trade.
+
+But these letters had only just made their appearance in the public papers,
+when I was summoned to England. Parliament, it appeared, had met; and I was
+immediately to leave Paris. Among those, of whom I had but just time to
+take leave, were the Deputies of Colour. At this, my last conference with
+them, I recommended moderation and forbearance, as the best gifts I could
+leave them; and I entreated them rather to give up their seats in the
+Assembly, than on that account to bring misery on their country; for that
+with patience their cause would ultimately triumph. They replied, that I
+had prescribed to them a most difficult task. They were afraid that neither
+the conduct of the White Colonists nor of the National Assembly could be
+much longer borne. They thanked me, however, for my advice. One of them
+gave me a trinket, by which I might remember him; and as for himself, he
+said, he should never forget one, who had taken such a deep interest in
+the welfare of his mother[A]. I found, however, notwithstanding all I
+said, that there was a spirit of dissatisfaction in them, which nothing
+but a redress of their grievances could subdue; and that, if the planters
+should persevere in their intrigues, and the National Assembly in delay,
+a fire would be lighted up in St. Domingo, which could not easily be
+extinguished. This was afterward realized: for Oge, in about three months
+from this time, left his companions to report to his constituents in St.
+Domingo the state of their mission; when hearing, on his arrival in that
+island, of the outrageous conduct of the Whites of the committee of Aquin,
+who had begun a persecution of the People of Colour for no other reason
+than that they had dared to seek the common privileges of citizens; and
+of the murder of Ferrand and Labadie, he imprudently armed his slaves.
+With a small but faithful band he rushed upon superior numbers; and was
+defeated. Taking refuge at length in the Spanish part of St. Domingo,
+he was given up; and his enemies, to strike terror into the People of
+Colour, broke him upon the wheel. From this time reconciliation between
+the parties became impossible. A bloody war commenced, and with it all
+those horrors which it has been our lot so frequently to deplore. It must
+be remembered, however, that the Slave-trade, by means of the cruel
+distinctions it occasioned, was the original cause; and though the
+revolution of France afforded the occasion; it was an occasion which
+would have been prevented, if it had not been for the intrigues and
+injustice of the Whites.
+
+[Footnote A: Africa.]
+
+Another, upon whom I had time to call, was the amiable Bishop of Chartres.
+When I left him, the Abbe Syeyes, who was with him, desired to walk with me
+to my hotel. He there presented me with a set of his works, which he sent
+for, while he staid with me; and on parting, he made use of this
+complimentary expression, in allusion, I suppose, to the cause I had
+undertaken,--"I am pleased to have been acquainted with the friend of man."
+
+It was necessary that I should see the Comte de Mirabeau and the Marquis de
+la Fayette, before I left Paris. I had written to each of them to
+communicate the intelligence of my departure, as soon as I received it. The
+Comte, it appeared, had nearly canvassed the Assembly. He could count upon
+three hundred members, who, for the sake of justice, and without any
+consideration of policy or of consequences, would support his motion.
+But alas! what proportion did this number bear to twelve hundred? About
+five hundred more would support him; but only on one condition; which
+was, if England would give an unequivocal proof of her intention to
+abolish the trade. The knowledge of these circumstances, he said, had
+induced him to write a letter to Mr. Pitt. In this he had explained,
+how far he could proceed without his assistance, and how far with it.
+He had frankly developed to him the mind and temper of the Assembly on
+this subject; but his answer must be immediate: for the White Colonists
+were daily gaining such an influence there, that he foresaw it would be
+impossible to carry the measure, if it were long delayed. On taking leave
+of him he desired me to be the bearer of the letter, and to present it
+to Mr. Pitt.
+
+On conversing with the Marquis de la Fayette, he lamented deeply the
+unexpected turn, which the cause of the Negros had lately taken in the
+Assembly. It was entirely owing to the daily intrigues of the White
+Colonists. He feared they would ruin every thing. If the Deputies of Colour
+had been heard on their arrival, their rights would have been acknowledged.
+But now there was little probability that they would obtain them. He
+foresaw nothing but desolation in St. Domingo. With respect to the
+abolition of the Slave-trade, it might be yet carried; but not unless
+England would concur in the measure. On this topic he enlarged with much
+feeling. He hoped the day was near at hand, when two great nations, which
+had been hitherto distinguished only for their hostility, one toward the
+other, would unite in so sublime a measure; and that they would follow up
+their union by another, still more lovely, for the preservation of eternal
+and universal peace. Thus their future rivalships might have the
+extraordinary merit of being rivalships in good. Thus the revolution of
+France, through the mighty aid of England, might become the source of
+civilization, of freedom, and of happiness to the whole world. No other
+nations were sufficiently enlightened for such an union, but all other
+nations might be benefited by it.
+
+The last person whom I saw, was Brissot. He accompanied me to my carriage.
+With him therefore I shall end my French account; and I shall end it in no
+way so satisfactory to myself, as in a very concise vindication of his
+character, from actual knowledge, against the attacks of those who have
+endeavoured to disparage it; but who never knew him. Justice and truth, I
+am convinced, demand some little declaration on this subject at my hands.
+Brissot then was a man of plain and modest appearance. His habits, contrary
+to those of his countrymen in general, were domestic. In his own family he
+set an amiable example, both as a husband and as a father. On all occasions
+he was a faithful friend. He was particularly watchful over his private
+conduct. From the simplicity of his appearance, and the severity of his
+morals, he was called The Quaker; at least in all the circles which I
+frequented. He was a man of deep feeling. He was charitable to the poor as
+far as a slender income permitted him. But his benevolence went beyond the
+usual bounds. He was no patriot in the ordinary acceptation of the word;
+for he took the habitable globe as his country, and wished to consider
+every foreigner as his brother.
+
+I left France, as it maybe easily imagined, much disappointed, that my
+labours, which had been of nearly six months continuance, should have had
+no better success; nor did I see, in looking forward, any circumstances
+that were consoling with respect to the issue of them there; for it was
+impossible that Mr. Pitt, even if he had been inclined to write to
+Mirabeau, circumstanced as matters then were with respect to the hearing of
+evidence, could have given him a promise, at least of a speedy abolition;
+and, unless his answer had been immediate, it would have arrived, seeing
+that the French planters were daily profiting by their intrigues, too late
+to be effectual.
+
+I had but just arrived in England, when Mr. Wilberforce made a new motion
+in the House of Commons on the subject of the, Slave-trade. In referring to
+the transactions of the last sessions, he found that twenty-eight days had
+been allotted to the hearing of witnesses against the abolition, and that
+eleven persons only had been examined in that time. If the examinations
+were to go on in the same manner, they might be made to last for years. He
+resolved therefore to move, that, instead of hearing evidence in future in
+the house at large, members should hear it in an open committee above
+stairs; which committee should sit notwithstanding any adjournment of the
+house itself. This motion he made; and in doing it he took an opportunity
+of correcting an erroneous report; which was, that he had changed his mind
+on this great subject. This was, he said, so far from being the case, that
+the more he contemplated the trade, the more enormous he found it, and the
+more he felt himself compelled to persevere in endeavours for its
+abolition.
+
+One would have thought that a motion, so reasonable and so constitutional,
+would have met with the approbation of all; but it was vehemently opposed
+by Mr. Gascoyne, Alderman Newnham, and others. The plea set up was, that
+there was no precedent for referring a question of such importance to a
+committee. It was now obvious, that the real object of our opponents in
+abandoning decision by the privy council evidence was delay. Unable to meet
+us there, they were glad to fly to any measure, which should enable them to
+put off the evil day. This charge was fixed upon them in unequivocal
+language by Mr. Fox; who observed besides, that if the members of the house
+should then resolve to hear evidence in a committee of the whole house as
+before, it would amount to a resolution, that the question of the abolition
+of the Slave-trade should be put by, or at least that it should never be
+decided by them. After a long debate, the motion of Mr. Wilberforce was
+voted without a division; and the examination of witnesses proceeded in
+behalf of those who were interested in the continuance of the trade.
+
+This measure having been resolved upon, by which dispatch in the
+examinations was promoted, I was alarmed lest we should be called upon for
+our own evidence, before we were fully prepared. The time which I had
+originally allotted for the discovery of new witnesses, had been taken up,
+if not wasted, in France. In looking over the names of the sixteen, who
+were to have been examined by the committee of privy council, if there
+had been time, one had died, and eight, who were sea-faring people,
+were out of the kingdom. It was time therefore to stir immediately
+in this business. Happily, on looking over my letters, which I found
+on my arrival in England, the names of several had been handed to me,
+with the places of their abode, who could give me information on the
+subject of our question. All these I visited with the utmost dispatch.
+I was absent only three weeks. I had travelled a thousand miles in
+this time, had conversed with seventeen persons, and had prevailed
+upon three to be examined.
+
+I had scarcely returned with the addition of these witnesses to my list,
+when I found it necessary to go out again upon the same errand. This second
+journey arose in part from the following circumstances. There was a matter
+in dispute relative to the mode of obtaining slaves in the rivers of
+Calabar and Bonny. It was usual, when the slave-ships lay there, for a
+number of canoes to go into the inland country. These went in a fleet.
+There might be from thirty to forty armed natives in each of them. Every
+canoe also had a four- or a six-pounder (cannon) fastened to her bow.
+Equipped in this manner they departed; and they were usually absent from
+eight to fourteen days. It was said that they went to fairs, which were
+held on the banks of these rivers, and at which there was a regular show of
+slaves. On their return they usually brought down from eight hundred to a
+thousand of these for the ships. These lay at the bottom of the canoes;
+their arms and legs having been first bound by the ropes of the country.
+Now the question was, how the people, thus going up these rivers, obtained
+their slaves?
+
+It was certainly a very suspicious circumstance, that such a number of
+persons should go out upon these occasions; and that they should be armed
+in such a manner. We presumed therefore, that, though they might buy many
+of the slaves, whom they brought down, at the fairs, which have been
+mentioned, they obtained others by violence, as opportunity offered. This
+inference we pressed upon our opponents; and called upon them to show what
+circumstances made such warlike preparations necessary on these excursions.
+To this they replied readily. The people in the canoes, said they, pass
+through the territories of different petty princes; to each of whom, on
+entering his territory, they pay a tribute or toll. This tribute has been
+long fixed; but attempts frequently have been made to raise it. They who
+follow the trade cannot afford to submit to these unreasonable demands; and
+therefore they arm themselves in case of any determination on the part of
+these petty princes to enforce them.
+
+This answer we never judged to be satisfactory. We tried therefore to throw
+light upon the subject, by inquiring if the natives, who went up on these
+expeditions, usually took with them as many goods, as would amount to the
+number of the slaves they were accustomed to bring back with them. But we
+could get no direct answer, from any actual knowledge, to this question.
+All had seen the canoes go out and return; but no one had seen them loaded,
+or had been on board them. It appeared, however, from circumstantial
+evidence, that, though the natives on these occasions might take some
+articles of trade with them, it was impossible from appearances, that they
+could take them in the proportion mentioned. We maintained then our
+inference as before; but it was still uniformly denied.
+
+How then were we to decide this important question? for it was said, that
+no white man was ever permitted by the natives to go up in these canoes. On
+mentioning accidentally the circumstances of the case, as I have now stated
+them, to a friend, immediately on my return from my last journey, he
+informed me, that he himself had been in company, about a year before, with
+a sailor, a very respectable-looking man, who had been up these rivers. He
+had spent half an hour with him at an inn. He described his person to me.
+But he knew nothing of his name, or of the place of his abode. All he knew
+was, that he was either going, or that he belonged to, some ship of war in
+ordinary; but he could not tell at what port. I might depend upon all these
+circumstances, if the man had not deceived him; and he saw no reason why he
+should.
+
+I felt myself set on fire, as it were, by this intelligence, deficient as
+it was; and I seemed to determine instantly that I would, if it were
+possible, find him out. For if our suspicions were true, that the natives
+frequently were kidnapped in these expeditions, it would be of great
+importance to the cause of the abolition to have them confirmed; for as
+many slaves came annually from these two rivers, as from all the coast of
+Africa besides. But how to proceed on so blind an errand was the question.
+I first thought of trying to trace the man by letter. But this might be
+tedious. The examinations were now going on rapidly. We should soon be
+called upon for evidence ourselves. Besides, I knew nothing of his name. I
+then thought it to be a more effectual way to apply to Sir Charles
+Middleton, as comptroller of the navy, by whose permission I could board
+every ship of war in ordinary in England, and judge for myself. But here
+the undertaking seemed very arduous; and the time it would consume became
+an objection in this respect, that I thought I could not easily forgive
+myself, if I were to fail in it. My inclination, however, preponderated
+this way. At length I determined to follow it; for, on deliberate
+consideration, I found that I could not employ my time more advantageously
+to the cause; for as other witnesses must be found out somewhere, it was
+highly probable that, if I should fail in the discovery of this man, I
+should, by moving among such a number of sea-faring people, find others,
+who could give their testimony in our favour.
+
+I must now inform the reader, that ships of war in ordinary, in one of
+which this man was reported to be, are those, which are out of commission,
+and which are laid up in the different rivers and waters in the
+neighbourhood of the King's dock-yards. Every one of these has a boatswain,
+gunner, carpenter, and assistants on board. They lie usually in divisions
+of ten or twelve; and a master in the navy has a command over every
+division.
+
+At length I began my journey. I boarded all the ships of war lying in
+ordinary at Deptford, and examined the different persons in each. From
+Deptford I proceeded to Woolwich, where I did the same. Thence I hastened
+to Chatham, and then, down the Medway, to Sheerness. I had now boarded
+above a hundred and sixty vessels of war. I had found out two good and
+willing evidences among them. But I could gain no intelligence of him, who
+was the object of my search.
+
+From Chatham, I made the best of my way to Portsmouth-harbour. A very
+formidable task presented itself here. But the masters' boats were ready
+for me; and I continued my pursuit. On boarding the Pegase, on the second
+day, I discovered a very respectable person in the gunner of that ship. His
+name was George Millar. He had been on board the Canterbury slave-ship at
+the dreadful massacre at Calabar. He was the only disinterested evidence
+living, of whom I had yet heard. He expressed his willingness to give his
+testimony, if his presence should be thought necessary in London. I then
+continued my pursuit for the remainder of the day. On the next day, I
+resumed and finished it for this quarter. I had now examined the different
+persons in more than a hundred vessels in this harbour, but I had not
+discovered the person I had gone to seek.
+
+Matters now began to look rather disheartening, I mean, as far as my grand
+object was concerned. There was but one other port left, and this was
+between two and three hundred miles distant. I determined however to go to
+Plymouth. I had already been more successful in this tour, with respect to
+obtaining general evidence, than in any other of the same length; and the
+probability was, that, as I should continue to move among the same kind of
+people, my success would be in a similar proportion according to the number
+visited. These were great encouragements to me to proceed. At length, I
+arrived at the place of my last hope. On my first day's expedition I
+boarded forty vessels, but found no one in these, who had been on the coast
+of Africa in the Slave-trade. One or two had been there in King's ships;
+but they had never been on shore. Things were now drawing near to a close;
+and, notwithstanding my success as to general evidence in this journey, my
+heart began to beat. I was restless and uneasy during the night. The next
+morning, I felt agitated again between the alternate pressure of hope and
+fear; and in this state I entered my boat. The fifty-seventh vessel, which
+I boarded in this harbour, was the Melampus frigate. One person belonging
+to it, on examining him in the captain's cabin, said he had been two
+voyages to Africa; and I had not long discoursed with him, before I found,
+to my inexpressible joy, that he was the man. I found too, that he
+unravelled the question in dispute precisely as our inferences had
+determined it. He had been two expeditions up the river Calabar in the
+canoes of the natives. In the first of these, they came within a certain
+distance of a village. They then concealed themselves under the bushes,
+which hung over the water from the banks. In this position they remained
+during day-light. But at night they went up to it armed; and seized all the
+inhabitants, who had not time to make their escape. They obtained
+forty-five persons in this manner. In the second they were out eight or
+nine days; when they made a similar attempt, and with nearly similar
+success. They seized men, women, and children, as they could find them in
+the huts. They then bound their arms, and drove them before them to the
+canoes. The name of the person, thus discovered on board the Melampus, was
+Isaac Parker. On inquiring into his character from the master of the
+division, I found it highly respectable. I found also afterwards, that he
+had sailed with Captain Cook, with great credit to himself, round the
+world. It was also remarkable that my brother, on seeing him in London,
+when he went to deliver his evidence, recognised him as having served on
+board the Monarch man-of-war, and as one of the most exemplary men in that
+ship.
+
+I returned now in triumph. I had been out only three weeks, and I had found
+out this extraordinary person, and five respectable witnesses besides.
+These, added to the three discovered in the last journey, and to those
+provided before, made us more formidable than at any former period; so that
+the delay of our opponents, which we had looked upon as so great an evil,
+proved in the end truly serviceable to our cause.
+
+On going into the committee-room of the House of Commons on my return, I
+found that the examinations were still going on in the behalf of those, who
+were interested in the continuance of the trade; and they went on beyond
+the middle of April, when it was considered that they had closed. Mr.
+Wilberforce moved accordingly on the twenty-third of the same month, that
+Captain Thomas Wilson, of the royal navy, and that Charles Berns Wadstrom
+and Henry Hew Dalrymple, esquires, do attend as witnesses on the behalf of
+the abolition. There was nothing now but clamour from those on the opposite
+side of the question. They knew well, that there were but few members of
+the House of Commons, who had read the privy council report. They knew
+therefore, that, if the question were to be decided by evidence, it must be
+decided by that, which their own witnesses had given before parliament. But
+this was the evidence only on one side. It was certain therefore, if the
+decision were to be made upon this basis, that it must be entirely in their
+favour. Will it then be believed that in an English House of Commons there
+could be found persons, who could move to prevent the hearing of any other
+witnesses on this subject; and, what is more remarkable, that they should
+charge Mr. Wilberforce, because he proposed the hearing of them, with the
+intention solely of delay? Yes. Such persons were found, but, happily, only
+among the friends of the Slave-trade. Mr. Wilberforce, in replying to them,
+could not help observing, that it was rather extraordinary that they, who
+had occasioned the delay of a whole year, should charge him with that, of
+which they themselves had been so conspicuously guilty. He then commented
+for some time on the injustice of their motion. He stated too, that he
+would undertake to remove from disinterested and unprejudiced persons many
+of the impressions, which had been made by the witnesses against the
+abolition; and he appealed to the justice and honour of the house in behalf
+of an injured people; under the hope, that they would not allow a decision
+to be made till they had heard the whole of the case. These observations,
+however, did not satisfy all those, who belonged to the opposite party.
+Lord Penrhyn contended for a decision without a moment's delay. Mr.
+Gascoyne relented; and said, he would allow three weeks to the
+abolitionists, during which their evidence, might be heard. At length the
+debate ended; in the course of which, Mr. Pitt and Mr. Fox powerfully
+supported Mr. Wilberforce; when the motion was negatived without any
+attempt at a division.
+
+The witnesses in behalf of the abolition of the Slave-trade now took
+possession of the ground, which those in favour of it had left. But what
+was our surprise, when only three of them had been heard, to find that Mr.
+Norris should come forward as an evidence! This he did to confirm what he
+had stated to the privy council as to the general question; but he did it
+more particularly, as it appeared afterwards, in the justification of his
+own conduct: for the part, which he had taken at Liverpool, as it related
+to me, had become a subject of conversation with many. It was now well
+known, what assistance he had given me there in my pursuit; how he had even
+furnished me with clauses for a bill for the abolition of the trade; how I
+had written to him, in consequence of his friendly cooperation, to come up
+as an evidence in our favour; and how at that moment he had accepted the
+office of a delegate on the contrary side. The noise, which the relation
+and repetition of these and other circumstances had made, had given him, I
+believe, considerable pain. His friends too had urged some explanation as
+necessary. But how short-sighted are they who do wrong! By coming forward
+in this imprudent manner, he fixed the stain only the more indelibly on
+himself; for he thus imposed upon me the cruel necessity of being examined
+against him; and this necessity was the more afflicting to me, because I
+was to be called upon, not to state facts relative to the trade, but to
+destroy his character as an evidence in its support. I was to be called
+upon, in fact, to explain all those communications, which have been stated
+to have taken place between us on this subject. Glad indeed should I have
+been to have declined this painful interference. But no one would hear of a
+refusal. The Bishop of London, Mr. Pitt, and Mr. Wilberforce, considered my
+appearance on this occasion as an imperious duty to the cause of the
+oppressed. It may be perhaps sufficient to say, that I was examined; that
+Mr. Norris. was present all the time; that I was cross-examined by counsel;
+and that after this time, Mr. Norris seemed to have no ordinary sense of
+his own degradation; for he never afterwards held up his head, or looked
+the abolitionists in the face, or acted with energy as a delegate, as on
+former occasions.
+
+The hearing of evidence continued to go on in behalf of the abolition of
+the trade. No less than twenty-four witnesses, altogether, were heard in
+this session. And here it may not be improper to remark, that, during the
+examination of our own witnesses as well as the cross-examination of those
+of our opponents, no counsel were ever employed. Mr. Wilberforce and Mr.
+William Smith undertook this laborious department; and as they performed it
+with great ability, so they did it with great liberality towards those, who
+were obliged to come under their notice in the course of this fiery ordeal.
+
+The bill of Sir William Dolben was now to be renewed. On this occasion the
+enemies of the abolition became again conspicuous; for on the twenty-sixth
+of May, they availed themselves of a thin house to propose an amendment, by
+which they increased the number of the slaves to the tonnage of the vessel.
+They increased it too, without taking into the account, as had hitherto
+been done, the extent of the superficies of the vessels, which were to
+carry them. This was the third indecorous attempt against what were only
+reasonable and expected proceedings in the present session. But their
+advantage was of no great duration; for, the very next day, the amendment
+was rejected on the report by a majority of ninety-five to sixty-nine, in
+consequence, principally, of the private exertions of Mr. Pitt. Of this
+bill, though it was renewed in other years besides the present, I shall say
+no more in this History; because it has nothing to do with the general
+question. Horrible as it yet left the situation of the poor slaves in their
+transportation, (which the plate has most abundantly shown) it was the best
+bill, which could be then obtained; and it answered to a certain degree the
+benevolent wishes of the worthy baronet, who introduced it: for if we could
+conclude that these voyages were made more comfortable to the injured
+Africans, in proportion as there was less mortality in them, he had
+undoubtedly the pleasure of seeing the end, at least partially, obtained;
+though he must always have felt a great drawback from it, by reflecting
+that the survivors, however their sufferings might have been a little
+diminished, were reserved for slavery.
+
+The session was now near its close; and we had the sorrow to find, though
+we had defeated our opponents in the three instances which have been
+mentioned, that the tide ran decidedly against us, upon the general
+question, in the House of Commons. The same statements, which had struck so
+many members with panic in the former sessions, such as that of
+emancipation, of the ruin and massacre of the planters, and of
+indemnification to the amount of seventy millions, had been industriously
+kept up, and this by a personal canvass among them. But this hostile
+disposition was still unfortunately increased by considerations of another
+sort. For the witnesses of our opponents had taken their ground first. No
+less than eleven of them had been examined in the last sessions. In the
+present, two-thirds of the time had been occupied by others on the same
+side. Hence the impression upon this ground also was against us; and we had
+yet had no adequate opportunity of doing it away. A clamour was also
+raised, where we thought it least likely to have originated. They (the
+planters) it was said, had produced persons in elevated life and of the
+highest character as witnesses; whereas we had been obliged to take up with
+those of the lowest condition. This idea was circulated directly after the
+introduction of Isaac Parker, before mentioned; a simple mariner; and who
+was now contrasted with the admirals on the other side of the question.
+This outcry was not only ungenerous, but unconstitutional. It is the glory
+of the English law, that it has no scale of veracity, which it adapts to
+persons, according to the station, which they may be found to occupy in
+life. In our courts of law the poor are heard as well as the rich; and if
+their reputation be fair, and they stand proof against the
+cross-examinations they undergo, both the judge and the jury must determine
+the matter in dispute by their evidence. But the House of Commons were now
+called upon by our opponents, to adopt the preposterous maxim of attaching
+falsehood to poverty, or of weighing truth by the standard of rank and
+riches.
+
+But though we felt a considerable degree of pain, in finding this adverse
+disposition among so many members of the Lower House, it was some
+consolation to us to know, that our cause had not suffered with their
+constituents, the people. These were still warmly with us. Indeed, their
+hatred of the trade had greatly increased. Many circumstances had occurred
+in this year to promote it. The committee, during my absence in France, had
+circulated the plate of the slave-ship throughout all England. No one saw
+it but he was impressed. It spoke to him in a language, which was at once
+intelligible and irresistible. It brought forth the tear of sympathy in
+behalf of the sufferers, and it fixed their sufferings in his heart. The
+committee too had been particularly vigilant during the whole of the year,
+with respect to the public papers. They had suffered no statement in behalf
+of those interested in the continuance of the trade, to go unanswered. Dr.
+Dickson, the author of the Letters on Slavery before mentioned, had come
+forward again with his services on this occasion, and by his active
+cooperation with a sub-committee appointed for the purpose, the coast was
+so well cleared of our opponents, that, though they were seen the next year
+again, through the medium of the same papers, they appeared only in sudden
+incursions, as it were, during which they darted a few weapons at us; but
+they never afterward ventured upon the plain to dispute the matter, inch by
+inch, or point by point, in an open and manly manner.
+
+But other circumstances occurred to keep up a hatred of the trade among the
+people in this interval, which, trivial as they were, ought not to be
+forgotten. The amiable poet Cowper had frequently made the Slave-trade the
+subject of his contemplation. He had already severely condemned it in his
+valuable poem The Task. But now he had written three little fugitive pieces
+upon it. Of these the most impressive was that, which he called The Negro's
+Complaint, and of which the following is a copy:
+
+  "Forced from home and all its pleasures,
+    Afric's coast I left forlorn,
+  To increase a stranger's treasures,
+    O'er the raging billows borne;
+  Men from England bought and sold me,
+    Paid my price in paltry gold;
+  But, though theirs they have inroll'd me,
+    Minds are never to be sold.
+
+  "Still in thought as free as ever,
+    What are England's rights, I ask.
+  Me from my delights to sever,
+    Me to torture, me to task?
+  Fleecy locks and black complexion
+    Cannot forfeit Nature's claim;
+  Skins may differ, but affection
+    Dwells in black and white the same.
+
+  "Why did all-creating Nature
+    Make the plant, for which we toil?
+  Sighs must fan it, tears must water,
+    Sweat of ours must dress the soil.
+  Think, ye masters, iron-hearted,
+    Lolling at your jovial boards,
+  Think, how many backs have smarted
+    For the sweets your cane affords.
+
+  "Is there, as you sometimes tell us,
+    Is there one, who rules on high;
+  Has he bid you buy and sell us,
+    Speaking from his throne, the sky?
+  Ask him, if your knotted scourges,
+    Fetters, blood-extorting screws,
+  Are the means, which duty urges
+    Agents of his will to use?
+
+  "Hark! he answers. Wild tornadoes,
+    Strewing yonder sea with wrecks,
+  Wasting towns, plantations, meadows,
+    Are the voice with which he speaks.
+  He, foreseeing what vexations
+    Afric's sons should undergo,
+  Fix'd their tyrants' habitations
+    Where his whirlwinds answer--No.
+
+  "By our blood in Afric wasted,
+    Ere our necks received the chain;
+  By the miseries, which we tasted
+    Crossing, in your barks, the main;
+  By our sufferings, since you brought us
+    To the man-degrading mart,
+  All sustain'd by patience, taught us
+    Only by a broken heart.
+
+  "Deem our nation brutes no longer,
+    Till some reason you shall find
+  Worthier of regard, and stronger,
+    Than the colour of our kind.
+  Slaves of gold! whose sordid dealings
+    Tarnish all your boasted powers,
+  Prove that you have human feelings,
+    Ere you proudly question ours."
+
+This little piece, Cowper presented in manuscript to some of his friends in
+London; and these, conceiving it to contain a powerful appeal in behalf of
+the injured Africans, joined in printing it. Having ordered it on the
+finest hot-pressed paper, and folded it up in a small and neat form, they
+gave it the printed title of "A Subject for Conversation at the Tea-table."
+After this, they sent many thousand copies of it in franks into the
+country. From one it spread to another, till it travelled almost over the
+whole island. Falling at length into the hands of the musician, it was set
+to music; and it then found its way into the streets, both of the
+metropolis and of the country, where it was sung as a ballad; and where it
+gave a plain account of the subject, with an appropriate feeling, to those
+who heard it.
+
+Nor was the philanthropy of the late Mr. Wedgwood less instrumental in
+turning the popular feeling in our favour. He made his own manufactory
+contribute to this end. He took the seal of the committee, as exhibited in
+the first volume, for his model; and he produced a beautiful cameo, of a
+less size, of which the ground was a most delicate white, but the Negro,
+who was seen imploring compassion in the middle of it, was in his own
+native colour. Mr. Wedgwood made a liberal donation of these, when
+finished, among his friends. I received from him no less than five hundred
+of them myself. They, to whom they were sent, did not lay them up in their
+cabinets, but gave them away likewise. They were soon, like The Negro's
+Complaint, in different parts of the kingdom. Some had them inlaid in gold
+on the lid of their snuff-boxes. Of the ladies, several wore them in
+bracelets, and others had them fitted up in an ornamental manner as pins
+for their hair. At length, the taste for wearing them became general; and
+thus fashion, which usually confines itself to worthless things, was seen
+for once in the honourable office of promoting the cause of justice,
+humanity, and freedom.
+
+I shall now only state that the committee took as members within its own
+body, in the period of time which is included in this chapter, the Reverend
+Mr. Ormerod, chaplain to the Bishop of London, and Captain James Bowen, of
+the royal navy; that they elected the honourable Nathaniel Curzon (now Lord
+Scarsdale), Dr. Frossard of Lyons, and Benjamin Garlike, esquire, then
+secretary to the English embassy at the Hague, honorary and corresponding
+members; and that they concluded their annual labours with a suitable
+report; in which they noticed the extraordinary efforts of our opponents to
+injure our cause, in the following manner: "In the progress of this
+business a powerful combination of interest has been excited against us.
+The African trader, the planter, and the West India merchant have united
+their forces to defend the fortress, in which their supposed treasures lie.
+Vague calculations and false alarms have been thrown out to the public, in
+order to show, that the constitution and even the existence of this free
+and opulent nation depend on its depriving the inhabitants of a foreign
+country of those rights and of that liberty, which we ourselves so highly
+and so justly prize. Surely in the nature of things and in the order of
+Providence it cannot be so. England existed as a great nation, long before
+the African commerce was known amongst us, and it is not to acts of
+injustice and violence that she owes her present rank in the scale of
+nations."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER III.
+
+_Continuation from July 1790 to July 1791--Author travels again throughout
+the kingdom--Object of his journey--Motion in the House of Commons to
+resume the hearing of evidence in favour of the abolition--List of all
+those examined on this side of the question--Machinations of interested
+persons, and cruel circumstances of the times previously to the day of
+decision--Motion at length made for stopping all further importation of
+Slaves from Africa--debates upon it--motion lost--Resolutions of the
+committee for the Abolition of the Slave-trade--Establishment of the Sierra
+Leone Company._
+
+
+It was a matter of deep affliction to us to think, that the crimes and
+sufferings inseparable from the Slave-trade were to be continued to another
+year. And yet it was our duty, in the present moment, to acquiesce in the
+postponement of the question. This postponement was not now for the purpose
+of delay, but of securing victory. The evidence, on the side of the
+abolition, was, at the end of the last session, but half finished. It was
+impossible, for the sake of Africa, that we could have then closed it. No
+other opportunity might offer in parliament for establishing an indelible
+record in her favour, if we were to neglect the present. It was our duty
+therefore even to wait to complete it, and to procure such a body of
+evidence, as should not only bear us out in the approaching contest, but
+such as, if we were to fail, would bear out our successors also. It was
+possible indeed, if the inhabitants of our islands were to improve in
+civilization, that the poor slaves might experience gradually an improved
+treatment with it; and so far testimony now might not be testimony for
+ever: but it was utterly impossible, while the Slave-trade lasted, and the
+human passions continued to be the same, that there should be any change
+for the better in Africa; or that any modes, less barbarous, should come
+into use for procuring slaves. Evidence therefore, if once collected on
+this subject, would be evidence for posterity. In the midst of these
+thoughts another journey occurred to me as necessary for this purpose; and
+I prayed, that I might have strength to perform it in the most effectual
+manner; and that I might be daily impressed, as I travelled along, with the
+stimulating thought, that the last hope for millions might possibly rest
+upon my own endeavours.
+
+The committee highly approved of this journey. Mr. Wilberforce saw the
+absolute necessity of it also; and had prepared a number of questions, with
+great ingenuity, to be put to such persons, as might have information to
+communicate. These I added to those in the tables, which have been already
+mentioned; and they made together a valuable collection on the subject.
+
+This tour was the most vexatious of any I had yet undertaken; many still
+refused to come forward to be examined, and some on the most frivolous
+pretences; so that I was disgusted, as I journeyed on, to find how little
+men were disposed to make sacrifices for so great a cause. In one part of
+it I went over nearly two thousand miles, receiving repeated refusals. I
+had not secured one witness within this distance. This was truly
+disheartening. I was subject to the whims and the caprice of those, whom I
+solicited on these occasions[A]. To these I was obliged to accommodate
+myself. When at Edinburgh, a person who could have given me material
+information, declined seeing me, though he really wished well to the cause.
+When I had returned southward as far as York, he changed his mind; and he
+would then see me. I went back, that I might not lose him. When I arrived,
+he would give me only private information. Thus I travelled, backwards and
+forwards, four hundred miles to no purpose. At another place a circumstance
+almost similar happened, though with a different issue. I had been for two
+years writing about a person, whose testimony was important. I had passed
+once through the town, in which he lived; but he would not then see me. I
+passed through it now, but no entreaties of his friends could make him
+alter his resolution. He was a man highly respectable as to situation in
+life; but of considerable vanity. I said therefore to my friend, on leaving
+the town, You may tell him that I expect to be at Nottingham in a few days;
+and though it be a hundred and fifty miles distant, I will even come back
+to see him, if he will dine with me on my return. A letter from my friend
+announced to me, when at Nottingham, that his vanity had been so gratified
+by the thought of a person coming expressly to visit him from such a
+distance, that he would meet me according to my appointment. I went back.
+We dined together. He yielded to my request. I was now repaid; and I
+returned towards Nottingham in the night. These circumstances I mention,
+and I feel it right to mention them, that the reader may be properly
+impressed with the great difficulties we found in collecting a body of
+evidence in comparison with our opponents. They ought never to be
+forgotten; for if with the testimony, picked up as it were under all these
+disadvantages, we carried our object against those, who had almost
+numberless witnesses to command, what must have been the merits of our
+cause! No person can indeed judge of the severe labour and trials in these
+journeys. In the present, I was out four months. I was almost over the
+whole island, I intersected it backwards and forwards both in the night and
+in the day. I travelled nearly seven thousand miles in this time, and I was
+able to count upon twenty new and willing evidences.
+
+[Footnote A: Ten or twelve of those, who were examined, much to their
+honour, came forward of their own accord.]
+
+Having now accomplished my object, Mr. Wilberforce moved on the fourth of
+February in the House of Commons, that a committee be appointed to examine
+further witnesses in behalf of the abolition of the Slave-trade. This
+motion was no sooner made, than Mr. Cawthorne rose, to our great surprise,
+to oppose it. He took upon himself to decide, that the house had heard
+evidence enough. This indecent motion was not without its advocates. Mr.
+Wilberforce set forth the injustice of this attempt; and proved, that out
+of eighty-one days, which had been given up to the hearing of evidence, the
+witnesses against the abolition had occupied no less than fifty-seven. He
+was strenuously supported by Mr. Burke, Mr. Martin, and other respectable
+members. At length, the debate ended in favour of the original motion, and
+a committee was appointed accordingly.
+
+The examinations began again on February the seventh, and continued till
+April the fifth, when they were finally closed. In this, as in the former
+session, Mr. Wilberforce and Mr. William Smith principally conducted them;
+and indeed it was necessary that they should have been present at these
+times; for it is perhaps difficult to conceive the illiberal manner, in
+which our witnesses were treated by those on the other side of the
+question. Men, who had left the trade upon principle, and who had come
+forward, against their apparent interest, to serve the cause of humanity
+and justice, were looked upon as mercenaries and culprits, or as men of
+doubtful and suspicious character. They were brow-beaten. Unhandsome
+questions were put to them. Some were kept for four days under examination.
+It was however highly to their honour, that they were found in no one
+instance to prevaricate, nor to waver as to the certainty of their facts.
+
+But this treatment, hard as it was for them to bear, was indeed good for
+the cause; for, coming thus pure out of the fire, they occasioned their own
+testimony, when read, to bear stronger marks of truth than that of the
+generality of our opponents; nor was it less superior, when weighed by
+other considerations. For the witnesses against the abolition were
+principally interested. They who were not, had been hospitably received at
+the planters' tables. The evidence too, which they delivered, was almost
+wholly negative. They had not seen such and such evils. But this was no
+proof that the evils did not exist. The witnesses, on the other hand, who
+came up in favour of the abolition, had no advantage in making their
+several assertions. In some instances they came up against their apparent
+interest; and, to my knowledge, suffered persecution for so doing. The
+evidence also, which they delivered, was of a positive nature. They gave an
+account of specific evils, which had come under their own eyes. These evils
+were never disproved. They stood therefore on a firm basis, as on a tablet
+of brass. Engraved there in affirmative characters; a few of them were of
+more value, than all the negative and airy testimony, which had been
+advanced on the other side of the question.
+
+That the public may judge, in some measure, of the respectability of the
+witnesses in favour of the abolition, and that they may know also to whom
+Africa is so much indebted for her deliverance, I shall subjoin their names
+in the three following lists. The first will contain those, who were
+examined by the privy council only; the second those, who were examined by
+the privy council and the house of commons also; and the third those, who
+were examined by the house of commons only.
+
+
+
+
+LIST I.
+
+Andrew Spaarman, physician, botanist, and successor to Linnaeus, traveller
+  on discovery in Africa for the King of Sweden.
+
+Reverend Isham Baggs, chaplain for two voyages to Africa in H.M. ship,
+  Grampus.
+
+Captain James Bowen, of the royal navy, one voyage to Africa.
+
+Mr. William James, a master in the royal navy, three voyages, as mate of a
+  slave-vessel.
+
+Mr. David Henderson, gunner of H.M. ship Centurion, three voyages to
+  Africa.
+
+Harry Gandy, two voyages to Africa, as captain of a slave-vessel.
+
+Thomas Eldred, two voyages there, as mate.
+
+James Arnold, three voyages there, as surgeon and surgeon's mate.
+
+Thomas Deane, two voyages there, as captain of a wood and ivory ship.
+
+
+
+
+LIST II.
+
+Major-General Rooke, commander of Goree, in Africa.
+
+Henry Hew Dalrymple, esquire, lieutenant of the 75th regiment at Goree, and
+  afterwards in all the West Indian islands.
+
+Thomas Willson, esquire, naval commander at Goree.
+
+John Hills, esquire, captain of H.M. ship Zephyr, on the African station.
+
+Sir George Yonge, two voyages as lieutenant, and two as captain, of a ship
+  of war, on the African station.
+
+Charles Berns Wadstrom, esquire, traveller on discovery in Africa for the
+  King of Sweden.
+
+Reverend John Newton, five voyages to Africa in a slave-vessel, and
+  resident eighteen months there.
+
+Captain John Ashley Hall, in the merchant service, two voyages in a
+  slave-vessel as a mate.
+
+Alexander Falconbridge, four voyages in a slave-vessel as surgeon and
+  surgeon's mate.
+
+Captain John Samuel Smith, of the royal navy, on the West India station.
+
+
+
+
+LIST III.
+
+Anthony Pantaleo How, esquire, employed by Government as a botanist in
+ Africa.
+
+Sir Thomas Bolton Thompson, two voyages as a lieutenant, and two as
+  commander of a ship of war on the African station.
+
+Lieutenant John Simpson, of the marines, two voyages in a ship of war on
+  the African station.
+
+Lieutenant Richard Storey, of the royal navy, four years on the
+  slave-employ all over the coast.
+
+Mr. George Miller, gunner of H.M. ship Pegase, one voyage in a slave-ship.
+
+Mr. James Morley, gunner of H.M. ship Medway, six voyages in a slave-ship.
+
+Mr. Henry Ellison, gunner of H.M. ship Resistance, eleven years in the
+  slave-trade.
+
+Mr. James Towne, carpenter of H.M. ship Syren, two voyages in a slave-ship.
+
+Mr. John Douglas, boatswain of H.M. ship Russel, one voyage in a
+  slave-ship.
+
+Mr. Isaac Parker, shipkeeper of H.M. ship Melampus, two voyages in a
+  slave-ship.
+
+Thomas Trotter, esquire, M.D. one voyage as surgeon of a slave-ship.
+
+Mr. Isaac Wilson, one voyage as surgeon of a slave-ship.
+
+Mr. Ecroyde Claxton, one voyage as surgeon of a slave-ship.
+
+James Kiernan, esquire, resident four years on the banks of the Senegal.
+
+Mr. John Bowman, eleven years in the slave-employ as mate, and as a factor
+  in the interior of Africa.
+
+Mr. William Dove, one voyage for slaves, and afterwards resident in
+  America.
+
+Major-general Tottenham, two years resident in the West Indies.
+
+Captain Giles, 19th regiment, seven years quartered in the West Indies.
+
+Captain Cook, 89th regiment, two years quartered in the West Indies.
+
+Lieutenant Baker Davison, 79th regiment, twelve years quartered in the West
+  Indies.
+
+Captain Hall, of the royal navy, five years on the West India station.
+
+Captain Thomas Lloyd, of the royal navy, one year on the West India
+  station.
+
+Captain Alexander Scott, of the royal navy, one voyage to Africa and the
+  West Indies.
+
+Mr. Ninian Jeffreys, a master in the royal navy, five years mate of a West
+  Indiaman, and for two years afterwards in the Islands in a ship of war.
+
+Reverend Thomas Gwynn Rees, chaplain of H.M. ship Princess Amelia, in the
+  West Indies.
+
+Reverend Robert Boucher Nicholls, dean of Middleham, many years resident in
+  the West Indies.
+
+Hercules Ross, esquire, twenty-one years a merchant in the West Indies.
+
+Mr. Thomas Clappeson, fifteen years in the West Indies as a wharfinger and
+  pilot.
+
+Mr. Mark Cook, sixteen years in the West Indies, first in the planting
+  business; and then as clerk and schoolmaster.
+
+Mr. Henry Coor, a mill-wright for fifteen years in the West Indies.
+
+Reverend Mr. Davies, resident fourteen years in the West Indies.
+
+Mr. William Duncan, four years in the West Indies, first as a clerk and
+  then as an overseer.
+
+Mr. William Fitzmaurice, fifteen years, first as a book-keeper, and then as
+  an overseer, in the West Indies.
+
+Mr. Robert Forster, six years, first in a store, then as second master and
+  pilot of a ship of war in the West Indies.
+
+Mr. Robert Ross, twenty-four years, first as a book-keeper, then as an
+  overseer, and afterwards as a planter, in the West Indies.
+
+Mr. John Terry, fourteen years an overseer or manager in the West Indies.
+
+Mr. Matthew Terry, twelve years resident, first as a book-keeper and
+  overseer, than as a land-surveyor in the King's service, and afterwards,
+  as a colony-surveyor, in the West Indies.
+
+George Woodward, esquire, an owner and mortgagee of property, and
+  occasionally a resident in the West Indies.
+
+Mr. Joseph Woodward, three years resident in the West Indies.
+
+Henry Botham, esquire, a director of sugar-works both in the East and West
+  Indies.
+
+Mr. John Giles, resident twelve years in the West Indies and America.
+
+J. Harrison, esquire, M.D. twenty-three years resident, in the medical
+  line, in the West Indies and America.
+
+Robert Jackson, esquire, M.D. four years resident in the West Indies in the
+  medical line, after which he joined his regiment, in the same profession,
+  in America.
+
+Thomas Woolrich, esquire, twenty years a merchant in the West Indies, but
+  in the interim was twice in America.
+
+Reverend James Stuart, two years in the West Indies, and twenty in America.
+
+George Baillie, esquire, one year in the West Indies, and twenty-five in
+  America.
+
+William Beverley, esquire, eighteen years in America.
+
+John Clapham, esquire, twenty years in America.
+
+Robert Crew, esquire, a native of America, and long resident there.
+
+John Savage, esquire, forty-six years resident in America.
+
+
+
+
+
+The evidence having been delivered on both sides, and then printed, it was
+judged expedient by Mr. Wilberforce, seeing that it filled three folio
+volumes, to abridge it. This abridgement was made by the different friends
+of the cause. William Burgh, esquire, of York; Thomas Babington, esquire,
+of Rothley Temple; the Reverend Thomas Gisborne, of Yoxall Lodge; Mr.
+Campbell Haliburton, of Edinburgh; George Harrison, with one or two others
+of the committee, and myself, were employed upon it. The greater share,
+however, of the labour fell upon Dr. Dickson. That no misrepresentation of
+any person's testimony might be made, Matthew Montagu, esquire, and the
+honourable E.J. Eliott, members of parliament, undertook to compare the
+abridged manuscripts with the original text, and to strike out or correct
+whatever they thought to be erroneous, and to insert whatever they thought
+to have been omitted. The committee, for the abolition, when the work was
+finished, printed it at their own expense. Mr. Wilberforce then presented
+it to the House of Commons, as a faithful abridgement of the whole
+evidence. Having been received as such under the guarantee of Mr. Montagu
+and Mr. Eliott, the committee sent it to every individual member of that
+House.
+
+The book having been thus presented, and a day fixed for the final
+determination of the question, our feelings became almost insupportable:
+for we had the mortification to find, that our cause was going down in
+estimation, where it was then most important that it should have increased
+in favour. Our opponents had taken advantage of the long delay, which the
+examination of evidence had occasioned, to prejudice the minds of many of
+the members of the House of Commons against us. The old arguments of
+emancipation, massacre, ruin, and indemnification, had been kept up; but,
+as the day of final decision approached, they had been increased. Such was
+our situation at this moment; when the current was turned still more
+powerfully against us by the peculiar circumstances of the times. It was
+indeed the misfortune of this great cause to be assailed by every weapon,
+which could be turned against it. At this time Thomas Paine had published
+his Rights of Man. This had been widely circulated. At this time also the
+French revolution had existed nearly two years. The people of England had
+seen, during this interval, a government as it were dissected. They had
+seen an old constitution taken down, and a new one put up, piece by piece,
+in its stead. The revolution, therefore, in conjunction with the book in
+question, had had the effect of producing dissatisfaction among thousands;
+and this dissatisfaction was growing, so as to alarm a great number of
+persons of property in the kingdom, as well as the government itself. Now
+will it be believed that our opponents had the injustice to lay hold of
+these circumstances, at this critical moment, to give a death-blow to the
+cause of the abolition? They represented the committee, though it had
+existed before the French revolution or the Rights of Man were heard of, as
+a nest of Jacobins; and they held up the cause, sacred as it was, and
+though it had the support of the minister, as affording an opportunity of
+meeting for the purpose of overthrowing the state. Their cry succeeded. The
+very book of the abridgment of the evidence was considered by many members
+as poisonous as that of the Rights of Man. It was too profane for many of
+them to touch; and they who discarded it, discarded the cause also.
+
+But these were not the only circumstances which were used as means, at this
+critical moment, to defeat us. News of the revolution, which had commenced
+in St. Domingo in consequence of the disputes between the Whites and the
+People of Colour, had, long before this, arrived in England. The horrible
+scenes which accompanied it, had been frequently published as so many
+arguments against our cause. In January new insurrections were announced as
+having happened in Martinique. The Negros there were described as armed,
+and the planters as having abandoned their estates for fear of massacre.
+Early in the month of March insurrections in the smaller French islands
+were reported. Every effort was then made to represent these as the effects
+of the new principles of liberty, and of the cry for abolition. But what
+should happen, just at this moment, to increase the clamour against us?
+Nothing less than an insurrection in Dominica.--Yes!--An insurrection in a
+British island. This was the very event for our opponents. "All the
+predictions of the planters had now become verified. The horrible massacres
+were now realizing at home." To give this news still greater effect, a
+meeting of our opponents was held at the London Tavern. By a letter read
+there it appeared, that "the ruin of Dominica was now at hand." Resolutions
+were voted, and a memorial presented to government, "immediately to
+dispatch such a military force to the different islands, as might preserve
+the Whites from destruction, and keep the Negros in subjection during the
+present critical state of the slave-bill." This alarm was kept up till the
+seventh of April, when another meeting took place to receive the answer of
+government to the memorial. It was there resolved, that "as it was too late
+to send troops to the islands, the best way of preserving them would be to
+bring the question of the Slave-trade to an immediate issue; and that it
+was the duty of the government, if they regarded the safety of the islands,
+to oppose the abolition of it." Accounts of all these proceedings were
+inserted in the public papers. It is needless to say that they were
+injurious to our cause. Many looked upon the abolitionists as monsters.
+They became also terrified themselves. The idea with these was, that unless
+the discussion on this subject was terminated, all would be lost. Thus,
+under a combination of effects arising from the publication of the Rights
+of Man, the rise and progress of the French revolution, and the
+insurrections of the Negros in the different islands, no one of which
+events had any thing to do with the abolition of the Slave-trade, the
+current was turned against us; and in this unfavourable frame of mind many
+members of parliament went into the House, on the day fixed for the
+discussion, to discharge their duty with respect to this great question.
+
+On the eighteenth of April Mr. Wilberforce made his motion. He began by
+expressing a hope, that the present debate, instead of exciting asperity
+and confirming prejudice, would tend to produce a general conviction of the
+truth of what in fact was incontrovertible; that the abolition of the
+Slave-trade was indispensably required of them, not only by morality and
+religion, but by sound policy. He stated that he should argue the matter
+from evidence. He adverted to the character, situation, and means of
+information of his own witnesses; and having divided his subject into
+parts, the first of which related to the manner of reducing the natives of
+Africa to a state of slavery, he handled it in the following manner.
+
+He would begin, he said, with the first boundary of the trade. Captain
+Wilson and Captain Hills, of His Majesty's navy, and Mr. Dalrymple of the
+land service, had concurred in stating, that in the country contiguous to
+the river Senegal, when slave-ships arrived there, armed parties were
+regularly sent out in the evening, who scoured the country, and brought in
+their prey. The wretched victims were to be seen in the morning bound back
+to back in the huts on shore, whence they were conveyed, tied hand and
+foot, to the slave-ships. The design of these ravages was obvious, because,
+when the Slave-trade was stopped, they ceased. Mr. Kiernan spoke of the
+constant depredations by the Moors to procure slaves. Mr. Wadstrom
+confirmed them. The latter gentleman showed also that they were excited by
+presents of brandy, gunpowder, and such other incentives; and that they
+were not only carried on by one community against another; but that the
+Kings were stimulated to practise them, in their own territories, and on
+their own subjects: and in one instance a chieftain, who, when intoxicated,
+could not resist the demands of the slave-merchants, had expressed, in a
+moment of reason, a due sense of his own crime, and had reproached his
+Christian seducers. Abundant also were the instances of private rapine.
+Individuals were kidnapped, whilst in their fields and gardens. There was
+an universal feeling of distrust and apprehension there. The natives never
+went any distance from home without arms; and when Captain Wilson asked
+them the reason of it, they pointed to a slave-ship then lying within
+sight.
+
+On the windward coast, it appeared from Lieutenant Story and Mr. Bowman,
+that the evils just mentioned existed, if possible, in a still higher
+degree. They had seen the remains of villages, which had been burnt, whilst
+the fields of corn were still standing beside them, and every other trace
+of recent desolation. Here an agent was sent to establish a settlement in
+the country, and to send to the ships such slaves as he might obtain. The
+orders he received from his captain were, that "he was to encourage the
+chieftains by brandy and gunpowder to go to war, to make slaves." This he
+did. The chieftains performed their part in return. The neighbouring
+villages were surrounded and set on fire in the night. The inhabitants were
+seized when making their escape; and, being brought to the agent, were by
+him forwarded to his principal on the coast. Mr. How, a botanist in the
+service of Government, stated, that on the arrival of an order for slaves,
+from Cape Coast Castle, while he was there, a native chief immediately sent
+forth armed parties, who brought in a supply of all descriptions in the
+night.
+
+But he would now mention one or two instances of another sort, and these
+merely on account of the conclusion, which was to be drawn from them. When
+Captain Hills was in the river Gambia, he mentioned accidentally to a Black
+pilot, who was in the boat with him, that he wanted a cabin-boy. It so
+happened that some youths were then on the shore with vegetables to sell.
+The pilot beckoned to them to come on board; at the same time giving
+Captain Hills to understand, that he might take his choice of them; and
+when Captain Hills rejected the proposal with indignation, the pilot seemed
+perfectly at a loss to account for his warmth; and drily observed, that the
+slave-captains would not have been so scrupulous. Again, when General Rooke
+commanded at Goree, a number of the natives, men, women, and children, came
+to pay him a friendly visit. All was gaiety and merriment. It was a scene
+to gladden the saddest, and to soften the hardest heart. But a
+slave-captain was not so soon thrown off his guard. Three English
+barbarians of this description had the audacity jointly to request the
+general, to seize the whole unsuspicious multitude and sell them. For this
+they alleged the precedent of a former governor. Was not this request a
+proof of the frequency of such acts of rapine? for how familiar must such
+have been to slave-captains, when three of them dared to carry to a British
+officer of rank such a flagitious proposal! This would stand in the place
+of a thousand instances. It would give credibility to every other act of
+violence stated in the evidence, however enormous it might appear.
+
+But he would now have recourse for a moment to circumstantial evidence. An
+adverse witness, who had lived on the Gold Coast, had said that the only
+way, in which children could be enslaved, was by whole families being sold
+when the principals had been condemned for witchcraft. But he said at the
+same time, that few were convicted of this crime, and that the younger part
+of a family in these cases was sometimes spared. But if this account were
+true, it would follow that the children in the slave-vessels would be few
+indeed. But it had been proved, that the usual proportion of these was
+never less than a fourth of the whole cargo on that coast, and also, that
+the kidnapping of children was very prevalent there.
+
+All these atrocities, he said, were fully substantiated by the evidence;
+and here he should do injustice to his cause, if he were not to make a
+quotation from the speech of Mr. B. Edwards in the Assembly of Jamaica,
+who, though he was hostile to his propositions, had yet the candour to
+deliver himself in the following manner there. "I am persuaded," says he,
+"that Mr. Wilberforce has been rightly informed as to the manner in which
+slaves are generally procured. The intelligence I have collected from my
+own Negros abundantly confirms his account; and I have not the smallest
+doubt, that in Africa the effects of this trade are precisely such as he
+has represented them. The whole, or the greatest part, of that immense
+continent is a field of warfare and desolation; a wilderness, in which the
+inhabitants are wolves towards each other. That this scene of oppression,
+fraud, treachery, and bloodshed, if not originally occasioned, is in part
+(I will not say wholly) upheld by the Slave-trade, I dare not dispute.
+Every man in the Sugar Islands may be convinced that it is so, who will
+inquire of any African Negros, on their first arrival, concerning the
+circumstances of their captivity. The assertion that it is otherwise, is
+mockery and insult."
+
+But it was not only by acts of outrage that the Africans were brought into
+bondage. The very administration of justice was turned into an engine for
+that end. The smallest offence was punished by a fine equal to the value of
+a slave. Crimes were also fabricated; false accusations were resorted to;
+and persons were sometimes employed to seduce the unwary into practices
+with a view to the conviction and the sale of them.
+
+It was another effect of this trade, that it corrupted the morals of those,
+who carried it on. Every fraud was used to deceive the ignorance of the
+natives by false weights and measures, adulterated commodities, and other
+impositions of a like sort. These frauds were even acknowledged by many,
+who had themselves practised them in obedience to the orders of their
+superiors. For the honour of the mercantile character of the country, such
+a traffic ought immediately to be suppressed.
+
+Yet these things, however clearly proved by positive testimony, by the
+concession of opponents, by particular inference, by general reasoning, by
+the most authentic histories of Africa, by the experience of all countries
+and of all ages,--these things, and (what was still more extraordinary)
+even the possibility of them, were denied by those, who had been brought
+forward on the other side of the question. These, however, were chiefly
+persons, who had been trading governors of forts in Africa; or who had long
+commanded ships in the Slave-trade. As soon as he knew the sort of
+witnesses which was to be called against him, he had been prepared to
+expect much prejudice. But his expectations had been greatly surpassed by
+the testimony they had given. He did not mean to impeach their private
+characters, but they certainly showed themselves under the influence of
+such gross prejudices, as to render them incompetent judges of the subject
+they came to elucidate. They seemed (if he might so say) to be enveloped by
+a certain atmosphere of their own; and to see, as it were, through a kind
+of African medium. Every object, which met their eyes, came distorted and
+turned from its true direction. Even the declarations, which they made on
+other occasions, seemed wholly strange to them. They sometimes not only
+forgot what they had seen, but what they had said; and when to one of them
+his own testimony to the privy council was read, he mistook it for that of
+another, whose evidence he declared to be "the merest burlesque in the
+world."
+
+But the House must be aware that there was not only an African medium, but
+an African logic. It seemed to be an acknowledged axiom in this; that every
+person, who offered a slave for sale, had a right to sell him, however
+fraudulently he might have obtained him. This had been proved by the
+witnesses, who opposed him. "It would have stopped my trade," said one of
+them, "to have asked the broker, how he came by the person he was offering
+me for sale"--"We always suppose," said another, "the broker has a right to
+sell the person he offers us"--"I never heard of such a question being
+asked," said a third; "a man would be thought a fool, who should put such a
+question."--He hoped the House would see the practical utility of this
+logic. It was the key-stone, which held the building together. By means of
+it, slave-captains might traverse the whole coast of Africa, and see
+nothing but equitable practices. They could not, however, be wholly
+absolved, even if they availed themselves of this principle to its fullest
+extent; for they had often committed depredations themselves; especially
+when they were passing by any part of the coast, where they did not mean to
+continue or to go again. Hence it was (as several captains of the navy and
+others had declared on their examination) that the natives, when at sea in
+their canoes, would never come near the men of war, till they knew them to
+be such. But finding this, and that they were not slave-vessels, they laid
+aside their fears, and came and continued on board with unsuspecting
+cheerfulness.
+
+With respect to the miseries of the Middle Passage, he had said so much on
+a former occasion, that he would spare the feelings of the committee as
+much as he could. He would therefore simply state that the evidence, which
+was before them, confirmed all those scenes of wretchedness, which he had
+then described; the same suffering from a state of suffocation by being
+crowded together; the same dancing in fetters; the same melancholy singing;
+the same eating by compulsion; the same despair; the same insanity; and all
+the other abominations which characterized the trade. New instances however
+had occurred, where these wretched men had resolved on death to terminate
+their woes. Some had destroyed themselves by refusing sustenance, in spite
+of threats and punishments. Others had thrown themselves into the sea; and
+more than one, when in the act of drowning, were seen to wave their hands
+in triumph, "exulting" (to use the words of an eye-witness) "that they had
+escaped." Yet these and similar things, when viewed through the African
+medium he had mentioned, took a different shape and colour. Captain Knox,
+an adverse witness, had maintained, that slaves lay during the night in
+tolerable comfort. And yet he confessed, that in a vessel of one hundred
+and twenty tons, in which he had carried two hundred and ninety slaves, the
+latter had not all of them room to lie on their backs. How comfortably then
+must they have lain in his subsequent voyages! for he carried afterwards in
+a vessel of a hundred and eight tons four hundred and fifty and in a vessel
+of one hundred and fifty tons, no less than six hundred slaves. Another
+instance of African deception was to be found in the testimony of Captain
+Frazer, one of the most humane captains in the trade. It had been said of
+him, that he had held hot coals to the mouth of a slave, to compel him to
+eat. He was questioned on this point; but not admitting, in the true spirit
+of African logic, that he who makes another commit a crime, is guilty of it
+himself, he denied the charge indignantly, and defied a proof. But it was
+said to him, "Did you never order such a thing to be done?" His reply was,
+"Being sick in my cabin, I was informed that a man-slave would neither eat,
+drink, nor speak. I desired the mate and surgeon to try to persuade him to
+speak. I desired that the slaves might try also. When I found he was still
+obstinate, not knowing whether it was from sulkiness or insanity, I ordered
+a person to present him with a piece of fire in one hand and a piece of yam
+in the other, and to tell me what effect this had upon him. I learnt that
+he took the yam and began to eat it, but he threw the fire overboard." Such
+was his own account of the matter. This was eating by duresse, if any thing
+could be called so. The captain, however, triumphed in his expedient, and
+concluded by telling the committee, that he sold this very slave at Grenada
+for forty pounds. Mark here the moral of the tale, and learn the nature and
+the cure of sulkiness.
+
+But upon whom did the cruelties, thus arising out of the prosecution of
+this barbarous traffic, fall? Upon a people with feeling and intellect like
+ourselves. One witness had spoken of the acuteness of their understandings;
+another of the extent of their memories; a third of their genius for
+commerce; a fourth of their proficiency in manufactures at home. Many had
+admired their gentle and peaceable disposition; their cheerfulness; and
+their hospitality. Even they, who were nominally slaves in Africa, lived a
+happy life. A witness against the abolition had described them as sitting
+and eating with their masters in the true style of patriarchal simplicity
+and comfort. Were these then a people incapable of civilization? The
+argument that they were an inferior species had been proved to be false.
+
+He would now go to a new part of the subject. An opinion had gone forth
+that the abolition of the trade would be the ruin of the West India
+Islands. He trusted he should prove that the direct contrary was the truth;
+though, had he been unable to do this, it would have made no difference as
+to his own vote. In examining, however, this opinion, he should exclude the
+subject of the cultivation of new lands by fresh importations of slaves.
+The impolicy of this measure, apart from its inhumanity, was indisputably
+clear. Let the committee consider the dreadful mortality, which attended
+it. Let them look to the evidence of Mr. Woolrich, and there see a contrast
+drawn between the slow, but sure progress of cultivation, carried on in the
+natural way, and the attempt to force improvements, which, however
+flattering the prospect at first, soon produced a load of debt, and
+inextricable embarrassments. He might even appeal to the statements of the
+West Indians themselves, who allowed that more than twenty millions were
+owing to the people of this country, to show that no system could involve
+them so deeply as that, on which they had hitherto gone. But he would refer
+them to the accounts of Mr. Irving, as contained in the evidence. Waving
+then the consideration of this part of the subject, the opinion in question
+must have arisen from a notion, that the stock of slaves, now in the
+islands, could not be kept up by propagation; but that it was necessary,
+from time to time, to recruit them with imported Africans. In direct
+refutation of this position he should prove, First, that in the condition
+and treatment of the Negros, there were causes, sufficient to afford us
+reason to expect a considerable decrease, but particularly that their
+increase had not been a serious object of attention; Secondly, that this
+decrease was in fact, notwithstanding, very trifling; or rather, he
+believed, he might declare it had now actually ceased; and, Thirdly, he
+should urge many direct and collateral facts and arguments, constituting on
+the whole an irresistible proof, that even a rapid increase might
+henceforth be expected.
+
+He wished to treat the West Indians with all possible candour; but he was
+obliged to confess, in arguing upon these points, that whatever splendid
+instances there might be of kindness towards their slaves, there were some
+evils of almost universal operation, were necessarily connected with the
+system of slavery. Above all, the state of degradation, to which they were
+reduced, deserved to be noticed; as it produced an utter inattention to
+them as moral agents. They were kept at work under the whip like cattle.
+They were left totally ignorant of morality and religion. There was no
+regular marriage among them. Hence promiscuous intercourse, early
+prostitution, and excessive drinking, were material causes of their
+decrease. With respect to the instruction of the slaves in the principles
+of religion, the happiest effects had resulted, particularly in Antigua,
+where, under the Moravians and Methodists, they had so far profited, that
+the planters themselves confessed their value, as property, had been raised
+one-third by their increased habits of regularity and industry.
+
+Whatever might have been said to the contrary, it was plainly to be
+inferred from the evidence, that the slaves were not protected by law.
+Colonial statutes had indeed been passed; but they were a dead letter;
+since, however ill they were treated, they were not considered as having a
+right to redress. An instance of astonishing cruelty by a Jew had been
+mentioned by Mr. Ross. It was but justice to say, that the man was held in
+detestation for it; but yet no one had ever thought of calling him to a
+legal account. Mr. Ross conceived a master had a right to punish his slave
+in whatever manner he might think proper. The same was declared by
+numberless other witnesses. Some instances, indeed, had lately occurred of
+convictions. A master had wantonly cut the mouth of a child, of six months
+old, almost from ear to ear. But did not the verdict of the jury show, that
+the doctrine of calling masters to an account was entirely novel; as it
+only pronounced him "Guilty, subject to the opinion of the court, if
+immoderate correction of a slave by his master be a crime indictable!" The
+court determined in the affirmative; and what was the punishment of this
+barbarous act?--A fine of forty shillings currency, equivalent to about
+twenty-five shillings sterling.
+
+The slaves were but ill off in point of medical care. Sometimes four or
+five, and even eight or nine thousand of them, were under the care of one
+medical man; which, dispersed on different and distant estates, was a
+greater number than he could possibly attend to.
+
+It was also in evidence, that they were in general under-fed. They were
+supported partly by the produce of their own provision-ground, and partly
+by an allowance of flour and grain from their masters. In one of the
+islands, where provision-ground did not answer one year in three, the
+allowance to a working Negro was but from five to nine pints of grain per
+week: in Dominica, where it never failed, from six to seven quarts: in
+Nevis and St. Christophers, where there was no provision-ground, it was but
+eleven pints. Add to this, that it might be still less, as the
+circumstances of their masters might become embarrassed; and in this case
+both an abridgment of their food, and an increase of their labour, would
+follow.
+
+But the great cause of the decrease of the slaves was in the non-residence
+of the planters. Sir George Yonge, and many others, had said, they had seen
+the slaves treated in a manner, which their owners would have resented, if
+they had known it. Mr. Orde spoke in the strongest terms of the misconduct
+of managers. The fact was, that these in general sought to establish their
+characters by producing large crops at a small immediate expense; too
+little considering how far the slaves might suffer from ill-treatment and
+excessive labour. The pursuit of such a system was a criterion for judging
+of their characters, as both Mr. Long and Mr. Ottley had confessed.
+
+But he must contend, in addition to this, that the object of keeping up the
+stock of slaves by breeding had never been seriously attended to. For this
+he might appeal both to his own witnesses, and to those of his opponents;
+but he would only notice one fact. It was remarkable that, when owners and
+managers were asked about the produce of their estates, they were quite at
+home as to the answer; but when they were asked about the proportion of
+their male and female slaves, and their infants, they knew little about the
+matter. Even medical men were adepts in the art of planting; but when they
+were asked the latter questions, as connected with breeding and rearing,
+they seemed quite amazed; and could give no information upon the subject of
+them.
+
+Persons, however, of great respectability had been called as witnesses, who
+had not seen the treatment of the Negros as he had now described it. He
+knew what was due to their characters; but yet he must enter a general
+protest against their testimony. "I have often," says Mr. Ross, "attended
+both governors and admirals upon tours in the island of Jamaica. But it was
+not likely that these should see much distress upon these occasions. The
+White People and drivers would take care not to harrow up the feelings of
+strangers of distinction by the exercise of the whip, or the infliction of
+punishments, at that particular time; and, even if there were any
+disgusting objects, it was natural to suppose that they would then remove
+them." But in truth these gentlemen had given proofs, that they were under
+the influence of prejudice. Some of them had declared the abolition would
+ruin the West Indies. But this, it was obvious, must depend upon the
+practicability of keeping up the stock without African supplies; and yet,
+when they were questioned upon this point, they knew nothing about it.
+Hence they had formed a conclusion without premises. Their evidence, too,
+extended through a long series of years. They had never seen one instance
+of ill-treatment in the time; and yet, in the same breath, they talked of
+the amended situation of the slaves; and that they were now far better off
+than formerly. One of them, to whom his country owed much, stated that a
+master had been sentenced to death for the murder of his own slave; but his
+recollection must have failed him; for the murder of a slave was not then a
+capital crime. A respectable governor also had delivered an opinion to the
+same effect; but, had he looked into the statute-book of the island, he
+would have found his error.
+
+It had been said that the slaves were in a better state than the peasantry
+of this country. But when the question was put to Mr. Ross, did he not
+answer, "that he would not insult the latter by a comparison?"
+
+It had been said again, that the Negros were happier as slaves, than they
+would be if they were to be made free. But how was this reconcileable with
+facts? If a Negro under extraordinary circumstances had saved money enough,
+did he not always purchase his release from this situation of superior
+happiness by the sacrifice of his last shilling? Was it not also notorious,
+that the greatest reward, which a master thought he could bestow upon his
+slave for long and faithful services, was his freedom?
+
+It had been said again, that Negros, when made free, never returned to
+their own country. But was not the reason obvious? If they could even reach
+their own homes in safety, their kindred and connections might be dead. But
+would they subject themselves to be kidnapped again; to be hurried once
+more on board a slave-ship; and again to endure and survive the horrors of
+the passage? Yet the love of their native country had been proved beyond a
+doubt. Many of the witnesses had heard them talk of it in terms of the
+strongest affection. Acts of suicide too were frequent in the islands,
+under the notion that these afforded them the readiest means of getting
+home. Conformably with this, Captain Wilson had maintained, that the
+funerals, which in Africa were accompanied with lamentations and cries of
+sorrow, were attended, in the West Indies, with every mark of joy.
+
+He had now, he said, made good his first proposition, That in the condition
+of the slaves there were causes, which should lead us to expect, that there
+would be a considerable decrease among them. This decrease in the island of
+Jamaica was but trifling, or, rather, it had ceased some years ago; and if
+there was a decrease, it was only on the imported slaves. It appeared from
+the privy council report, that from 1698 to 1730 the decrease was three and
+a half per cent.; from 1730 to 1755 it was two and a half per cent.; from
+1755 to 1768 it was lessened to one and three quarters; and from 1768 to
+1788 it was not more than one per cent.: this last decrease was not greater
+than could be accounted for from hurricanes and consequent famines, and
+from the number of imported Africans who perished in the seasoning. The
+latter was a cause of mortality, which, it was evident, would cease with
+the importations. This conclusion was confirmed in part by Dr. Anderson,
+who, in his testimony to the Assembly of Jamaica, affirmed, that there was
+a considerable increase on the properties of the island, and particularly
+in the parish in which he resided.
+
+He would now proceed to establish his second proposition, That from
+henceforth a very considerable increase might be expected. This he might
+support by a close reasoning upon the preceding facts. But the testimony of
+his opponents furnished him with sufficient evidence. He could show, that
+wherever the slaves were treated better than ordinary, there was uniformly
+an increase in their number. Look at the estates of Mr. Willock, Mr.
+Ottley, Sir Ralph Payne, and others. In short, he should weary the
+committee, if he were to enumerate the instances of plantations, which were
+stated in the evidence to have kept up their numbers only from a little
+variation in their treatment. A remedy also had been lately found for a
+disorder, by which vast numbers of infants had been formerly swept away.
+Mr. Long also had laid it down, that whenever the slaves should bear a
+certain proportion to the produce, they might be expected to keep up their
+numbers; but this proportion they now exceeded. The Assembly of Jamaica had
+given it also as their opinion, "that when once the sexes should become
+nearly equal in point of number, there was no reason to suppose, that the
+increase of the Negros by generation would fall short of the natural
+increase of the labouring poor in Great Britain." But the inequality, here
+spoken of, could only exist in the case of the African Negros, of whom more
+males were imported than females; and this inequality would be done away
+soon after the trade should cease.
+
+But the increase of the Negros, where their treatment was better than
+ordinary, was confirmed in the evidence by instances in various parts of
+the world. From one end of the continent of America to the other their
+increase had been undeniably established; and this to a prodigious extent,
+though they had to contend with the severe cold of the winter, and in some
+parts with noxious exhalations in the summer. This was the case also in the
+settlement of Bencoolen in the East Indies. It appeared from the evidence
+of Mr. Botham, that a number of Negros, who had been imported there in the
+same disproportion of the sexes as in West India cargoes, and who lived
+under the same disadvantages, as in the Islands, of promiscuous intercourse
+and general prostitution, began, after they had been settled a short time,
+annually to increase.
+
+But to return to the West Indies.--A slave-ship had been many years ago
+wrecked near St. Vincent's. The slaves on board, who escaped to the island,
+were without necessaries; and, besides, were obliged to maintain a war with
+the native Caribbs: yet they soon multiplied to an astonishing number; and,
+according to Mr. Ottley, they were now on the increase. From Sir John
+Dalrymple's evidence it appeared, that the domestic slaves in Jamaica, who
+were less worked than those in the field, increased; and from Mr. Long,
+that the free Blacks and Mulattoes there increased also.
+
+But there was an instance which militated against these facts (and the only
+one in the evidence) which he would now examine. Sir Archibald Campbell had
+heard, that the Maroons in Jamaica in the year 1739 amounted to three
+thousand men fit to carry arms. This supposed their whole number to have
+been about twelve thousand. But in the year 1782, after a real muster by
+himself, he found, to his great astonishment, that the fighting men did not
+then amount to three hundred. Now the fact was, that Sir Archibald
+Campbell's first position was founded upon rumour only; and was not true.
+For according to Mr. Long, the Maroons were actually numbered in 1749; when
+they amounted to about six hundred and sixty in all, having only a hundred
+and fifty men fit to carry arms. Hence, if when mustered by Sir Archibald
+Campbell he found three hundred fighting men, they must from 1749 to 1782
+have actually doubled their population.
+
+Was it possible, after these instances, to suppose that the Negros could
+not keep up their numbers, if their natural increase were made a subject of
+attention? The reverse was proved by sound reasoning. It had been confirmed
+by unquestionable facts. It had been shown, that they had increased In
+every situation, where there was the slightest circumstance in their
+favour. Where there had been any decrease, it was stated to be trifling;
+though no attention appeared to have been paid to the subject. This
+decrease had been gradually lessening; and, whenever a single cause of it
+had been removed (many still remaining), it had altogether ceased. Surely
+these circumstances formed a body of proof, which was irresistible.
+
+He would now speak of the consequences of the abolition of the Slave-trade
+in other points of view; and first, as to its effects upon our marine. An
+abstract of the Bristol and Liverpool muster-rolls had been just laid
+before the House. It appeared from this, that in three hundred and fifty
+slave-vessels, having on board twelve thousand two hundred and sixty-three
+persons, two thousand six hundred and forty-three were lost in twelve
+months; whereas in four hundred and sixty-two West Indiamen, having on
+board seven thousand six hundred and forty persons, one hundred and
+eighteen only were lost in seven months. This rather exceeded the losses
+stated by Mr. Clarkson. For their barbarous usage on board these ships, and
+for their sickly and abject state in the West Indies, he would appeal to
+Governor Parry's letter; to the evidence of Mr. Ross; to the assertion of
+Mr. B. Edwards, an opponent; and to the testimony of Captains Sir George
+Yonge and Thompson, of the Royal Navy. He would appeal also to what Captain
+Hall, of the Navy, had given in evidence. This gentleman, after the action
+of the twelfth of April, impressed thirty hands from a slave-vessel, whom
+he selected with the utmost care from a crew of seventy; and he was
+reprimanded by his admiral, though they could scarcely get men to bring
+home the prizes, for introducing such wretches to communicate disorders to
+the fleet. Captain Smith of the Navy had also declared, that when employed
+to board Guineamen to impress sailors, although he had examined near twenty
+vessels, he never was able to get more than two men, who were fit for
+service; and these turned out such inhuman fellows, although good seamen,
+that he was obliged to dismiss them from the ship.
+
+But he hoped the committee would attend to the latter part of the assertion
+of Captain Smith. Yes:--this trade, while it injured the constitutions of
+our sailors, debased their morals. Of this, indeed, there was a barbarous
+illustration in the evidence. A slaveship had struck on some shoals, called
+the Morant Keys, a few leagues from the east end of Jamaica. The crew
+landed in their boats, with arms and provisions, leaving the slaves on
+board in their irons. This happened in the night. When morning came, it was
+discovered that the Negros had broken their shackles, and were busy in
+making rafts; upon which afterwards they placed the women and children. The
+men attended upon the latter, swimming by their side, whilst they drifted
+to the island where the crew were. But what was the sequel? From an
+apprehension that the Negros would consume the water and provision, which
+had been landed, the crew resolved to destroy them as they approached the
+shore. They killed between three and four hundred. Out of the whole cargo
+only thirty-three were saved, who, on being brought to Kingston, were sold.
+It would, however, be to no purpose, he said, to relieve the Slave-trade
+from this act of barbarity. The story of the Morant Keys was paralleled by
+that of Captain Collingwood; and were you to got rid of these, another, and
+another, would still present itself, to prove the barbarous effects of this
+trade on the moral character.
+
+But of the miseries of the trade there was no end. Whilst he had been
+reading out of the evidence the story of the Morant Keys, his eye had but
+glanced on the opposite page, and it met another circumstance of horror.
+This related to what were called the refuse-slaves. Many people in Kingston
+were accustomed to speculate in the purchase of those, who were left after
+the first day's sale. They then carried them out into the country, and
+retailed them. Mr. Ross declared, that he had seen these landed in a very
+wretched state, sometimes in the agonies of death, and sold as low as for a
+dollar, and that he had known several expire in the piazzas of the
+vendue-master. The bare description superseded the necessity of any remark.
+Yet these were the familiar incidents of the Slave-trade.
+
+But he would go back to the seamen. He would mention another cause of
+mortality, by which many of them lost their lives. In looking over Lloyd's
+list, no less than six vessels were cut off by the irritated natives in one
+year, and the crews massacred. Such instances were not unfrequent. In
+short, the history of this commerce was written throughout in characters of
+blood.
+
+He would next consider the effects of the abolition on those places where
+it was chiefly carried on. But would the committee believe, after all the
+noise which had been made on this subject, that the Slave-trade composed
+but a thirtieth part of the export trade of Liverpool, and that of the
+trade of Bristol it constituted a still less proportion? For the effects of
+the abolition on the general commerce of the kingdom, he would refer them
+to Mr. Irving; from whose evidence it would appear, that the medium value
+of the British manufactures, exported to Africa, amounted only to between
+four and five hundred thousand pounds annually. This was but a trifling
+sum. Surely the superior capital, ingenuity, application, and integrity, of
+the British manufacturer would command new markets for the produce of his
+industry, to an equal amount, when this should be no more. One branch,
+however, of our manufactures, he confessed, would suffer from the
+abolition; and that was the manufacture of gunpowder; of which the nature
+of our connection with Africa drew from us as much as we exported to all
+the rest of the world besides.
+
+He hastened, however, to another part of the argument. Some had said, "We
+wish to put an end to the Slave-trade, but we do not approve of your mode.
+Allow more time. Do not displease the legislatures of the West India
+islands. It is by them that those laws must be passed, and enforced, which
+will secure your object." Now he was directly at issue with these
+gentlemen. He could show, that the abolition was the only certain mode of
+amending the treatment of the slaves, so as to secure their increase; and
+that the mode which had been offered to him, was at once inefficacious and
+unsafe. In the first place, how could any laws, made by these legislatures,
+be effectual, whilst the evidence of Negros was in no case admitted against
+White men? What was the answer from Grenada? Did it not state, "that they
+who were capable of cruelty, would in general be artful enough to prevent
+any but slaves from being witnesses of the fact?" Hence it had arisen, that
+when positive laws had been made, in some of the islands, for the
+protection of the slaves, they had been found almost a dead letter.
+Besides, by what law would you enter into every man's domestic concerns,
+and regulate the interior economy of his house and plantation? This would
+be something more than a general excise. Who would endure such a law? And
+yet on all these and innumerable other minutiae must depend the protection
+of the slaves, their comforts, and the probability of their increase. It
+was universally allowed, that the Code Noir had been utterly neglected in
+the French islands, though there was an officer appointed by the crown to
+see it enforced. The provisions of the Directorio had been but of little
+more avail in the Portuguese settlements, or the institution of a Protector
+of the Indians, in those of the Spaniards. But what degree of protection
+the slaves would enjoy might be inferred from the admission of a gentleman,
+by whom this very plan of regulation had been recommended, and who was
+himself no ordinary person, but a man of discernment and legal resources.
+He had proposed a limitation of the number of lashes to be given by the
+master or overseer for one offence. But, after all, he candidly confessed,
+that his proposal was not likely to be useful, while the evidence of slaves
+continued inadmissible against their masters. But he could even bring
+testimony to the inefficacy of such regulations. A wretch in Barbadoes had
+chained a Negro girl to the floor, and flogged her till she was nearly
+expiring. Captain Cook and Major Fitch, hearing her cries, broke open the
+door and found her. The wretch retreated from their resentment, but cried
+out exultingly, "that he had only given her thirty-nine lashes (the number
+limited by law) at any one time; and that he had only inflicted this number
+three times since the beginning of the night," adding, "that he would
+prosecute them for breaking open his door; and that he would flog her to
+death for all any one, if he pleased; and that he would give her the fourth
+thirty-nine before morning."
+
+But this plan of regulation was not only inefficacious, but unsafe. He
+entered his protest against the fatal consequences, which might result from
+it. The Negros were creatures like ourselves; but they were uninformed, and
+their moral character was debased. Hence they were unfit for civil rights.
+To use these properly they must be gradually restored to that level, from
+which they had been so unjustly degraded. To allow them an appeal to the
+laws, would be to awaken in them a sense of the dignity of their nature.
+The first return of life, after a swoon, was commonly a convulsion,
+dangerous at once to the party himself and to all around him. You should
+first prepare them for the situation, and not bring the situation to them.
+To be under the protection of the law was in fact to be a freeman; and to
+unite slavery and freedom in one condition was impracticable. The
+abolition, on the other hand, was exactly such an agent as the case
+required. All hopes of supplies from the Coast being cut off, breeding
+would henceforth become a serious object of attention; and the care of
+this, as including better clothing and feeding, and milder discipline,
+would extend to innumerable particulars, which an act of assembly could
+neither specify nor enforce. The horrible system, too, which many had gone
+upon, of working out their slaves in a few years, and recruiting their
+gangs with imported Africans, would receive its death-blow from the
+abolition of the trade. The opposite would force itself on the most
+unfeeling heart. Ruin would stare a man in the face, if he were not to
+conform to it. The non-resident owners would then express themselves in the
+terms of Sir Philip Gibbs, "that he should consider it as the fault of his
+manager, if he were not to keep up the number of his slaves." This
+reasoning concerning the different tendencies of the two systems was
+self-evident. But facts were not wanting to confirm it. Mr. Long had
+remarked, that all the insurrections and suicides in Jamaica had been found
+among the imported slaves, who, not having lost the consciousness of civil
+rights, which they had enjoyed in their own country, could not brook the
+indignities to which they were subjected in the West Indies. An instance in
+point was afforded also by what had lately taken place in the island of
+Dominica. The disturbance there had been chiefly occasioned by some runaway
+slaves from the French islands. But what an illustration was it of his own
+doctrine to say, that the slaves of several persons, who had been treated,
+with kindness, were not among the number of the insurgents on that
+occasion!
+
+But when persons coolly talked of putting an end to the Slave-trade through
+the medium of the West India legislatures, and of gradual abolition, by
+means of regulations, they surely forgot the miseries which this horrid
+traffic occasioned in Africa during every moment of its continuance. This
+consideration was conclusive with him, when called upon to decide whether
+the Slave-trade should be tolerated for a while, or immediately abolished.
+The divine law against murder was absolute and unqualified. Whilst we were
+ignorant of all these things, our sanction of them might, in some measure,
+be pardoned. But now, when our eyes were opened, could we tolerate them for
+a moment, unless we were ready at once to determine, that gain should be
+our God, and, like the heathens of old, were prepared to offer up human
+victims at the shrine of our idolatry?
+
+This consideration precluded also the giving heed for an instant to another
+plea, namely, that if we were to abolish the trade it would be
+proportionably taken up by other nations. But, whatever other nations did,
+it became Great Britain, in every point of view, to take a forward part.
+One half of this guilty commerce had been carried on by her subjects. As we
+had been great in our crime, we should be early in our repentance. If
+Providence had showered his blessings upon us in unparalleled abundance, we
+should show ourselves grateful for them by rendering them subservient to
+the purposes for which they were intended. There would be a day of
+retribution, wherein we should have to give an account of all those
+talents, faculties, and opportunities, with which we had been intrusted.
+Let it not then appear, that our superior power had been employed to
+oppress our fellow-creatures, and our superior light to darken the creation
+of God. He could not but look forward with delight to the happy prospects
+which opened themselves to his view in Africa from the abolition of the
+Slave-trade; when a commerce, justly deserving that name, should be
+established with her; not like that, falsely so called, which now
+subsisted, and which all who were interested for the honour of the
+commercial character (though there were no superior principle) should
+hasten to disavow. Had this trade indeed been ever so profitable, his
+decision would have been in no degree affected by that consideration.
+"Here's the smell of blood on the hand still, and all the perfumes of
+Arabia cannot sweeten it."
+
+He doubted, whether it was not almost an act of degrading condescension to
+stoop to discuss the question in the view of commercial interest. On this
+ground, however, he was no less strong than on every other. Africa abounded
+with productions of value, which she would gladly exchange for our
+manufactures, when these were not otherwise to be obtained: and to what an
+extent her demand might then grow exceeded almost the powers of
+computation. One instance already existed of a native king, who being
+debarred by his religion the use of spirituous liquors, and therefore not
+feeling the irresistible temptation to acts of rapine which they afforded
+to his countrymen, had abolished the Slave-trade throughout all his
+dominions, and was encouraging an honest industry.
+
+For his own part, he declared that, interested as he might be supposed to
+be in the final event of the question, he was comparatively indifferent as
+to the present decision of the House upon it. Whatever they might do, the
+people of Great Britain, he was confident, would abolish the Slave-trade
+when, as would then soon happen, its injustice and cruelty should be fairly
+laid before them. It was a nest of serpents, which would never have existed
+so long, but for the darkness in which they lay hid. The light of day would
+now be let in on them, and they would vanish from the sight. For himself,
+he declared he was engaged in a work, which he would never abandon. The
+consciousness of the justice of his cause would carry him forward, though
+he were alone; but he could not but derive encouragement from considering
+with whom he was associated. Let us not, he said, despair. It is a blessed
+cause; and success, ere long, will crown our exertions. Already we have
+gained one victory. We have obtained for these poor creatures the
+recognition of their human nature[A], which, for a while, was most
+shamefully denied them. This is the first fruits of our efforts.
+
+[Footnote A: This point was actually obtained by the evidence before the
+House of Commons; for, after this, we heard no more of them as an inferior
+race.]
+
+Let us persevere, and our triumph will be complete. Never, never, will we
+desist, till we have wiped away this scandal from the Christian name; till
+we have released ourselves from the load of guilt under which we at present
+labour; and till we have extinguished every trace of this bloody traffic,
+which our posterity, looking back to the history of these enlightened
+times, will scarcely believe had been suffered to exist so long, a disgrace
+and a dishonour to our country.
+
+
+He then moved, that the chairman be instructed to move for leave to bring
+in a bill to prevent the further importation of slaves into the British
+colonies in the West Indies.
+
+Colonel Tarleton immediately rose up, and began by giving an historical
+account of the trade from the reign of Elizabeth to the present time. He
+then proceeded to the sanction, which parliament had always given it. Hence
+it could not then be withdrawn without a breach of faith. Hence, also, the
+private property embarked in it was sacred, nor could it be invaded, unless
+an adequate compensation were given in return.
+
+They, who had attempted the abolition of the trade, were led away by a
+mistaken humanity. The Africans themselves had no objection to its
+continuance.
+
+With respect to the Middle Passage, he believed the mortality there to be
+on an average only five in the hundred; whereas in regiments, sent out to
+the West Indies, the average loss in the year was about ten and a half per
+cent.
+
+The Slave-trade was absolutely necessary, if we meant to carry on our West
+India commerce; for many attempts had been made to cultivate the lands in
+the different islands by White labourers; but they had always failed.
+
+It had also the merit of keeping up a number of seamen in readiness for the
+state. Lord Rodney had stated this as one of its advantages on the breaking
+out of a war. Liverpool alone could supply nine hundred and ninety-three
+seamen annually.
+
+He would now advert to the connections dependent upon the African trade. It
+was the duty of the House to protect the planters, whose lives had been,
+and were then, exposed to imminent dangers, and whose property had
+undergone an unmerited depreciation. To what could this depreciation, and
+to what could the late insurrection at Dominica, be imputed, which had been
+saved from horrid carnage and midnight-butchery only by the adventitious
+arrival of two British regiments? They could only be attributed to the long
+delayed question of the abolition of the Slave-trade; and if this question
+were to go much longer unsettled, Jamaica would be endangered also.
+
+To members of landed property he would observe, that the abolition would
+lessen the commerce of the country, and increase the national debt and the
+number of their taxes. The minister, he hoped, who patronized this wild
+scheme, had some new pecuniary resource in store to supply the deficiencies
+it would occasion.
+
+To the mercantile members he would speak thus: "A few ministerial men in
+the house had been gifted with religious inspiration, and this had been
+communicated to other eminent personages in it: these enlightened
+philanthropists had discovered, that it was necessary, for the sake of
+humanity and for the honour of the nation, that the merchants concerned in
+the African trade should be persecuted, notwithstanding the sanction of
+their trade by parliament, and notwithstanding that such persecution must
+aggrandize the rivals of Great Britain." Now how did this language sound?
+It might have done in the twelfth century, when all was bigotry and
+superstition. But let not a mistaken humanity, in these enlightened times,
+furnish a colourable pretext for any injurious attack on property or
+character.
+
+These things being considered, he should certainly oppose the measure in
+contemplation. It would annihilate a trade, whose exports amounted to eight
+hundred thousand pounds annually, and which employed a hundred and sixty
+vessels and more than five thousand seamen. It would destroy also the West
+India trade, which was of the annual value of six millions; and which
+employed one hundred and sixty thousand tons of shipping, and seamen in
+proportion. These were objects of too much importance to the country to be
+hazarded on an unnecessary speculation.
+
+Mr. Grosvenor then rose. He complimented the humanity of Mr. Wilberforce,
+though he differed from him on the subject of his motion. He himself had
+read only the privy council report; and he wished for no other evidence.
+The question had then been delayed two years. Had the abolition been so
+clear a point as it was said to be, it could not have needed either so much
+evidence or time.
+
+He had heard a good deal about kidnapping and other barbarous practices. He
+was sorry for them. But these were the natural consequences of the laws of
+Africa; and it became us as wise men to turn them to our own advantage. The
+Slave-trade was certainly not an amiable trade. Neither was that of a
+butcher; but yet it was a very necessary one.
+
+There was great reason to doubt the propriety of the present motion. He had
+twenty reasons for disapproving it. The first was, that the thing was
+impossible. He needed not therefore to give the rest. Parliament, indeed,
+might relinquish the trade. But to whom? To foreigners, who would continue
+it, and without the humane regulations, which were applied to it by his
+country-men.
+
+He would give advice to the house on this subject in the words, which the
+late Alderman Beckford used on a different occasion: "Meddle not with
+troubled waters: they will be found to be bitter waters, and the waters of
+affliction." He again admitted, that the Slave-trade was not an amiable
+trade; but he would not gratify his humanity at the expense of the
+interests of his country; and he thought we should not too curiously
+inquire into the unpleasant circumstances, which attended it.
+
+Mr. James Martin succeeded Mr. Grosvenor. He said, he had been long aware,
+how much self-interest could pervert the judgment; but he was not apprized
+of the full power of it, till the Slave-trade became a subject of
+discussion. He had always conceived, that the custom of trafficking in
+human beings had been incautiously begun, and without any reflection upon
+it; for he never could believe that any man, under the influence of moral
+principles, could suffer himself knowingly to carry on a trade replete with
+fraud, cruelty, and destruction; with destruction, indeed, of the worst
+kind, because it subjected the sufferers to a lingering death. But he found
+now, that even such a trade as this could be sanctioned.
+
+It was well observed in the petition from the University of Cambridge
+against the Slave-trade, "that a firm belief in the Providence of a
+benevolent Creator assured them that no system, founded on the oppression
+of one part of mankind, could be beneficial to another." He felt much
+concern, that in an assembly of the representatives of a country, boasting
+itself zealous not only for the preservation of its own liberties, but for
+the general rights of mankind, it should be necessary to say a single word
+upon such a subject; but the deceitfulness of the human heart was such, as
+to change the appearances of truth, when it stood in opposition to
+self-interest. And he had to lament that even among those, whose public
+duty it was to cling to the universal and eternal principles of truth,
+justice, and humanity, there were found some, who could defend that which
+was unjust, fraudulent, and cruel.
+
+The doctrines he had heard that evening, ought to have been reserved for
+times the most flagrantly profligate and abandoned. He never expected then
+to learn, that the everlasting laws of righteousness were to give way to
+imaginary, political, and commercial expediency; and that thousands of our
+fellow-creatures were to be reduced to wretchedness, that individuals might
+enjoy opulence, or government a revenue.
+
+He hoped that the house for the sake of its own character would explode
+these doctrines with all the marks of odium they deserved; and that all
+parties would join in giving a death-blow to this execrable trade. The
+royal family would, he expected, from their known benevolence, patronize
+the measure. Both Houses of Parliament were now engaged in the prosecution
+of a gentleman accused of cruelty and oppression in the East. But what were
+these cruelties, even if they could be brought home to him, when compared
+in number and degree to those, which were every day and every hour
+committed in the abominable traffic, which was now under their discussion!
+He considered therefore both Houses of Parliament as pledged upon this
+occasion. Of the support of the bishops he could have no doubt; because
+they were to render Christianity amiable, both by their doctrine and their
+example. Some of the inferior clergy had already manifested a laudable zeal
+in behalf of the injured Africans. The University of Cambridge had
+presented a petition to that house worthy of itself. The Sister-university
+had, by one of her representatives, given sanction to the measure.
+Dissenters of various denominations, but particularly the Quakers, (who to
+their immortal honour had taken the lead in it,) had vied with those of the
+established church in this amiable contest. The first counties, and some of
+the largest trading towns, in the kingdom had espoused the cause. In short,
+there had never been more unanimity in the country, than in this righteous
+attempt.
+
+With such support, and with so good a cause, it would be impossible to
+fail. Let but every man stand forth, who had at any time boasted of himself
+as an Englishman, and success would follow. But if he were to be unhappily
+mistaken as to the result, we must give up the name of Englishmen. Indeed,
+if we retained it, we should be the greatest hypocrites in the world; for
+we boasted of nothing more than of our own liberty; we manifested the
+warmest indignation at the smallest personal insult; we professed liberal
+sentiments towards other nations: but to do these things, and to continue
+such a traffic, would be to deserve the hateful character before mentioned.
+While we could hardly bear the sight of any thing resembling slavery, even
+as a punishment, among ourselves, how could we consistently entail an
+eternal slavery upon others?
+
+It had been frequently, but most disgracefully said, that "we should not be
+too eager in setting the example. Let the French begin it." Such a
+sentiment was a direct libel upon the ancient, noble, and generous
+character of this nation. We ought, on the other hand, under the blessings
+we enjoyed, and under the high sense we entertained of our own dignity as a
+people, to be proudly fearful, lest other nations should anticipate our
+design, and obtain the palm before us. It became us to lead. And if others
+should not follow us, it would belong to them to glory in the shame of
+trampling under foot the laws of reason, humanity, and religion.
+
+This motion, he said, came strongly recommended to them. The honourable
+member, who introduced it, was justly esteemed for his character. He was
+the representative too of a noble county, which had been always ready to
+take the lead in every public measure for the good of the community, or for
+the general benefit of mankind; of a county too, which had had the honour
+of producing a Saville. Had his illustrious predecessor been alive, he
+would have shown the same zeal on the same occasion. The preservation of
+the unalienable rights of all his fellow-creatures was one of the chief
+characteristics of that excellent citizen. Let every member in that house
+imitate him in the purity of their conduct and in the universal rectitude
+of their measures, and they would pay the same tender regard to the rights
+of other countries as to those of their own; and, for his part, he should
+never believe those persons to be sincere, who were loud in their
+professions of love of liberty, if he saw that love confined to the narrow
+circle of one community, which ought to be extended to the natural rights
+of every inhabitant of the globe.
+
+But we should be better able to bring ourselves up to this standard of
+rectitude, if we were to put ourselves into the situation of those, whom we
+oppressed. This was the rule of our religion. What should we think of
+those, who should say, that it was their interest to injure us? But he
+hoped we should not deceive ourselves so grossly as to imagine, that it was
+our real interest to oppress any one. The advantages to be obtained by
+tyranny were imaginary, and deceitful to the tyrant; and the evils they
+caused to the oppressed were grievous, and often insupportable.
+
+Before he sat down, he would apologize, if he had expressed himself too
+warmly on this subject. He did not mean to offend any one. There were
+persons connected with the trade, some of whom he pitied on account of the
+difficulty of their situation. But he should think most contemptibly of
+himself as a man, if he could talk on this traffic without emotion. It
+would be a sign to him of his own moral degradation. He regretted his
+inability to do justice to such a cause; but if, in having attempted to
+forward it, he had shown the weakness of his powers, he must console
+himself with the consideration, that he felt more solid comfort in having
+acted up to sound public principles, than he could have done from the
+exertion of the most splendid talents against the conviction of his
+conscience.
+
+Mr. Burdon rose, and said he was embarrassed to know how to act. Mr.
+Wilberforce had in a great measure met his ideas. Indeed he considered
+himself as much in his hands; but he wished to go gradually to the
+abolition of the trade. He wished to give time to the planters to recruit
+their stocks. He feared the immediate abolition might occasion a monopoly
+among such of them as were rich, to the detriment of the less affluent. We
+ought, like a judicious physician, to follow nature, and to promote a
+gradual recovery.
+
+Mr. Francis rose next. After complimenting Mr. Wilberforce, he stated that
+personal considerations might appear to incline him to go against the side
+which he was about to take, namely, that of strenuously supporting his
+motion. Having himself an interest in the West Indies, he thought that what
+he should submit to the house would have the double effect of evidence and
+argument; and he stated most unequivocally his opinion, that the abolition
+of the Slave-trade would tend materially to the benefit of the West Indies.
+
+The arguments urged by the honourable mover were supported by the facts,
+which he had adduced from the evidence, more strongly than any arguments
+had been supported in any speech be had ever heard. He wished, however,
+that more of these facts had been introduced into the debate; for they were
+apt to have a greater effect upon the mind than mere reasonings, however
+just and powerful. Many had affirmed that the Slave-trade was politic and
+expedient; but it was worthy of remark, that no man had ventured to deny
+that it was criminal. Criminal, however, be declared it to be in the
+highest degree; and he believed it was equally impolitic. Both its
+inexpediency and injustice had been established by the honourable mover. He
+dwelt much on the unhappy situation of the Negros in the West Indies, who
+were without the protection of government or of efficient laws, and subject
+to the mere caprice of men, who were at once the parties, the judges, and
+the executioners.
+
+He instanced an overseer, who, having thrown a Negro into a copper of
+boiling cane-juice for a trifling offence, was punished merely by the loss
+of his place, and by being obliged to pay the value of the slave. He stated
+another instance of a girl of fourteen, who was dreadfully whipped for
+coming too late to her work. She fell down motionless after it; and was
+then dragged along the ground, by the legs, to an hospital; where she died.
+The murderer, though tried, was acquitted by a jury of his peers, upon the
+idea, that it was impossible a master could destroy his own property. This
+was a notorious fact. It was published in the Jamaica Gazette; and it had
+even happened since the question of the abolition had been started.
+
+The only argument used against such cruelties, was the master's interest in
+the slave. But he urged the common cruelty to horses, in which their
+drivers had an actual interest with the drivers of men in the colonies, as
+a proof that this was no security. He had never heard an instance of a
+master being punished for the murder of his slave. The propagation of the
+slaves was so far from being encouraged, that it was purposely checked,
+because it was thought more profitable and less troublesome to buy a full
+grown Negro, than to rear a child. He repeated that his interest might have
+inclined him to the other side of the question; but he did not choose to
+compromise between his interest and his duty; for, if he abandoned his
+duty, he should not be happy in this world; nor should he deserve happiness
+in the next.
+
+Mr. Pitt rose, but he said it was only to move, seeing that justice could
+not be done to the subject this evening, that the further consideration of
+the question might be adjourned to the next.
+
+Mr. Cawthorne and Colonel Tarleton both opposed this motion, and Colonel
+Phipps and Lord Carhampton supported it.
+
+Mr. Fox said, the opposition to the adjournment was uncandid and
+unbecoming. They who opposed it well knew that the trade could not bear
+discussion. Let it be discussed; and, although there were symptoms of
+predetermination in some, the abolition of it must be carried. He would not
+believe that there could be found in the House of Commons men of such hard
+hearts and inaccessible understandings, as to vote an assent to its
+continuance, and then go home to their families, satisfied with their vote,
+after they had been once made acquainted with the subject.
+
+Mr. Pitt agreed with Mr. Fox, that from a full discussion of the subject
+there was every reason to augur, that the abolition would be adopted. Under
+the imputations, with which this trade was loaded, gentlemen should
+remember, they could not do justice to their own characters, unless they
+stood up, and gave their reasons for opposing the abolition of it. It was
+unusual also to force any question of such importance to so hasty a
+decision. For his own part, it was his duty, from the situation in which he
+stood, to state fully his own sentiments on the question; and, however
+exhausted both he and the house might be, he was resolved it should not
+pass without discussion, as long as he had strength to utter a word upon
+it. Every principle, that could bind a man of honour and conscience, would
+impel him to give the most powerful support he could to the motion for the
+abolition.
+
+The motion of Mr. Pitt was assented to, and the house was adjourned
+accordingly.
+
+On the next day the subject was resumed. Sir William Yonge rose, and said,
+that, though he differed from the honourable mover, he had much admired his
+speech of the last evening. Indeed the recollection of it made him only the
+more sensible of the weakness of his own powers; and yet, having what he
+supposed to be irrefragable arguments in his possession, he felt emboldened
+to proceed.
+
+And, first, before he could vote for the abolition, he wished to be
+convinced, that, whilst Britain were to lose, Africa would gain. As for
+himself, he hated a traffic in men, and joyfully anticipated its
+termination at no distant period under a wise system of regulation: but he
+considered the present measure as crude and indolent; and as precluding
+better and wiser measures, which were already in train. A British
+Parliament should attain not only the best ends, but by the wisest means.
+
+Great Britain might abandon her share of this trade, but she could not
+abolish it. Parliament was not an assembly of delegates from the powers of
+Europe, but of a single nation. It could not therefore suppress the trade;
+but would eventually aggravate those miseries incident to it, which every
+enlightened man must acknowledge, and every good man must deplore. He
+wished the traffic for ever closed. But other nations were only waiting for
+our decision, to seize the part we should leave them. The new projects of
+these would be intemperate; and, in the zeal of rivalship, the present
+evils of comparatively sober dealing would be aggravated beyond all
+estimate in this new and heated auction of bidders for life and limb. We
+might indeed by regulation give an example of new principles of policy and
+of justice; but if we were to withdraw suddenly from this commerce, like
+Pontius Pilate, we should wash our hands indeed, but we should not be
+innocent as to the consequences.
+
+On the first agitation of this business, Mr. Wilberforce had spoken
+confidently of other nations following our example. But had not the
+National Assembly of France referred the Slave-trade to a select committee,
+and had not that committee rejected the measure of its abolition? By the
+evidence it appeared, that the French and Spaniards were then giving
+bounties to the Slave-trade; that Denmark was desirous of following it;
+that America was encouraging it; and that the Dutch had recognized its
+necessity, and recommended its recovery. Things were bad enough indeed as
+they were, but he was sure this rivalship would make them worse.
+
+He did not admit the disorders imputed to the trade in all their extent.
+Pillage and kidnapping could not be general, on account of the populousness
+of the country; though too frequent instances of it had been proved. Crimes
+might be falsely imputed. This he admitted; but only partially. Witchcraft,
+he believed, was the secret of poisoning, and therefore deserved the
+severest punishment. That there should be a number of convictions for
+adultery, where polygamy was a custom, was not to be wondered at. But he
+feared, if a sale of these criminals were to be done away, massacre would
+be the substitute.
+
+An honourable member had asked on a former day, "Is it an excuse for
+robbery, to say that another would have committed it?" But the Slave-trade
+did not necessarily imply robbery. Not long since Great Britain sold her
+convicts, indirectly at least, to slavery. But he was no advocate for the
+trade. He wished it had never been begun; and that it might soon terminate.
+But the means were not adequate to the end proposed.
+
+Mr. Burke had said on a former occasion, "that in adopting the measure we
+must prepare to pay the price of our virtue." He was ready to pay his share
+of that price. But the effect of the purchase must be first ascertained. If
+they did not estimate this, it was not benevolence, but dissipation.
+Effects were to be duly appreciated; and though statesmen might rest every
+thing on a plausible manifesto of cause, the humbler moralist, meditating
+peace and goodwill towards men, would venture to call such statesmen
+responsible for consequences.
+
+In regard to the colonies, a sudden abolition would be oppression. The
+legislatures there should be led, and not forced, upon this occasion. He
+was persuaded they would act wisely to attain the end pointed out to them.
+They would see, that a natural increase of their Negros might be effected
+by an improved system of legislation; and that in the result the
+Slave-trade would be no longer necessary.
+
+A sudden abolition, also, would occasion dissatisfaction there. Supplies
+were necessary for some time to come. The Negros did not yet generally
+increase by birth. The gradation of ages was not yet duly filled. These and
+many defects might be remedied, but not suddenly.
+
+It would cause also distress there. The planters, not having their expected
+supplies, could not discharge their debts. Hence their slaves would be
+seized and sold. Nor was there any provision in this case against the
+separation of families, except as to the mother and infant child. These
+separations were one of the chief outrages complained of in Africa. Why
+then should we promote them in the West Indies? The confinement on board a
+slave-ship had been also bitterly complained of; but, under distraint for
+the debt of a master, the poor slave might linger in a gaol twice or thrice
+the time of the Middle Passage.
+
+He again stated his abhorrence of the Slave-trade; but as a resource,
+though he hoped but a temporary one, it was of such consequence to the
+existence of the country, that it could not suddenly be withdrawn. The
+value of the imports and exports between Great Britain and the West Indies,
+including the excise and customs, was between seven and eight millions
+annually; and the tonnage of the ships employed, about an eighth of the
+whole tonnage of these kingdoms.
+
+He complained that in the evidence the West India planters had been by no
+means spared. Cruel stories had been hastily and lightly told against them.
+Invidious comparisons had been made to their detriment. But it was well
+known, that one of our best comic writers, when he wished to show
+benevolence in its fairest colours, had personified it in the character of
+the West Indian. He wished the slave might become as secure as the
+apprentice in this country: but it was necessary that the alarms concerning
+the abolition of the Slave-trade should, in the mean time, be quieted; and
+he trusted that the good sense and true benevolence of the House would
+reject the present motion.
+
+Mr. Matthew Montagu rose, and said a few words in support of the motion;
+and after condemning the trade in the strongest manner, he declared, that
+as long as he had life, he would use every faculty of his body and mind in
+endeavouring to promote its abolition.
+
+Lord John Russell succeeded Mr. Montagu. He said, that although slavery was
+repugnant to his feelings, he must vote against the abolition, as visionary
+and delusive. It was a feeble attempt without the power to serve the cause
+of humanity. Other nations would take up the trade. Whenever a bill of wise
+regulation should be brought forward, no man would be more ready than
+himself to lend his support. In this way the rights of humanity might be
+asserted without injury to others. He hoped he should not incur censure by
+his vote; for, let his understanding be what it might, he did not know that
+he had, notwithstanding the assertions of Mr. Fox, an inaccessible heart.
+
+Mr. Stanley (agent for the islands) rose next. He felt himself called upon,
+he said, to refute the many calumnies, which had for years been propagated
+against the planters, (even through the medium of the pulpit, which should
+have been employed to better purposes,) and which had at length produced
+the mischievous measure, which was now under the discussion of the House. A
+cry had been sounded forth, and from one end of the kingdom to the other;
+as if there had never been a slave from Adam to the present time. But it
+appeared to him to have been the intention of Providence, from the very
+beginning, that one set of men should be slaves to another. This truth was
+as old as it was universal. It was recognized in every history, under every
+government, and in every religion. Nor did the Christian religion itself,
+if the comments of Dr. Halifax, bishop of Gloucester, on a passage in St.
+Paul's epistle to the Corinthians were true, show more repugnance to
+slavery than any other.
+
+He denied that the slaves were procured in the manner which had been
+described. It was the custom of all savages to kill their prisoners; and
+the Africans ought to be thankful that they had been carried safe into the
+British colonies.
+
+As to the tales of misery in the Middle Passage, they were gross
+falsehoods; and as to their treatment in the West Indies, he knew
+personally that it was, in general, indulgent and humane.
+
+With regard to promoting their increase by any better mode of treatment, he
+wished gentlemen would point it out to him. As a planter he would thank
+them for it. It was absurd to suppose that he and others were blind to
+their own interest. It was well known that one Creole slave was worth two
+Africans: and their interest therefore must suggest to them that the
+propagation of slaves was preferable to the purchase of imported Negros, of
+whom one half very frequently died in the seasoning.
+
+He then argued the impossibility of beasts doing the work of the
+plantations. He endeavoured to prove that the number of these, adequate to
+this purpose, could not be supplied with food; and after having made many
+other observations, which, on account of the lowness of his voice, could
+not be heard, he concluded by objecting to the motion.
+
+Mr. William Smith rose. He wondered how the last speaker could have had the
+boldness to draw arguments from scripture in support of the Slave-trade.
+Such arguments could be intended only to impose on those, who never took
+the trouble of thinking for themselves. Could it be thought for a moment,
+that the good sense of the House could be misled by a few perverted or
+misapplied passages, in direct opposition to the whole tenor and spirit of
+Christianity; to the theory, he might say, of almost every religion, which
+had ever appeared in the world? Whatever might have been advanced, every
+body must feel, that the Slave-trade could not exist an hour, if that
+excellent maxim, "to do to others as we would wish that others should do to
+us," had its proper influence on the conduct of men.
+
+Nor was Mr. Stanley more happy in his argument of the antiquity and
+universality of slavery. Because a practice had existed, did it necessarily
+follow that it was just? By this argument every crime might be defended
+from the time of Cain. The slaves of antiquity, however, were in a
+situation far preferable to that of the Negros in the West Indies. A
+passage in Macrobius, which exemplified this in the strongest manner, was
+now brought to his recollection. "Our ancestors," says Macrobius,
+"denominated the master father of the family, and the slave domestic, with
+the intention of removing all odium from the condition of the master, and
+all contempt from that of the servant." Could this language be applied to
+the present state of West India slavery?
+
+It had been complained of by those who supported the trade, that they
+laboured under great disadvantages by being obliged to contend against the
+most splendid abilities which the House could boast. But he believed they
+laboured under one, which was worse, and for which no talents could
+compensate; he meant the impossibility of maintaining their ground fairly
+on any of those principles, which every man within those walls had been
+accustomed, from his infancy, to venerate as sacred. He and his friends too
+laboured under some disadvantages. They had been charged with fanaticism.
+But what had Mr. Long said, when he addressed himself to those planters,
+who were desirous of attempting improvements on their estates?  He advised
+them "not to be diverted by partial views, vulgar prejudices, or the
+ridicule which might spring from weak minds, from a benevolent attention to
+the public good." But neither by these nor by other charges were he or his
+friends to be diverted from the prosecution of their purpose. They were
+convinced of the rectitude and high importance of their object; and were
+determined never to desist from pursuing it, till it should be attained.
+
+But they had to struggle with difficulties far more serious. The West
+Indian interest, which opposed them, was a collected body; of great power,
+affluence, connections, and respectability.
+
+Artifice had also been employed. Abolition and emancipation had been so
+often confounded, and by those who knew better, that it must have been
+purposely done, to throw an odium on the measure which was now before them.
+
+The abolitionists had been also accused as the authors of the late
+insurrection in Dominica. A revolt had certainly taken place in that
+island. But revolts there had occurred frequently before. Mr. Stanley
+himself, in attempting to fix this charge upon them, had related
+circumstances, which amounted to their entire exculpation. He had said,
+that all was quiet there till the disturbances in the French islands; when
+some Negros from the latter had found their way to Dominica, and had
+excited the insurrection in question. He had also said, that the Negros in
+our own islands hated the idea of the abolition; for they thought, as no
+new labourers were to come in, they should be subjected to increased
+hardships. But if they and their masters hated this same measure, how was
+this coincidence of sentiment to give birth to insurrection?
+
+Other fallacies also had been industriously propagated. Of the African
+trade it had been said, that the exports amounted to a million annually;
+whereas, from the report on the table, it had on an average amounted to
+little more than half a million; and this included the articles for the
+purchase of African produce, which were of the value of a hundred and forty
+thousand pounds.
+
+The East Indian trade, also, had been said to depend on the West Indian and
+the African. In the first place, it had but very little connection with the
+former at all. Its connection with the latter was principally on account of
+the saltpetre, which it furnished for making gunpowder. Out of nearly three
+millions of pounds in weight of the latter article, which had been exported
+in a year from this country, one half had been sent to Africa alone; for
+the purposes, doubtless, of maintaining peace, and encouraging civilization
+among its various tribes! Four or five thousand persons were said also to
+depend for their bread in manufacturing guns for the African trade; and
+these, it was pretended, could not make guns of another sort.--But where
+lay the difficulty?--One of the witnesses had unravelled it. He had seen
+the Negros maimed by the bursting of these guns. They killed more from the
+butt than from the muzzle. Another had stated, that on the sea-coast the
+natives were afraid to fire a trade-gun.
+
+In the West Indian commerce two hundred and forty thousand tons of shipping
+were stated to be employed. But here deception intruded itself again. This
+statement included every vessel, great and small, which went from the
+British West Indies to America, and to the foreign islands; and, what was
+yet more unfair, all the repeated voyages of each throughout the year. The
+shipping, which could only fairly be brought into this account, did but
+just exceed half that which had been mentioned.
+
+In a similar manner had the islands themselves been overrated. Their value
+had been computed, for the information of the privy council, at thirty-six
+millions; but the planters had estimated them at seventy. The truth,
+however, might possibly lie between these extremes. He by no means wished
+to depreciate their importance; but he did not like that such palpable
+misrepresentations should go unnoticed.
+
+An honourable member (Colonel Tarleton) had disclaimed every attempt to
+interest the feelings of those present, but had desired to call them to
+reason and accounts. He also desired (though it was a question of feeling,
+if any one ever was,) to draw the attention of the committee to reason and
+accounts--to the voice of reason instead of that of prejudice, and to
+accounts in the place of idle apprehensions. The result, he doubted not,
+would be a full persuasion, that policy and justice were inseparable upon
+this, as upon every other occasion.
+
+The same gentleman had enlarged on the injustice of depriving the Liverpool
+merchants of a business, on which were founded their honour and their
+fortunes. On what part of it they founded their honour he could not
+conjecture, except from those passages in the evidence, where it appeared,
+that their agents in Africa had systematically practised every fraud and
+villainy, which the meanest and most unprincipled cunning could suggest, to
+impose on the ignorance of those with whom they traded.
+
+The same gentleman had also lamented, that the evidence had not been taken
+upon oath. He himself lamented it too. Numberless facts had been related by
+eye-witnesses, called in support of the abolition, so dreadfully atrocious,
+that they appeared incredible; and seemed rather, to use the expression of
+Ossian, like "the histories of the days of other times." These procured for
+the trade a species of acquittal, which it could not have obtained, had the
+committee been authorised to administer an oath. He apprehended also, in
+this case, that some other persons would have been rather more guarded in
+their testimony. Captain Knox would not then perhaps have told the
+committee, that six hundred slaves could have had comfortable room at night
+in his vessel of about one hundred and forty tons; when there could have
+been no more than five feet six inches in length, and fifteen inches in
+breadth, to about two thirds of his number.
+
+The same gentleman had also dwelt upon the Slave-trade as a nursery for
+seamen. But it had appeared by the muster-rolls of the slave-vessels, then
+actually on the table of the House, that more than a fifth of them died in
+the service, exclusive of those who perished when discharged in the West
+Indies; and yet he had been instructed by his constituents to maintain this
+false position. His reasoning, too, was very curious; for, though numbers
+might die, yet as one half, who entered, were landsmen, seamen were
+continually forming. Not to dwell on the expensive cruelty of forming these
+seamen by the yearly destruction of so many hundreds, this very statement
+was flatly contradicted by the evidence. The muster-rolls from Bristol
+stated the proportion of landmen in the trade there at one twelfth, and the
+proper officers of Liverpool itself at but a sixteenth, of the whole
+employed. In the face again of the most glaring facts, others had
+maintained that the mortality in these vessels did not exceed that of other
+trades in the tropical climates. But the same documents, which proved that
+twenty-three per cent, were destroyed in this wasting traffic, proved that
+in West India ships only about one and a half per cent. were lost,
+including every casualty.--But the very men, under whose management this
+dreadful mortality had been constantly occurring, had coolly said, that
+much of it might be avoided by proper regulations. How criminal then were
+they, who, knowing this, had neither publicly proposed, nor in their
+practice adopted, a remedy!
+
+The average loss of the slaves on board, which had been calculated by Mr.
+Wilberforce at twelve and a half per cent., had been denied. He believed
+this calculation, taking in all the circumstances connected with it, to be
+true; but that for years not less than one tenth had so perished, he would
+challenge those concerned in the traffic to disprove. Much evidence had
+been produced on the subject; but the voyages had been generally selected.
+There was only one, who had disclosed the whole account. This was Mr.
+Anderson of London, whose engagements in this trade had been very
+inconsiderable. His loss had only amounted to three per cent.; but,
+unfortunately for the Slave-traders of Liverpool, his vessel had not taken
+above three fourths of that number in proportion to the tonnage which they
+had stated to be necessary to the very existence of their trade.
+
+An honourable member (Mr. Grosvenor) had attributed the protraction of this
+business to those who had introduced it. But from whom did the motion for
+further evidence (when that of the privy council was refused) originate,
+but from the enemies of the abolition? The same gentleman had said, it was
+impossible to abolish the trade; but where was the impossibility of
+forbidding the further importation of slaves into our own colonies? and
+beyond this the motion did not extend.
+
+The latter argument had also been advanced by Sir William Yonge and others.
+But allowing it its full force, would there be no honour in the dereliction
+of such a commerce? Would it be nothing publicly to recognise great and
+just principles? Would our example be nothing?--Yes: every country would
+learn, from our experiment, that American colonies could be cultivated
+without the necessity of continual supplies equally expensive and
+disgraceful.
+
+But we might do more than merely lay down principles or propose examples.
+We might, in fact, diminish the evil itself immediately by no
+inconsiderable part,--by the whole of our own supply: and here he could not
+at all agree with the honourable baronet, in what seemed to him a
+commercial paradox, that the taking away from an open trade by far the
+largest customer, and the lessening of the consumption of the article,
+would increase both the competition and the demand, and of course all those
+mischiefs, which it was their intention to avert.
+
+That the civilization of the Africans was promoted, as had been asserted,
+by their intercourse with the Europeans, was void of foundation, as had
+appeared from the evidence. In manners and dishonesty they had indeed
+assimilated with those who frequented their coasts. But the greatest
+industry and the least corruption of morals were in the interior, where
+they were out of the way of this civilizing connection.
+
+To relieve Africa from famine, was another of the benign reasons which had
+been assigned for continuing the trade. That famines had occurred there, he
+did not doubt; but that they should annually occur, and with such
+arithmetical exactness as to suit the demands of the Slave-trade, was a
+circumstance most extraordinary; so wonderful indeed, that, could it once
+be proved, he should consider it as a far better argument in favour of the
+divine approbation of that trade, than any which had ever yet been
+produced.
+
+As to the effect of the abolition on the West Indies, it would give weight
+to every humane regulation which had been made; by substituting a certain
+and obvious interest, in the place of one depending upon chances and
+calculation. An honourable member (Mr. Stanley) had spoken of the
+impossibility of cultivating the estates there without further importations
+of Negros; and yet, of all the authorities he had brought to prove his
+case, there was scarcely one which might not be pressed to serve more or
+less effectually against him. Almost every planter he had named had found
+his Negros increase under the good treatment he had professed to give them;
+and it was an axiom, throughout the whole evidence, that wherever they were
+well used importations were not necessary. It had been said indeed by some
+adverse witnesses, that in Jamaica all possible means had been used to keep
+up the stock by breeding; but how preposterous was this, when it was
+allowed that the morals of the slaves had been totally neglected, and that
+the planters preferred buying a larger proportion of males than females!
+
+The misfortune was, that prejudice and not reason was the enemy to be
+subdued. The prejudices of the West Indians on these points were numerous
+and inveterate. Mr. Long himself had characterized them on this account, in
+terms which he should have felt diffident in using. But Mr. Long had shown
+his own prejudices also. For he justified the chaining of the Negros on
+board the slave-vessels, on account of "their bloody, cruel, and malicious
+dispositions." But hear his commendation of some of the Aborigines of
+Jamaica, "who had miserably perished in caves, whither they had retired to
+escape the tyranny of the Spaniards. These," says he, "left a glorious
+monument of their having disdained to survive the loss of their liberty and
+their country." And yet this same historian could not perceive that this
+natural love of liberty might operate as strongly and as laudably in the
+African Negro, as in the Indian of Jamaica.
+
+He was concerned to acknowledge that these prejudices were yet further
+strengthened by resentment against those who had taken an active part in
+the abolition of the Slave-trade. But it was never the object of these to
+throw a stigma on the whole body of the West Indians; but to prove the
+miserable effects of the trade. This it was their duty to do; and if, in
+doing this, disgraceful circumstances had come out, it was not their fault;
+and it must never be forgotten that they were true.
+
+That the slaves were exposed to great misery in the islands, was true as
+well from inference as from facts: for what might not be expected from the
+use of arbitrary power, where the three characters of party, judge, and
+executioner were united! The slaves too were more capable on account of
+their passions, than the beasts of the field, of exciting the passions of
+their tyrants. To what a length the ill treatment of them might be carried,
+might be learnt from the instance which General Tottenham mentioned to have
+seen in the year 1780 in the streets of Bridge Town, Barbadoes: "A youth
+about nineteen (to use his own words in the evidence), entirely naked, with
+an iron collar about his neck, having five long projecting spikes. His body
+both before and behind, was covered with wounds. His belly and thighs were
+almost cut to pieces, with running ulcers all over them; and a finger might
+have been laid in some of the weals. He could not sit down, because his
+hinder part was mortified; and it was impossible for him to lie down, on
+account of the prongs of his collar." He supplicated the General for
+relief. The latter asked, who had punished him so dreadfully? The youth
+answered, his master had done it. And because he could not work, this same
+master, in the same spirit of perversion, which extorts from scripture a
+justification of the Slave-trade, had fulfilled the apostolic maxim, that
+he should have nothing to eat. The use he meant to make of this instance
+was to show the unprotected state of the slaves. What must it be, where
+such an instance could pass not only unpunished, but almost unregarded! If,
+in the streets of London, but a dog were to be seen lacerated like this
+miserable man, how would the cruelty of the wretch be execrated, who had
+thus even abused a brute!
+
+The judicial punishments also inflicted upon the Negro showed the low
+estimation, in which, in consequence of the strength of old customs and
+deep-rooted prejudices, they were held. Mr. Edwards, in his speech to the
+Assembly at Jamaica, stated the following case, as one which had happened
+in one of the rebellions there. Some slaves surrounded the dwelling-house
+of their mistress. She was in bed with a lovely infant. They deliberated
+upon the means of putting her to death in torment. But in the end one of
+them reserved her for his mistress; and they killed her infant with an axe
+before her face. "Now," says Mr. Edwards, (addressing himself to his
+audience,) "you will think that no torments were too great for such
+horrible excesses. Nevertheless I am of a different opinion. I think that
+death, unaccompanied with cruelty, should be the utmost exertion of human
+authority over our unhappy fellow-creatures." Torments, however, were
+always inflicted in these cases. The punishment was gibbeting alive, and
+exposing the delinquents to perish by the gradual effects of hunger,
+thirst, and a parching sun; in which situation they were known to suffer
+for nine days, with a fortitude scarcely credible, never uttering a single
+groan. But horrible as the excesses might have been, which occasioned these
+punishments, it muse be remembered, that they were committed by ignorant
+savages, who had been dragged from all they held most dear; whose patience
+had been exhausted by a cruel and loathsome confinement during their
+transportation; and whose resentment had been wound up to the highest pitch
+of fury by the lash of the driver.
+
+But he would now mention another instance, by way of contrast, out of the
+evidence. A child on board a slave-ship, of about ten months old, took sulk
+and would not eat. The captain flogged it with a cat; swearing that he
+would make it eat, or kill it. From this and other ill-treatment the
+child's legs swelled. He then ordered some water to be made hot to abate
+the swelling. But even his tender mercies were cruel; for the cook, on
+putting his hand into the water, said it was too hot. Upon this the captain
+swore at him, and ordered the feet to be put in. This was done. The nails
+and skin came off. Oiled cloths were then put round them. The child was at
+length tied to a heavy log. Two or three days afterwards, the captain
+caught it up again; and repeated that he would make it eat, or kill it. He
+immediately flogged it again, and in a quarter of an hour it died. But,
+after the child was dead, whom should the barbarian select to throw it
+overboard, but the wretched mother? In vain she started from the office. He
+beat her, till he made her take up the child and carry it to the side of
+the vessel. She then dropped it into the sea, turning her head the other
+way that she might not see it. Now it would naturally be asked, Was not
+this captain also gibbered alive? Alas! although the execrable, barbarity
+of the European exceeded that of the Africans before mentioned, almost as
+much as his opportunities of instruction had been greater than theirs, no
+notice whatsoever was taken of this horrible action; and a thousand similar
+cruelties had been committed in this abominable trade with equal impunity:
+but he would say no more. He should vote for the abolition, not only as it
+would do away all the evils complained of in Africa and the Middle Passage;
+but as it would be the most effectual means of ameliorating the condition
+of those unhappy persons, who were still to continue slaves in the British
+colonies.
+
+Mr. Courtenay rose. He said, he could not but consider the assertion of Sir
+William Yonge as a mistake, that the Slave-trade, if abandoned by us, would
+fall into the hands of France. It ought to be recollected, with what
+approbation the motion for abolishing it, made by the late Mirabeau, had
+been received; although the situation of the French colonies might then
+have presented obstacles to carrying the measure into immediate execution.
+He had no doubt, if parliament were to begin, so wise and enlightened a
+body as the National Assembly would follow the example. But even if France
+were not to relinquish the trade, how could we, if justice required its
+abolition, hesitate as to our part of it?
+
+The trade, it had been said, was conducted upon the principles of humanity.
+Yes: we rescued the Africans from what we were pleased to call their
+wretched situation in their own country, and then we took credit for our
+humanity; because, after having killed one half of them in the seasoning,
+we substituted what we were again pleased to call a better treatment than
+that which they would have experienced at home.
+
+
+It had been stated that the principle of war among savages was a general
+massacre. This was not true. They frequently adopted the captives into
+their own families; and, so far from massacring the women and children,
+they often gave them the protection which the weakness of their age and sex
+demanded.
+
+There could be no doubt, that the practice of kidnapping prevailed in
+Africa. As to witchcraft, it had been made a crime in the reign of James
+the First in this country, for the purpose of informations; and how much
+more likely were informations to take place in Africa, under the
+encouragement afforded by the Slave-trade! This trade, it had been said,
+was sanctioned by twenty-six acts of parliament. He did not doubt but
+fifty-six might be found, by which parliament had sanctioned witchcraft; of
+the existence of which we had now no belief whatever.
+
+It had been said by Mr. Stanley, that the pulpit had been used as an
+instrument of attack on the Slave-trade. He was happy to learn it had been
+so well employed; and he hoped the Bishops would rise up in the House of
+Lords, with the virtuous indignation which became them, to abolish a
+traffic so contrary to humanity, justice, and religion.
+
+He entreated every member to recollect, that on his vote that night
+depended the happiness of millions; and that it was then in his power to
+promote a measure, of which the benefits would be felt over one whole
+quarter of the globe; that the seeds of civilization might, by the present
+bill, be sown all over Africa; and the first principles of humanity be
+established in regions, where they had hitherto been excluded by the
+existence of this execrable trade.
+
+Lord Carysfort rose, and said, that the great cause of the abolition had
+flourished by the manner in which it had been opposed. No one argument of
+solid weight has been adduced against it. It had been shown, but never
+disproved, that the colonial laws were inadequate to the protection of the
+slaves; that the punishments of the latter were most unmerciful; that they
+were deprived of the right of self-defence against any White man; and, in
+short, that the system was totally repugnant to the principles of the
+British constitution.
+
+Colonel Phipps followed Lord Carysfort. He denied that this was a question
+in which the rights of humanity and the laws of nature were concerned. The
+Africans became slaves in consequence of the constitution of their own
+governments. These were founded in absolute despotism. Every subject was an
+actual slave. The inhabitants were slaves to the great men; and the great
+men were slaves to the Prince. Prisoners of war, too, were by law subject
+to slavery. Such being the case, he saw no more cruelty in disposing of
+them to our merchants, than to those of any other nation. Criminals also in
+cases of adultery and witchcraft became slaves by the same laws.
+
+It had been said, that there were no regulations in the West Indies for the
+protection of slaves. There were several; though he was ready to admit,
+that more were necessary; and he would go in this respect as far as
+humanity might require. He had passed ten months in Jamaica, where he had
+never seen any such acts of cruelty as had been talked of. Those which he
+had seen were not exercised by the Whites, but by the Blacks. The dreadful
+stories, which had been told, ought no more to fix a general stigma upon
+the planters, than the story of Mrs. Brownrigg to stamp this polished
+metropolis with the general brand of murder. There was once a haberdasher's
+wife (Mrs. Nairne) who locked up her apprentice girl, and starved her to
+death; but did ever any body think of abolishing haberdashery on this
+account? He was persuaded the Negros in the West Indies were cheerful and
+happy. They were fond of ornaments; but it was not the characteristic of
+miserable persons to show a taste for finery. Such a taste, on the
+contrary, implied a cheerful and contented mind. He was sorry to differ
+from his friend Mr. Wilberforce, but he must oppose his motion.
+
+Mr. Pitt rose, and said, that from the first hour of his having had the
+honour to sit in parliament down to the present, among all the questions,
+whether political or personal, in which it had been his fortune to take a
+share, there had never been one in which his heart was so deeply interested
+as in the present; both on account of the serious principles it involved,
+and the consequences connected with it.
+
+The present was not a mere question of feeling. The argument, which ought
+in his opinion to determine the committee, was, that the Slave-trade was
+unjust. It was therefore such a trade as it was impossible for him to
+support, unless it could be first proved to him, that there were no laws of
+morality binding upon nations; and that it was not the duty of a
+legislature to restrain its subjects from invading the happiness of other
+countries, and from violating the fundamental principles of justice.
+
+Several had stated the impracticability of the measure before them. They
+wished to see the trade abolished; but there was some necessity for
+continuing it, which they conceived to exist. Nay, almost every one, he
+believed, appeared to wish, that the further importation of slaves might
+cease; provided it could be made out, that the population of the West
+Indies could be maintained without it. He proposed therefore to consider
+the latter point; for, as the impracticability of keeping up the population
+there appeared to operate as the chief objection, he trusted that, by
+showing it to be ill founded, he should clear away all other obstacles
+whatever; so that, having no ground either of justice or necessity to stand
+upon, there could be no excuse left to the committee for resisting the
+present motion.
+
+He might reasonably, however, hope that they would not reckon any small or
+temporary disadvantage, which might arise from the abolition, to be a
+sufficient reason against it. It was surely not any slight degree of
+expediency, nor any small balance of profit, nor any light shades of
+probability on the one side, rather than on the other, which would
+determine them on this question. He asked pardon even for the supposition.
+The Slave-trade was an evil of such magnitude, that there must be a common
+wish in the committee at once to put an end to it, if there were no great
+and serious obstacles. It was a trade, by which multitudes of unoffending
+nations were deprived of the blessings of civilization, and had their peace
+and happiness invaded. It ought therefore to be no common expediency, it
+ought to be nothing less than the utter ruin of our islands, which it
+became those to plead, who took upon them to defend the continuance of it.
+
+He could not help thinking that the West India gentlemen had manifested an
+over great degree of sensibility as to the point in question; and that
+their alarms had been unreasonably excited upon it. He had examined the
+subject carefully for himself; and he would now detail those reasons, which
+had induced him firmly to believe, not only that no permanent mischief
+would follow from the abolition; but not even any such temporary
+inconvenience, as could be stated to be a reason for preventing the House
+from agreeing to the motion before them; on the contrary, that the
+abolition itself would lay the foundation for the more solid improvement of
+all the various interests of those colonies.
+
+In doing this he should apply his observations chiefly to Jamaica, which
+contained more than half the slaves in the British West Indies; and if he
+should succeed in proving that no material detriment could arise to the
+population there, this would afford so strong a presumption with respect to
+the other islands, that the House could no longer hesitate, whether they
+should, or should not, put a stop to this most horrid trade.
+
+In the twenty years ending in 1788, the annual loss of slaves in Jamaica
+(that is, the excess of deaths above the births,) appeared to be one in the
+hundred. In a preceding period the loss was greater; and, in a period
+before that, greater still; there having been a continual gradation in the
+decrease through the whole time. It might fairly be concluded, therefore,
+that (the average loss of the last period being one per cent.) the loss in
+the former part of it would be somewhat more, and in the latter part
+somewhat less, than one per cent.; insomuch that it might be fairly
+questioned, whether, by this time, the births and deaths in Jamaica might
+not be stated as nearly equal. It was to be added, that a peculiar
+calamity, which swept away fifteen thousand slaves, had occasioned a part
+of the mortality in the last-mentioned period. The probable loss,
+therefore, now to be expected was very inconsiderable indeed.
+
+There was, however, one circumstance to be added, which the West India
+gentlemen, in stating this matter, had entirely overlooked; and which was
+so material, as clearly to reduce the probable diminution in the population
+of Jamaica down to nothing. In all the calculations he had referred to of
+the comparative number of births and deaths, all the Negros in the island
+were included. The newly imported, who died in the seasoning, made a part.
+But these swelled, most materially, the number of the deaths. Now as these
+extraordinary deaths would cease, as soon as the importations ceased, a
+deduction of them ought to be made from his present calculation.
+
+But the number of those, who thus died in the seasoning, would make up of
+itself nearly the whole of that one per cent., which had been stated. He
+particularly pressed an attention to this circumstance; for the complaint
+of being likely to want hands in Jamaica, arose from the mistake of
+including the present unnatural deaths, caused by the seasoning, among the
+natural and perpetual causes of mortality. These deaths, being erroneously
+taken into the calculations, gave the planters an idea, that the numbers
+could not be kept up. These deaths, which were caused merely by the
+Slave-trade, furnished the very ground, therefore, on which the continuance
+of that trade had been thought necessary.
+
+The evidence as to this point was clear; for it would be found in that
+dreadful catalogue of deaths, arising from the seasoning and the passage,
+which the House had been condemned to look into, that one half died. An
+annual mortality of two thousand slaves in Jamaica might be therefore
+charged to the importation; which, compared with the whole number on the
+island, hardly fell short of the whole one per cent. decrease.
+
+Joining this with all the other considerations, he would then ask, Could
+the decrease of the slaves in Jamaica be such--could the colonies be so
+destitute of means--could the planters, when by their own accounts they
+were establishing daily new regulations for the benefit of the
+slaves--could they, under all these circumstances, be permitted to plead
+that total impossibility of keeping up their number, which they had rested
+on, as being indeed the only possible pretext for allowing fresh
+importations from Africa? He appealed therefore to the sober judgment of
+all, whether the situation of Jamaica was such, as to justify a hesitation
+in agreeing to the present motion.
+
+It might be observed also, that, when the importations should stop, that
+disproportion between the sexes, which was one of the obstacles to
+population, would gradually diminish; and a natural order of things be
+established. Through the want of this natural order a thousand grievances
+were created, which it was impossible to define; and which it was in vain
+to think that, under such circumstances, we could cure. But the abolition
+of itself would work this desirable effect. The West Indians would then
+feel a near and urgent interest to enter into a thousand little details,
+which it was impossible for him to describe, but which would have the
+greatest influence on population. A foundation would thus be laid for the
+general welfare of the islands; a new system would rise up, the reverse of
+the old; and eventually both their general wealth and happiness would
+increase.
+
+He had now proved far more than he was bound to do; for, if he could only
+show that the abolition would not be ruinous, it would be enough. He could
+give up, therefore, three arguments out of four, through the whole of what
+he had said, and yet have enough left for his position. As to the Creoles,
+they would undoubtedly increase. They differed in this entirely from the
+imported slaves, who were both a burthen and a curse to themselves and
+others. The measure now proposed would operate like a charm; and, besides
+stopping all the miseries in Africa and the passage, would produce even
+more benefit in the West Indies than legal regulations could effect.
+
+He would now just touch upon the question of emancipation. A rash
+emancipation of the slaves would be mischievous. In that unhappy situation,
+to which our baneful conduct had brought ourselves and them, it would be no
+justice on either side to give them liberty. They were as yet incapable of
+it; but their situation might be gradually amended. They might be relieved
+from every thing harsh and severe; raised from their present degraded
+state; and put under the protection of the law. Till then, to talk of
+emancipation was insanity. But it was the system of fresh importations,
+which interfered with these principles of improvement; and it was only the
+abolition which could establish them. This suggestion had its foundation in
+human nature. Wherever the incentive of honour, credit, and fair profit
+appeared, energy would spring up; and when these labourers should have the
+natural springs of human action afforded them, they would then rise to the
+natural level of human industry.
+
+From Jamaica he would now go to the other islands. In Barbadoes the slaves
+had rather increased. In St. Kitts the decrease for fourteen years had been
+but three fourths per cent.; but here many of the observations would apply,
+which he had used in the case of Jamaica. In Antigua many had died by a
+particular calamity. But for this, the decrease would have been trifling.
+In Nevis and Montserrat there was little or no disproportion of the sexes;
+so that it might well be hoped, that the numbers would be kept up in these
+islands. In Dominica some controversy had arisen about the calculation; but
+Governor Orde had stated an increase of births above the deaths. From
+Grenada and St. Vincents no accurate accounts had been delivered in answer
+to the queries sent them; but they were probably not in circumstances less
+favourable than in the other islands.
+
+On a full review then, of the state of the Negro population in the West
+Indies, was there any serious ground of alarm from the abolition of the
+Slave-trade? Where was the impracticability, on which alone so many had
+rested their objections? Must we not blush at pretending, that it would
+distress our consciences to accede to this measure, as far as the question
+of the Negro population was concerned?
+
+Intolerable were the mischiefs of this trade, both in its origin and
+through every stage of its progress. To say that slaves could be furnished
+us by fair and commercial means was ridiculous. The trade sometimes ceased,
+as during the late war. The demand was more or less according to
+circumstances. But how was it possible, that to a demand so exceedingly
+fluctuating the supply should always exactly accommodate itself? Alas! we
+made human beings the subject of commerce; we talked of them as such; and
+yet we would not allow them the common principle of commerce, that the
+supply must accommodate itself to the consumption. It was not from wars,
+then, that the slaves were chiefly procured. They were obtained in
+proportion as they were wanted. If a demand for slaves arose, a supply was
+forced in one way or other; and it was in vain, overpowered as we then were
+with positive evidence, as well as the reasonableness of the supposition,
+to deny that by the Slave-trade we occasioned all the enormities which had
+been alleged against it.
+
+Sir William Yonge had said, that, if we were not to take the Africans from
+their country, they would be destroyed. But he had not yet read, that all
+uncivilized nations destroyed their captives. We assumed therefore what was
+false. The very selling of them implied this: for, if they would sell their
+captives for profit, why should they not employ them so as to receive a
+profit also? Nay, many of them, while there was no demand from the
+slave-merchants, were often actually so employed. The trade, too, had been
+suspended during the war; and it was never said, or thought, that any such
+consequence had then followed.
+
+The honourable baronet had also said in justification of the Slave-trade,
+that witchcraft commonly implied poison, and was therefore a punishable
+crime; but did he recollect that not only the individual accused, but that
+his whole family, were sold as slaves? The truth was, we stopped the
+natural progress of civilization in Africa. We cut her off from the
+opportunity of improvement. We kept her down in a state of darkness,
+bondage, ignorance and bloodshed. Was not this an awful consideration for
+this country? Look at the map of Africa, and see how little useful
+intercourse had been established on that vast continent! While other
+countries were assisting and enlightening each other, Africa alone had none
+of these benefits. We had obtained as yet only so much knowledge of her
+productions, as to show that there was a capacity for trade, which we
+checked. Indeed, if the mischiefs there were out of the question, the
+circumstance of the Middle Passage alone would, in his mind, be reason
+enough for the abolition. Such a scene as that of the slave-ships passing
+over with their wretched cargoes to the West Indies, if it could be spread
+before the eyes of the House, would be sufficient of itself to make them
+vote in favour of it; but when it could be added, that the interest even of
+the West Indies themselves rested on the accomplishment of this great
+event, he could not conceive an act of more imperious duty, than that,
+which was imposed upon the House, of agreeing to the present motion.
+
+Sir Archibald Edmonstone rose, and asked, whether the present motion went
+so far, as to pledge those who voted for it, to a total and immediate
+abolition.
+
+Mr. Alderman Watson rose next. He defended the Slave-trade as highly
+beneficial to the country, being one material branch of its commerce. But
+he could not think of the African trade without connecting it with the West
+Indian. The one hung upon the other. A third important branch also depended
+upon it; which was the Newfoundland fishery: the latter could not go on, if
+it were not for the vast quantity of inferior fish bought up for the Negros
+in the West Indies; and which was quite unfit for any other market. If
+therefore we destroyed the African, we destroyed the other trades. Mr.
+Turgot, he said, had recommended in the National Assembly of France the
+gradual abolition of the Slave-trade. He would therefore recommend it to
+the House to adopt the same measure, and to soften the rigours of slavery
+by wholesome regulations; but an immediate abolition he could not
+countenance.
+
+Mr. Fox at length rose. He observed that some expressions, which he had
+used on the preceding day, had been complained of as too harsh and severe.
+He had since considered them; but he could not prevail upon himself to
+retract them; because, if any gentleman, after reading the evidence on the
+table, and attending to the debate, could avow himself an abetter of this
+shameful traffic in human flesh, it could only be either from some hardness
+of heart, or some difficulty of understanding, which he really knew not how
+to account for.
+
+Some had considered this question as a question of political, whereas it
+was a question of personal, freedom. Political freedom was undoubtedly a
+great blessing; but, when it came to be compared with personal, it sank to
+nothing. To confound the two, served therefore to render all arguments on
+either perplexing and unintelligible. Personal freedom was the first right
+of every human being. It was a right, of which he who deprived a
+fellow-creature was absolutely criminal in so depriving him, and which he
+who withheld was no less criminal in withholding. He could not therefore
+retract his words with respect to any, who (whatever respect he might
+otherwise have for them) should, by their vote of that night, deprive their
+fellow-creatures of so great a blessing. Nay, he would go further. He would
+say, that if the House, knowing what the trade was by the evidence, did not
+by their vote mark to all mankind their abhorrence of a practice so savage,
+so enormous, so repugnant to all laws human and divine, they would consign
+their character to eternal infamy.
+
+That the pretence of danger to our West Indian islands from the abolition
+of the Slave-trade was totally unfounded, Mr. Wilberforce had abundantly
+proved: but if there were they, who had not been satisfied with that proof,
+was it possible to resist the arguments of Mr. Pitt on the same subject? It
+had been shown, on a comparison of the births and deaths in Jamaica, that
+there was not now any decrease of the slaves. But if there had been, it
+would have made no difference to him in his vote; for, had the mortality
+been ever so great there, he should have ascribed it to the system of
+importing Negros, instead of that of encouraging their natural increase.
+Was it not evident, that the planters thought it more convenient to buy
+them fit for work, than to breed them? Why, then, was this horrid trade to
+be kept up?--To give the planters, truly, the liberty of misusing their
+slaves, so as to check population; for it was from ill-usage only that, in
+a climate so natural to them, their numbers could diminish. The very
+ground, therefore, on which the planters rested the necessity of fresh
+importations, namely, the destruction of lives in the West Indies, was
+itself the strongest argument that could be given, and furnished the most
+imperious call upon parliament for the abolition of the trade.
+
+Against this trade innumerable were the charges. An honourable member, Mr.
+Smith, had done well to introduce those tragical stories, which had made
+such an impression upon the House. No one of these had been yet
+controverted. It had indeed been said, that the cruelty of the African
+captain to the child was too bad to be true; and we had been desired to
+look at the cross-examination of the witness, as if we should find traces
+of the falsehood of his testimony there. But his cross-examination was
+peculiarly honourable to his character; for after he had been pressed, in
+the closest manner, by some able members of the House, the only
+inconsistency they could fix upon him was, whether the fact had happened on
+the same day of the same month of the year 1764 or the year 1765.
+
+But it was idle to talk of the incredibility of such instances. It was not
+denied, that absolute power was exercised by the slave-captains; and if
+this was granted, all the cruelties charged upon them would naturally
+follow. Never did he hear of charges so black and horrible as those
+contained in the evidence on the table. They unfolded such a scene of
+cruelty, that if the House, with all their present knowledge of the
+circumstances, should dare to vote for its continuance, they must have
+nerves, of which he had no conception. We might find instances indeed, in
+history, of men violating the feelings of nature on extraordinary
+occasions. Fathers had sacrificed their sons and daughters, and husbands
+their wives; but to imitate their characters we ought to have not only
+nerves as strong as the two Brutuses, but to take care that we had a cause
+as good; or that we had motives for such a dereliction of our feelings as
+patriotic as those, which historians had annexed to these when they handed
+them to the notice of the world.
+
+But what was our motive in the case before us?--to continue a trade which
+was a wholesale sacrifice of a whole order and race of our
+fellow-creatures; which carried them away by force from their native
+country, in order to subject them to the mere will and caprice, the tyranny
+and oppression, of other human beings, for their whole natural lives, them
+and their posterity for ever!! O most monstrous wickedness! O unparalleled
+barbarity! And, what was more aggravating, this most complicated scene of
+robbery and murder which mankind had ever witnessed, had been honoured by
+the name of--trade.
+
+That a number of human beings should be at all times ready to be furnished
+as fair articles of commerce, just as our occasions might require, was
+absurd. The argument of Mr. Pitt on this head was unanswerable. Our demand
+was fluctuating: it entirely ceased at some times: at others it was great
+and pressing. How was it possible, on every sudden call, to furnish a
+sufficient return in slaves, without resorting to those execrable means of
+obtaining them, which were stated in the evidence? These were of three
+sorts, and he would now examine them.
+
+Captives in war, it was urged, were consigned either to death or slavery.
+This, however, he believed to be false in point of fact. But suppose it
+were true; Did it not become us, with whom it was a custom, founded in the
+wisest policy, to pay the captives a peculiar respect and civility, to
+inculcate the same principles in Africa? But we were so far from doing
+this, that we encouraged wars for the sake of taking, not men's goods and
+possessions, but men themselves; and it was not the war which was the cause
+of the Slave-trade, but the Slave-trade which was the cause of the war. If
+was the practice of the slave-merchants to try to intoxicate the African
+kings in order to turn them to their purpose. A particular instance
+occurred in the evidence of a prince, who, when sober, resisted their
+wishes; but in the moment of inebriety he gave the word for war, attacked
+the next village, and sold the inhabitants to the merchants.
+
+The second mode was kidnapping. He referred the House to various instances
+of this in the evidence: but there was one in particular, from which we
+might immediately infer the frequency of the practice. A Black trader had
+kidnapped a girl and sold her; but he was presently afterwards kidnapped
+and sold himself; and, when he asked the captain who bought him, "What! do
+you buy me, who am a great trader?" the only answer was, "Yes, I will buy
+you, or her, or any body else, provided any one will sell you;" and
+accordingly both the trader and the girl were carried to the West Indies
+and sold for slaves.
+
+The third mode of obtaining slaves was by crimes committed or imputed. One
+of these was adultery. But was Africa the place, where Englishmen, above
+all others, were to go to find out and punish adulterers? Did it become us
+to cast the first stone? It was a most extraordinary pilgrimage for a most
+extraordinary purpose! And yet upon this plea we justified our right of
+carrying off its inhabitants. The offence alleged next was witchcraft. What
+a reproach it was to lend ourselves to this superstition!--Yes: we stood
+by; we heard the trial; we knew the crime to be impossible; and that the
+accused must be innocent: but we waited in patient silence for his
+condemnation; and then we lent our friendly aid to the police of the
+country, by buying the wretched convict, with all his family; whom, for the
+benefit of Africa, we carried away also into perpetual slavery.
+
+With respect to the situation of the slaves in their transportation, he
+knew not how to give the House a more correct idea of the horrors of it,
+than by referring them to the printed section of the slave-ship; where the
+eye might see what the tongue must fall short in describing. On this dismal
+part of the subject he would not dwell. He would only observe, that the
+acts of barbarity, related of the slave-captains in these voyages, were so
+extravagant, that they had been attributed in some instances to insanity.
+But was not this the insanity of arbitrary power? Who ever read the facts
+recorded of Nero without suspecting he was mad? Who would not be apt to
+impute insanity to Caligula--or Domitian--or Caracalla--or Commodus--or
+Heliogabalus? Here were six Roman emperors, not connected in blood, nor by
+descent, who, each of them, possessing arbitrary power, had been so
+distinguished for cruelty, that nothing short of insanity could be imputed
+to them. Was not the insanity of the masters of slave-ships to be accounted
+for on the same principles?
+
+Of the slaves in the West Indies it had been said, that they were taken
+from a worse state to a better. An honourable member, Mr. W. Smith, had
+quoted some instances out of the evidence to the contrary. He also would
+quote one or two others. A slave under hard usage had run away. To prevent
+a repetition of the offence his owner sent for his surgeon, and desired him
+to cut off the man's leg. The surgeon refused. The owner, to render it a
+matter of duty in the surgeon, broke it. "Now," says he, "you must cut it
+off; or the man will die." We might console ourselves, perhaps, that this
+happened in a French island; but he would select another instance, which
+had happened in one of our own. Mr. Ross heard the shrieks of a female
+issuing from an outhouse; and so piercing, that he determined to see what
+was going on. On looking in he perceived a young female tied up to a beam
+by her wrists; entirely naked; and in the act of involuntary writhing and
+swinging; while the author of her torture was standing below her with a
+lighted torch in his hand, which he applied to all the parts of her body as
+it approached him. What crime this miserable woman had perpetrated he knew
+not; but the human mind could not conceive a crime warranting such a
+punishment.
+
+He was glad to see that these tales affected the House. Would they then
+sanction enormities, the bare recital of which made them shudder? Let them
+remember that humanity did not consist in a squeamish ear. It did not
+consist in shrinking and starting at such tales as these; but in a
+disposition of the heart to remedy the evils they unfolded. Humanity
+belonged rather to the mind than to the nerves. But, if so, it should
+prompt men to charitable exertion. Such exertion was necessary in the
+present case. It was necessary for the credit of our jurisprudence at home,
+and our character abroad. For what would any man think of our justice, who
+should see another hanged for a crime, which would be innocence itself, if
+compared with those enormities, which were allowed in Africa and the West
+Indies under the sanction of the British parliament?
+
+It had been said, however, in justification of the trade, that the Africans
+were less happy at home than in the Islands. But what right had we to be
+judges of their condition? They would tell us a very different tale, if
+they were asked. But it was ridiculous to say, that we bettered their
+condition, when we dragged them from every thing dear in life to the most
+abject state of slavery.
+
+One argument had been used, which for a subject so grave was the most
+ridiculous he had ever heard. Mr. Alderman Watson had declared the
+Slave-trade to be necessary on account of its connection with our
+fisheries. But what was this but an acknowledgment of the manner, in which
+these miserable beings were treated? The trade was to be kept up, with all
+its enormities, in order that there might be persons to consume the refuse
+fish from Newfoundland, which was too bad for any body else to eat.
+
+It had been said that England ought not to abolish the Slave-trade, unless
+other nations would also give it up. But what kind of morality was this?
+The trade was defensible upon no other principle than that of a highwayman.
+Great Britain could not keep it upon these terms. Mere gain was not a
+motive for a great country to rest on, as a justification of any measure.
+Honour was its superior; and justice was superior to honour.
+
+With regard to the emancipation of those in slavery, he coincided with Mr.
+Wilberforce and Mr. Pitt; and upon this principle, that it might be as
+dangerous to give freedom at once to a man used to slavery, as, in the case
+of a man who had never seen day-light, to expose him all at once to the
+full glare of a meridian sun.
+
+With respect to the intellect and sensibility of the Africans, it was pride
+only, which suggested a difference between them and ourselves. There was a
+remarkable instance to the point in the evidence, and which he would quote.
+In one of the slave-ships was a person of consequence; a man, once high in
+a military station, and with a mind not insensible to the eminence of his
+rank. He had been taken captive and sold; and was then in the hold,
+confined promiscuously with the rest. Happening in the night to fall
+asleep, he dreamed that he was in his own country; high in honour and
+command; caressed by his family and friends; waited on by his domestics;
+and surrounded with all his former comforts in life. But awaking suddenly,
+and finding where he was, he was heard to burst into the loudest groans and
+lamentations on the miserable contrast of his present state; mixed with the
+meanest of his subjects; and subjected to the insolence of wretches a
+thousand times lower than himself in every kind of endowment. He appealed
+to the House, whether this was not as moving a picture of the miserable
+effects of the Slave-trade, as could be well imagined. There was one way,
+by which they might judge of it. Let them make the case their own. This was
+the Christian rule of judging; and, having mentioned Christianity, he was
+sorry to find that any should suppose, that it had given countenance to
+such a system of oppression. So far was this from being the case, that he
+thought it one of the most splendid triumphs of this religion, that it had
+caused slavery to be so generally abolished on its appearance in the world.
+It had done this by teaching us, among other beautiful precepts, that, in
+the sight of their Maker, all mankind were equal. Its influence appeared to
+have been more powerful in this respect than that of all the ancient
+systems of philosophy; though even in these, in point of theory, we might
+trace great liberality and consideration for human rights. Where could be
+found finer sentiments of liberty than in Demosthenes and Cicero? Where
+bolder assertions of the rights of mankind, than in Tacitus and Thucydides?
+But, alas! these were the holders of slaves! It was not so with those who
+had been converted to Christianity. He knew, however, that what he had been
+ascribing to Christianity had been imputed by others to the advances which
+philosophy had made. Each of the two parties took the merit to itself. The
+philosopher gave it to philosophy, and the divine to religion. He should
+not then dispute with either of them; but, as both coveted the praise, why
+should they not emulate each other by promoting this improvement in the
+condition of the human race?
+
+He would now conclude by declaring, that the whole country, indeed the
+whole civilized world, must rejoice that such a bill as the present had
+been moved for, not merely as a matter of humanity, but as an act of
+justice; for he would put humanity out of the case. Could it be called
+humanity to forbear from committing murder? Exactly upon this ground did
+the present motion stand; being strictly a question of national justice. He
+thanked Mr. Wilberforce for having pledged himself so strongly to pursue
+his object till it was accomplished; and, as for himself, he declared,
+that, in whatever situation he might ever be, he would use his warmest
+efforts for the promotion of this righteous cause.
+
+Mr. Stanley (the member for Lancashire) rose, and declared that, when he
+came into the house, he intended to vote against the abolition; but that
+the impression made both on his feelings and on his understanding was such,
+that he could not persist in his resolution. He was now convinced that the
+entire abolition of the Slave-trade was called for equally by sound policy
+and justice. He thought it right and fair to avow manfully this change in
+his opinion. The abolition, he was sure, could not long fail of being
+carried. The arguments for it were irresistible.
+
+The honourable Mr. Ryder said, that he came to the house, not exactly in
+the same circumstances as Mr. Stanley, but very undecided on the subject.
+He was, however, so strongly convinced by the arguments he had heard, that
+he was become equally earnest for the abolition.
+
+Mr. Smith (member for Pontefract) said, that he should not trouble the
+House at so late an hour, further than to enter his protest, in the most
+solemn manner, against this trade, which he considered as most disgraceful
+to the country, and contrary to all the principles of justice and religion.
+
+Mr. Sumner declared himself against the total, immediate, and unqualified
+abolition, which he thought would wound at least the prejudices of the West
+Indians, and might do mischief; but a gradual abolition should have his
+hearty support.
+
+Major Scott declared there was no member in the house, who would give a
+more independent vote upon this question than himself. He had no concern
+either in the African or West Indian trades; but in the present state of
+the finances of the country, he thought it would be a dangerous experiment
+to risk any one branch of our foreign commerce. As far as regulation would
+go, he would join in the measure.
+
+Mr. Burke said he would use but few words. He declared that he had for a
+long time had his mind drawn towards this great subject. He had even
+prepared a bill for the regulation of the trade, conceiving at that time
+that the immediate abolition of it was a thing hardly to be hoped for; but
+when he found that Mr. Wilberforce had seriously undertaken the work, and
+that his motion was for the abolition, which he approved much more than his
+own, he had burnt his papers; and made an offering of them in honour of his
+nobler proposition, much in the same manner as we read, that the curious
+books were offered up and burnt at the approach of the Gospel. He highly
+applauded the confessions of Mr. Stanley and Mr. Ryder. It would be a
+glorious tale for them to tell their constituents, that it was impossible
+for them, however prejudiced, if sent to hear discussion in that house, to
+avoid surrendering up their hearts and judgments at the shrine of reason.
+
+Mr. Drake said, that he would oppose the abolition to the utmost. We had by
+a want of prudent conduct lost America. The house should be aware of being
+carried away by the meteors with which they had been dazzled. The leaders,
+it was true, were for the abolition; but the minor orators, the dwarfs, the
+pigmies, he trusted, would that night carry the question against them. The
+property of the West Indians was at stake; and, though men might be
+generous with their own property, they should not be so with the property
+of others.
+
+Lord Sheffield reprobated the overbearing language, which had been used by
+some gentlemen towards others, who differed in opinion from them on a
+subject of so much difficulty as the present. He protested against a
+debate, in which he could trace nothing like reason; but, on the contrary,
+downright phrensy, raised perhaps by the most extraordinary eloquence. The
+abolition, as proposed, was impracticable. He denied the right of the
+legislature to pass a law for it. He warned the Chancellor of the Exchequer
+to beware of the day, on which the bill should pass, as the worst he had
+ever seen.
+
+Mr. Milnes declared, that he adopted all those expressions against the
+Slave-trade, which had been thought so harsh; and that the opinion of the
+noble lord had been turned in consequence of having become one of the
+members for Bristol. He quoted a passage from Lord Sheffield's pamphlet;
+and insisted that the separation of families in the West Indies, there
+complained of by himself, ought to have compelled him to take the contrary
+side of the question.
+
+Mr. Wilberforce made a short reply to some arguments in the course of the
+debate; after which, at half past three in the morning, the House divided.
+There appeared for Mr. Wilberforce's motion eighty-eight, and against it
+one hundred and sixty-three; so that it was lost by a majority of
+seventy-five votes.
+
+By this unfavourable division the great contest, in which we had been so
+long engaged, was decided. We were obliged to give way to superior numbers.
+Our fall, however, grievous as it was, was rendered more tolerable by the
+circumstance of having been prepared to expect it. It was rendered more
+tolerable also by other considerations; for we had the pleasure of knowing,
+that we had several of the most distinguished characters in the kingdom,
+and almost all the splendid talents of the House of Commons[A], in our
+favour. We knew too, that the question had not been carried against us
+either by evidence or by argument; but that we were the victims of the
+accidents and circumstances of the times. And as these considerations
+comforted us, when we looked forward to future operations on this great
+question, so we found great consolation as to the past, in believing, that,
+unless human constitutions were stronger then they really were, we could
+not have done more than we had done towards the furtherance of the cause.
+
+[Footnote A: It is a pity that no perfect list was ever made of this or of
+any other division in the House of Commons on this subject. I can give,
+however, the names of the following members, as having voted for Mr.
+Wilberforce's motion at this time.
+
+  Mr. Pitt,            Hon. R. Fitzpatrick,
+  Mr. Fox,             Sir William Dolben,
+  Mr. Burke,           Sir Henry Houghton,
+  Mr. Grey,            Sir Edward Lyttleton,
+  Mr. Windham,         Sir William Scott,
+  Mr. Sheridan,        Mr. Samuel Thornton,
+  Mr. Whitbread,       Mr. Henry Thornton,
+  Mr. Courtenay,       Mr. Robert Thornton,
+  Mr. Francis,         Mr. Duncombe,
+  Mr. Wilberforce,     Mr. Martin,
+  Mr. Ryder,           Mr. Milnes,
+  Mr. William Smith,   Mr. Steele,
+  Mr. John Smyth,      Mr. Coke,
+  Mr. Robert Smith,    Mr. Elliott,
+  Mr. Powys,           Mr. Montagu,
+  Lord Apsley,         Mr. Bastard,
+  Lord Bayham,         Mr. Stanley,
+  Lord Arden,          Mr. Plumer,
+  Lord Carysfort,      Mr. Beaufoy,
+  Lord Muncaster,      Mr. I.H. Browne,
+  Lord Barnard,        Mr. G.N. Edwards,
+  Lord North,          Mr. W.M. Pitt,
+  Lord Euston,         Mr. Bankes.
+  General Burgoyne]
+
+The committee for the abolition held a meeting soon after this our defeat.
+It was the most impressive I ever attended. The looks of all bespoke the
+feelings of their hearts. Little was said previously to the opening of the
+business; and, after it was opened, it was conducted with a kind of solemn
+dignity, which became the occasion. The committee, in the course of its
+deliberations, came to the following resolutions:
+
+That the thanks of this committee be respectfully given to the illustrious
+minority of the House of Commons, who lately stood forth the assertors of
+British justice and humanity, and the enemies of a traffic in the blood of
+man.
+
+
+That our acknowledgements are particularly due to William Wilberforce,
+esquire, for his unwearied exertions to remove this opprobrium of our
+national character; and to the right honourable William Pitt, and the right
+honourable Charles James Fox, for their virtuous and dignified cooperation
+in the same cause.
+
+That the solemn declarations of these gentlemen, and of Matthew Montagu and
+William Smith, esquires, that they will not relinquish, but with life,
+their struggle for the abolition of the Slave-trade, are not only highly
+honourable to themselves as Britons, as Statesmen, and as Christians, but
+must eventually, as the light of evidence shall be more and more diffused,
+be seconded by the good wishes of every man not immediately interested in
+the continuance of that detestable commerce.
+
+And, lastly, that anticipating the opposition they should have to sustain
+from persons trained to a familiarity with the rapine and desolation
+necessarily attendant on the Slave-trade, and sensible also of the
+prejudices which implicitly arise from long-established usages, this
+committee consider the late decision in the House of Commons as a delay,
+rather than a defeat. In addressing a free and enlightened nation on a
+subject, in which its justice, its humanity, and its wisdom are involved,
+they cannot despair of final success; and they do hereby, under an
+increasing conviction of the excellence of their cause, and inconformity to
+the distinguished examples before them, renew their firm protestation, that
+they will never desist from appealing to their countrymen, till the
+commercial intercourse with Africa shall cease to be polluted with the
+blood of its inhabitants.
+
+These resolutions were published, and they were followed by a suitable
+report.
+
+The committee, in order to strengthen themselves for the prosecution of
+their great work, elected Sir William Dolben, baronet, Henry Thornton,
+Lewis Alexander Grant, and Matthew Montagu, esquires, who were members of
+parliament, and Truman Harford, Josiah Wedgwood, jun. esquire, and John
+Clarkson, esquire, of the royal navy, as members of their own body; and
+they elected the Reverend Archdeacon Plymloy (now Corbett) an honorary and
+corresponding member, in consequence of the great services which he had
+rendered their cause in the shires of Hereford and Salop, and the adjacent
+counties of Wales.
+
+The several committees, established in the country, on receiving the
+resolutions and report as before mentioned, testified their sympathy in
+letters of condolence to that of London on the late melancholy occasion;
+and expressed their determination to support it as long as any vestiges of
+this barbarous traffic should remain.
+
+At length the session ended; and though, in the course of it, the
+afflicting loss of the general question had occurred, there was yet an
+attempt made by the abolitionists in parliament, which met with a better
+fate. The Sierra Leone company received the sanction of the legislature.
+The object of this institution was to colonize a small portion of the coast
+of Africa. They, who were to settle there, were to have no concern in the
+Slave-trade, but to discourage it as much as possible. They were to
+endeavour to establish a new species of commerce, and to promote
+cultivation in its neighbourhood by free labour. The persons more generally
+fixed upon for colonists, were such Negros, with their wives and families,
+as chose to abandon their habitations in Nova Scotia. These had followed
+the British arms in America; and had been settled there, as a reward for
+their services, by the British government. My brother, just mentioned to
+have been chosen a member of the committee, and who had essentially served
+the great cause of the abolition on many occasions, undertook a visit to
+Nova Scotia, to see if those in question were willing to undergo the
+change; and in that case to provide transports, and conduct them to Sierra
+Leone. This object he accomplished. He embarked more than eleven hundred
+persons in fifteen vessels, of all which he took the command. On landing
+them he became the first Governor of the new Colony. Having laid the
+foundation of it, he returned to England; when a successor was appointed.
+From that time many unexpected circumstances, but particularly devastations
+by the French in the beginning of the war, took place, which, contributed
+to ruin the trading company, which was attached to it. It is pleasing,
+however, to reflect, that though the object of the institution, as far as
+mercantile profit was concerned, thus failed, the other objects belonging
+to it were promoted. Schools, places of worship, agriculture, and the
+habits of civilized life, were established. Sierra Leone, therefore, now
+presents itself as the medium of civilization for Africa. And, in this
+latter point of view, it is worth all the treasure which has been lost in
+supporting it: for the Slave-trade, which was the great obstacle to this
+civilization, being now happily abolished, there is a metropolis,
+consisting of some hundreds of persons, from which may issue the seeds of
+reformation to this injured continent; and which, when sown, may be
+expected to grow into fruit without interruption. New schools may be
+transplanted from thence into the interior. Teachers, and travellers on
+discovery, may be sent from thence in various directions; who may return to
+it occasionally as to their homes. The natives too, able now to travel in
+safety, may resort to it from various parts. They may see the improvements
+which are going on from time to time. They may send their children to it
+for education. And thus it may become the medium[A] of a great intercourse
+between England and Africa, to the benefit of each other.
+
+[Footnote A: To promote this desirable end an association took place last
+year, called The African Institution, under the patronage of the Duke of
+Gloucester, as president, and of the friends to the African cause,
+particularly of such as were in parliament, and as belonged to the
+committee for the abolition of the Slave-trade.]
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IV.
+
+_Continuation from July 1791 to July 1792--Author travels round the kingdom
+again--Object of his journey--People begin to leave off the use of
+sugar--to form committees--and to send petitions to Parliament--Motion made
+in the House of Commons for the immediate abolition of the trade--Debates
+upon it--Abolition resolved upon, but not to commence till 1796--Resolution
+taken to the Lords--Latter determine upon hearing evidence--Evidence at
+length introduced--Further hearing of it postponed to the next session._
+
+
+The defeat which we had just sustained, was a matter of great triumph to
+our opponents. When they considered the majority in the House of Commons in
+their favour, they viewed the resolutions of the committee, which have been
+detailed, as the last spiteful effort of a vanquished and dying animal, and
+they supposed that they had consigned the question to eternal sleep. The
+committee, however, were too deeply attached to the cause, vanquished as
+they were, to desert it; and they knew also too well the barometer of
+public feeling, and the occasion of its fluctuations, to despair. In the
+year 1787 the members of the House of Commons, as well as the people, were
+enthusiastic in behalf of the abolition of the trade. In the year 1788 the
+fair enthusiasm of the former began to fade. In 1789 it died. In 1790
+prejudice started up as a noxious weed in its place. In 1791 this prejudice
+arrived at its growth. But to what were these changes owing?--To delay;
+during which the mind, having been gradually led to the question as a
+commercial, had been gradually taken from it as a moral object. But it was
+possible to restore the mind to its proper place. Add to which, that the
+nation had never deserted the cause during this whole period.
+
+It is much to the honour of the English people, that they should have
+continued to feel for the existence of an evil which was so far removed
+from their sight. But at this moment their feelings began to be
+insupportable. Many of them resolved, as soon as parliament had rejected
+the bill, to abstain from the use of West Indian produce. In this state of
+things a pamphlet, written by William Bell Crafton, of Tewksbury, and
+called "A Sketch of the Evidence, with a Recommendation on the Subject to
+the Serious Attention of People in general," made its appearance; and
+another followed it, written by William Fox, of London, "On the Propriety
+of abstaining from West India Sugar and Rum." These pamphlets took the same
+ground. They inculcated abstinence from these articles as a moral duty;
+they inculcated it as a peaceable and constitutional measure; and they laid
+before the reader a truth, which was sufficiently obvious, that if each
+would abstain, the people would have a complete remedy for this enormous
+evil in their own power.
+
+While these things were going on, it devolved upon me to arrange all the
+evidence on the part of the abolition under proper heads, and to abridge it
+into one volume. It was intended that a copy of this should be sent into
+different towns of the kingdom, that all might know, if possible, the
+horrors (as far as the evidence contained them) of this execrable trade;
+and as it was possible that these copies might lie in the places where they
+were sent, without a due attention to their contents, I resolved, with the
+approbation of the committee, to take a journey, and for no other purpose
+than personally to recommend that they might be read.
+
+The books, having been printed, were dispatched before me. Of this tour I
+shall give the reader no other account than that of the progress of the
+remedy, which the people were then taking into their own hands. And first I
+may observe, that there was no town, through which I passed, in which there
+was not some one individual who had left off the use of sugar. In the
+smaller towns there were from ten to fifty by estimation, and in the larger
+from two to five hundred, who had made this sacrifice to virtue. These were
+of all ranks and parties. Rich and poor, churchmen and dissenters, had
+adopted the measure. Even grocers had left off trading in the article, in
+some places. In gentlemen's families, where the master had set the example,
+the servants had often voluntarily followed it; and even children, who were
+capable of understanding the history of the sufferings of the Africans,
+excluded, with the most virtuous resolution, the sweets, to which they had
+been accustomed, from their lips. By the best computation I was able to
+make from notes taken down in my journey, no fewer than three hundred
+thousand persons had abandoned the use of sugar.
+
+Having travelled over Wales, and two thirds of England, I found it would be
+impossible to visit Scotland on the same errand. I had already, by moving
+upwards and downwards in parallel lines, and by intersecting these in the
+same manner, passed over six thousand miles. By the best calculation I
+could make, I had yet two thousand to perform. By means of almost incessant
+journeyings night and day, I had suffered much in my health. My strength
+was failing daily. I wrote therefore to the committee on this subject; and
+they communicated immediately with Dr. Dickson, who, on being applied to,
+visited Scotland in my stead. He consulted first with the committee at
+Edinburgh relative to the circulation of the Abridgement of the Evidence.
+He then pursued his journey, and, in conjunction with the unwearied efforts
+of Mr. Campbel Haliburton, rendered essential service to the cause for this
+part of the kingdom.
+
+On my return to London I found that the committee had taken into their own
+body T.F. Forster, B.M. Forster, and James West, esquires, as members; and
+that they had elected Hercules Ross, esquire, an honorary and corresponding
+member, in consequence of the handsome manner in which he had come forward
+as an evidence, and of the peculiar benefit which had resulted from his
+testimony to the cause.
+
+The effects of the two journeys by Dr. Dickson and myself were soon
+visible. The people could not bear the facts, which had been disclosed to
+them by the Abridgement of the Evidence. They were not satisfied, many of
+them, with the mere abstinence from sugar; but began to form committees to
+correspond with that of London. The first of these appeared at Newcastle
+upon Tyne, so early as the month of October. It consisted of the Reverend
+William Turner as chairman, and of Robert Ormston, William Batson, Henry
+Taylor, Ralph Bainbridge, George Brown, Hadwen Bragg, David Sutton, Anthony
+Clapham, George Richardson, and Edward Prowit. It received a valuable
+addition afterwards by the admission of many others. The second was
+established at Nottingham. The Reverend Jeremiah Bigsby became the
+president, and the Rev. G. Walker and J. Smith, and Mess. Dennison, Evans,
+Watson, Hart, Storer, Bott, Hawkesley, Pennington, Wright, Frith, Hall, and
+Wakefield, the committee. The third was formed at Glasgow, under the
+patronage of David Dale, Scott Moncrieff, Robert Graham, Professor Millar,
+and others. Other committees started up in their turn. At length public
+meetings began to take place, and after this petitions to be sent to
+parliament; and these so generally, that there was not a day for three
+months, Sundays excepted, in which five or six were not resolved upon in
+some places or other in the kingdom.
+
+Of the enthusiasm of the nation at this time none can form an opinion but
+they who witnessed it. There never was perhaps a season when so much
+virtuous feeling pervaded all ranks. Great pains were taken by interested
+persons in many places to prevent public meetings. But no efforts could
+avail. The current ran with such strength and rapidity, that it was
+impossible to stem it. In the city of London a remarkable instance
+occurred. The livery had been long waiting for the common council to begin
+a petition. But the lord mayor and several of the aldermen stifled it. The
+former, indignant at this conduct, insisted upon a common hall. A day was
+appointed; and, though the notice given of it was short, the assemblage was
+greater than had ever been remembered on any former occasion. Scarcely a
+liveryman was absent, unless sick, or previously engaged. The petition,
+when introduced, was opposed by those who had prevented it in the common
+council. But their voices were drowned amidst groans and hissings. It was
+shortly after carried; and it had not been signed more than half an hour,
+before it was within the walls of the House of Commons. The reason of this
+extraordinary dispatch was, that it had been kept back by intrigue so late,
+that the very hour, in which it was delivered to the House, was that in
+which Mr. Wilberforce was to make his new motion.
+
+And as no petitions were ever more respectable than those presented on this
+occasion, as far as they breathed the voice of the people, and as far as
+they were founded on a knowledge of the object which they solicited, so
+none were ever more numerous, as far as we have any record of such
+transactions. Not fewer than three hundred and ten were presented from
+England; one hundred and eighty-seven from Scotland; and twenty from Wales.
+Two other petitions also for the abolition came from England, but they were
+too late for delivery. On the other side of the question, one was presented
+from the town of Reading for regulation, in opposition to that for
+abolition from the same place. There were also four against abolition. The
+first of these was from certain persons at Derby in opposition to the other
+from that town. The second was from Stephen Fuller, esquire, as agent for
+Jamaica. The third from J. Dawson, esquire, a slave-merchant at Liverpool.
+And the fourth from the merchants, planters, mortgagees, annuitants, and
+others concerned in the West Indian colonies. Taking in all these
+statements, the account stood thus. For regulation there was one; against
+all abolition there were four; and for the total abolition of the trade
+five hundred and nineteen.
+
+On the second of April Mr. Wilberforce moved the order of the day; which
+having been agreed to, Sir William Dolben was put into the chair.
+
+He then began by soliciting the candid attention of the West Indians to
+what he was going to deliver to the House. However others might have
+censured them indiscriminately, he had always himself made a distinction
+between them and their system. It was the latter only, which he reprobated.
+If aristocracy had been thought a worse form of government than monarchy,
+because the people had many tyrants instead of one, how objectionable must
+be that form of it, which existed in our colonies! Arbitrary power could be
+bought there by any one, who could buy a slave. The fierceness of it was
+doubtless restrained by an elevation of mind in many, as arising from a
+consciousness of superior rank and consequence: but, alas! it was too often
+exercised there by the base and vulgar. The more liberal too of the
+planters were not resident upon their estates. Hence a promiscuous censure
+of them would be unjust, though their system would undoubtedly be odious.
+
+As for the cure of this monstrous evil, he had shown, last year, that
+internal regulations would not produce it. These could have no effect,
+while the evidence of slaves was inadmissible. What would be the situation
+of the bulk of the people of this country, if only gentlemen of five
+hundred a-year were admitted as evidences in our courts of law? Neither was
+the cure of it in the emancipation of the slaves. He did not deny that he
+wished them this latter blessing. But, alas, in their present degraded
+state, they were unfit for it! Liberty was the child of reason and order.
+It was indeed a plant of celestial growth, but the soil must be prepared
+for its reception. He, who would see it flourish and bring forth its proper
+fruit, must not think it sufficient to let it shoot in unrestrained
+licentiousness. But if this inestimable blessing was ever to be imparted to
+them, the cause must be removed, which obstructed its introduction. In
+short, no effectual remedy could be found but in the abolition of the
+Slave-trade.
+
+He then took a copious view of the advantages, which would arise both to
+the master and to the slave, if this traffic were done away; and having
+recapitulated and answered the different objections to such a measure, he
+went to that part of the subject, in which he described himself to be most
+interested.
+
+He had shown, he said, last year, that Africa was exposed to all the
+horrors of war; and that most of these wars had their origin in the
+Slave-trade. It was then said, in reply, that the natural barbarity of the
+natives was alone sufficient to render their country a scene of carnage.
+This was triumphantly instanced in the king of Dahomey. But his honourable
+friend Lord Muncaster, then in the House, had proved in his interesting
+publication, which had appeared since, called Historical Sketches of the
+Slave-trade and of its Effects in Africa, addressed to the People of Great
+Britain, that the very cruelties of this king, on which so much stress had
+been laid, were committed by him in a war, which had been undertaken
+expressly to punish an adjacent people for having stolen some of his
+subjects and sold them for slaves.
+
+He had shown also last year, that kings were induced to seize and sell
+their subjects, and individuals each other, in consequence of the existence
+of the Slave-trade.
+
+He had shown also, that the administration of justice was perverted, so as
+to become a fertile source of supply to this inhuman traffic; that every
+crime was punished by slavery; that false accusations were made, to procure
+convicts; and that even the judges had a profit on the convictions.
+
+He had shown again, that many acts of violence were perpetrated by the
+Europeans themselves. But he would now relate others, which had happened
+since. The captain of an English vessel, lying in the river Cameroons, sent
+his boat with three sailors and a slave to get water. A Black trader seized
+the latter, and took him away. He alleged in his defence, that the captain
+owed him goods to a greater amount than the value of the slave; and that he
+would not pay him.
+
+This being told on board, the captain, and a part of his crew, who were
+compelled to blacken their naked bodies that they might appear like the
+natives, went on shore at midnight, armed with muskets and cutlasses. They
+fired on the trader's dwelling, and killed three of his children on the
+spot. The trader, being badly wounded, died while they were dragging him to
+the boat; and his wife, being wounded also, died in half an hour after she
+was on board the ship. Resistance having been made to these violent
+proceedings, some of the sailors were wounded, and one was killed. Some
+weeks after this affray, a chieftain of the name of Quarmo went on board
+the same vessel to borrow some cutlasses and muskets. He was going, he
+said, into the country to make war; and the captain should have half of his
+booty. So well understood were the practices of the trade, that his request
+was granted. Quarmo, however, and his associates, finding things favourable
+to their design, suddenly seized the captain, threw him overboard, hauled
+him into their canoe, and dragged him to the shore; where another party of
+the natives, lying in ambush, seized such of the crew as were absent from
+the ship. But how did these savages behave, when they had these different
+persons in their power? Did they not instantly retaliate by murdering them
+all? No--they only obliged the captain to give an order on the vessel to
+pay his debts. This fact came out only two months ago in a trial in the
+court of common pleas--not in a trial for piracy and murder--but in the
+trial of a civil suit, instituted by some of the poor sailors, to whom the
+owners refused their wages, because the natives, on account of the
+villanous conduct of their captain, had kept them from their vessel by
+detaining them as prisoners on shore. This instance, he said, proved the
+dreadful nature of the Slave-trade, its cruelty, its perfidy, and its
+effect on the Africans as well as on the Europeans, who carried it on. The
+cool manner, in which the transaction was conducted on both sides, showed
+that these practices were not novel. It showed also the manner of doing
+business in the trade. It must be remembered too, that these transactions
+were carrying on at the very time when the inquiry concerning this trade
+was going forward in Parliament, and whilst the witnesses of his opponents
+were strenuously denying not only the actual, but the possible, existence
+of any such depredations.
+
+But another instance happened only in August last. Six British ships, the
+Thomas, Captain Phillips; the Wasp, Captain Hutchinson; the Recovery,
+Captain Kimber, of Bristol; and the Martha, Captain Houston; the Betsey,
+Captain Doyle; and the Amachree, (he believed,) Captain Lee, of Liverpool;
+were anchored off the town of Calabar. This place was the scene of a
+dreadful massacre about twenty years before. The captains of these vessels,
+thinking that the natives asked too much for their slaves, held a
+consultation, how they should proceed; and agreed to fire upon the town
+unless their own terms were complied with. On a certain evening they
+notified their determination to the traders; and told them, that, if they
+continued obstinate, they would put it into execution the next morning. In
+this they kept their word. They brought sixty-six guns to bear upon the
+town; and fired on it for three hours. Not a shot was returned. A canoe
+then went off to offer terms of accommodation. The parties however not
+agreeing, the firing recommenced; more damage was done; and the natives
+were forced into submission. There were no certain accounts of their loss.
+Report said that fifty were killed; but some were seen lying badly wounded,
+and others in the agonies of death, by those who went afterwards on shore.
+
+He would now say a few words relative to the Middle Passage, principally to
+show, that regulation could not effect a cure of the evil there. Mr. Isaac
+Wilson had stated in his evidence, that the ship, in which he sailed, only
+three years ago, was of three hundred and seventy tons; and that she
+carried six hundred and two slaves. Of these she lost one hundred and
+fifty-five. There were three or four other vessels in company with her, and
+which belonged to the same owners. One of these carried four hundred and
+fifty, and buried two hundred; another carried four hundred and sixty-six,
+and buried seventy-three; another five hundred and forty-six, and buried
+one hundred and fifty-eight; and from the four together, after the landing
+of their cargoes, two hundred and twenty died. He fell in with another
+vessel, which had lost three hundred and sixty-two; but the number, which
+had been bought, was not specified. Now if to these actual deaths, during
+and immediately after the voyage, we were to add the subsequent loss in the
+seasoning, and to consider that this would be greater than ordinary in
+cargoes which were landed in such a sickly state, we should find a
+mortality, which, if it were only general for a few months, would entirely
+depopulate the globe.
+
+But he would advert to what Mr. Wilson said, when examined, as a surgeon,
+as to the causes of these losses, and particularly on board his own ship,
+where he had the means of ascertaining them. The substance of his reply was
+this--That most of the slaves laboured under a fixed melancholy, which now
+and then broke out into lamentations and plaintive songs, expressive of the
+loss of their relations, friends, and country. So powerfully did this
+sorrow operate, that many of them attempted in various ways to destroy
+themselves, and three actually effected it. Others obstinately refused to
+take sustenance; and when the whip and other violent means were used to
+compel them to eat, they looked up in the face of the officer, who
+unwillingly executed this painful task, and said with a smile, in their own
+language, "Presently we shall be no more." This, their unhappy state of
+mind, produced a general languor and debility, which were increased in many
+instances by an unconquerable aversion to food, arising partly from
+sickness, and partly, to use the language of the slave-captains, from
+sulkiness. These causes naturally produced the flux. The contagion spread;
+several were carried off daily; and the disorder, aided by so many powerful
+auxiliaries, resisted the power of medicine. And it was worth while to
+remark, that these grievous sufferings were not owing either to want of
+care on the part of the owners, or to any negligence or harshness of the
+captain; for Mr. Wilson declared, that his ship was as well fitted out, and
+the crew and slaves as well treated, as any body could reasonably expect.
+
+He would now go to another ship. That, in which Mr. Claxton sailed as a
+surgeon, afforded a repetition of all the horrid circumstances which had
+been described. Suicide was attempted, and effected; and the same barbarous
+expedients were adopted to compel the slaves to continue an existence,
+which they considered as too painful to be endured. The mortality also was
+as great. And yet here again the captain was in no wise to blame. But this
+vessel had sailed since the regulating act. Nay, even in the last year the
+deaths on shipboard would be found to have been between ten and eleven per
+cent. on the whole number exported. In truth, the House could not reach the
+cause of this mortality by all their regulations. Until they could cure a
+broken heart--until they could legislate for the affections, and bind by
+their statutes the passions and feelings of the mind, their labour would be
+in vain.
+
+Such were the evils of the Passage. But evils were conspicuous every where,
+in this trade. Never was there indeed a system so replete with wickedness
+and cruelty. To whatever part of it we turned our eyes, whether to Africa,
+the Middle Passage, or the West Indies, we could find no comfort, no
+satisfaction, no relief. It was the gracious ordinance of Providence, both
+in the natural and moral world, that good should often arise out of evil.
+Hurricanes cleared the air; and the propagation of truth was promoted by
+persecution. Pride, vanity, and profusion contributed often, in their
+remoter consequences, to the happiness of mankind. In common, what was in
+itself evil and vicious was permitted to carry along with it some
+circumstances of palliation. The Arab was hospitable; the robber brave. We
+did not necessarily find cruelty associated with fraud, or meanness with
+injustice. But here the case was far otherwise. It was the prerogative of
+this detested traffic to separate from evil its concomitant good, and to
+reconcile discordant mischiefs. It robbed war of its generosity; it
+deprived peace of its security: we saw in it the vices of polished society,
+without its knowledge or its comforts; and the evils of barbarism without
+its simplicity. No age, no sex, no rank, no condition was exempt from the
+fatal influence of this wide-wasting calamity. Thus it attained to the
+fullest measure of pure, unmixed, unsophisticated wickedness; and, scorning
+all competition and comparison, it stood without a rival in the secure,
+undisputed, possession of its detestable preeminence.
+
+But, after all this, wonderful to relate, this execrable traffic had been
+defended on the ground of benevolence! It had been said, that the slaves
+were captives and convicts, who, if we were not to carry them away, would
+be sacrificed, and many of them at the funerals of people of rank,
+according to the savage custom of Africa. He had shown, however, that our
+supplies of slaves were obtained from other quarters than these. But he
+would wave this consideration for the present. Had it not been acknowledged
+by his opponents, that the custom of ransoming slaves prevailed in Africa?
+With respect to human sacrifices, he did not deny, that there might have
+been some instances of these; but they had not been proved to be more
+frequent than amongst other barbarous nations; and, where they existed,
+being acts of religion, they would not be dispensed with for the sake of
+commercial gain. In fact, they had nothing to do with the Slave-trade; only
+perhaps, if it were abolished, they might, by means of the civilization
+which would follow, be done away.
+
+But, exclusively of these sacrifices, it had been asserted, that it was
+kindness to the inhabitants to take them away from their own country. But
+what said the historians of Africa, long before the question of the
+abolition was started? "Axim," says Bosman, "is cultivated, and abounds
+with numerous large and beautiful villages: its inhabitants are
+industriously employed in trade, fishing, or agriculture."--"The
+inhabitants of Adom always expose large quantities of corn to sale, besides
+what they want for their own use."--"The people of Acron husband their
+grounds and time so well, that every year produces a plentiful harvest."
+Speaking of the Fetu country, he says, "Frequently, when walking through
+it, I have seen it abound with fine well built and populous towns,
+agreeably enriched with vast quantities of corn and cattle, palm-wine and
+oil. The inhabitants all apply themselves without distinction to
+agriculture; some sow corn; others press oil, and draw wine from the
+palm-trees."
+
+Smith, who was sent out by the royal African company in 1726, assures us,
+"that the discerning natives account it their greatest unhappiness, that
+they were ever visited by the Europeans. They say that we Christians
+introduced the traffic of slaves; and that before our coming they lived in
+peace. But, say they, it is observable, wherever Christianity comes, there
+come swords and guns and powder and ball with it."
+
+"The Europeans," says Bruce, "are far from desiring to act as peace-makers
+among them. It would be too contrary to their interests; for the only
+object of their wars is to carry off slaves; and, as these form the
+principal part of their traffic, they would be apprehensive of drying up
+the source of it, were they to encourage the people to live well together."
+
+"The neighbourhood of the Damel and Tin keep them perpetually at war, the
+benefit of which accrues to the Company, who buy all the prisoners made on
+either side; and the more there are to sell, the greater is their profit;
+for the only end of their armaments is to make captives, to sell them to
+the White traders."
+
+Artus, of Dantzic, says that in his time, "those liable to pay fines were
+banished till the fine was paid; when they returned to their houses and
+possessions."
+
+Bosman affirms "that formerly all crimes in Africa were compensated by fine
+or restitution, and, where restitution was impracticable, by corporal
+punishment."
+
+Moore says, "Since this trade has been used, all punishments have been
+changed into slavery. There being an advantage in such condemnation, they
+strain the crimes very hard, in order to get the benefit of selling the
+criminal. Not only murder, theft, and adultery, are punished by selling the
+criminal for a slave, but every trifling crime is punished in the same
+manner."
+
+Loyer affirms that "the King of Sain, on the least pretence, sells his
+subjects for European goods. He is so tyrannically severe, that he makes a
+whole village responsible for the fault of one inhabitant; and on the least
+offence sells them all for slaves."
+
+Such, he said, were the testimonies, not of persons whom he had summoned;
+not of friends of the abolition: but of men who were themselves, many of
+them, engaged in the Slave-trade. Other testimonies might be added; but
+these were sufficient to refute the assertions of his opponents, and to
+show the kind services we had done to Africa by the introduction of this
+trade.
+
+He would just touch upon the argument, so often repeated, that other
+nations would carry on the Slave-trade, if we abandoned it. But how did we
+know this? Had not Denmark given a noble example to the contrary? She had
+consented to abolish the trade in ten years; and had she not done this,
+even though we, after an investigation for nearly five years, had ourselves
+hung back? But what might not be expected, if we were to take up the cause
+in earnest; if we were to proclaim to all nations the injustice of the
+trade, and to solicit their concurrence in the abolition of it! He hoped
+the representatives of the nation would not be less just than the people.
+The latter had stepped forward, and expressed their sense more generally by
+petitions, than in any instance in which they had ever before interfered.
+To see this great cause thus triumphing over distinctions and prejudices
+was a noble spectacle. Whatever might be said of our political divisions,
+such a sight had taught us, that there were subjects still beyond the reach
+of party; that there was a point of elevation, where we ascended above the
+jarring of the discordant elements, which ruffled and agitated the vale
+below. In our ordinary atmosphere clouds and vapours obscured the air, and
+we were the sport of a thousand conflicting winds and adverse currents; but
+here we moved in a higher region, where all was pure and clear, and free
+from perturbation and discomposure.
+
+  "As some tall cliff, that lifts its awful form,
+  Swells from the vale, and midway leaves the storm;
+  Though round its breast the rolling clouds are spread,
+  Eternal sunshine settles on its head."
+
+Here then, on this august eminence, he hoped we should build the Temple of
+Benevolence; that we should lay its foundation deep in Truth and Justice;
+and that we should inscribe upon its gates, "Peace and Goodwill to Men."
+Here we should offer the first-fruits of our benevolence, and endeavour to
+compensate, if possible, for the injuries we had brought upon our
+fellow-men.
+
+He would only now observe, that his conviction of the indispensable
+necessity of immediately abolishing this trade remained as strong as ever.
+Let those who talked of allowing three or four years to the continuance of
+it, reflect on the disgraceful scenes which had passed last year. As for
+himself, he would wash his hands of the blood which would be spilled in
+this horrid interval. He could not, however, but believe, that the hour was
+come, when we should put a final period to the existence of this cruel
+traffic. Should he unhappily be mistaken, he would never desert the cause;
+but to the last moment of his life he would exert his utmost powers in its
+support. He would now move, "That it is the opinion of this committee, that
+the trade carried on by British subjects for the purpose of obtaining
+slaves on the coast of Africa, ought to be abolished."
+
+Mr. Baillie was in hopes that the friends of the abolition would have been
+contented with the innocent blood which had been already shed. The great
+island of St. Domingo had been torn to pieces by insurrections. The most
+dreadful barbarities had been perpetrated there. In the year 1789 the
+imports into it exceeded five millions sterling. The exports from it in the
+same year amounted to six millions; and the trade employed three hundred
+thousand tons of shipping, and thirty thousand seamen. This fine island,
+thus advantageously situated, had been lost in consequence of the agitation
+of the question or the Slave-trade. Surely so much mischief ought to have
+satisfied those who supported it; but they required the total destruction
+of all the West Indian colonies, belonging to Great Britain, to complete
+the ruin.
+
+The honourable gentleman, who had just spoken, had dwelt, upon the
+enormities of the Slave-trade. He was far from denying, that many acts of
+inhumanity might accompany it; but as human nature was much the same every
+where, it would be unreasonable to expect among African traders, or the
+inhabitants of our islands, a degree of perfection in morals, which was not
+to be found in Great Britain itself. Would any man estimate the character
+of the English nation by what was to be read in the records of the Old
+Bailey? He himself, however, had lived sixteen years in the West Indies,
+and he could bear testimony to the general good usage of the slaves.
+
+Before the agitation of this impolitic question the slaves were contented
+with their situation. There was a mutual confidence between them and their
+masters: and this continued to be the case till the new doctrines were
+broached. But now depots of arms were necessary on every estate; and the
+scene was totally reversed. Nor was their religious then inferior to their
+civil state. When the English took possession of Grenada, where his
+property lay, they found them baptized and instructed in the principles of
+the Roman Catholic faith. The priests of that persuasion had indeed been
+indefatigable in their vocation; so that imported Africans generally
+obtained within twelve months a tolerable idea of their religious duties.
+He had seen the slaves there go through the public mass in a manner, and
+with a fervency, which would have done credit to more civilized societies.
+But the case was now altered; for, except where the Moravians had been,
+there was no trace in our islands of an attention to their religious
+interests.
+
+It had been said, that their punishments were severe. There might be
+instances of cruelty; but these were not general. Many of them were
+undoubtedly ill disposed; though not more, according to their number, on a
+plantation, than in a regiment, or in a ship's crew. Had we never heard of
+seamen being flogged from ship to ship, or of soldiers dying in the very
+act of punishment? Had we not also heard, even in this country of boasted
+liberty, of seamen being seized, and carried away, when returning from
+distant voyages, after an absence of many years; and this without even
+being allowed to see their wives and families? As to distressed objects, he
+maintained, that there was more wretchedness and poverty in St. Giles's,
+than in all the West Indian islands belonging to Great Britain.
+
+He would now speak of the African and West Indian trades. The imports and
+exports of these amounted to upwards of ten millions annually; and they
+gave employment to three hundred thousand tons of shipping, and to about
+twenty-five thousand seamen. These trades had been sanctioned by our
+ancestors in parliament. The acts for this purpose might be classed under
+three heads. First, they were such as declared the colonies and the trade
+thereof advantageous to Great Britain, and therefore entitled to her
+protection. Secondly, such as authorised, protected, and encouraged the
+trade to Africa, as advantageous in itself, and necessary to the welfare
+and existence of the sugar colonies: and, Thirdly, such as promoted and
+secured loans of money to the proprietors of the said colonies, either from
+British subjects or from foreigners. These acts[A], he apprehended, ought
+to satisfy every person of the legality and usefulness of these trades.
+They were enacted in reigns distinguished for the production of great and
+enlightened characters. We heard then of no wild and destructive doctrines
+like the present. These were reserved for this age of novelty and
+innovation. But he must remind the House, that the inhabitants of our
+islands had as good a right to the protection of their property, as the
+inhabitants of Great Britain. Nor could it be diminished in any shape
+without full compensation. The proprietors of lands in the ceded islands,
+which were purchased of government under specific conditions of settlement,
+ought to be indemnified. They also (of whom he was one) who had purchased
+the territory granted by the crown to General Monkton in the Island of St.
+Vincent, ought to be indemnified also. The sale of this had gone on
+briskly, till it was known, that a plan was in agitation for the abolition
+of the Slave-trade. Since that period the original purchasers had done
+little or nothing, and they had many hundred acres on hand, which would be
+of no value, if the present question was carried. In fact, they had a right
+to compensation. The planters generally spent their estates in this
+country. They generally educated their children in it. They had never been
+found seditious or rebellious; and they demanded of the Parliament of Great
+Britain that protection, which, upon the principles of good faith, it was
+in duty bound to afford them in common with the rest of his majesty's loyal
+subjects.
+
+[Footnote A: Here he quoted them specifically.]
+
+Mr. Vaughan stated that, being a West Indian by birth and connected with
+the islands, he could speak from his own knowledge. In the early part of
+his life he was strongly in favour of the abolition of the Slave-trade. He
+had been educated by Dr. Priestley and the father of Mrs. Barbauld; who
+were both of them friends to that question. Their sentiments he had
+imbibed: but, although bred at the feet of Gamaliel, he resolved to judge
+for himself, and he left England for Jamaica.
+
+He found the situation of the slaves much better than he had imagined.
+Setting aside liberty, they were as well off as the poor in Europe. They
+had little want of clothes or fuel: they had a house and garden found them;
+were never imprisoned for debts; nor deterred from marrying through fear of
+being unable to support a family; their orphans and widows were taken care
+of, as they themselves were when old and disabled; they had medical
+attendance without expense; they had private property, which no master ever
+took front them; and they were resigned to their situation, and looked for
+nothing beyond it. Perhaps persons might have been prejudiced by living in
+the towns, to which slaves were often sent for punishment; and where there
+were many small proprietors; or by seeing no Negro otherwise than as
+belonging to the labouring poor; but they appeared to him to want nothing
+but liberty; and it was only occasionally that they were abused.
+
+There were two prejudices with respect to the colonies, which he would
+notice. The first was, that cruel usage occasioned the inequality of births
+and deaths among the slaves. But did cruelty cause the excess of deaths
+above births in the city of London? No--this excess had other causes. So it
+had among the slaves. Of these more males were imported than females: they
+were dissolute too in their morals; they had also diseases peculiar to
+themselves. But in those islands where they nearly kept up their numbers,
+there was this difficulty, that the equality was preserved by the increase
+on one estate compensating for the decrease on another. These estates,
+however, would not interchange their numbers; whereas, where freedom
+prevailed, the free labourers circulated from one employer to another, and
+appeared wherever they were wanted.
+
+The second was, that all chastisement of the slaves was cruelty. But this
+was not true. Their owners generally withdrew them from public justice; so
+that they, who would have been publicly executed elsewhere, were often kept
+alive by their masters, and were found punished again and again for
+repeating their faults. Distributive justice occasioned many punishments;
+as one slave was to be protected against every other slave: and, when one
+pilfered from another, then the master interfered. These punishments were
+to be distinguished from such as arose from enforcing labour, or from the
+cruelty of their owners. Indeed he had gone over the islands, and he had
+seen but little ill usage. He had seen none on the estate where he resided.
+The whip, the stocks, and confinement, were all the modes of punishment he
+had observed in other places. Some slaves belonging to his father were
+peculiarly well off. They saved money, and spent it in their own way.
+
+But, notwithstanding all he had said, he allowed that there was room for
+improvement; and particularly for instilling into the slaves the principles
+of religion. Where this should be realized, there would be less punishment,
+more work, more marriages, more issue, and more attachment to masters.
+Other improvements would be the establishment of medical societies; the
+introduction of task-work; and grants of premiums and honorary distinctions
+both to fathers and mothers, according to the number of children which they
+should rear. Besides this, Negro evidence should be allowed in the courts
+of law, it being left to the discretion of the court or jury to take or
+reject it, according to the nature of the case. Cruel masters also should
+be kept in order in various ways. They should be liable to have their
+slaves taken from them, and put in trust. Every instrument of punishment
+should be banished, except the whip. The number of lashes should be
+limited; and the punishment should not be repeated till after intervals.
+These and other improvements should be immediately adopted by the planters.
+The character of the exemplary among them was hurt by being confounded with
+that of lower and baser men. He concluded by stating, that the owners of
+slaves were entitled to compensation, if, by means of the abolition, they
+should not be able to find labourers for the cultivation of their lands[A].
+
+[Footnote A: Mr. Vaughan declared in a future stage of the debate, that he
+wished to see a prudent termination both of the Slave-trade and of slavery;
+and that, though he was the eldest son of his father, he never would, on
+any consideration, become the owner of a slave.]
+
+Mr. Henry Thornton conceived, that the two last speakers had not spoken to
+the point. The first had described the happy state of the slaves in the
+West Indies. The latter had made similar representations; but yet had
+allowed, that much improvement might be made in their condition. But this
+had nothing to do with the question then before them. The manner of
+procuring slaves in Africa was the great evil to be remedied. Africa was to
+be stripped of its inhabitants to supply a population for the West Indies.
+There was a Dutch proverb, which said, "My son, get money, honestly if you
+can--but get money:" or, in other words, "Get slaves, honestly if you
+can--but get slaves." This was the real grievance; and the two honourable
+gentlemen, by confining their observations to the West Indies, had entirely
+overlooked it.
+
+Though this evil had been fully proved, he could not avoid stating to the
+House some new facts, which had come to his knowledge as a director of the
+Sierra Leone Company, and which would still further establish it. The
+consideration, that they had taken place since the discussion of the last
+year on this subject, obliged him to relate them.
+
+Mr. Falconbridge, agent to the Company, sitting one evening in Sierra
+Leone, heard a shout, and immediately afterwards the report of a gun.
+Fearing an attack, he armed forty of the settlers, and rushed with them to
+the place from whence the noise came. He found a poor wretch, who had been
+crossing from a neighbouring village, in the possession of a party of
+kidnappers, who were tying his hands. Mr. Falconbridge, however, dared not
+rescue him, lest, in the defenceless state of his own town, retaliation
+might be made upon him.
+
+At another time a young woman, living half a mile off, was sold, without
+any criminal charge, to one of the slave-ships. She was well acquainted
+with the agent's wife, and had been with her only the day before. Her cries
+were heard; but it was impossible to relieve her.
+
+At another time a young lad, one of the free settlers who went from
+England, was caught by a neighbouring chief, as he was straggling alone
+from home, and sold for a slave. The pretext was, that some one in the town
+of Sierra Leone had committed an offence. Hence the first person belonging
+to it, who could be seized, was to be punished. Happily the free settlers
+saw him in his chains; and they recovered him, before he was conveyed to
+the ship.
+
+To mark still more forcibly the scenes of misery, to which the Slave-trade
+gave birth, he would mention a case stated to him in a letter by King
+Naimbanna. It had happened to this respectable person, in no less than
+three instances, to have some branches of his family kidnapped, and carried
+off to the West Indies. At one time three young men, Corpro, Banna, and
+Marbrour, were decoyed on board a Danish slave-ship, under pretence of
+buying something, and were taken away. At another time another relation
+piloted a vessel down the river. He begged to be put on shore, when he came
+opposite to his own town; but he was pressed to pilot her to the river's
+mouth. The captain then pleaded the impracticability of putting him on
+shore; carried him to Jamaica; and sold him for a slave. Fortunately,
+however, by means of a letter, which was conveyed there, the man, by the
+assistance of the governor, was sent back to Sierra Leone. At another time
+another relation was also kidnapped. But he had not the good fortune, like
+the former, to return.
+
+He would mention one other instance. A son had sold his own father, for
+whom he obtained a considerable price: for, as the father was rich in
+domestic slaves, it was not doubted that he would offer largely for his
+ransom. The old man accordingly gave twenty-two of these in exchange for
+himself. The rest, however, being from that time filled with apprehensions
+of being on some ground or other sold to the slave-ships, fled to the
+mountains of Sierra Leone, where they now dragged on a miserable existence.
+The son himself was sold, in his turn, soon after. In short, the whole of
+that unhappy peninsula, as he learnt from eye-witnesses, had been desolated
+by the trade in slaves. Towns were seen standing without inhabitants all
+over the coast; in several of which the agent of the Company had been.
+There was nothing but distrust among the inhabitants. Every one, if he
+stirred from home, felt himself obliged to be armed.
+
+Such was the nature of the Slave-trade. It had unfortunately obtained the
+name of a trade; and many had been deceived by the appellation. But it was
+war, and not trade. It was a mass of crimes, and not commerce. It was that
+which prevented the introduction of a trade in Africa; for it was only by
+clearing and cultivating the lands, that the climate could be made healthy
+for settlements; but this wicked traffic, by dispersing the inhabitants,
+and causing the lands to remain uncultivated, made the coast unhealthy to
+Europeans. He had found, in attempting to establish a colony there, that it
+was an obstacle, which opposed itself to him in innumerable ways; it
+created more embarrassments than all the natural impediments of the
+country; and it was more hard to contend with, than any difficulties of
+climate, soil, or natural disposition of the people.
+
+We would say a few words relative to the numerous petitions, which were
+then on the table of the House. They had shown, in an extraordinary manner,
+the opinion of the people. He did not wish to turn this into a
+constitutional question; but he would observe, that it was of the utmost
+consequence to the maintenance of the constitution of this country, that
+the reputation of Parliament should be maintained. But nothing could
+prejudice its character so much, as a vote, which should lead the people to
+believe, that the legislative body was the more corrupt part of it, and
+that it was slow to adopt moral principles.
+
+It had been often insinuated that Parliament, by interfering in this trade,
+departed from its proper functions. No idea could be more absurd: for, was
+it not its duty to correct abuses? and what abuses were greater than
+robbery and murder? He was indeed anxious for the abolition. He desired it,
+as a commercial man, on account of the commercial character of the country.
+He desired it for the reputation of Parliament, on which so materially
+depended the preservation of our happy constitution: but most of all he
+prayed for it for the sake of those eternal principles of justice, which it
+was the duty of nations, as well as of individuals, to support.
+
+Colonel Tarleton repeated his arguments of the last year. In addition to
+these he inveighed bitterly against the abolitionists, as a junto of
+sectaries, sophists, enthusiasts, and fanatics. He condemned the abolition
+as useless, unless other nations would take it up. He brought to the
+recollection of the House the barbarous scenes which had taken place in St.
+Domingo, all of which, he said, had originated in the discussion of this
+question. He described the alarms, in which the inhabitants of our own
+islands were kept, lest similar scenes should occur from the same cause. He
+ridiculed the petitions on the table. Itinerant clergymen, mendicant
+physicians, and others, had extorted signatures from the sick, the
+indigent, and the traveller. School-boys were invited to sign them, under
+the promise of a holiday. He had letters to produce, which would prove all
+these things, though he was not authorized to give up the names of those
+who had written them.
+
+Mr. Montagu said, that, in the last session, he had simply entered his
+protest against the trade; but now he could be no longer silent; and as
+there were many, who had conceived regulation to be more desirable than
+abolition, he would confine himself to that subject.
+
+Regulation, as it related to the manner of procuring slaves, was utterly
+impossible: for how could we know the case of each individual, whom we
+forced away into bondage? Could we establish tribunals all along the coast,
+and in every ship, to find it out? What judges could we get for such an
+office? But, if this could not be done upon the coast, how could we
+ascertain the justness of the captivity of by far the greatest number, who
+were brought from immense distances inland?
+
+He would not dwell upon the proof of the inefficiency of regulations, as to
+the Middle Passage. His honourable friend Mr. Wilberforce had shown, that,
+however the mortality might have been lessened in some ships by the
+regulations of Sir William Dolben, yet, wherever a contagious disorder
+broke out, the greatest part of the cargo was swept away. But what
+regulations by the British Parliament could prevent these contagions, or
+remove them suddenly, when they appeared?
+
+Neither would regulations be effectual, as they related to the protection
+of the slaves in the West Indies. It might perhaps be enacted, as Mr.
+Vaughan had suggested, that their punishments should be moderate; and that
+the number of lashes should be limited. But the colonial legislatures had
+already done as much, as the magic of words alone could do, upon this
+subject: yet the evidence upon the table clearly proved, that the only
+protection of slaves was in the clemency of their masters. Any barbarity
+might be exercised with impunity, provided no White person were to see it,
+though it happened in the sight of a thousand slaves. Besides, by splitting
+the offence, and inflicting the punishment at intervals, the law could be
+evaded, although the fact was within the reach of the evidence of a White
+man. Of this evasion, Captain Cook, of the eighty-ninth regiment, had given
+a shocking instance: and Chief Justice Ottley had candidly confessed, that
+"he could devise no method of bringing a master, so offending, to justice,
+while the evidence of the slave continued inadmissible." But perhaps
+councils of protection, and guardians of the slaves, might be appointed.
+This again was an expedient, which sounded well; but which would be
+nugatory and absurd. What person would risk the comfort of his life by the
+exercise of so invidious an interference? But supposing that one or two
+individuals could be found, who would sacrifice all their time, and the
+friendship of their associates, for the good of the slaves; what could they
+effect? Could they be in all places at once? But even if acts of barbarity
+should be related to them, how were they to come at the proof of them?
+
+It appeared then that no regulations could be effectual until the slaves
+were admitted to give their evidence: but to admit them to this privilege
+in their present state would be to endanger the safety and property of
+their masters. Mr. Vaughan had, however, recommended this measure with
+limitations, but it would produce nothing but discontent; for how were the
+slaves to be persuaded, that it was fit they should be admitted to speak
+the truth, and then be disbelieved and disregarded? What a fermentation
+would such a conduct naturally excite in men dismissed with injuries
+unredressed, though abundantly proved, in their apprehension, by their
+testimony! In fact, no regulations would do. There was no cure for these
+evils, but in the abolition of the Slave-trade. He called upon the planters
+to concur with his honourable friend Mr. Wilberforce in this great measure.
+He wished them to consider the progress, which the opinion of the injustice
+of this trade was making in the nation at large, as manifested by the
+petitions; which had almost obstructed the proceedings of the House by
+their perpetual introduction. It was impossible for them to stifle this
+great question. As for himself, he would renew his profession of last year,
+that he would never cease, but with life, to promote so glorious an end.
+
+Mr. Whitbread said, that even if he could conceive, that the trade was, as
+some had asserted it to be, founded on principles of humanity; that the
+Africans were rescued from death in their own country; that, upon being
+carried to the West Indies, they were put under kind masters; that their
+labour there was easy; that at evening they returned cheerful to their
+homes; that in sickness they were attended with care; and that their old
+age was rendered comfortable; even then he would vote for the abolition of
+the Slave-trade; inasmuch as he was convinced, that that, which was
+fundamentally wrong, no practice could justify.
+
+No eloquence could persuade him, that the Africans were torn from their
+country and their dearest connections, merely that they might lead a
+happier life; or that they could be placed under the uncontrolled dominion
+of others without suffering. Arbitrary power would spoil the hearts of the
+best. Hence would arise tyranny on the one side, and a sense of injury on
+the other. Hence the passions would be let loose, and a state of perpetual
+enmity would follow.
+
+He needed only to go to the accounts of those who defended the system of
+slavery, to show that it was cruel. He was forcibly struck last year by an
+expression of an honourable member, an advocate for the trade, who, when
+he came to speak of the slaves, on selling off the stock of a plantation,
+said, that they fetched less than the common price, because they were
+damaged.--Damaged!--What! were they goods and chattels? What an idea was
+this to hold out of our fellow-creatures. We might imagine how slaves were
+treated, if they could be spoken of in such a manner. Perhaps these unhappy
+people had lingered out the best part of their lives in the service of
+their master. Able then to do but little, they were sold for little! and
+the remaining substance of their sinews was to be pressed out by another,
+yet more hardened than the former, and who had made a calculation of their
+vitals accordingly.
+
+As another proof, he would mention a passage in a pamphlet, in which the
+author, describing the happy situation of the slaves, observed, that a good
+Negro never wanted a character. A bad one could always be detected by his
+weals and scars. What was this but to say, that there were instruments in
+use, which left indelible marks behind them; and who would say, that these
+were used justly?
+
+An honourable gentleman, Mr. Vaughan, had said, that setting aside slavery,
+the slaves were better off than the poor in this country. But what was it
+that we wished to abolish? Was it not the Slave-trade, which would destroy
+in time the cruel distinction he had mentioned? The same honourable
+gentleman had also expressed his admiration of their resignation; but might
+it not be that resignation, which was the consequence of despair?
+
+Colonel Tarleton had insinuated, that the petitions on the table had been
+obtained in an objectionable manner. He had the honour to present one from
+his constituents; which he would venture to say had originated with
+themselves; and that there did not exist more respectable names in the
+kingdom, than those of the persons who had signed it. He had also asserted,
+that there was a strong similitude in their tenour and substance, as if
+they had been manufactured by the same persons. This was by no means to be
+wondered at. There was surely but one plain tale to tell; and it was not
+surprising, that it had been clothed in nearly the same expressions. There
+was but one boon to ask, and that was--the abolition of this wicked trade.
+
+It had been said by another, (Mr. Baillie) that the horrible insurrections
+in St. Domingo arose from the discussion of the question of the
+Slave-trade. He denied the assertion; and maintained that they were the
+effect of the trade itself. There was a point of endurance, beyond which
+human nature could not go; at which the mind of man rose by its native
+elasticity with a spring and violence proportioned to the degree to which
+it had been depressed. The calamities in St. Domingo proceeded from the
+Slave-trade alone; and, if it were continued, similar evils were to be
+apprehended in our own islands. The cruelties, which the slaves had
+perpetrated in that unfortunate colony, they had learnt from their masters.
+Had not an African eyes? Had he not ears? Had he not organs, senses, and
+passions? If you pricked him, would he not feel the puncture and bleed? If
+you poisoned him, would he not die? and, if you wronged him, would he not
+revenge? But he had said sufficient; for he feared he could not better the
+instruction.
+
+Mr. Milbank would only just observe, that the policy of the measure of the
+abolition was as great, as its justice was undeniable. Where slavery
+existed, every thing was out of its natural place. All improvement was at
+an end. There must also, from the nature of the human heart, be oppression.
+He warned the planters against the danger of fresh importations, and
+invited their concurrence in the measure.
+
+Mr. Dundas (now Lord Melville) declared, that he had always been a warm
+friend to the abolition of the Slave-trade, though he differed with Mr.
+Wilberforce as to the mode of effecting it.
+
+The abolitionists, and those on the opposite side of the question, had,
+both of them, gone into extremes. The former were for the immediate and
+abrupt annihilation of the trade. The latter considered it as essentially
+necessary to the existence of the West Indian islands, and therefore laid
+it down, that it was to be continued for ever. Such was the vast distance
+between the parties. He would now address himself to each.
+
+He would say first, that he agreed with his honourable friend Mr.
+Wilberforce in very material points. He believed the trade was not founded
+in policy; that the continuation of it was not essential to the
+preservation of our trade with the West Indian islands; and that the slaves
+were not only to be maintained, but increased there, by natural population.
+He agreed, too, as to the propriety of the abolition. But when his
+honourable friend talked of direct and abrupt abolition, he would submit it
+to him, whether he did not run counter to the prejudices of those who were
+most deeply interested in the question; and whether, if he could obtain his
+object without wounding these, it would not be better to do it? Did he not
+also forget the sacred attention, which Parliament had ever shown to the
+private interests and patrimonial rights of individuals?
+
+Whatever idea men might then have of the African trade, certain it was that
+they, who had connected themselves with it, had done it under the sanction
+of Parliament. It might also be well worth while to consider (though the
+conduct of other nations ought not to deter us from doing our duty) whether
+British subjects in the West Indies might not be supplied with slaves under
+neutral flags. Now he believed it was possible to avoid these objections,
+and at the same time to act in harmony with the prejudices which had been
+mentioned. This might be done by regulations, by which we should effect the
+end much more speedily than by the way proposed. By regulations, he meant
+such as would increase the breed of the slaves in the West Indies; such as
+would ensure a moral education to their children; and such as would even in
+time extinguish hereditary slavery. The extinction, however, of this was
+not to be effected by allowing the son of an African slave to obtain his
+freedom on the death of his parent. Such a son should be considered as born
+free. He should then be educated at the expense of the person importing his
+parents; and, when arrived at such a degree of strength as might qualify
+him to labour, he should work for a term of years for the payment of the
+expense of his education and maintenance. It was impossible to emancipate
+the existing slaves at once; nor would such an emancipation be of any
+immediate benefit to themselves: but this observation would not apply to
+their descendants, if trained and educated in the manner he had proposed.
+
+He would now address himself to those who adopted the opposite extreme: and
+he thought he should not assume too much, when he said, that if both
+slavery and the Slave-trade could be abolished with safety to their
+property, it deeply concerned their interests to do it. Such a measure,
+also, would only be consistent with the principles of the British
+Constitution. It was surely strange that we, who were ourselves free,
+should carry on a Slave-trade with Africa; and that we should never think
+of introducing cultivation into the West Indies by free labourers.
+
+That such a measure would tend to their interest he had no doubt. Did not
+all of them agree with Mr. Long, that the great danger in the West Indies
+arose from the importation of the African slaves there? Mr. Long had
+asserted, that all the insurrections there arose from these. If this
+statement were true, how directly it bore upon the present question! But we
+were told also, by the same author, that the Slave-trade gave rise to
+robbery, murder, and all kinds of depredations on the coast of Africa. Had
+this been answered? No: except indeed it had been said, that the slaves
+were such as had been condemned for crimes. Well then: the imported
+Africans consisted of all the convicts, rogues, thieves, and vagabonds in
+Africa. But would the West Indians choose to depend on fresh supplies of
+these for the cultivation of their lands, and the security of their
+islands, when it was also found that every insurrection had arisen from
+them? it was plain the safety of the islands was concerned in this
+question. There would be danger so long as the trade lasted. The Planters
+were, by these importations, creating the engines of their own destruction.
+Surely they would act more to their own interest, if they would concur in
+extinguishing the trade, than by standing up for its continuance.
+
+He would now ask them, what right they had to suppose that Africa would for
+ever remain in a state of barbarism. If once an enlightened prince were to
+rise up there, his first act would be to annihilate the Slave-trade. If the
+light of heaven were ever to descend upon that continent, it would directly
+occasion its downfall. It was their interest then to contrive a mode of
+supplying labour, without trusting to precarious importations from that
+quarter. They might rest assured that the trade could not continue. He did
+not allude to the voice of the people in the petitions then lying on the
+table of the House; but he knew certainly, that an idea not only of the
+injustice but of the impolicy of this trade had been long entertained by
+men of the most enlightened understandings in this country. Was it then a
+prudent thing for them to rest on this commerce for the further improvement
+of their property?
+
+There was a species of slavery, prevailing only a few years ago, in the
+collieries in certain boroughs of Scotland. Emancipation there was thought
+a duty by Parliament: But what an opposition there was to the measure!
+Nothing but ruin would be the consequence of it! After several years
+struggle the bill was carried. Within a year after, the ruin so much talked
+of vanished in smoke, and there was an end of the business. It had also
+been contended that Sir William Dolben's bill would be the ruin of
+Liverpool: and yet one of its representatives had allowed, that this bill
+had been of benefit to the owners of the slave-vessels there. Was he then
+asking too much of the West Indians, to request a candid consideration of
+the real ground of their alarms? He would conclude by stating, that he
+meant to propose a middle way of proceeding. If there was a number of
+members in the House, who thought with him, that this trade ought to be
+ultimately abolished, but yet by moderate measures, which should neither
+invade the property nor the prejudices of individuals; he wished them to
+unite, and they might then reduce the question to its proper limits.
+
+Mr. Addington (the speaker) professed himself to be one of those moderate
+persons called upon by Mr. Dundas. He wished to see some middle measure
+suggested. The fear of doing injury to the property of others, had hitherto
+prevented him from giving an opinion against a system, the continuance of
+which he could not countenance.
+
+He utterly abhorred the Slave-trade. A noble and learned lord, who had now
+retired from the bench, said on a certain occasion, that he pitied the
+loyalty of that man, who imagined that any epithet could aggravate the
+crime of treason. So he himself knew of no language which could aggravate
+the crime of the Slave-trade. It was sufficient for every purpose of
+crimination, to assert, that man thereby was bought and sold, or that he
+was made subject to the despotism of man. But though he thus acknowledged
+the justice due to a whole continent on the one side, he confessed there
+were opposing claims of justice on the other. The case of the West Indians
+deserved a tender consideration also.
+
+He doubted, if we were to relinquish the Slave-trade alone, whether it
+might not be carried on still more barbarously than at present; and
+whether, if we were to stop it altogether, the islands could keep up their
+present stocks. It had been asserted that they could. But he thought that
+the stopping of the importations could not be depended upon for this
+purpose, so much as a plan for providing them with more females.
+
+With the mode suggested by his right honourable friend, Mr. Dundas, he was
+pleased, though he did not wholly agree to it. He could not grant liberty
+to the children born in the islands. He thought also, that the trade ought
+to be permitted for ten or twelve years longer, under such arrangements as
+should introduce a kind of management among the slaves there, favourable to
+their interests, and of course to their future happiness. One species of
+regulation which he should propose, would be greater encouragement to the
+importation of females than of males, by means of a bounty on the former
+till their numbers should be found equal. Rewards also might be given to
+those slaves who should raise a certain number of children; and to those
+who should devise means of lightening negro-labour. If the plan of his
+honourable friend should comprehend these regulations, he would heartily
+concur in it. He wished to see the Slave-trade abolished. Indeed it did not
+deserve the name of a trade. It was not a trade, and ought not to be
+allowed. He was satisfied, that in a few years it would cease to be the
+reproach of this nation and the torment of Africa. But under regulations
+like these, it would cease without any material injury to the interests of
+others.
+
+Mr. Fox said, that after what had fallen from the two last speakers he
+could remain no longer silent. Something so mischievous had come out, and
+something so like a foundation had been laid for preserving, not only for
+years to come, but for ever, this detestable traffic, that he should feel
+himself wanting in his duty, if he were not to deprecate all such
+deceptions and delusions upon the country.
+
+The honourable gentlemen had called themselves moderate men: but upon this
+subject he neither felt, nor desired to feel, any thing like a sentiment of
+moderation. Their speeches had reminded him of a passage in Middleton's
+Life of Cicero. The translation of it was defective, though it would
+equally suit his purpose. He says, "To enter into a man's house, and kill
+him, his wife, and family, in the night, is certainly a most heinous crime,
+and deserving of death; but to break open his house, to murder him, his
+wife, and all his children, in the night, may be still very right, provided
+it be done with moderation." Now, was there any thing more absurd in this
+passage, than to say, that the Slave-trade might be carried on with
+moderation; for, if you could not rob or murder a single man with
+moderation, with what moderation could you pillage and wound a whole
+nation? In fact, the question of the abolition was simply a question of
+justice. It was only, whether we should authorize by law, respecting
+Africa, the commission of crimes, for which, in this country, we should
+forfeit our lives; notwithstanding which, it was to be treated, in the
+opinion of these honourable gentlemen, with moderation.
+
+Mr. Addington had proposed to cure the disproportion of the sexes in the
+islands, by a bounty on the importation of females; or, in other words, by
+offering a premium to any crew of ruffians, who would tear them from their
+native country. He would let loose a banditti against the most weak and
+defenceless of the sex. He would occasion these to kill fathers, husbands,
+and brothers, to get possession of their relatives, the females, who, after
+this carnage, were to be reserved for--slavery. He should like to see the
+man, who would pen such a moderate clause for a British Parliament.
+
+Mr. Dundas had proposed to abolish the Slave-trade, by bettering the state
+of the slaves in the islands, and particularly that of their offspring. His
+plan, with respect to the latter, was not a little curious. They were to
+become free, when born; and then they were to be educated at the expense of
+those to whom their fathers belonged. But it was clear, that they could not
+be educated for nothing. In order, therefore, to repay this expense, they
+were to be slaves for ten or fifteen years. In short, they were to have an
+education, which was to qualify them to become freemen; and, after they had
+been so educated, they were to become slaves. But as this free education
+might possibly unfit them for submitting to slavery; so, after they had
+been made to bow under the yoke for ten or fifteen years, they might then,
+perhaps, be equally unfit to become free; and therefore, might be retained
+as slaves for a few years longer, if not for their whole lives. He never
+heard of a scheme so moderate, and yet so absurd and visionary.
+
+The same honourable gentleman had observed, that the conduct of other
+nations should not hinder us from doing our duty; but yet neutrals would
+furnish our islands with slaves. What was the inference from this moderate
+assertion, but that we might as well supply them ourselves? He hoped, if we
+were yet to be supplied, it would never be by Englishmen. We ought no
+longer to be concerned in such a crime.
+
+An adversary, Mr. Baillie, had said, that it would not be fair to take the
+character of this country from the records of the Old Bailey. He did not at
+all wonder, when the subject of the Slave-trade was mentioned, that the Old
+Bailey naturally occurred to his recollection. The facts which had been
+described in the evidence, were associated in all our minds with the ideas
+of criminal justice. But Mr. Baillie had forgot the essential difference
+between the two cases. When we learnt from these records, that crimes were
+committed in this country, we learnt also, that they were punished with
+transportation and death. But the crimes committed in the Slave-trade were
+passed over with impunity. Nay, the perpetrators were even sent out again
+to commit others.
+
+As to the mode of obtaining slaves, it had been suggested as the least
+disreputable, that they became so in consequence of condemnation as
+criminals. But he would judge of the probability of this mode by the
+reasonableness of it. No less than eighty thousand Africans were exported
+annually by the different nations of Europe from their own country. Was it
+possible to believe, that this number could have been legally convicted of
+crimes, for which they had justly forfeited their liberty? The supposition
+was ridiculous. The truth was, that every enormity was practised to obtain
+the persons of these unhappy people. He referred those present to the case
+in the evidence of the African trader, who had kidnapped and sold a girl,
+and who was afterwards kidnapped and sold himself. He desired them to
+reason upon the conversation which had taken place between the trader and
+the captain of the ship on this occasion. He desired them also to reason
+upon the instance mentioned this evening, which had happened in the river
+Cameroons, and they would infer all the rapine, all the desolation, and all
+the bloodshed, which had been placed to the account of this execrable
+trade.
+
+An attempt had been made to impress the House with the horrible scenes
+which had taken place in St. Domingo, as an argument against the abolition
+of the Slave-trade; but could any more weighty argument be produced in its
+favour? What were the causes of the insurrections there? They were two. The
+first was the indecision of the National Assembly, who wished to compromise
+between that which was right and that which was wrong on this subject. And
+the second was the oppression of the People of Colour, and of the Slaves.
+In the first of the causes we saw something like the moderation of Mr.
+Dundas and Mr. Addington. One day this Assembly talked of liberty, and
+favoured the Blacks. Another day they suspended their measures, and
+favoured the Whites. They wished to steer a middle course; but decision had
+been mercy. Decision even against the Planters would have been a thousand
+times better than indecision and half measures. In the mean time, the
+People of Colour took the great work of justice into their own hands.
+Unable, however, to complete this of themselves, they called in the aid of
+the Slaves. Here began the second cause; for the Slaves, feeling their own
+power, began to retaliate on the Whites. And here it may be observed, that,
+in all revolutions, the clemency or cruelty of the victors will always be
+in proportion to their former privileges, or their oppression. That the
+Slaves then should have been guilty of great excesses was not to be
+wondered at; for where did they learn their cruelty? They learnt it from
+those who had tyrannized over them. The oppression, which they themselves
+had suffered, was fresh in their memories, and this had driven them to
+exercise their vengeance so furiously. If we wished to prevent similar
+scenes in our own islands, we must reject all moderate measures, and at
+once abolish the Slave-trade. By doing this, we should procure a better
+treatment for the Slaves there; and when this happy change of system should
+have taken place, we might depend on them for the defence of the islands as
+much as on the Whites themselves.
+
+Upon the whole, he would give his opinion of this traffic in a few words.
+He believed it to be impolitic--he knew it to be inhuman--he was certain it
+was unjust--he though it so inhuman and unjust, that, if the colonies could
+not be cultivated without it, they ought not to be cultivated at all. It
+would be much better for us to be without them, than not abolish the
+Slave-trade. He hoped therefore that members would this night act the part
+which would do them honour. He declared, that, whether he should vote in a
+large minority or a small one, he would never give up the cause. Whether in
+the House of Parliament or out of it, in whatever situation he might ever
+be, as long as he had a voice to speak, this question should never be at
+rest. Believing the trade to be of the nature of crimes and pollutions,
+which stained the honour of the country, he would never relax his efforts.
+It was his duty to prevent man from preying upon man; and if he and his
+friends should die before they had attained their glorious object, he hoped
+there would never be wanting men alive to their duty, who would continue to
+labour till the evil should be wholly done away. If the situation of the
+Africans was as happy as servitude could make them, he could not consent to
+the enormous crime of selling man to man; nor permit a practice to
+continue, which put an entire bar to the civilization of one quarter of the
+globe. He was sure that the nation would not much longer allow the
+continuance of enormities which shocked human nature. The West Indians had
+no right to demand that crimes should be permitted by this country for
+their advantage; and, if they were wise, they would lend their cordial
+assistance to such measures, as would bring about, in the shortest possible
+time, the abolition of this execrable trade.
+
+Mr. Dundas rose again, but it was only to move an amendment, namely, that
+the word "gradually" should be inserted before the words "to be abolished"
+in Mr. Wilberforce's motion.
+
+Mr. Jenkinson (now Lord Hawkesbury) said, that the opinions of those who
+were averse to the abolition had been unfairly stated. They had been
+described as founded on policy, in opposition to humanity. If it could be
+made out that humanity would be aided by the abolition, he would be the
+last person to oppose it. The question was not, he apprehended, whether the
+trade was founded in injustice and oppression. He admitted it was: nor was
+it, whether it was in itself abstractedly an evil: he admitted this also:
+but whether, under all the circumstances of the case, any considerable
+advantage would arise to a number of our fellow-creatures from the
+abolition of the trade in the manner in which it had been proposed.
+
+He was ready to admit, that the Africans at home were made miserable by the
+Slave-trade, and that, if it were universally abolished, great benefit
+would arise to them. No one, however, would assert, that these miseries
+arose from the trade as carried on by Great Britain only. Other countries
+occasioned as much of the evil as we did; and if the abolition of it by us
+should prove only the transferring of it to those countries, very little
+benefit would result from the measure.
+
+What then was the probability of our example being followed by foreign
+powers? Five years had now elapsed since the question was first started,
+and what had any of them done? The Portuguese continued the trade. The
+Spaniards still gave a bounty to encourage it. He believed there were
+agents from Holland in this country, who were then negotiating with persons
+concerned in it in order to secure its continuance. The abolition also had
+been proposed in the National Assembly of France, and had been rejected
+there. From these circumstances he had a right to infer, that if we gave up
+the trade, we should only transfer it to those countries: but this transfer
+would be entirely against the Africans. The mortality on board English
+ships, previously to the regulating bill, was four and an eighth per cent.
+Since that time it had been reduced to little more than three per cent.[A]
+In French ships it was near ten, and in Dutch ships from five to seven, per
+cent. In Portuguese it was less than either in French or Dutch, but more
+than in English ships since the regulating bill. Thus the deaths of the
+Africans would be more than doubled, if we were to abolish the trade.
+
+[Footnote A: Mr. Wilberforce stated it on the same evening to be between
+ten and eleven per cent. for the last year. The number then exported from
+Africa to our islands was rather more than 22,000, of whom more than 2,300
+died.]
+
+Perhaps it might be replied, that, the importations being stopped in our
+own islands, fewer Africans would experience this misery, because fewer
+would be taken from their own country on this account. But he had a right
+to infer, that as the planters purchased slaves at present, they would
+still think it their interest to have them. The question then was, whether
+they could get them by smuggling. Now it appeared by the evidence, that
+many hundred slaves had been stolen from time to time from Jamaica, and
+carried into Cuba. But if persons could smuggle slaves out of our colonies,
+they could smuggle slaves into them; but particularly when the planters
+might think it to their interest to assist them.
+
+With respect to the slaves there, instances had been related of their
+oppression, which shocked the feelings of all who heard them: But was it
+fair to infer from these their general ill usage? Suppose a person were to
+make a collection of the different abuses, which had happened for a series
+of years under our own happy constitution, and use these as an argument of
+its worthlessness; should we not say to him, that in the most perfect
+system which the human intellect could form, some defects would exist; and
+that it was unfair to draw inferences from such partial facts? In the same
+manner he would argue relative to the alleged treatment of the slaves.
+Evidence had been produced upon this point on both sides. He should not be
+afraid to oppose the authorities of Lord Rodney, and others, against any,
+however respectable, in favour of the abolition. But this was not
+necessary. There was another species of facts, which would answer the same
+end. Previously to the year 1730 the decrease of the slaves in our islands
+was very considerable. From 1730 to 1755 the deaths were reduced to only
+two and a half per cent. above the births: from 1755 to 1768 to only one
+and three fourths; and from 1768 to 1788 to only one per cent. This then,
+on the first view of the subject, would show, that whatever might have been
+the situation of slaves formerly, it had been gradually improved. But if,
+in addition to this, we considered the peculiar disadvantages under which
+they laboured; the small proportion of females to males; and the
+hurricanes, and famines, which had swept away thousands, we should find it
+physically impossible, that they could have increased as related, if they
+had been treated as cruelly as the friends of the abolition had described.
+
+This species of facts would enable him also to draw still more important
+conclusions; namely, that as the slaves in the West Indies had gradually
+increased, they would continue to increase; that very few years would pass,
+not only before the births were equal to the deaths, but before they were
+more numerous than the deaths; and that if this was likely to happen in the
+present state of things, how much more would it happen, if by certain
+regulations the increase of the slaves should be encouraged?
+
+The only question then was, whether it was more advantageous to breed or to
+import. He thought he should prove the former; and if so, then this
+increase was inevitable, and the importations would necessarily cease.
+
+In the first place, the gradual increase of the slaves of late years
+clearly proved, that such increase had been encouraged. But their price had
+been doubled in the last twenty years. The planter therefore must feel it
+his interest to desist from purchasing, if possible. But again, the
+greatest mortality was among the newly imported slaves. The diseases they
+contracted on the passage, and their deaths in the seasoning, all made for
+the same doctrine. Add to this, that slaves bred in the islands were more
+expert at colonial labour, more reconciled to their situation, and better
+disposed towards their masters, than those who were brought from Africa.
+
+But it had been said, that the births and deaths in the islands were now
+equal; and, that therefore no further supply was wanted. He denied the
+propriety of this inference. The slaves were subject to peculiar diseases.
+They were exposed also to hurricanes and consequent famines. That the day,
+however, would come, when the stock there would be sufficient, no person
+who attended to the former part of his argument could doubt. That they had
+gradually increased, were gradually, increasing, and would, by certain
+regulations, increase more and more, must be equally obvious. But these
+were all considerations for continuing the traffic a little longer.
+
+He then desired the House to reflect upon the state of St. Domingo. Had not
+its calamities been imputed by its own deputies to the advocates for the
+abolition? Were ever any scenes of horror equal to those which had passed
+there? And should we, when principles of the same sort were lurking in our
+own islands, expose our fellow-subjects to the same miseries, who, if
+guilty of promoting this trade, had, at least, been encouraged in it by
+ourselves?
+
+That the Slave-trade was an evil, he admitted. That the state of slavery
+itself was likewise an evil, he admitted; and if the question was, not
+whether we should abolish, but whether we should establish these, he would
+be the first to oppose himself to their existence; but there were many
+evils, which we should have thought it our duty to prevent, yet which, when
+they had once arisen, it was more dangerous to oppose than to submit to.
+The duty of a statesman was, to consider abstractedly what was right or
+wrong, but to weigh the consequences which were likely to result from the
+abolition of an evil, against those, which were likely to result from its
+continuance. Agreeing then most perfectly with the abolitionists in their
+end, he differed from them only in the means of accomplishing it. He was
+desirous of doing that gradually, which he conceived they were doing
+rashly. He had therefore drawn up two propositions. The first was, That an
+address be presented to His Majesty, that he would recommend to the
+colonial assemblies to grant premiums to such planters, and overseers, as
+should distinguish themselves by promoting the annual increase of the
+slaves by birth; and likewise freedom to every female slave, who had reared
+five children to the age of seven years. The second was, That a bounty of
+five pounds per head be given to the master of every slave-ship, who should
+import in any cargo a greater number of females than males, not exceeding
+the age of twenty-five years. To bring forward these propositions, he would
+now move that the chairman leave the chair.
+
+Mr. Este wished the debate to be adjourned. He allowed there ware many
+enormities in the trade, which called for regulation. There were two
+propositions before the House: the one for the immediate, and the other for
+the gradual, abolition of the trade. He thought that members should be
+allowed time to compare their respective merits. At present his own opinion
+was, that gradual abolition would answer the end proposed in the least
+exceptionable manner.
+
+Mr. Pitt rejoiced that the debate had taken a turn, which contracted the
+question into such narrow limits. The matter then in dispute was merely as
+to the time at which the abolition should take place. He therefore
+congratulated the House, the country, and the world, that this great point
+had been gained; that we might now consider this trade as having received
+its condemnation; that this curse of mankind was seen in its true light;
+and that the greatest stigma on our national character, which ever yet
+existed, was about to be removed! Mankind, he trusted, were now likely to
+be delivered from the greatest practical evil that ever afflicted the human
+race--from the most severe and extensive calamity recorded in the history
+of the world.
+
+His honourable friend (Mr. Jenkinson) had insinuated, that any act for the
+abolition would be evaded. But if we were to enforce this act with all the
+powers of the country, how could it fail to be effectual? But his
+honourable friend had himself satisfied him upon this point. He had
+acknowledged, that the trade would drop of itself, on account of the
+increasing dearness of the commodity imported. He would ask then, if we
+were to leave to the importer no means of importation but by smuggling; and
+if, besides all the present disadvantages, we were to load him with all the
+charges and hazards of the smuggler, would there be any danger of any
+considerable supply of fresh slaves being poured into the islands through
+this channel? The question under these circumstances, he pronounced, would
+not bear a dispute.
+
+His honourable friend had also maintained, that it would be inexpedient to
+stop the importations immediately, because the deaths and births in the
+islands were as yet not equal. But he (Mr. Pitt) had proved last year, from
+the most authentic documents, that an increase of the births above the
+deaths had already taken place. This then was the time for beginning the
+abolition. But he would now observe, that five years had elapsed since
+these documents were framed; and therefore the presumption was, that the
+Black population was increasing at an extraordinary rate. He had not, to be
+sure, in his consideration of the subject, entered into the dreadful
+mortality arising from the clearing of new lands. Importations for this
+purpose were to be considered, not as carrying on the trade, but as setting
+on foot a Slave-trade, a measure which he believed no one present would
+then support. He therefore asked his honourable friend, whether the period
+he had looked to was now arrived? whether the West Indies, at this hour,
+were not in a state, in which they could maintain their population?
+
+It had been argued, that one or other of these two assertions was false;
+that either the population of the slaves must be decreasing, (which the
+abolitionists denied,) or, if it was increasing, the slaves must have been
+well treated. That their population was rather increasing than otherwise,
+and also that their general treatment was by no means so good as it ought
+to have been, were both points which had been proved by different
+witnesses. Neither were they incompatible with each other. But he would see
+whether the explanation of this seeming contradiction would not refute the
+argument of expediency, as advanced by his honourable friend. Did the
+slaves decrease in numbers?--Yes. Then ill usage must have been the cause
+of it; but if so, the abolition was immediately necessary to restrain it.
+Did they, on the other hand, increase?--Yes. But if so, no further
+importations were wanted: Was their population (to take a middle course)
+nearly stationary, and their treatment neither so good nor so bad as it
+might be?--Yes. But if so, this was the proper period for stopping further
+supplies; for both the population and the treatment would be improved by
+such a measure.
+
+But he would show again the futility of the argument of his honourable
+friend. He himself had admitted, that it was in the power of the colonists
+to correct the various abuses, by which the Negro population was
+restrained. But they could not do this without improving the condition of
+their slaves; without making them approximate towards the rank of citizens;
+without giving them some little interest in their labour, which would
+occasion them to work with the energy of men. But now the Assembly of
+Grenada had themselves stated, "that though the Negros were allowed the
+afternoons of only one day in every week, they would do as much work in
+that afternoon, when employed for their own benefit, as in the whole day,
+when employed in their masters' service." Now after this confession, the
+House might burn all his calculations relative to the Negro population;
+for, if it had not yet quite reached the desirable state which he had
+pointed out, this confession had proved, that further supplies were not
+wanted. A Negro, if he worked for himself, could do double work. By an
+improvement then in the mode of labour, the work in the islands could be
+doubled. But if so, what would become of the argument of his honourable
+friend? for then only half the number of the present labourers were
+necessary.
+
+He would now try this argument of expediency by other considerations. The
+best informed writers on the subject had told us, that the purchase of new
+Negros was injurious to the planters. But if this statement was just, would
+not the abolition be beneficial to them? That it would, was the opinion of
+Mr. Long, their own historian. "If the Slave-trade," says he, "was
+prohibited for four or five years, it would enable them, to retrieve their
+affairs by preventing them from running into debt, either by renting or
+purchasing Negros." To this acknowledgment he would add a fact from the
+evidence, which was, that a North American province, by such a prohibition
+alone for a few years, from being deeply plunged in debt, had become
+independent, rich, and flourishing.
+
+The next consideration was the danger, to which the islands were exposed
+from the newly imported slaves. Mr. Long, with a view of preventing
+insurrections, had advised, that a duty, equal to a prohibition, might be
+laid on the importation of Coromantine slaves. After noticing one
+insurrection, which happened through their means, he speaks of another in
+the following year, in which thirty-three Coromantines, "most of whom had
+been newly imported, murdered and wounded no less than nineteen Whites in
+the space of an hour." To the authority of Mr. Long he would add the
+recorded opinion of a Committee of the House of Assembly of Jamaica, which
+was appointed to inquire into the best means of preventing future
+insurrections. The Committee reported, that "the rebellion had originated,
+like most others, with the Coromantines," and they proposed that a bill
+should be brought in for laying a higher duty on the importation of these
+particular Negros, which should operate as a prohibition. But the danger
+was not confined to the introduction of Coromantines. Mr. Long accounts for
+the frequent insurrections in Jamaica from the greatness of its general
+importations. "In two years and a half," says he, "twenty-seven thousand
+Negros have been imported--No wonder that we have rebellions!" Surely then,
+when his honourable friend spoke of the calamities of St. Domingo, and of
+similar dangers impending over our own islands, it ill became him to be the
+person to cry out for further importations! It ill became him to charges
+upon the abolitionists the crime of stirring up insurrections, who only
+recommended what the Legislature of Jamaica itself had laid down in a time
+of danger with an avowed view to prevent them. It was indeed a great
+satisfaction to himself, that among the many arguments for prohibiting the
+Slave-trade, the security of our West Indian possessions against internal
+commotions, as well as foreign enemies, was among the most prominent and
+forcible. And here he would ask his honourable friend, whether in this part
+of the argument he did not see reason for immediate abolition. Why should
+we any longer persist in introducing those latent principles of
+conflagration, which, if they should once burst forth, might annihilate the
+industry of a hundred years? which might throw the planters back a whole
+century in their profits, in their cultivation, and in their progress
+towards the emancipation of their slaves? It was our duty to vote, that the
+abolition of the Slave-trade should be immediate, and not to leave it to he
+knew not what future time or contingency.
+
+Having now done with the argument of expediency, he would consider the
+proposition of his right honourable friend Mr. Dundas; that, on account of
+some patrimonial rights of the West Indians, the prohibition of the
+Slave-trade would be an invasion of their legal inheritance. He would first
+observe, that, if this argument was worth any thing, it applied just as
+much to gradual as to immediate abolition. He had no doubt, that, at
+whatever period we should say the trade should cease, it would be equally
+set up; for it would certainly be just as good an argument against the
+measure in seventy years hence, as it was against it now. It implied also,
+that Parliament had no right to stop the importations: but had this
+detestable traffic received such a sanction, as placed it more out of the
+jurisdiction of the legislature for ever after, than any other branch of
+our trade? In what a situation did the proposition of his honourable friend
+place the legislature of Great Britain! It was scarcely possible to lay a
+duty on any one article, which might not in some way affect the property of
+individuals. But if the laws respecting the Slave-trade implied a contract
+for its perpetual continuance, the House could never regulate any other of
+the branches of our national commerce.
+
+But any contract for the promotion of this trade must, in his opinion, have
+been void from the beginning: for if it was an outrage upon justice, and
+only another name for fraud, robbery, and murder, What pledge could devolve
+upon the legislature to incur the obligation of becoming principals in the
+commission of such enormities by sanctioning their continuance?
+
+But he would appeal to the acts themselves. That of 23 George II. c. 31,
+was the one upon which the greatest stress was laid. How would the House be
+surprised to hear, that the very outrages committed in the prosecution of
+this trade had been forbidden by that act! "No master of a ship trading to
+Africa," says the act, "shall by fraud, force, or violence, or by any
+indirect practice whatever, take on board or carry away from that coast any
+Negro, or native of that country, or commit any violence on the natives, to
+the prejudice of the said trade; and every person so offending, shall for
+every such offence forfeit one hundred pounds." But the whole trade had
+been demonstrated to be a system of fraud, force, and violence; and
+therefore the contract was daily violated, under which the Parliament
+allowed it to continue.
+
+But why had the trade ever been permitted at all? The preamble of the act
+would show: "Whereas the trade to and from Africa is very advantageous to
+Great Britain, and necessary for supplying the Plantations and Colonies
+thereunto belonging with a sufficient number of Negros at reasonable rates,
+and for that purpose the said trade should be carried on"--Here then we
+might see what the Parliament had in view, when it passed this act. But no
+one of the occasions, on which it grounded its proceedings, now existed. He
+would plead, then, the act itself as an argument for the abolition. If it
+had been proved that, instead of being very advantageous to Great Britain,
+it was the most destructive to her interests--that it was the ruin of her
+seamen--that it stopped the extension of her manufactures;--if it had been
+proved, in the second place, that it was not now necessary for the supply
+of our Plantations with Negros;--if it had been further established, that
+it was from the beginning contrary to the first principles of justice, and
+consequently that a pledge for its continuance, had one been attempted to
+be given, must have been absolutely void--where in this act of parliament
+was the contract to be found, by which Britain was bound, as she was said
+to be, never to listen to her own true interests and to the cries of the
+natives of Africa? Was it not clear, that all argument, founded on the
+supposed pledge of Parliament, made against those who employed it?
+
+But if we were not bound by existing laws to the support of this trade, we
+were doubly criminal in pursuing it: for why ought it to be abolished at
+all? Because it was incurable injustice. Africa was the ground, on which he
+chiefly rested; and there it was, that his two honourable friends, one of
+whom had proposed gradual abolition, and the other regulation, did not
+carry their principles to their full extent. Both had confessed the trade
+to be a moral evil. How much stronger then was the argument for immediate
+than for gradual abolition! If on the ground of a moral evil it was to be
+abolished at last, why ought it not now? Why was injustice to be suffered
+to remain for a single hour? He knew of no evil, which ever had existed,
+nor could he imagine any to exist, worse than the tearing of eighty
+thousand persons annually from their native land, by a combination of the
+most civilized nations, in the most enlightened quarter of the globe; but
+more especially by that nation, which called herself the most free and the
+most happy of them all.
+
+He would now notice the objection, that other nations would not give up the
+Slave-trade, if we were to renounce it. But if the trade were stained but
+by a thousandth part of the criminality, which he and others, after a
+thorough investigation of the subject, charged upon it, the House ought
+immediately to vote its abolition. This miserable argument, if persevered
+in, would be an eternal bar to the annihilation of the evil. How was it
+ever to be eradicated, if every nation was thus prudentially to wait till
+the concurrence of all the world should be obtained? But it applied a
+thousand times more strongly in a contrary way. How much more justly would
+other nations say, "Great Britain, free as she is, just and honourable as
+she is, not only has not abolished, but has refused to abolish, the
+Slave-trade. She has investigated it well. Her senate has deliberated upon
+it. It is plain, then, that she sees no guilt in it." With this argument we
+should furnish the other nations of Europe, if we were again to refuse to
+put an end to this cruel traffic: and we should have from henceforth not
+only to answer for our own, but for their crimes also. Already we had
+suffered one year to pass away; and now, when the question was renewed, not
+only had this wretched argument been revived, but a proposition had been
+made for the gradual abolition of the trade. He knew indeed the difficulty
+of reforming long established abuses: but in the present case, by proposing
+some other period than the present, by prescribing some condition, by
+waiting for some contingency, perhaps till we obtained the general
+concurrence of Europe, (a concurrence which he believed never yet took
+place at the commencement of any one improvement in policy or morals,) he
+feared that this most enormous evil would never be redressed. Was it not
+folly to wait for the stream to run down before we crossed the bed of its
+channel? Alas! we might wait for ever. The river would still flow on. We
+should be no nearer the object, which we had in view, so long as the step,
+which could alone bring us to it, was not taken.
+
+He would now proceed to the civilization of Africa; and as his eye had just
+glanced upon a West Indian law in the evidence upon the table, he would
+begin with an argument, which the sight of it had suggested to him. This
+argument had been ably answered in the course of the evening; but he would
+view it in yet another light. It had been said, that the savage disposition
+of the Africans rendered the prospect of their civilization almost
+hopeless. This argument was indeed of long standing; but, last year, it had
+been supported upon a new ground. Captain Frazer had stated in his
+evidence, that a boy had been put to death at Cabenda, because there were
+those who refused to purchase him as a slave. This single story was deemed
+by him, and had been considered by others, as a sufficient proof of the
+barbarity of the Africans, and of the inutility of abolishing the
+Slave-trade. But they, who had used this fact, had suppressed several
+circumstances relating to it. It appeared, on questioning Captain Frazer
+afterward, that this boy had previously run away from his master three
+several times; that the master had to pay his value, according to the
+custom of the country, every time he was brought back; and that partly from
+anger at the boy for running away so frequently, and partly to prevent a
+repetition of the same expense, he determined to destroy him. Such was the
+explanation of the signal instance, which was to fix barbarity on all
+Africa, as it came out in the cross-examination of Captain Frazer. That
+this African master was unenlightened and barbarous, he freely admitted:
+but what would an enlightened and civilized West Indian have done in a
+similar case? He would quote the law, passed in the West Indies in 1722,
+which he had just cast his eye upon in the book of evidence, by which law
+this very same crime of running away was by the legislature of an island,
+by the grave and deliberate sentence of an enlightened legislature,
+punished with death; and this, not in the case only of the third offence,
+but even in the very first instance. It was enacted, "That, if any Negro or
+other slave should withdraw himself from his master for the term of six
+months; or any slave, who was absent, should not return within that time,
+every such person should suffer death." There was also another West Indian
+law, by which every Negro was armed against his fellow-negro, for he was
+authorized to kill every runaway slave; and he had even a reward held out
+to him for so doing. Let the House now contrast the two cases. Let them ask
+themselves which of the two exhibited the greater barbarity; and whether
+they could possibly vote for the continuance of the Slave-trade, upon the
+principle, that the Africans had shown themselves to be a race of
+incorrigible barbarians?
+
+Something like an opposite argument, but with a like view, had been
+maintained by others on this subject. It had been said, in justification of
+the trade, that the Africans had derived some little civilization from
+their intercourse with us. Yes: we had given them just enough of the forms
+of justice to enable them to add the pretext of legal trials to their other
+modes of perpetrating the most atrocious crimes. We had given them just
+enough of European improvements, to enable them the more effectually to
+turn Africa into a ravaged wilderness. Alas! alas! we had carried on a
+trade with them from this civilized and enlightened country, which, instead
+of diffusing knowledge, had been a check to every laudable pursuit. We had
+carried a poison into their country, which spread its contagious effects
+from one end of it to the other, and which penetrated to its very centre,
+corrupting every part to which it reached. We had there subverted the whole
+order of nature; we had aggravated every natural barbarity, and furnished
+to every man motives for committing, under the name of trade, acts of
+perpetual hostility and perfidy against his neighbour. Thus had the
+perversion of British commerce carried misery instead of happiness to one
+whole quarter of the globe. False to the very principles of trade,
+misguided in our policy, unmindful of our duty, what almost irreparable
+mischief had we done to that continent! How should we hope to obtain
+forgiveness from Heaven, if we refused to use those means, which the mercy
+of Providence had still reserved to us for wiping away the guilt and shame,
+with which we were now covered? If we refused even this degree of
+compensation, how aggravated would be our guilt! Should we delay, then, to
+repair these incalculable injuries? We ought to count the days, nay the
+very hours, which intervened to delay the accomplishment of such a work.
+
+On this great subject, the civilization of Africa, which, he confessed, was
+near his heart, he would yet add a few observations. And first he would
+say, that the present deplorable state of that country, especially when we
+reflected that her chief calamities were to be ascribed to us, called for
+our generous aid, rather than justified any despair, on our part, of her
+recovery, and still less a repetition of our injuries. On what ground of
+theory or history did we act, when we supposed that she was never to be
+reclaimed? There was a time, which it might be now fit to call to
+remembrance, when human sacrifices, and even, this very practice of the
+Slave-trade, existed in our own island. Slaves, as we may read in Henry's
+History of Great Britain, were formerly an established article of our
+exports. "Great numbers," he says, "were exported, like cattle, from the
+British coast, and were to be seen exposed for sale in the Roman
+market."--"Adultery, witchcraft, and debt," says the same historian, "were
+probably some of the chief sources of supplying the Roman market with
+British slaves--prisoners taken in war were added to the number--there
+might be also among them some unfortunate gamesters, who, after having lost
+all their goods, at length, staked themselves, their wives, and their
+children." Now every one of these sources of slavery had been stated to be
+at this hour a source of slavery in Africa. If these practices, therefore,
+were to be admitted as proofs of the natural incapacity of its inhabitants,
+why might they not have been applied to ancient Britain? Why might not then
+some Roman senator, pointing to British barbarians, have predicted with
+equal boldness, that these were a people, who were destined never to be
+free; who were without the understanding necessary for the attainment of
+useful arts; depressed by the hand of Nature below the level of the human
+species; and created to form a supply of slaves for the rest of the world?
+But happily, since that time, notwithstanding what would then have been the
+justness of these predictions, we had emerged from barbarism. We were now
+raised to a situation, which exhibited a striking contrast to every
+circumstance, by which a Roman might have characterized us, and by which we
+now characterized Africa. There was indeed one thing wanting to complete
+the contrast, and to clear us altogether from the imputation of acting even
+to this hour as barbarians; for we continued to this hour a barbarous
+traffic in slaves. We continued it even yet, in spite of all our great
+pretensions. We were once as obscure among the nations of the earth, as
+savage in our manners, as debased in our morals, as degraded in our
+understandings, as these unhappy Africans. But in the lapse of a long
+series of years, by a progression slow, and for a time almost
+imperceptible, we had become rich in a variety of acquirements. We were
+favoured above measure in the gifts of Providence, we were unrivalled in
+commerce, preeminent in arts, foremost in the pursuits of philosophy and
+science, and established in all the blessings of civil society: we were in
+the possession of peace, of liberty, and of happiness: we were under the
+guidance of a mild and a beneficent religion; and we were protected by
+impartial laws, and the purest administration of justice: we were living
+under a system of government, which our own happy experience led us to
+pronounce the best and wisest, and which had become the admiration of the
+world. From all these blessings we must for ever have been excluded, had
+there been any truth in those principles, which some had not hesitated to
+lay down as applicable to the case of Africa; and we should have been at
+this moment little superior, either in morals, knowledge, or refinement, to
+the rude inhabitants of that continent.
+
+If then we felt that this perpetual confinement in the fetters of brutal
+ignorance would have been the greatest calamity which could have befallen
+us; if we viewed with gratitude the contrast between our present and our
+former situation; if we shuddered to think of the misery, which would still
+have overwhelmed us, had our country continued to the present times,
+through some cruel policy, to be the mart for slaves to the more civilized
+nations of the world;--God forbid, that we should any longer subject Africa
+to the same dreadful scourge, and exclude the sight of knowledge from her
+coasts, which had reached every other quarter of the globe!
+
+He trusted we should no longer continue this commerce; and that we should
+no longer consider ourselves as conferring too great a boon on the natives
+of Africa in restoring them to the rank of human beings. He trusted we
+should not think ourselves too liberal, if, by abolishing the Slave-trade,
+we gave them the same common chance of civilization with other parts of the
+world. If we listened to the voice of reason and duty this night, some of
+us might live to see a reverse of that picture, from which we now turned
+our eyes with shame. We might live to behold the natives engaged in the
+calm occupations of industry, and in the pursuit of a just commerce. We
+might behold the beams of science and philosophy breaking in upon their
+land, which at some happy period in still later times might blaze with full
+lustre; and joining their influence to that of pure religion, might
+illuminate and invigorate the most distant extremities of that immense
+continent. Then might we hope, that even Africa (though last of all the
+quarters of the globe) should enjoy at length, in the evening of her days,
+those blessings, which had descended so plentifully upon us in a much
+earlier period of the world. Then also would Europe, participating in her
+improvement and prosperity, receive an ample recompense for the tardy
+kindness (if kindness it could be called) of no longer hindering her from
+extricating herself out of the darkness, which, in other more fortunate
+regions, had been so much more speedily dispelled.
+
+  --Nos primus equis Oriens afflavit anhelis;
+  Illic sera rubens accendit lumina Vesper.
+
+Then might be applied to Africa those words, originally used indeed with a
+different view:
+
+  Hic demum exactis ---- ----
+  Devenere locos laetos, et amoena vireta
+  Fortunatorum nemorum, sedesque beatas;
+  Largior hic campos aether et lumine vestit
+  Purpurco:
+
+It was in this view--it was as an atonement for our long and cruel
+injustice towards Africa, that the measure proposed by his honourable
+friend Mr. Wilberforce most forcibly recommended itself to his mind. The
+great and happy change to be expected in the state of her inhabitants was,
+of all the various benefits of the abolition, in his estimation the most
+extensive and important. He should vote against the adjournment; and he
+should also oppose every proposition, which tended either to prevent, or
+even to postpone for an hour, the total abolition of the Slave-trade.
+
+Mr. Pitt having concluded his speech (at about six in the morning), Sir
+William Dolben, the chairman, proposed the following questions. The first
+was on the motion of Mr. Jenkinson, "that the chairman do now leave the
+chair." This was lost by a majority of two hundred and thirty-four to
+eighty-seven. The second was on the motion of Mr. Dundas, "that the
+abolition should be gradual;" when the votes for gradual exceeded those for
+immediate by one hundred and ninety-three to one hundred and twenty-five.
+He then put the amended question, that "it was the opinion of the
+committee, that the trade ought to be gradually abolished." The committee
+having divided again, the votes for a gradual abolition were two hundred
+and thirty, and those against any abolition were eighty-five.
+
+After this debate, the committee for the abolition of the Slave-trade held
+a meeting. They voted their thanks to Mr. Wilberforce for his motion, and
+to Mr. Pitt, Mr. Fox, and those other members of the House, who had
+supported it. They resolved also, that the House of Commons, having
+determined that the Slave-trade ought to be gradually abolished, had by
+that decision manifested their opinion, that it was cruel and unjust. They
+resolved also, that a gradual abolition of it was not an adequate remedy
+for its injustice and cruelty; neither could it be deemed a compliance with
+the general wishes of the people, as expressed in their numerous and urgent
+petitions to Parliament. And they resolved lastly, that the interval, in
+which the Slave-trade should be permitted to continue, afforded a prospect
+of redoubled cruelties and ravages on the coast of Africa; and that it
+imposed therefore an additional obligation on every friend to the cause to
+use all constitutional means to obtain its immediate abolition.
+
+At a subsequent meeting they voted their thanks to the right honourable
+Lord Muncaster, for the able support he had given to the great object of
+their institution by his Historical Sketches of the Slave-trade, and of its
+Effects in Africa, addressed to the People of Great Britain; and they
+elected the Reverend Richard Gifford and the Reverend Thomas Gisborne
+honorary and corresponding members; the first on account of his excellent
+sermon before mentioned and other services, and the latter on account of
+his truly Christian and seasonable pamphlet, entitled Remarks on the late
+Decision of the House of Commons respecting the Abolition of the
+Slave-trade.
+
+On the twenty-third of April, the House of Commons resolved itself into a
+committee of the whole House, to consider the subject again; and Mr.
+Beaufoy was put into the chair.
+
+Mr. Dundas, upon whom the task of introducing a bill for the gradual
+abolition of the Slave-trade now devolved, rose to offer the outlines of a
+plan for that purpose. He intended, he said, immediately to abolish that
+part of the trade, by which we supplied foreigners with slaves. The other
+part of it was to be continued seven years from the first of January next.
+He grounded the necessity of its continuance till this time upon the
+documents of the Negro-population in the different islands. In many of
+these, slaves were imported, but they were re-exported nearly in equal
+numbers. Now all these he considered to be in a state to go on without
+future supplies from Africa. Jamaica and the ceded islands retained almost
+all the slaves imported into them. This he considered as a proof that these
+had not attained the same desirable state; and it was therefore necessary,
+that the trade should be continued longer on this account.
+
+It was his intention, however, to provide proper punishments, while it
+lasted, for abuses both in Africa and the Middle Passage. He would take
+care, as far as he could, that none but young slaves should be brought from
+the Coast of Africa. He would encourage establishments there for a new
+species of traffic. Foreign nations should be invited to concur in the
+abolition. He should propose a praedial rather than a personal service for
+the West Indies, and institutions, by which the slaves there should be
+instructed in religious duties. He concluded by reading several
+resolutions, which he would leave to the future consideration of the House.
+
+Mr. Pitt then rose. He deprecated the resolutions altogether. He denied
+also the inferences, which Mr. Dundas had drawn from the West-Indian
+documents relative to the Negro-population. He had looked over his own
+calculations from the same documents again and again, and he would submit
+them, with all their data, if it should be necessary, to the House.
+
+Mr. Wilberforce and Mr. Fox held the same language. They contended also,
+that Mr. Dundas had now proved, a thousand times more strongly than ever,
+the necessity of immediate abolition. All the resolutions he had read were
+operative against his own reasoning. The latter observed, that the
+Slave-traders were in future only to be allowed to steal innocent children
+from their disconsolate parents.
+
+After a few observations by Lord Sheffield, Mr. Drake, Colonel Tarleton,
+and Mr. Rolle, the House adjourned.
+
+On the twenty-fifth of April it resumed the consideration of the subject.
+Mr. Dundas then went over his former resolutions, and concluded by moving,
+"that it should not be lawful to import any African Negros into any British
+colonies, in ships owned or navigated by British subjects, at any time
+after the first of January 1800."
+
+Lord Mornington (now Marquis Wellesley) rose to propose an amendment. He
+congratulated his countrymen, that the Slave-trade had received its
+death-wound. This traffic was founded in injustice; and between right and
+wrong there could be no compromise. Africa was not to be sacrificed to the
+apparent good of the West-Indies. He would not repeat those enormities out
+of the evidence, which had made such a deep impression upon the House. It
+had been resolved, that the trade should be abolished. The question then
+was, how long they were to persevere in the crime of its continuance. One
+had said, that they might be unjust for ten years longer; another, only
+till the beginning of the next century. But this diversity of opinion had
+proceeded from an erroneous statement of Mr. Dundas against the clear and
+irrefragable calculations of Mr. Pitt. The former had argued, that, because
+Jamaica and the ceded islands had retained almost all the slaves which had
+been imported into them, they were therefore not yet in a situation to
+support their population without further supplies from Africa. But the
+truth was, that the slaves, so retained, were kept, not to maintain the
+population there, but to clear new land. Now the House had determined, that
+the trade was not to be continued for this purpose. The population,
+therefore, in the islands was sufficient to continue the ordinary
+cultivation of them.
+
+He deprecated the idea, that the Slave-trade had been so sanctioned by the
+acts of former parliaments, that the present could make no alteration in
+it. Had not the House altered the import of foreign sugar into our islands?
+a measure, which at the time affected the property of many. Had they not
+prohibited the exports of provisions from America to the same quarter?
+Again, as to compacts, had the Africans ever been parties to these? It was
+rather curious also, when King James the Second gave a charter to the
+slave-traders, that he should have given them a right to all the south of
+Africa, and authority over every person born therein! But, by doing this,
+it was clear, that he gave them a right which he never possessed himself.
+After many other observations, he concluded by moving, "that the year 1793
+be substituted in the place of the year 1800."
+
+In the course of the debate, which followed, Mr. Burdon stated his
+conviction of the necessity of immediate abolition; but he would support
+the amendment, as the shortest of the terms proposed.
+
+Mr. Robert Thornton would support it also, as the only choice left him. He
+dared not accede to a motion, by which we were to continue for seven years
+to imbrue our hands in innocent blood.
+
+Mr. Ryder would not support the trade for one moment, if he could avoid it.
+He could not hold a balance with gold in one scale, and blood in the other.
+
+Mr. William Smith exposed the wickedness of restricting the trade to
+certain ages. The original motion, he said, would only operate as a
+transfer of cruelty from the aged and the guilty to the young and the
+innocent. He entreated the House to consider, whether, if it related to
+their own children, any one of them would vote for it.
+
+Mr. Windham had hitherto felt a reluctance to speaking, not from the
+abstruseness, but from the simplicity, of the subject; but he could not
+longer be silent, when he observed those arguments of policy creeping again
+out of their lurking-places, which had fled before eloquence and truth. The
+House had clearly given up the policy of the question. They had been
+determined by the justice of it. Why were they then to be troubled again
+with arguments of this nature? These, if admitted, would go to the
+subversion of all public as well as private morality. Nations were as much
+bound as individuals to a system of morals, though a breach in the former
+could not be so easily punished. In private life morality took pretty good
+care of itself. It was a kind of retail article, in which the returns were
+speedy. If a man broke open his neighbour's house, he would feel the
+consequences. There was an ally of virtue, who rendered it the interest of
+individuals to be moral, and he was called the executioner. But as such
+punishment did not always await us in our national concerns, we should
+substitute honour as the guardian of our national conduct. He hoped the
+West-Indians would consider the character of the mother-country, and the
+obligations to national as well as individual justice. He hoped also they
+would consider the sufferings, which they occasioned both in Africa, in the
+passage, and in the West-Indies. In the passage indeed no one was capable
+of describing them. The section of the slave-ship, however, made up the
+deficiency of language, and did away all necessity of argument, on this
+subject. Disease there had to struggle with the new affliction of chains
+and punishment. At one view were the irksomeness of a gaol, and the
+miseries of an hospital; so that the holds of these vessels put him in mind
+of the regions of the damned. The trade, he said, ought immediately to be
+abolished. On a comparison of the probable consequences of the abolition of
+it, he saw on one side only doubtful contingencies, but on the other shame
+and disgrace.
+
+Sir James Johnstone contended for the immediate abolition of the trade. He
+had introduced the plough into his own plantation in the West Indies, and
+he found the land produced more sugar than when cultivated in the ordinary
+way by slaves. Even for the sake of the planters, he hoped the abolition
+would not be long delayed.
+
+Mr. Dundas replied: after which a division took place. The number of votes
+in favour of the original motion were one hundred and fifty-eight, and for
+the amendment one hundred and nine.
+
+On the 27th of April the House resumed the subject. Mr. Dundas moved, as
+before, that the Slave-trade should cease in the year 1800; upon which Lord
+Mornington moved, that the year 1795 should be substituted for the latter
+period.
+
+In the course of the debate, which followed, Mr. Hubbard said, that he had
+voted against the abolition, when the year 1793 was proposed; but he
+thought that, if it were not to take place till 1795, sufficient time would
+be allowed the planters. He would support this amendment; and he
+congratulated the House on the prospect of the final triumph of truth,
+humanity, and justice.
+
+Mr. Addington preferred the year 1796 to the year 1795.
+
+Mr. Alderman Watson considered the abolition in 1796 to be as destructive
+as if it were immediate.
+
+A division having taken place, the number of votes in favour of the
+original motion were one hundred and sixty-one, and in favour of Lord
+Mornington's amendment for the year 1795, one hundred and twenty-one. Sir
+Edward Knatchbull, however, seeing that there was a disposition in the
+House to bring the matter to a conclusion, and that a middle line would be
+preferred, moved that the year 1796 should be substituted for the year
+1800. Upon this the House divided again; when there appeared for the
+original motion only one hundred and thirty-two, but for the amendment one
+hundred and fifty-one.
+
+The gradual abolition having been now finally agreed upon for the year
+1796, a committee was named, which carried the resolution to the Lords.
+
+On the eighth of May, the Lords were summoned to consider it. Lord
+Stormont, after having spoken for some time, moved, that they should hear
+evidence upon it. Lord Grenville opposed the motion on account of the
+delay, which would arise from an examination of the witnesses by the House
+at large: but he moved that such witnesses should be examined by a
+committee of the House. Upon this a debate ensued, and afterwards a
+division; when the original motion was carried by sixty-three against
+thirty-six.
+
+On the 15th of May the Lords met again. Evidence was then ordered to be
+summoned in behalf of those interested in the continuance of the trade. At
+length it was introduced; but on the fifth of June, when only seven persons
+had been examined, a motion was made and carried, that the farther
+examinations should be postponed to the next session.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER V.
+
+_Continuation from July 1792 to July 1793--Author travels round the kingdom
+again--Motion to renew the resolution of the last year in the
+Commons--Motion lost--New Motion in the Commons to abolish the foreign
+Slave-trade--Motion lost--Proceedings of the Lords._
+
+
+The resolution adopted by the Commons, that the trade should cease in 1796,
+was a matter of great joy to many; and several, in consequence of it,
+returned to the use of sugar. The committee, however, for the abolition did
+not view it in the same favourable light. They considered it as a political
+manoeuvre to frustrate the accomplishment of the object. But the
+circumstance, which gave them the most concern, was the resolution of the
+Lords to hear evidence. It was impossible now to say, when the trade would
+cease. The witnesses in behalf of the merchants and planters had obtained
+possession of the ground; and they might keep it, if they chose, even till
+the year 1800, to throw light upon a measure which was to be adopted in
+1796. The committee found too, that they had again the laborious task
+before them of finding out new persons to give testimony in behalf of their
+cause; for some of their former witnesses were dead, and others were out of
+the kingdom; and unless they replaced these, there would be no probability
+of making out that strong case in the Lords, which they had established in
+the Commons. It devolved therefore upon me once more to travel for this
+purpose: but as I was then in too weak a state to bear as much fatigue as
+formerly, Dr. Dickson relieved me, by taking one part of the tour, namely,
+that to Scotland, upon himself.
+
+These journeys we performed with considerable success; during which the
+committee elected Mr. Joseph Townsend of Baltimore, in Maryland, an
+honorary and corresponding member.
+
+Parliament having met, Mr. Wilberforce, in February 1793, moved, that the
+House resolve itself into a committee of the whole House on Thursday next,
+to consider of the circumstances of the Slave-trade. This motion was
+opposed by Sir William Yonge, who moved, that this day six months should be
+substituted for Thursday next. A debate ensued: of this, however, as well
+as of several which followed, I shall give no account; as it would be
+tedious to the reader to hear a repetition of the same arguments. Suffice
+it to say, that the motion was lost by a majority of sixty-one to
+fifty-three.
+
+This sudden refusal of the House of Commons to renew their own vote of the
+former year gave great uneasiness to the friends of the cause. Mr.
+Wilberforce, however, resolved, that the session should not pass without an
+attempt to promote it in another form; and accordingly, on the fourteenth
+of May, he moved for leave to bring in a bill to abolish that part of the
+Slave-trade, by which the British merchants supplied foreigners with
+slaves. This motion was opposed like the former; but was carried by a
+majority of seven. The bill was then brought in; and it passed its first
+and second reading with little opposition; but on the fifth of June,
+notwithstanding the eloquence of Mr. Pitt and of Mr. Fox, and the very able
+speeches of Mr. Francis, Mr. Courtenay, and others, it was lost by a
+majority of thirty-one to twenty-nine.
+
+In the interval between these motions the question experienced in the Lords
+considerable opposition. The Duke of Clarence moved that the House should
+not proceed in the consideration of the Slave-trade till after the Easter
+recess. The Earl of Abingdon was still more hostile afterwards. He
+deprecated the new philosophy. It was as full of mischief as the Box of
+Pandora. The doctrine of the abolition of the Slave-trade was a species of
+it; and he concluded by moving, that all further consideration of the
+subject be postponed. To the epithet, then bestowed upon the abolition of
+it by this nobleman, the Duke of Clarence added those of fanatics and
+hypocrites! among whom he included Mr. Wilberforce by name. All the other
+Lords, however, who were present, manifested such a dislike to the
+sentiments of the Earl of Abingdon, that he withdrew this motion.
+
+After this the hearing of evidence on the resolution of the House of
+Commons was resumed; and seven persons were examined before the close of
+the session.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VI.
+
+_Continuation from July 1793 to July 1794--Author travels round the kingdom
+again--Motion to abolish the foreign Slave-trade renewed in the
+Commons--and carried--but lost in the Lords--further proceedings
+there--Author, on account of his declining health, obliged to retire from
+the cause._
+
+
+The committee for the abolition could not view the proceedings of both
+Houses of Parliament on this subject during the year 1793, without being
+alarmed for the fate of their question. The only two sources of hope, which
+they could discover, were in the disposition then manifested by the peers
+as to the conduct of the Earl of Abingdon, and in their determination to
+proceed in the hearing of evidence. The latter circumstance indeed was the
+more favourable, as the resolution, upon which the witnesses were to be
+examined, had not been renewed by the Commons. These considerations,
+however, afforded no solid ground for the mind to rest upon. They only
+broke in upon it, like faint gleams of sunshine, for a moment, and then
+were gone. In this situation the committee could only console themselves by
+the reflection, that they had done their duty. In looking, however, to
+their future services, one thing, and only one, seemed practicable; and
+this was necessary; namely, to complete the new body of evidence, which
+they had endeavoured to form in the preceding year. The determination to do
+this rendered another journey on my part indispensable; and I undertook it,
+broken down us my constitution then was, beginning it in September 1793,
+and completing it in February 1794.
+
+Mr. Wilberforce, in this interval, had digested his plan of operations; and
+accordingly, early in the session of 1794, he asked leave to renew his
+former bill, to abolish that part of the trade, by means of which British
+merchants supplied foreigners with slaves. This request was opposed by Sir
+William Yonge; but it was granted, on a division of the House, by a
+majority of sixty-three to forty votes.
+
+When the bill was brought in, it was opposed by the same member; upon which
+the House divided; and there appeared for Sir William Yonge's amendment
+thirty-eight votes, but against it fifty-six.
+
+On a motion for the recommitment of the bill, Lord Sheffield divided the
+House, against whose motion there was a majority of forty-two. And, on the
+third reading of it, it was opposed again; but it was at length carried.
+
+The speakers against the bill were; Sir William Yonge, Lord Sheffield,
+Colonel Tarleton, Alderman Newnham, and Mr. Payne, Este, Lechmere,
+Cawthorne, Jenkinson, and Dent. Those who spoke in favour of it were; Mr.
+Pitt, Fox, William Smith, Whitbread, Francis, Burdon, Vaughan, Barham, and
+Serjeants Watson and Adair.
+
+While the foreign Slave-bill was thus passing its stages in the Commons,
+Dr. Horsley, bishop of Rochester, who saw no end to the examinations, while
+the witnesses were to be examined at the bar of the House of Lords, moved,
+that they should be taken in future before a committee above-stairs. Dr.
+Porteus, bishop of London, and the Lords Guildford, Stanhope, and
+Grenville, supported this motion. But the Lord Chancellor Thurlow, aided by
+the Duke of Clarence, and by the Lords Mansfield, Hay, Abingdon, and
+others, negatived it by a majority of twenty-eight.
+
+At length the bill itself was ushered into the House of Lords. On reading
+it a second time, it was opposed by the Duke of Clarence, Lord Abingdon,
+and others. Lord Grenville and the Bishop of Rochester declined supporting
+it. They alleged, as a reason, that they conceived the introduction of it
+to have been improper pending the inquiry on the general subject of the
+Slave-trade. This declaration brought up the Lords Stanhope and Lauderdale,
+who charged them with inconsistency as professed friends of the cause. At
+length the bill was lost. During these discussions the examination of the
+witnesses was resumed by the Lords; but only two of them were heard in this
+session[A].
+
+[Footnote A: After this the examinations wholly dropped in the House of
+Lords.]
+
+After this decision the question was in a desperate state; for if the
+Commons would not renew their own resolution, and the Lords would not
+abolish the foreign part of the Slave-trade, What hope was there, of
+success? It was obvious too, that in the former House, Mr. Pitt and Mr.
+Dundas voted against each other. In the latter, the Lord Chancellor Thurlow
+opposed every motion in favour of the cause. The committee therefore were
+reduced to this;--either they must exert themselves without hope, or they
+must wait till some change should take place in their favour. As far as I
+myself was concerned, all exertion was then over. The nervous system was
+almost shattered to pieces. Both my memory and my hearing failed me. Sudden
+dizziness seized my head. A confused singing in the ears followed me,
+wherever I went. On going to bed the very stairs seemed to dance up and
+down under me, so that, misplacing my foot, I sometimes fell. Talking too,
+if it continued but half an hour, exhausted me, so that profuse
+perspirations followed; and the same effect was produced even by an active
+exertion of the mind for the like time. These disorders had been brought on
+by degrees in consequence of the severe labours necessarily attached to the
+promotion of the cause. For seven years I had a correspondence to maintain
+with four hundred persons with my own hand. I had some book or other
+annually to write in behalf of the cause. In this time I had travelled more
+than thirty-five thousand miles in search of evidence, and a great part of
+these journeys in the night. All this time my mind had been on the stretch.
+It had been bent too to this one subject; for I had not even leisure to
+attend to my own concerns. The various instances of barbarity, which had
+come successively to my knowledge within this period, had vexed, harassed,
+and afflicted it. The wound, which these had produced, was rendered still
+deeper by those cruel disappointments before related, which arose from the
+reiterated refusal of persons to give their testimony, after I had
+travelled hundreds of miles in quest of them. But the severest stroke was
+that inflicted by the persecution, begun and pursued by persons interested
+in the continuance of the trade, of such witnesses as had been examined
+against them; and whom, on account of their dependent situation in life, it
+was most easy to oppress. As I had been the means of bringing these forward
+on these occasions, they naturally came to me, when thus persecuted, as the
+author of their miseries and their ruin. From their supplications and wants
+it would have been ungenerous and ungrateful to have fled[A]. These
+different circumstances, by acting together, had at length brought me into
+the situation just mentioned; and I was therefore obliged, though very
+reluctantly, to be borne out of the field, where I had placed the great
+honour and glory of my life.
+
+[Footnote A: The late Mr. Whitbread, to whom one day in deep affliction on
+this account I related accidentally a circumstance of this kind, generously
+undertook, in order to make my mind easy upon the subject, to make good all
+injuries, which should in future arise to individuals from such
+persecution; and he repaired these, at different times, at a considerable
+expense. I feel it a duty to divulge this circumstance, out of respect to
+the memory of one of the best of men, and of one, whom, if the history of
+his life were written, it would appear to have been an extraordinary honour
+to the country to have produced.]
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VII.
+
+_Continuation from July 1794 to July 1799--Various motions within this
+period._
+
+
+I purpose, though it may seem abrupt after the division which has hitherto
+been made of the contents of this volume, to throw the events of the next
+five years into one chapter.
+
+Mr. Wilberforce and the members of the committee, whose constitutions had
+not suffered like my own, were still left; and they determined to persevere
+in the promotion of their great object; as long as their health and their
+faculties permitted them. The former, accordingly, in the month of February
+1795, moved in the House of Commons for leave to bring in a bill for the
+abolition of the Slave-trade. This motion was then necessary, if, according
+to the resolution of that House, the Slave-trade was to cease in 1796. It
+was opposed, however, by Sir William Yonge, and unfortunately lost by a
+majority of seventy-eight to fifty-seven.
+
+In the year 1796 Mr. Wilberforce renewed his efforts in the Commons. He
+asked leave to bring in a bill for the abolition of the Slave-trade, but in
+a limited time. The motion was opposed as before; but on a division, there
+were for it ninety-three, and against it only sixty-seven.
+
+The bill having been brought in, was opposed in its second reading; but it
+was carried through it by a majority of sixty-four to thirty-one.
+
+In a future stage it was opposed again; but it triumphed by a majority of
+seventy-six to thirty-one. Mr. Eliott was then put into the chair. Several
+clauses were adopted; and the first of March 1797 was fixed for the
+abolition of the trade: but in the next stage of it, after a long speech
+from Mr. Dundas, it was lost by a majority of seventy-four against seventy.
+
+Mr. Francis, who had made a brilliant speech in the last debate,
+considering that nothing effectual had been yet done on this great
+question, and wishing that a practical beginning might be made, brought
+forward soon afterwards, a motion relative to the improvement of the
+condition of the slaves in the West Indies. This, after a short debate, was
+negatived without a division. Mr. William Smith also moved an address to
+His Majesty, that he would be pleased to give directions to lay before the
+House copies of the several acts relative to regulations in behalf of the
+slaves, passed by the different colonial assemblies since the year 1788.
+This motion was adopted by the House. Thus passed away the session of 1796.
+
+In the year 1797, while Mr. Wilberforce was deliberating upon the best
+measure for the advancement of the cause, Mr. C. Ellis came forward with a
+new motion. He began by declaring, that he agreed with the abolitionists as
+to their object; but he differed with them as to the mode of attaining it.
+The Slave-trade he condemned as a cruel and pernicious system; but, as it
+had become an inveterate evil, he feared it could not be done away all at
+once, without injury to the interests of numerous individuals, and even to
+the Negros themselves. He concluded by moving an address to His Majesty,
+humbly requesting, that he would give directions to the governors of the
+West Indian islands, to recommend it to the colonial assemblies to adopt
+such measures as might appear to them best calculated to ameliorate the
+condition of the Negros, and thereby to remove gradually the Slave-trade;
+and likewise to assure His Majesty of the readiness of this House to concur
+in any measure to accelerate this desirable object. This motion was
+seconded by Mr. Barham. It was opposed, however, by Mr. Wilberforce, Mr.
+Pitt, and others; but was at length carried by a majority of ninety-nine to
+sixty-three.
+
+In the year 1798 Mr. Wilberforce asked leave to renew his former bill, to
+abolish the Slave-trade within a limited time. He was supported by Mr.
+Canning, Mr. Hobhouse, Sir Robert Buxton, Mr. Bouverie, and others. Mr.
+Sewell, Bryan Edwards, Henniker, and C. Ellis, took the opposite side of
+the question. Mr. Ellis, however, observed, that he had no objection to
+restricting the Slave-trade to plantations already begun in the colonies;
+and Mr. Barham professed himself a friend to the abolition, if it could be
+accomplished in a reasonable way. On a division, there appeared to be for
+Mr. Wilberforce's motion eighty-three, but against it eighty-seven.
+
+In the year 1799 Mr. Wilberforce, undismayed by these different
+disappointments, renewed his motion. Colonel M. Wood, Mr. Petrie, and
+others, among whom were Mr. Windham and Mr. Dundas, opposed it. Mr. Pitt,
+Fox, W. Smith, Sir William Dolben, Sir R. Milbank, Mr. Hobhouse, and Mr.
+Canning, supported it. Sir R. Milbank contended, that modifications of a
+system fundamentally wrong ought not to be tolerated by the legislature of
+a free nation. Mr. Hobhouse said, that nothing could be so nefarious as
+this traffic in blood. It was unjust in its principle. It was cruel in its
+practice. It admitted of no regulation whatever. The abolition of it was
+called for equally by morality and sound policy. Mr. Canning exposed the
+folly of Mr. Dundas, who had said, that as Parliament had in the year 1787
+left the abolition to the colonial assemblies, it ought not to be taken out
+of their hands. This great event, he observed, could only be accomplished
+in two ways; either by these assemblies, or by the Parliament of England.
+Now the members of the assembly of Jamaica had professed, that they would
+never abolish the trade. Was it not therefore idle to rely upon them for
+the accomplishment of it? He then took a very comprehensive view of the
+arguments, which had been offered in the course of the debate, and was
+severe upon the planters in the House, who, he said, had brought into
+familiar use certain expressions, with no other view than to throw a veil
+over their odious system. Among these was--their right to import labourers.
+But never was the word "labourers" so prostituted, as when it was used for
+slaves. Never was the word "right" so prostituted, not even when The Rights
+of Man were talked of, as when the right to trade in man's blood was
+asserted by the members of an enlightened assembly. Never was the right of
+importing these labourers worse defended than when the antiquity of the
+Slave-trade, and its foundation on antient acts of parliament, were brought
+forward in its support. We had been cautioned not to lay our unhallowed
+hands on the antient institution of the Slave-trade; nor to subvert a
+fabric, raised by the wisdom of our ancestors, and consecrated by a lapse
+of ages. But on what principles did we usually respect the institutions of
+antiquity? We respected them when we saw some shadow of departed worth and
+usefulness; or some memorial of what had been creditable to mankind. But
+was this the case with the Slave-trade? Had it begun in principles of
+justice or national honour, which the changes of the world alone had
+impaired? had it to plead former services and glories in behalf of its
+present disgrace? In looking at it we saw nothing but crimes and sufferings
+from the beginning--nothing but what wounded and convulsed our
+feelings--nothing but what excited indignation and horror. It had not even
+to plead what could often be said in favour of the most unjustifiable wars.
+Though conquest had sometimes originated in ambition, and in the worst of
+motives, yet the conquerors and the conquered were sometimes blended
+afterwards into one people; so that a system of common interest arose out
+of former differences. But where was the analogy of the cases? Was it only
+at the outset that we could trace violence and injustice on the part of the
+Slave-trade? Were the oppressors and the oppressed so reconciled, that
+enmities ultimately ceased?--No. Was it reasonable then to urge a
+prescriptive right, not to the fruits of an antient and forgotten evil, but
+to a series of new violences; to a chain of fresh enormities; to cruelties
+continually repeated; and of which every instance inflicted a fresh
+calamity, and constituted a separate and substantial crime?
+
+The debate being over, the House divided; when it appeared that there were
+for Mr. Wilberforce's motion seventy-four, but against it eighty-two.
+
+The motion for the general abolition of the Slave-trade having been thus
+lost again in the Commons, a new motion was made there soon after, by Mr.
+Henry Thornton, on the same subject. The prosecution of this traffic on
+certain parts of the coast of Africa had become so injurious to the new
+settlement at Sierra Leone, that not only its commercial prospects were
+impeded, but its safety endangered. Mr. Thornton therefore brought in a
+bill to confine the Slave-trade within certain limits. But even this bill,
+though it had for its object only to free a portion of the coast from the
+ravages of this traffic, was opposed by Mr. Gascoyne, Dent, and others.
+Petitions also were presented against it. At length, after two divisions,
+on the first of which there were thirty-two votes to twenty-seven, and on
+the second thirty-eight to twenty-two, it passed through all its stages.
+
+When it was introduced into the Lords the petitions were renewed against
+it. Delay also was interposed to its progress by the examination of
+witnesses. It was not till the fifth of July that the matter was brought to
+issue. The opponents of the bill at that time were, the Duke of Clarence,
+Lord Westmoreland, Lord Thurlow, and the Lords Douglas and Hay, the two
+latter being Earls of Morton and Kinnoul in Scotland. The supporters of it
+were Lord Grenville, who introduced it; Lord Loughborough; Holland; and Dr.
+Horsley, bishop of Rochester. The latter was peculiarly eloquent. He began
+his speech by arraigning the injustice and impolicy of the trade:
+injustice, he said, which no considerations of policy could extenuate;
+impolicy, equal in degree to its injustice.
+
+He well knew that the advocates for the Slave-trade had endeavoured to
+represent the project for abolition as a branch of jacobinism; but they,
+who supported it, proceeded upon no visionary motives of equality or of the
+imprescriptible rights of man. They strenuously upheld the gradations of
+civil society: but they did indeed affirm that these gradations were, both
+ways, both as they ascended and as they descended, limited. There was an
+existence of power, to which no good king would aspire; and there was an
+extreme condition of subjection, to which man could not be degraded without
+injustice; and this they would maintain was the condition of the African,
+who was torn away into slavery.
+
+He then explained the limits of that portion of Africa, which the bill
+intended to set apart as sacred to peace and liberty. He showed that this
+was but one-third of the coast; and therefore that two-thirds were yet left
+for the diabolical speculations of the slave-merchants. He expressed his
+surprise that such witnesses as those against the bill should have been
+introduced at all. He affirmed that their oaths were falsified by their own
+log-books; and that from their own accounts the very healthiest of their
+vessels were little better than pestilential gaols. Mr. Robert Hume, one of
+these witnesses, had made a certain voyage. He had made it in thirty-three
+days. He had shipped two hundred and sixty-five slaves, and he had lost
+twenty-three of them. If he had gone on losing his slaves, all of whom were
+under twenty-five years of age, at this rate, it was obvious, that he would
+have lost two hundred and fifty-three of them, if his passage had lasted
+for a year. Now in London only seventeen would have died, of that age, out
+of one thousand within the latter period.
+
+After having exposed the other voyages of Mr. Hume in a similar manner, he
+entered into a commendation of the views of the Sierra Leone company; and
+then defended the character of the Africans in their own country, as
+exhibited in the Travels of Mr. Mungo Park. He made a judicious
+discrimination with respect to slavery, as it existed among them. He showed
+that this slavery was analogous to that of the heroic and patriarchal ages;
+and contrasted it with the West Indian in an able manner.
+
+He adverted, lastly, to what had fallen from the learned counsel, who had
+supported the petitions of the slave-merchants. One of them had put this
+question to their lordships, "if the Slave-trade were as wicked as it had
+been represented, why was there no prohibition of it in the holy
+scriptures?" He then entered into a full defence of the scriptures on this
+ground, which he concluded by declaring that, as St. Paul had coupled
+men-stealers with murderers, he had condemned the Slave-trade in one of its
+most productive modes, and generally in all its modes:--and here it was
+worthy of remark, that the word used by the apostle on this occasion, and
+which had been translated men-stealers, should have been rendered
+slave-traders. This was obvious from the Scholiast of Aristophanes, whom he
+quoted. It was clear therefore that the Slave-trade, if murder was
+forbidden, had been literally forbidden also.
+
+The learned counsel too had admonished their lordships, to beware how they
+adopted the visionary projects of fanatics. He did not know in what
+direction this shaft was shot; and he cared not. It did not concern him.
+With the highest reverence for the religion of the land, with the firmest
+conviction of its truth, and with the deepest sense of the importance of
+its doctrines, he was proudly conscious, that the general shape and fashion
+of his life bore nothing of the stamp of fanaticism. But he begged leave,
+in his turn, to address a word of serious exhortation to their lordships.
+He exhorted them to beware, how they were persuaded to bury, under the
+opprobrious name of fanaticism, the regard which they owed to the great
+duties of mercy and justice, for the neglect of which (if they should
+neglect them) they would be answerable at that tribunal, where no
+prevarication of witnesses could misinform the judge; and where no subtlety
+of an advocate, miscalling the names of things, putting evil for good and
+good for evil, could mislead his judgement.
+
+At length the debate ended: when the bill was lost by a majority of
+sixty-eight to sixty-one, including personal votes and proxies.
+
+I cannot conclude this chapter without offering a few remarks. And, first,
+I may observe, as the substance of the debates has not been given for the
+period which it contains, that Mr. Wilberforce, upon whom too much praise
+cannot be bestowed for his perseverance from year to year, amidst the
+disheartening circumstances which attended his efforts, brought every new
+argument to bear, which either the discovery of new light or the events of
+the times produced. I may observe also, in justice to the memories of Mr.
+Pitt and Mr. Fox, that there was no debate within this period, in which
+they did not take a part; and in which they did not irradiate others from
+the profusion of their own light: and, thirdly, that in consequence of the
+efforts of the three, conjoined with those of others, the great cause of
+the abolition was secretly gaining ground. Many members who were not
+connected with the trade, but who had yet hitherto supported it, were on
+the point of conversion. Though the question had oscillated backwards and
+forwards, so that an ordinary spectator could have discovered no gleam of
+hope at these times, nothing is more certain, than that the powerful
+eloquence then displayed had smoothed the resistance to it; had shortened
+its vibrations; and had prepared it for a state of rest.
+
+With respect to the West Indians themselves, some of them began to see
+through the mists of prejudice, which had covered them. In the year 1794,
+when the bill for the abolition of the foreign Slave-trade was introduced,
+Mr. Vaughan and Mr. Barham supported it. They called upon the planters in
+the House to give way to humanity, where their own interests could not be
+affected by their submission. This indeed may be said to have been no
+mighty thing; but it was a frank confession of the injustice of the
+Slave-trade, and the beginning of the change which followed, both with
+respect to themselves and others.
+
+With respect to the old friends of the cause, it is with regret I mention,
+that it lost the support of Mr. Windham within this period; and this regret
+is increased by the consideration, that he went off on the avowed plea of
+expediency against moral rectitude; a doctrine, which, at least upon this
+subject, he had reprobated for ten years. It was, however, some
+consolation, as far as talents were concerned, (for there can be none for
+the loss of virtuous feeling,) that Mr. Canning, a new member, should have
+so ably supplied his place.
+
+Of the gradual abolitionists, whom we have always considered as the most
+dangerous enemies of the cause, Mr. Jenkinson (now Lord Hawkesbury), Mr.
+Addington (now Lord Sidmouth), and Mr. Dundas (now Lord Melville),
+continued their opposition during all this time. Of the first two I shall
+say nothing at present; but I cannot pass over the conduct of the latter.
+He was the first person, as we have seen, to propose the gradual abolition
+of the Slave-trade; and he fixed the time for its cessation on the first of
+January 1800. His sincerity on this occasion was doubted by Mr. Fox at the
+very outset; for he immediately rose and said, that "something so
+mischievous had come out, something so like a foundation had been laid for
+preserving, not only for years to come, but for any thing he knew for ever,
+this detestable traffic, that he felt it his duty immediately to deprecate
+all such delusions upon the country." Mr. Pitt, who spoke soon afterwards,
+in reply to an argument advanced by Mr. Dundas, maintained, that "at
+whatever period the House should say that the Slave-trade should actually
+cease, this defence would equally be set up; for it would be just as good
+an argument in seventy years hence, as it was against the abolition then."
+And these remarks Mr. Dundas verified in a singular manner within this
+period: for in the year 1796, when his own bill, as amended in the Commons,
+was to take place, he was one of the most strenuous opposers of it; and in
+the year 1799, when in point of consistency it devolved upon him to propose
+it to the House, in order that the trade might cease on the first of
+January 1800, (which was the time of his own original choice, or a time
+unfettered by parliamentary amendment,) he was the chief instrument of
+throwing out Mr. Wilberforce's bill, which promised even a longer period to
+its continuance: so that it is obvious, that there was no time, within his
+own limits, when the abolition would have suited him, notwithstanding his
+profession, "that he had always been a warm advocate for the measure."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VIII.
+
+_Continuation from July 1799 to July 1805--Various motions within this
+period._
+
+
+The question had now been brought forward in almost every possible way, and
+yet had been eventually lost. The total and immediate abolition had been
+attempted; and then the gradual. The gradual again had been tried for the
+year 1793, then for 1795, and then for 1796, at which period it was
+decreed, but never allowed to be executed. An abolition of a part of the
+trade, as it related to the supply of foreigners with slaves, was the next
+measure proposed; and when this failed, the abolition of another part of
+it, as it related to the making of a certain portion of the coast of Africa
+sacred to liberty, was attempted; but this failed also. Mr. Wilberforce
+therefore thought it prudent, not to press the abolition as a mere annual
+measure, but to allow members time to digest the eloquence, which had been
+bestowed upon it for the last five years, and to wait till some new
+circumstances should favour its introduction. Accordingly he allowed the
+years 1800, 1801, 1802, and 1803 to pass over without any further
+parliamentary notice than the moving for certain papers; during which he
+took an opportunity of assuring the House, that he had not grown cool in
+the cause, but that he would agitate it in a future session.
+
+In the year 1804, which was fixed upon for renewed exertion, the committee
+for the abolition of the Slave-trade elected James Stephen, Zachary
+Macaulay, Henry Brougham, esquires, and William Phillips, into their own
+body. Four other members also, Robert Grant and John Thornton, esquires,
+and William Manser and William Allen, were afterwards added to the list.
+Among the reasons for fixing upon this year one may be assigned, namely,
+that the Irish members, in consequence of the Union which had taken place
+between the two countries, had then all taken their seats in the House of
+Commons; and that most of them were friendly to the cause.
+
+This being the situation of things, Mr. Wilberforce, on the thirtieth of
+March, asked leave to renew his bill for the abolition of the Slave-trade
+within a limited time. Mr. Fuller opposed the motion. A debate ensued.
+Colonel Tarleton, Mr. Devaynes, Mr. Addington, and Mr. Manning spoke
+against it. The latter, however, notwithstanding his connection with the
+West Indies, said he would support it, if an indemnification were offered
+to the planters, in case any actual loss should accompany the measure.
+
+Sir William Geary questioned the propriety of immediate abolition.
+
+Sir Robert Buxton, Mr. Pitt, Fox, and Durham, spoke in favour of the
+motion.
+
+Mr. William Smith rose, when the latter had seated himself, and
+complimented him on this change of sentiment, so honourable to him,
+inasmuch as he had espoused the cause of humanity against his supposed
+interest as a planter. Mr. Leigh said, that he would not tolerate such a
+traffic for a moment. All the feelings of nature revolted at it. Lord de
+Blaquiere observed, "it was the first time the question had been proposed
+to Irishmen as legislators. He believed it would be supported by most of
+them. As to the people of Ireland, he could pledge himself, that they were
+hostile to this barbarous traffic." An amendment having been proposed by
+Mr. Manning, a division took place upon it, when leave was given to bring
+in the bill, by a majority of one hundred and twenty-four to forty-nine.
+
+On the seventh of June, when the second reading of the bill was moved, it
+was opposed by Sir W. Yonge, Dr. Laurence, Mr. C. Brook, Mr. Dent, and
+others. Among these Lord Castlereagh professed himself a friend to the
+abolition of the trade, but he differed as to the mode. Sir J. Wrottesley
+approved of the principle of the bill, but would oppose it in some of its
+details. Mr. Windham allowed the justice, but differed as to the
+expediency, of the measure. Mr. Deverell professed himself to have been a
+friend to it; but he had then changed his mind. Sir Laurence Parsons wished
+to see a plan for the gradual extinction of the trade. Lord Temple
+affirmed, that the bill would seal the death-warrant of every White
+inhabitant of the islands. The second reading was supported by Sir Ralph
+Milbank, Mr. Pitt, Fox, William Smith, Whitbread, Francis, Barham, and by
+Mr. Grenfell, and Sir John Newport. Mr. Grenfell observed, that he could
+not give a silent vote, where the character of the country was concerned.
+When the question of the abolition first came before the public, he was a
+warm friend to it; and from that day to this he had cherished the same
+feelings. He assured Mr. Wilberforce of his constant support. Sir John
+Newport stated that the Irish nation took a virtuous interest in this noble
+cause. He ridiculed the idea, that the trade and manufactures of the
+country would suffer by the measure in contemplation; but, even if they
+should suffer, he would oppose it. "Fiat justitia, ruat coelum." Upon a
+division, there appeared for the second reading one hundred, and against it
+forty-two.
+
+On the twelfth of June, when a motion was made to go into a committee upon
+the bill, it was opposed by Mr. Fuller, C. Brook, C. Ellis, Dent, Deverell,
+and Manning: and it was supported by Sir Robert Buxton, Mr. Barham, and the
+honourable J.S. Cocks. The latter condemned the imprudence of the planters.
+Instead of profiting by the discussions, which had taken place, and making
+wise provisions against the great event of the abolition, which would
+sooner or later take place, they had only thought of new stratagems to
+defeat it. He declared his abhorrence of the trade, which he considered to
+be a national disgrace. The House divided: when there were seventy-nine for
+the motion, and against it twenty.
+
+On the twenty-seventh of June the bill was opposed in its last stage by Sir
+W. Young, Mr. Dickenson, G. Rose, Addington, and Dent: and supported by Mr.
+Pitt, W. Smith, Francis, and Barham; when it was carried by a majority of
+sixty-nine to thirty-six. It was then taken up to the Lords; but on a
+motion of Lord Hawkesbury, then a member of that House, the discussion of
+it was postponed to the next year.
+
+The session being ended, the committee for the abolition of the Slave-trade
+increased its number, by the election of the right honourable Lord
+Teignmouth, Dr. Dickson, and Wilson Birkbeck, as members.
+
+In the year 1805, Mr. Wilberforce renewed his motion of the former year.
+Colonel Tarleton, Sir William Yonge, Mr. Fuller, and Mr. Gascoyne opposed
+it. Leave, however, was given him to introduce his bill.
+
+On the second reading of it a serious opposition took place; and an
+amendment was moved for postponing it till that day six months. The
+amendment was opposed by Mr. Fox and Mr. Huddlestone. The latter could not
+help lifting his voice against this monstrous traffic in the sinews and
+blood of man, the toleration of which had so long been the disgrace of the
+British legislature. He did not charge the enormous guilt resulting from it
+upon the nation at large; for the nation had washed its hands of it by the
+numerous petitions it had sent against it; and it had since been a matter
+of astonishment to all Christendom, how the constitutional guardians of
+British freedom should have sanctioned elsewhere the greatest system of
+cruelty and oppression in the world.
+
+He said that a curse attended this trade even in the mode of defending it.
+By a certain fatality, none but the vilest arguments were brought forward,
+which corrupted the very persons, who used them. Every one of these were
+built on the narrow ground of interest; of pecuniary profit; of sordid
+gain; in opposition to every higher consideration; to every motive that had
+reference to humanity, justice, and religion; or to that great principle,
+which comprehended them all. Place only before the most determined advocate
+of this odious traffic the exact image of himself in the garb and harness
+of a slave, dragged and whipped about like a beast: place this image also
+before him, and paint it as that of one without a ray of hope to cheer him;
+and you would extort from him the reluctant confession, that he would not
+endure for an hour the misery, to which he condemned his fellow-man for
+life. How dared he then to use this selfish plea of interest against the
+voice of the generous sympathies of his nature? But even upon this narrow
+ground the advocates for the traffic had been defeated. If the unhallowed
+argument of expediency was worth any thing when opposed to moral rectitude,
+or if it were to supersede the precepts of Christianity, where was a man to
+stop, or what line was he to draw? For any thing he knew, it might be
+physically true, that human blood was the best manure for the land; but who
+ought to shed it on that account? True expediency, however, was, where it
+ever would be found, on the side of that system, which was most merciful
+and just. He asked how it happened, that sugar could be imported cheaper
+from the East Indies, than from the West, notwithstanding the vast
+difference of the length of the voyages, but on account of the impolicy of
+slavery, or that it was made in the former case by the industry of free
+men, and in the latter by the languid drudgery of slaves.
+
+As he had had occasion to advert to the Eastern part of the world, he would
+make an observation upon an argument, which had been collected from that
+quarter. The condition of the Negros in the West Indies had been lately
+compared with that of the Hindoos. But he would observe that the Hindoo,
+miserable as his hovel was, had sources of pride and happiness, to which
+not only the West Indian slave, but even his master, was a stranger. He was
+to be sure a peasant; and his industry was subservient to the
+gratifications of an European lord. But he was, in his own belief, vastly
+superior to him. He viewed him as one of the lowest cast. He would not on
+any consideration eat from the same plate. He would not suffer his son to
+marry the daughter of his master, even if she could bring him all the West
+Indies as her portion. He would observe too, that the Hindoo-peasant drank
+his water from his native well; that, if his meal were scanty, he received
+it from the hand of her, who was most dear to him; that, when he laboured,
+he laboured for her and his offspring. His daily task being finished, he
+reposed with his family. No retrospect of the happiness of former days,
+compared with existing misery, disturbed his slumber; nor horrid dreams
+occasioned him to wake in agony at the dawn of day. No barbarous sounds of
+cracking whips reminded him, that with the form and image of a man his
+destiny was that of the beast of the field. Let the advocates for the
+bloody traffic state what they had to set off on their side of the question
+against the comforts and independence of the man, with whom they compared
+the slave.
+
+The amendment was supported by Sir William Yonge, Sir William Pulteney,
+Colonel Tarleton, Mr. Gascoyne, C. Brook, and Hiley Addington. On dividing
+the House upon it, there appeared for it seventy-seven, but against it only
+seventy.
+
+This loss of the question, after it had been carried in the last year by so
+great a majority, being quite unexpected, was a matter of severe
+disappointment; and might have discouraged the friends of the cause in this
+infancy of their renewed efforts, if they had not discovered the reason of
+its failure. After due consideration it appeared, that no fewer than nine
+members, who had never been absent once in sixteen years when it was
+agitated, gave way to engagements on the day of the motion, from a belief
+that it was safe. It appeared also, that out of the great number of Irish
+members, who supported it in the former year, only nine were in the House,
+when it was lost. It appeared also that, previously to this event, a
+canvass, more importunate than had been heard of on any former occasion,
+had been made among the latter by those interested in the continuance of
+the trade. Many of these, unacquainted with the detail of the subject, like
+the English members, admitted the dismal representations, which were then
+made to them. The desire of doing good on the one hand, and the fear of
+doing injury on the other, perplexed them; and in this dubious state they
+absented themselves at the time mentioned.
+
+The causes of the failure having been found accidental, and capable of a
+remedy, it was resolved, that an attempt should be made immediately in the
+House in a new form. Accordingly Lord Henry Petty signified his intention
+of bringing in a bill for the abolition of the foreign part of the
+Slave-trade; but the impeachment of Lord Melville, and other weighty
+matters coming on, the notice was not acted upon in that session.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IX.
+
+_Continuation from July 1805 to July 1806--Author returns to his duty in
+the committee--travels again round the Kingdom--Death of Mr. Pitt--his
+character, an it related to the question--Motion for the abolition of the
+foreign Slave-trade--resolution to take measures for the total abolition of
+it--Address to the King to negotiate with foreign powers for their
+concurrence in it--Motion to prevent any new vessel going into the
+trade--these carried through both houses of parliament._
+
+
+It was now almost certain, to the inexpressible joy of the committee, that
+the cause, with proper vigilance, could be carried in the next session in
+the House of Commons. It became them therefore to prepare to support it. In
+adverting to measures for this purpose, it occurred to them, that the House
+of Lords, if the question should be then carried to them from the Commons,
+might insist upon hearing evidence on the general subject. But, alas, even
+the body of witnesses, which had been last collected, was broken by death
+or dispersion! It was therefore to be formed again. In this situation it
+devolved upon me, as I had now returned to the committee after an absence
+of nine years, to take another journey for this purpose.
+
+This journey I performed with extraordinary success. In the course of it I
+had also much satisfaction on another account. I found the old friends of
+the cause still faithful to it. It was remarkable, however, that the youth
+of the rising generation knew but little about the question. For the last
+eight or nine years the committee had not circulated any books; and the
+debates in the Commons during that time had not furnished them with the
+means of an adequate knowledge concerning it. When, however, I conversed
+with these, as I travelled along, I discovered a profound attention to what
+I said; an earnest desire to know more of the subject; and a generous
+warmth in favour of the injured Africans, which I foresaw could soon be
+turned into enthusiasm. Hence I perceived that the cause furnished us with
+endless sources of rallying; and that the ardour, which we had seen with so
+much admiration in former years, could be easily renewed.
+
+I had scarcely finished my journey, when Mr. Pitt died. This event took
+place in January 1806. I shall stop therefore to make a few observations
+upon his character, as it related to this cause. This I feel myself bound
+in justice to do, because his sincerity towards it has been generally
+questioned.
+
+The way, in which Mr. Pitt became acquainted with this question, has
+already been explained. A few doubts having been removed, when it was first
+started, he professed himself a friend to the abolition. The first proof,
+which he gave of his friendship to it is known but to few; but it is,
+nevertheless, true, that so early as in 1788, he occasioned a communication
+to be made to the French government, in which he recommended an union of
+the two countries for the promotion of the great measure. This proposition
+seemed to be then new and strange to the court of France; and the answer
+was not favourable.
+
+From this time his efforts were reduced within the boundaries of his own
+power.
+
+As far, however, as he had scope, he exerted them. If we look at him in his
+parliamentary capacity, it must be acknowledged by all, that he took an
+active, strenuous, and consistent part, and this year after year, by which
+he realized his professions. In my own private communications with him,
+which were frequent, he never failed to give proofs of a similar
+disposition. I had always free access to him. I had no previous note or
+letter to write for admission. Whatever papers I wanted, he ordered. He
+exhibited also in his conversation with me on these occasions marks of a
+more than ordinary interest in the welfare of the cause. Among the
+subjects, which were then started, there was one, which was always near his
+heart. This was the civilization of Africa. He looked upon this great work
+as a debt due to that continent for the many injuries we had inflicted upon
+it: and had the abolition succeeded sooner, as in the infancy of his
+exertions he had hoped, I know he had a plan, suited no doubt to the
+capaciousness of his own mind, for such establishments in Africa, as he
+conceived would promote in due time this important end.
+
+I believe it will be said, notwithstanding what I have advanced, that if
+Mr. Pitt had exerted himself as the minister of the country in behalf of
+the abolition, he could have carried it. This brings the matter to an
+issue; for unquestionably the charge of insincerity, as it related to this
+great question, arose from the mistaken notion, that, as his measures in
+parliament were supported by great majorities, he could do as he pleased
+there. But, they who hold this opinion, must be informed, that there were
+great difficulties, against which he had to struggle on this subject. The
+Lord Chancellor Thurlow ran counter to his wishes almost at the very
+outset. Lord Liverpool and Mr. Dundas did the same. Thus, to go no further,
+three of the most powerful members of the cabinet were in direct opposition
+to him. The abolition then, amidst this difference of opinion, could never
+become a cabinet measure; but if so, then all his parliamentary efforts in
+this case wanted their usual authority, and he could only exert his
+influence as a private man[A].
+
+[Footnote A: This he did with great effect on one or two occasions. On the
+motion of Mr. Cawthorne in 1791, the cause hung as it were by a thread; and
+would have failed that day, to my knowledge, but for his seasonable
+exertions.]
+
+But a difficulty, still more insuperable, presented itself, in an
+occurrence which took place in the year 1791, but which is much too
+delicate to be mentioned. The explanation of it, however, would convince
+the reader, that all the efforts of Mr. Pitt from that day were rendered
+useless, I mean as to bringing the question, as a minister of state, to a
+favourable issue.
+
+But though Mr. Pitt did not carry this great question, he was yet one of
+the greatest supporters of it. He fostered it in its infancy. If, in his
+public situation, he had then set his face against it, where would have
+been our hope? He upheld it also in its childhood; and though in this state
+of its existence it did not gain from his protection all the strength which
+it was expected it would have acquired, he yet kept it from falling, till
+his successors, in whose administration a greater number of favourable
+circumstances concurred to give it vigour, brought it to triumphant
+maturity.
+
+Lord Grenville and Mr. Fox, having been called to the head of the executive
+government on the death of Mr. Pitt, the cause was ushered into parliament
+under new auspices. In a former year His Majesty had issued a proclamation,
+by which British merchants were forbidden (with certain defined exceptions)
+to import slaves into the colonies, which had been conquered by the British
+arms in the course of the war. This circumstance afforded an opportunity of
+trying the question in the House of Commons with the greatest hope of
+success. Accordingly Sir A. Pigott, the attorney-general, as an officer of
+the crown; brought in a bill on the thirty-first of March 1806, the first
+object of which was, to give effect to the proclamation now mentioned. The
+second was, to prohibit British subjects from being engaged in importing
+slaves into the colonies of any foreign power, whether hostile or neutral.
+And the third was, to prohibit British subjects and British capital from
+being employed in carrying on a Slave-trade in foreign ships; and also to
+prevent the outfit of foreign ships from British ports.
+
+Sir A. Pigott, on the introduction of this bill, made an appropriate
+speech. The bill was supported by Mr. Fox, Sir William Yonge, Mr. Brook,
+and Mr. Bagwell; but opposed by Generals Tarleton and Gascoyne, Mr. Rose,
+Sir Robert Peele, and Sir Charles Price. On the third reading a division
+being called for, there appeared for it thirty-five, and against it only
+thirteen.
+
+On the seventh of May it was introduced into the Lords. The supporters of
+it there were, the Duke of Gloucester, Lord Grenville, the Bishops of
+London and St. Asaph, the Earl of Buckinghamshire, and the Lords Holland,
+Lauderdale, Auckland, Sidmouth, and Ellenborough. The opposers were, the
+Dukes of Clarence and Sussex, the Marquis of Sligo, the Earl of
+Westmoreland, and the Lords Eldon and Sheffield. At length a division took
+place, when there appeared to be in favour of it forty-three, and against
+it eighteen.
+
+During the discussions, to which this bill gave birth, Lord Grenville and
+Mr. Fox declared in substance, in their respective Houses of Parliament,
+that they felt the question of the Slave-trade to be one, which involved
+the dearest interests of humanity, and the most urgent claims of policy,
+justice, and religion; and that, should they succeed in effecting its
+abolition, they would regard that success as entailing more true glory on
+their administration, and more honour and advantage on their country, than
+any other measure, in which they could be engaged. The bill having passed
+(the first, which dismembered this cruel trade,) it was thought proper to
+follow it up in a prudent manner; and, as there was not then time in the
+advanced period of the session to bring in another for the total extinction
+of it, to move a resolution, by which both Houses should record those
+principles, on which the propriety of the latter measure was founded. It
+was judged also expedient that Mr. Fox, as the prime minister in the House
+of Commons, should introduce it there.
+
+On the tenth of June Mr. Fox rose. He began by saying that the motion, with
+which he should conclude, would tend in its consequences to effect the
+total abolition of the Slave-trade; and he confessed that, since he had sat
+in that House (a period of between thirty and forty years), if he had done
+nothing else, but had only been instrumental in carrying through this
+measure, he should think his life well spent; and should retire quite
+satisfied, that he had not lived in vain.
+
+In adverting to the principle of the trade, he noticed some strong
+expressions of Mr. Burke concerning it. "To deal in human flesh and blood,"
+said that great man, "or to deal, not in the labour of men, but in men
+themselves, was to devour the root, instead of enjoying the fruit of human
+diligence."
+
+Mr. Fox then took a view of the opinions of different members of the House
+on this great question; and showed that, though many had opposed the
+abolition, all but two or three, among whom were the members for Liverpool,
+had confessed, that the trade ought to be done away. He then went over the
+different resolutions of the House on the subject, and concluded from
+thence, that they were bound to support his motion.
+
+He combated the argument, that the abolition would ruin the West-Indian
+Islands. In doing this he paid a handsome compliment to the memory of Mr.
+Pitt, whose speech upon this particular point was, he said, the most
+powerful and convincing of any he had ever heard. Indeed they, who had not
+heard it, could have no notion of it. It was a speech, of which he would
+say with the Roman author, reciting the words of the Athenian orator, "Quid
+esset, si ipsum audivissetis!" It was a speech no less remarkable for
+splendid eloquence, than for solid sense and convincing reason; supported
+by calculations founded on facts, and conclusions drawn from premises, as
+correctly as if they had been mathematical propositions; all tending to
+prove that, instead of the West Indian plantations suffering an injury,
+they would derive a material benefit by the abolition of the Slave-trade.
+He then called upon the friends of this great man to show their respect for
+his memory by their votes; and he concluded with moving, "that this House,
+considering the African Slave-trade to be contrary to the principles of
+justice, humanity, and policy, will, with all practicable expedition, take
+effectual measures for the abolition of the said trade, in such a manner,
+and at such a period, as may be deemed advisable."
+
+Sir Ralph Milbank rose, and seconded the motion.
+
+General Tarleton rose next. He deprecated the abolition, on account of the
+effect which it would have on the trade and revenue of the country.
+
+Mr. Francis said the merchants of Liverpool were at liberty to ask for
+compensation; but he, for one, would never grant it for the loss of a
+trade, which had been declared to be contrary to humanity and justice. As
+an uniform friend to this great cause, he wished Mr. Fox had not introduced
+a resolution, but a real bill for the abolition of the Slave-trade. He
+believed that both Houses were then disposed to do it away. He wished the
+golden opportunity might not be lost.
+
+Lord Castlereagh thought it a proposition, on which no one could entertain
+a doubt, that the Slave-trade was a great evil in itself; and that it was
+the duty and policy of Parliament to extirpate it; but he did not think the
+means offered were adequate to the end proposed. The abolition, as a
+political question, was a difficult one. The year 1796 had been once fixed
+upon by the House, as the period when the trade was to cease; but, when the
+time arrived, the resolution was not executed. This was a proof, either
+that the House did not wish for the event, or that they judged it
+impracticable. It would be impossible, he said, to get other nations to
+concur in the measure; and, even if they were to concur, it could not be
+effected. We might restrain the subjects of the parent-state from following
+the trade; but we could not those in our colonies. A hundred frauds would
+be committed by those, which we could not detect. He did not mean by this,
+that the evil was to go on for ever. Had a wise plan been proposed at
+first, it might have been half-cured by this time. The present resolution
+would do no good. It was vague, indefinite, and unintelligible. Such
+resolutions were only the Slave-merchants' harvests. They would go for more
+slaves than usual in the interim. He should have advised a system of duties
+on fresh importations of slaves, progressively increasing to a certain
+extent; and that the amount of these duties should be given to the
+planters, as a bounty to encourage the Negro-population upon their estates.
+Nothing could be done, unless we went hand in hand with the latter. But he
+should deliver himself more fully on this subject, when any thing specific
+should be brought forward in the shape of a bill.
+
+Sir S. Romilly, the solicitor-general, differed from Lord Castlereagh; for
+he thought the resolution of Mr. Fox was very simple and intelligible. If
+there was a proposition vague and indefinite, it was that, advanced by the
+noble lord, of a system of duties on fresh importations, rising
+progressively, and this under the patronage and cooperation of the
+planters. Who could measure the space between the present time and the
+abolition of the trade, if that measure were to depend upon the approbation
+of the colonies?
+
+The cruelty and injustice of the Slave-trade had been established by
+evidence beyond a doubt. It had been shown to be carried on by rapine,
+robbery, and murder; by fomenting and encouraging wars; by false
+accusations; and imaginary crimes. The unhappy victims were torn away not
+only in the time of war, but of profound peace. They were then carried
+across the Atlantic, in a manner too horrible to describe; and afterwards
+subjected to eternal slavery. In support of the continuance of such a
+traffic, he knew of nothing but assertions already disproved, and arguments
+already refuted. Since the year 1796, when it was to cease by a resolution
+of Parliament, no less than three hundred and sixty thousand Africans had
+been torn away from their native land. What an accumulation was this to our
+former guilt!
+
+General Gascoyne made two extraordinary assertions: First, that the trade
+was defensible on Scriptural ground.--"Both thy bondmen and thy bondmaids,
+which thou shalt have, shall be of the heathen, that are round about thee;
+of them shall you have bondmen and bondmaids. And thou shalt take them as
+an heritance for thy children after thee to inherit them for a possession;
+they shall be thy bondmen for ever." Secondly, that the trade had been so
+advantageous to this country, that it would have been advisable even to
+institute a new one, if the old had not existed.
+
+Mr. Wilberforce replied to General Gascoyne. He then took a view of the
+speech of Lord Castlereagh, which he answered point by point. In the course
+of his observations he showed, that the system of duties progressively
+increasing, as proposed by the noble lord, would be one of the most
+effectual modes of perpetuating the Slave-trade. He exposed also the false
+foundation of the hope of any reliance on the cooperation of the colonists.
+The House, he said, had on the motion of Mr. Ellis in the year 1797, prayed
+His Majesty to consult with the colonial legislatures to take such
+measures, as might conduce to the gradual abolition of the African
+Slave-trade. This address was transmitted to them by Lord Melville. It was
+received in some of the islands with a declaration, "that they possibly
+might, in some instances, endeavour to improve the condition of their
+slaves; but they should do this, not with any view to the abolition of the
+Slave-trade; for they considered that trade as their birth-right, which
+could not be taken from them; and that we should deceive ourselves by
+supposing, that they would agree to such a measure." He desired to add to
+this the declaration of General Prevost in his public letter from Dominica.
+Did he not say, when asked what steps had been taken there in consequence
+of the resolution of the House in 1797, "that the act of the legislature,
+entitled an act for the encouragement, protection, and better government of
+slaves, appeared to him to have been considered, from the day it was passed
+until this hour, as a political measure to avert the interference of the
+mother-country in the management of the slaves."
+
+Sir William Yonge censured the harsh language of Sir Samuel Romilly, who
+had applied the terms rapine, robbery, and murder to those, who were
+connected with the Slave-trade. He considered the resolution of Mr. Fox as
+a prelude to a bill for the abolition of that traffic, and this bill as a
+prelude to emancipation, which would not only be dangerous in itself, but
+would change the state of property in the islands.
+
+Lord Henry Petty, after having commented on the speeches of Sir S. Romilly
+and Lord Castlereagh, proceeded to state his own opinion on the trade;
+which was, that it was contrary to justice, humanity, and sound policy, all
+of which he considered to be inseparable. On its commencement in Africa the
+wickedness began. It produced there fraud and violence, robbery and murder.
+It gave birth to false accusations, and a mockery of justice. It was the
+parent of every crime, which could at once degrade and afflict the human
+race. After spreading vice and misery all over this continent, it doomed
+its unhappy victims to hardships and cruelties which were worse than death.
+The first of these was conspicuous in their transportation. It was found
+there, that cruelty begat cruelty; that the system, wicked in its
+beginning, was equally so in its progress; and that it perpetuated its
+miseries wherever it was carried on. Nor was it baneful only to the
+objects, but to the promoters of it. The loss of British seamen in this
+traffic was enormous. One fifth of all, who were employed in it, perished;
+that is, they became the victims of a system, which was founded on fraud,
+robbery, and murder; and which procured to the British nation nothing but
+the execration of mankind. Nor had we yet done with the evils, which
+attended it; for it brought in its train the worst of all moral effects,
+not only as it respected the poor slaves, when transported to the colonies,
+but as it respected those, who had concerns with them there. The arbitrary
+power, which it conferred, afforded men of bad dispositions full scope for
+the exercise of their passions; and it rendered men, constitutionally of
+good dispositions, callous to the misery of others. Thus it depraved the
+nature of all, who were connected with it. These considerations had made
+him a friend to the abolition from the time he was capable of reasoning
+upon it. They were considerations also, which determined the House in the
+year 1782 to adopt a measure of the same kind as the present. Had any thing
+happened to change the opinion of members since? On the contrary, they had
+now the clearest evidence, that all the arguments then used against the
+abolition were fallacious; being founded not upon truth, but on assertions
+devoid of all truth, and derived from ignorance or prejudice.
+
+Having made these remarks, he proved by a number of facts the folly of the
+argument, that the Africans laboured under such a total degradation of
+mental and moral faculties, that they were made for slavery.
+
+He then entered into the great subject of population. He showed that in all
+countries, where there were no unnatural hardships, mankind would support
+themselves. He applied this reasoning to the Negro-population in the West
+Indies; which he maintained could not only be kept up, but increased,
+without any further importations from Africa.
+
+He then noticed the observations of Sir W. Yonge on the words of Sir S.
+Romilly; and desired him to reserve his indignation for those, who were
+guilty of acts of rapine, robbery, and murder, instead of venting it on
+those, who only did their duty in describing them. Never were accounts more
+shocking than those lately sent to government from the West Indies. Lord
+Seaforth, and the Attorney-general, could not refrain, in explaining them,
+from the use of the words murder and torture. And did it become members of
+that House (in order to accommodate the nerves of the friends of the
+Slave-trade) to soften down their expressions, when they were speaking on
+that subject; and to desist from calling that murder and torture, for which
+a governor, and the attorney-general, of one of the islands could find no
+better name?
+
+After making observations relative to the cooperation of foreign powers in
+this great work, he hoped that the House would not suffer itself to be
+drawn, either by opposition or by ridicule, to the right or to the left;
+but that it would, advance straight forward to the accomplishment of the
+most magnanimous act of justice, that was ever achieved by any legislature
+in the world.
+
+Mr. Rose declared, that on the very first promulgation of this question, he
+had proposed to the friends of it the very plan of his noble friend Lord
+Castlereagh; namely, a system of progressive duties, and of bounties for
+the promotion of the Negro-population. This he said to show that he was
+friendly to the principle of the measure. He would now observe, that he did
+not wholly like the present resolution. It was too indefinite. He wished
+also, that something had been said on the subject of compensation. He was
+fearful also, lest the abolition should lead to the dangerous change of
+emancipation. The Negros, he said, could not be in a better state, or more
+faithful to their masters, than they were. In three attacks made by the
+enemy on Dominica, where he had a large property, arms had been put into
+their hands; and every one of them had exerted himself faithfully. With
+respect to the cruel acts in Barbadoes, an account of which had been sent
+to government by Lord Seaforth and the Attorney-general of Barbadoes, he
+had read them; and never had he read any thing on this subject with more
+horror. He would agree to the strongest measures for the prevention of such
+acts in future. He would even give up the colony, which should refuse to
+make the wilful murder of a slave felony. But as to the other, or common,
+evils complained of, he thought the remedy should be gradual; and such also
+as the planters would concur in. He would nevertheless not oppose the
+present resolution.
+
+Mr. Barham considered compensation but reasonable, where losses were to
+accrue from the measure, when it should be put in execution; but he
+believed that the amount of it would be much less than was apprehended. He
+considered emancipation, though so many fears had been expressed about it,
+as forming no objection to the abolition, though he had estates in the West
+Indies himself. Such a measure, if it could be accomplished successfully,
+would be an honour to the country, and a blessing to the planters; but
+preparation must be made for it by rendering the slaves fit for freedom,
+and by creating in them an inclination to free labour. Such a change could
+only be the work of time.
+
+Sir John Newport said that the expressions of Sir S. Romilly, which had
+given such offence, had been used by others; and would be used with
+propriety, while the trade lasted. Some slave-dealers of Liverpool had
+lately attempted to prejudice certain merchants of Ireland in their favour.
+But none of their representations answered; and it was remarkable, that the
+reply made to them was in these words. "We will have no share in a traffic,
+consisting in rapine, blood, and murder." He then took a survey of a system
+of duties progressively increasing, and showed, that it would be utterly
+inefficient; and that there was no real remedy for the different evils
+complained of, but in the immediate prohibition of the trade.
+
+Mr. Canning renewed his professions of friendship to the cause. He did not
+like the present resolution; yet he would vote for it. He should have been
+better pleased with a bill, which would strike at once at the root of this
+detestable commerce.
+
+Mr. Manning wished the question to be deferred to the next session. He
+hoped, compensation would then be brought forward as connected with it.
+Nothing, however, effectual could be done without the concurrence of the
+planters.
+
+Mr. William Smith noticed, in a striking manner, the different
+inconsistencies in the arguments of those, who contended for the
+continuance of the trade.
+
+Mr. Windham deprecated not only the Slave-trade, but slavery also. They
+were essentially connected with each other. They were both evils, and ought
+both of them to be done away. Indeed, if emancipation would follow the
+abolition, he should like the latter measure the better. Rapine, robbery,
+and murder were the true characteristics of this traffic. The same epithets
+had not indeed been applied to slavery, because this was a condition, in
+which some part of the human race had been at every period of the history
+of the world. It was, however, a state, which ought not to be allowed to
+exist. But, notwithstanding all these confessions, he should weigh well the
+consequences of the abolition before he gave it his support. It would be on
+a balance between the evils themselves and the consequences of removing
+them, that he should decide for himself on this question.
+
+Mr. Fox took a view of all the arguments, which had been advanced by the
+opponents of the abolition; and having given an appropriate answer to each,
+the House divided, when there appeared for the resolution one hundred and
+fourteen, and against it but fifteen.
+
+Immediately after this division Mr. Wilberforce moved an address to His
+Majesty, "praying that he would be graciously pleased, to direct a
+negotiation to be entered into, by which foreign powers should be invited
+to cooperate with His Majesty in measures to be adopted for the abolition
+of the African Slave-trade."
+
+This address was carried without a division. It was also moved and carried,
+that "these resolutions be communicated to the Lords; and that their
+concurrence should be desired therein."
+
+On the twenty-fourth of June the Lords met to consider of the resolution
+and address. The Earl of Westmoreland proposed, that both counsel and
+evidence should be heard against them; but his proposition was overruled.
+
+Lord Grenville then read the resolution of the Commons. This resolution, he
+said, stated first, that the Slave-trade was contrary to humanity, justice,
+and sound policy. That it was contrary to humanity was obvious; for
+humanity might be said to be sympathy for the distress of others, or a
+desire to accomplish benevolent ends by good means. But did not the
+Slave-trade convey ideas the very reverse of this definition? It deprived
+men of all those Comforts, in which it pleased the Creator to make the
+happiness of his creatures to consist,--of the blessings of society,--of
+the charities of the dear relationships of husband, wife, father, son, and
+kindred,--of the due discharge of the relative duties of these,--and of
+that freedom, which in its pure and natural sense was one of the greatest
+gifts of God to man.
+
+It was impossible to read the evidence, as it related to this trade,
+without acknowledging the inhumanity of it, and our own disgrace. By what
+means was it kept up in Africa? By wars instigated, not by the passions of
+the natives, but by our avarice. He knew it would be said in reply to this,
+that the slaves, who were purchased by us, would be put to death, if we
+were not to buy them. But what should we say, if it should turn out, that
+we were the causes of those very cruelties, which we affected to prevent?
+But, if it were not so, ought the first nation in the world to condescend
+to be the executioner of savages?
+
+Another way of keeping up the Slave-trade was by the practice of
+man-stealing. The evidence was particularly clear upon this head. This
+practice included violence, and often bloodshed. The inhumanity of it
+therefore could not be doubted.
+
+The unhappy victims, being thus procured, were conveyed, he said, across
+the Atlantic in a manner which justified the charge of inhumanity again.
+Indeed the suffering here was so great, that neither the mind could
+conceive nor the tongue describe it. He had said on a former occasion, that
+in their transportation there was a greater portion of misery condensed
+within a smaller space, than had ever existed in the known world. He would
+repeat his words; for he did not know, how he could express himself better
+on the subject. And, after all these horrors, what was their destiny? It
+was such, as justified the charge in the resolution again: for, after
+having survived the sickness arising from the passage, they were doomed to
+interminable slavery.
+
+We had been, he said, so much accustomed to words, descriptive of the
+cruelty of this traffic, that we had almost forgotten their meaning. He
+wished that some person, educated as an Englishman, with suitable powers of
+eloquence, but now for the first time informed of all the horrors of it,
+were to address their lordships upon it, and he was sure, that they would
+instantly determine that it should cease. But the continuance of it had
+rendered cruelty familiar to us; and the recital of its horrors had been so
+frequent, that we could now hear them stated without being affected as we
+ought to be. He intreated their lordships, however, to endeavour to
+conceive the hard case of the unhappy victims of it; and as he had led them
+to the last stage of their miserable existence, which was in the colonies,
+to contemplate it there. They were there under the arbitrary will of a
+cruel task-master from morning till night. When they went to rest, would
+not their dreams be frightful? When they awoke, would they not awake,
+
+          ----"only to discover sights of woe,
+  Regions of sorrow, doleful shades, where peace
+  And rest can never dwell, hope never comes
+  That comes to all; but torture without end
+  Still urges?"----
+
+They knew no change, except in the humour of their masters, to whom their
+whole destiny was entrusted. We might perhaps flatter ourselves with
+saying, that they were subject to the will of Englishmen. But Englishmen
+were not better than others, when in possession of arbitrary power. The
+very fairest exercise of it was a never-failing corrupter of the heart. But
+suppose it were allowed, that self-interest might operate some little
+against cruelty; yet where was the interest of the overseer or the driver?
+But he knew it would be said, that the evils complained of in the colonies
+had been mitigated. There might be instances of this; but they could never
+be cured, while slavery existed. Slavery took away more than half of the
+human character. Hence the practice, where it existed, of rejecting the
+testimony of the slave: but, if his testimony was rejected, where could be
+his redress against his oppressor?
+
+Having shown the inhumanity, he would proceed to the second point in the
+resolution, or the injustice, of the trade. We had two ideas of justice,
+first, as it belonged to society by virtue of a social compact; and,
+secondly, as it belonged to men, not as citizens of a community, but as
+beings of one common nature. In a state of nature, man had a right to the
+fruit of his own labour absolutely to himself; and one of the main
+purposes, for which he entered into society, was, that he might be better
+protected in the possession of his rights. In both cases therefore it was
+manifestly unjust, that a man should be made to labour during the whole of
+his life, and yet have no benefit from his labour. Hence the Slave-trade
+and the Colonial slavery were a violation of the very principle, upon which
+all law for the protection of property was founded. Whatever benefit was
+derived from that trade to an individual, it was derived from dishonour and
+dishonesty. He forced from the unhappy victim of it that, which the latter
+did not wish to give him; and he gave to the same victim that, which he in
+vain attempted to show was an equivalent to the thing he took, it being a
+thing for which there was no equivalent; and which, if he had not obtained
+by force, he would not have possessed at all. Nor could there be any answer
+to this reasoning, unless it could be proved, that it had pleased God to
+give to the inhabitants of Britain a property in the liberty and life of
+the natives of Africa. But he would go further on this subject. The
+injustice complained of was not confined to the bare circumstance of
+robbing them of the right to their own labour. It was conspicuous
+throughout the system. They, who bought them, became guilty of all the
+crimes which had been committed in procuring them; and, when they possessed
+them, of all the crimes which belonged to their inhuman treatment. The
+injustice in the latter case amounted frequently to murder. For what was it
+but murder to pursue a practice, which produced untimely death to thousands
+of innocent and helpless beings? It was a duty, which their lordships owed
+to their Creator, if they hoped for mercy, to do away this monstrous
+oppression.
+
+With respect to the impolicy of the trade (the third point in the
+resolution), he would say at once, that whatever was inhuman and unjust
+must be impolitic. He had, however, no objection to argue the point upon
+its own particular merits; and, first, he would observe, that a great man,
+Mr. Pitt, now no more, had exerted his vast powers on many subjects to the
+admiration of his hearers; but on none more successfully than on the
+subject of the abolition of the Slave-trade. He proved, after making an
+allowance for the price paid for the slaves in the West Indies, for the
+loss of them in the seasoning, and for the expense of maintaining them
+afterwards, and comparing these particulars with the amount in value of
+their labour there, that the evils endured by the victims of the traffic
+were no gain to the master, in whose service they took place. Indeed Mr.
+Long had laid it down in his History of Jamaica, that the best way to
+secure the planters from ruin would be to do that, which the resolution
+recommended. It was notorious, that when any planter was in distress, and
+sought to relieve himself by increasing the labour on his estate by means
+of the purchase of new slaves, the measure invariably tended to his
+destruction. What then was the importation of fresh Africans but a system,
+tending to the general ruin of the islands?
+
+But it had often been said, that without fresh importations the population
+of the slaves could not be supported in the islands. This, however, was a
+mistake. It had arisen from reckoning the deaths of the imported Africans,
+of whom so many were lost in the seasoning, among the deaths of the
+Creole-slaves. He did not mean to say, that under the existing degree of
+misery the population would greatly increase; but he would maintain, that,
+if the deaths and the births were calculated upon those, who were either
+born, or who had been a long time in the islands, so as to be considered as
+natives, it would be found that the population had not only been kept up,
+but that it had been increased.
+
+If it was true, that the labour of a free man was cheaper than that of a
+slave; and also that the labour of a long imported slave was cheaper than
+that of a fresh imported one; and again, that the chances of mortality were
+much more numerous among the newly imported slaves in the West Indies, than
+among those of old standing there (propositions, which he took to be
+established), we should see new arguments for the impolicy of the trade.
+
+It might be stated also, that the importation of vast bodies of men, who
+had been robbed of their rights, and grievously irritated on that account,
+into our colonies (where their miserable condition opened new sources of
+anger and revenge), was the importation only of the seeds of insurrection
+into them. And here he could not but view with astonishment the reasoning
+of the West Indian planters, who held up the example of St. Domingo as a
+warning against the abolition of the Slave-trade; because the continuance
+of it was one of the great causes of the insurrections and subsequent
+miseries in that devoted island. Let us but encourage importations in the
+same rapid progression of increase every year, which took place in St.
+Domingo, and we should witness the same effect in our own islands.
+
+To expose the impolicy of the trade further, he would observe, that it was
+an allowed axiom, that as the condition of man was improved, he became more
+useful. The history of our own country, in very early times, exhibited
+instances of internal slavery, and this to a considerable extent. But we
+should find that precisely in proportion as that slavery was ameliorated,
+the power and prosperity of the country flourished. This was exactly
+applicable to the case in question. There could be no general amelioration
+of slavery in the West Indies, while the Slave-trade lasted: but, if we
+were to abolish it, we should make it the interest of every owner of slaves
+to do that, which would improve their condition; and which indeed would
+lead ultimately to the annihilation of slavery itself. This great event,
+however, could not be accomplished at once. It could only be effected in a
+course of time.
+
+It would be endless, he said, to go into all the cases, which would
+manifest the impolicy of this odious traffic. Inhuman as it was, unjust as
+it was, he believed it to be equally impolitic; and if their lordships
+should be of this opinion also, he hoped they would agree to that part of
+the resolution, in which these truths were expressed. With respect to the
+other part of it, or that they would proceed to abolish the trade, he
+observed, that neither the time nor the manner of doing it were specified.
+Hence if any of them should differ as to these particulars, they might yet
+vote for the resolution; as they were not pledged to any thing definite in
+these respects; provided they thought that the trade should be abolished at
+some time or other; and he did not believe, that there was any one of them,
+who would sanction its continuance for ever.
+
+Lord Hawkesbury said, that he did not mean to discuss the question on the
+ground of justice and humanity, as contradistinguished from sound policy.
+If it could fairly be made out, that the African Slave-trade was contrary
+to justice and humanity, it ought to be abolished. It did not, however,
+follow, because a great evil subsisted, that therefore it should be
+removed; for it might be comparatively a less evil, than that which would
+accompany the attempt to remove it. The noble lord, who had just spoken,
+had exemplified this: for though slavery was a great evil in itself, he was
+of opinion, that it could not be done away but in a course of time.
+
+A state of slavery, he said, had existed in Africa from the earliest time;
+and, unless other nations would concur with England in the measure of the
+abolition, we could not change it for the better.
+
+Slavery had existed also throughout all Europe. It had now happily in a
+great measure been done away. But how? Not by acts of parliament; for these
+might have retarded the event; but by the progress of civilization, which
+removed the evil in a gradual and rational manner.
+
+He then went over the same ground of argument, as when a member of the
+Commons in 1792. He said that the inhumanity of the abolition was visible
+in this, that not one slave less would be taken from Africa; and that such,
+as were taken from it, would suffer more than they did now, in the hands of
+foreigners. He maintained also, as before, that the example of St. Domingo
+afforded one of the strongest arguments against the abolition of the trade.
+And he concluded by objecting to the resolution, inasmuch as it could do no
+good; for the substance of it would be to be discussed again in a future
+session.
+
+The Bishop of London (Dr. Porteus) began by noticing the concession of the
+last speaker, namely, that, if the trade was contrary to humanity and
+justice, it ought to be abolished. He expected, he said, that the noble
+lord would have proved, that it was not contrary to these great principles,
+before he had supported its continuance; but not a word had he said to
+show, that the basis of the resolution in these respects was false. It
+followed then, he thought, that as the noble lord had not disproved the
+premises, he was bound to abide by the conclusion.
+
+The ways, he said, in which the Africans were reduced to slavery in their
+own country, were by wars, many of which were excited for the purpose; by
+the breaking up of villages; by kidnapping; and by convictions for a
+violation of their own laws. Of the latter class many were accused falsely,
+and of crimes which did not exist. He then read a number of extracts from
+the evidence examined before the privy council, and from the histories of
+those, who, having lived in Africa, had thrown light upon this subject,
+before the question was agitated. All these, he said, (and similar
+instances could be multiplied,) proved the truth of the resolution, that
+the African Slave-trade was contrary to the principles of humanity,
+justice, and sound policy.
+
+It was moreover, he said, contrary to the principles of the religion we
+professed. It was not superfluous to say this, when it had been so
+frequently asserted, that it was sanctioned both by the Jewish and the
+Christian dispensations. With respect to the Jews he would observe, that
+there was no such thing as perpetual slavery among them. Their slaves were
+of two kinds, those of their own nation, and those from the country round
+about them. The former were to be set free on the seventh year; and the
+rest, of whatever nation, on the fiftieth, or on the year of Jubilee. With
+respect to the Christian dispensation, it was a libel to say, that it
+countenanced such a traffic. It opposed it both in its spirit and in its
+principle. Nay, it opposed it positively; for it classed men-stealers, or
+slave-traders, among the murderers of fathers and mothers and the most
+profane criminals upon earth.
+
+The antiquity of slavery in Africa, which the noble lord had glanced at,
+afforded, he said, no argument for its continuance. Such a mode of defence
+would prevent for ever the removal of any evil. It would justify the
+practice of the Chinese, who exposed their infants in the streets to
+perish. It would also justify piracy; for that practice existed long before
+we knew any thing of the African Slave-trade.
+
+He then combated the argument, that we did a kindness to the Africans by
+taking them from their homes; and concluded, by stating to their lordships,
+that, if they refused to sanction the resolution, they would establish
+these principles, "that though individuals might not rob and murder, yet
+that nations might--that though individuals incurred the penalties of death
+by such practices, yet that bodies of men might commit them with impunity
+for the purposes of lucre,--and that for such purposes they were not only
+to be permitted, but encouraged."
+
+The Lord Chancellor (Erskine) confessed, that he was not satisfied with his
+own conduct on this subject. He acknowledged with deep contrition, that,
+during the time he was a member of the other House, he had not once
+attended, when this great question was discussed.
+
+In the West Indies he could say personally, that the slaves were well
+treated, where he had an opportunity of seeing them. But no judgement was
+to be formed there with respect to the evils complained of. They must be
+appreciated as they existed in the trade. Of these he had also been an
+eye-witness. It was on this account that he felt contrition for not having
+attended the House on this subject; for there were some cruelties in this
+traffic which the human imagination could not aggravate. He had witnessed
+such scenes over the whole coast of Africa: and he could say, that, if
+their lordships could only have a sudden glimpse of them, they would be
+struck with horror; and would be astonished, that they could ever have been
+permitted to exist. What then would they say to their continuance year
+after year, and from age to age?
+
+From information, which he could not dispute, he was warranted in saying,
+that on this continent husbands were fraudulently and forcibly severed from
+their wives, and parents from their children; and that all the ties of
+blood and affection were torn up by the roots. He had himself seen the
+unhappy natives put together in heaps in the hold of a ship, where, with
+every possible attention to them, their situation must have been
+intolerable. He had also heard proved, in courts of justice, facts still
+more dreadful than those which he had seen. One of these he would just
+mention. The slaves on board a certain ship rose in a mass to liberate
+themselves; and having advanced far in the pursuit of their object, it
+became necessary to repel them by force. Some of them yielded; some of them
+were killed in the scuffle; but many of them actually jumped into the sea
+and were drowned; thus preferring death to the misery of their situation;
+while others hung to the ship, repenting of their rashness, and bewailing
+with frightful noises their horrid fate. Thus the whole vessel exhibited
+but one hideous scene of wretchedness. They, who were subdued, and secured
+in chains, were seized with the flux, which carried many of them off. These
+things were proved in a trial before a British jury, which had to consider,
+whether this was a loss, which fell within the policy of insurance, the
+slaves being regarded as if they had been only a cargo of dead matter. He
+could mention other instances, but they were much too shocking to be
+described. Surely their lordships could never consider such a traffic to be
+consistent with humanity or justice. It was impossible.
+
+That the trade had long subsisted there was no doubt; but this was no
+argument for its continuance. Many evils of much longer standing had been
+done away; and it was always our duty to attempt to remove them. Should we
+not exult in the consideration, that we, the inhabitants of a small island,
+at the extremity of the globe, almost at its north pole, were become the
+morning-star to enlighten the nations of the earth, and to conduct them out
+of the shades of darkness into the realms of light; thus exhibiting to an
+astonished and an admiring world the blessings of a free constitution? Let
+us then not allow such a glorious opportunity to escape us.
+
+It had been urged that we should suffer by the abolition of the
+Slave-trade. He believed we should not suffer. He believed that our duty
+and our interest were inseparable: and he had no difficulty in saying, in
+the face of the world, that his own opinion was, that the interests of a
+nation would be best preserved by its adherence to the principles of
+humanity, justice, and religion.
+
+The Earl of Westmoreland said, that the African Slave-trade might be
+contrary to humanity and justice, and yet it might be politic; at least, it
+might be inconsistent with humanity, and yet be not inconsistent with
+justice: this was the case, when we executed a criminal, or engaged in war.
+
+It was, however, not contrary to justice; for justice in this case must be
+measured by the law of nations. But the purchase of slaves was not contrary
+to this law. The Slave-trade was a trade with the consent of the
+inhabitants of two nations, and procured by no terror, nor by any act of
+violence whatever. Slavery had existed from the first ages of the world,
+not only in Africa, but throughout the habitable globe; among the Persians,
+Greeks, and Romans; and he could compare, with great advantage to his
+argument, the wretched condition of the slaves in these ancient states with
+that of those in our colonies. Slavery too had been allowed in a nation,
+which was under the especial direction of Providence. The Jews were allowed
+to hold the heathen in bondage. He admitted, that what the learned prelate
+had said relative to the emancipation of the latter in the year of jubilee
+was correct; but he denied that his quotation relative to the stealers of
+men referred to the Christian religion. It was a mere allusion to that,
+which was done contrary to the law of nations, which was the only measure
+of justice between states.
+
+With respect to the inhumanity of the trade, he would observe, that if
+their lordships, sitting there as legislators, were to set their faces
+against every thing which appeared to be inhuman, much of the security on
+which their lives and property depended, might be shaken, if not totally
+destroyed. The question was, not whether there was not some evil attending
+the Slave-trade, but whether by the measure now before them they should
+increase or diminish the quantum of human misery in the world. He believed,
+for one, considering the internal state of Africa, and the impossibility of
+procuring the concurrence of foreign nations in the measure, that they
+would not be able to do any good by the adoption of it.
+
+As to the impolicy of the trade, the policy of it, on the other hand, was
+so great, that he trembled at the consequences of its abolition. The
+property connected with this question amounted to a hundred millions. The
+annual produce of the islands was eighteen millions, and it yielded a
+revenue of four millions annually. How was this immense property and income
+to be preserved? Some had said it would be preserved, because the Black
+population in the islands could be kept up without further supplies. But
+the planters denied this assertion; and they were the best judges of the
+subject.
+
+He condemned the resolution as a libel upon the wisdom of the law of the
+land, and upon the conduct of their ancestors. He condemned it also,
+because, if followed up, it would lead to the abolition of the trade, and
+the abolition of the trade to the emancipation of the slaves in our
+colonies.
+
+The Bishop of St. Asaph (Dr. Horsley) said, that, allowing the slaves in
+the West Indies even to be pampered with delicacies, or to be put to rest
+on a bed of roses, they could not be happy, for--a slave would be still a
+slave. The question, however, was not concerning the alteration of their
+condition, but whether we should abolish the practice, by which they were
+put in that condition? Whether it was humane, just, and politic in us so to
+place them? This question was easily answered; for he found it difficult to
+form any one notion of humanity, which did not include a desire of
+promoting the happiness of others; and he knew of no other justice than
+that, which was founded on the principle of doing to others, as we should
+wish they should do to us. And these principles of humanity and justice
+were so clear, that he found it difficult to make them clearer. Perhaps no
+difficulty was greater than that of arguing a self-evident proposition, and
+such he took to be the character of the proposition, that the Slave-trade
+was inhuman and unjust.
+
+It had been said, that slavery had existed from the beginning of the world.
+He would allow it. But had such a trade as the Slave-trade ever existed
+before? Would the noble Earl, who had talked of the slavery of ancient Rome
+and Greece, assert, that in the course of his whole reading, however
+profound it might have been, he had found any thing resembling such a
+traffic? Where did it appear in history, that ships were regularly fitted
+out to fetch away tens of thousands of persons annually, against their
+will, from their native land; that these were subject to personal
+indignities and arbitrary punishments during their transportation; and that
+a certain proportion of them, owing to suffocation and other cruel causes,
+uniformly perished? He averred, that nothing like the African Slave-trade
+was ever practised in any nation upon earth.
+
+If the trade then was repugnant, as he maintained it was, to justice and
+humanity, he did not see how, without aiding and abetting injustice and
+inhumanity, any man could sanction it: and he thought that the noble baron
+(Hawkesbury) was peculiarly bound to support the resolution; for he had
+admitted that if it could be shown, that the trade was contrary to these
+principles, the question would be at an end. Now this contrariety had been
+made apparent, and his lordship had not even attempted to refute it.
+
+He would say but little on the subject of revealed religion, as it related
+to this question, because the reverend prelate, near him, had spoken so
+fully upon it. He might observe, however, that at the end of the sixth
+year, when the Hebrew slave was emancipated, he was to be furnished
+liberally from the flock, the floor, and the wine-press of his master.
+
+Lord Holland lamented the unfaithfulness of the noble baron (Hawkesbury) to
+his own principles, and the inflexible opposition of the noble earl
+(Westmoreland), from both which circumstances he despaired for ever of any
+assistance from them to this glorious cause. The latter wished to hear
+evidence on the subject, for the purpose, doubtless, of delay. He was sure,
+that the noble earl did not care what the evidence would say on either
+side; for his mind was made up, that the trade ought not to be abolished.
+
+The noble earl had made a difference between humanity, justice, and sound
+policy. God forbid, that we should ever admit such distinctions in this
+country! But he had gone further, and said, that a thing might be inhuman,
+and yet not unjust; and he put the case of the execution of a criminal in
+support of it. Did he not by this position confound all notions of right
+and wrong in human institutions? When a criminal was justly executed, was
+not the execution justice to him who suffered, and humanity to the body of
+the people at large?
+
+The noble earl had said also, that we should do no good by the abolition,
+because other nations would not concur in it. He did not know what other
+nations would do; but this he knew, that we ourselves ought not to be
+unjust because they should refuse to be honest. It was, however,
+self-obvious, that, if we admitted no more slaves into our colonies, the
+evil would be considerably diminished.
+
+Another of his arguments did not appear to be more solid; for surely the
+Slave-trade ought not to be continued, merely because the effect of the
+abolition might ultimately be that of the emancipation of the slaves; an
+event, which would be highly desirable in its due time.
+
+The noble lord had also said, that the planters were against the abolition,
+and that without their consent it could never be accomplished. He differed
+from him in both these points: for, first, he was a considerable planter
+himself, and yet he was a friend to the measure: secondly, by cutting off
+all further supplies, the planters would be obliged to pay more attention
+to the treatment of their slaves, and this treatment would render the trade
+unnecessary.
+
+The noble earl had asserted also, that the population in the West Indies
+could not be kept up without further importations; and this was the opinion
+of the planters, who were the best judges of the subject. As a planter he
+differed from his lordship again. If indeed all the waste lands were to be
+brought into cultivation, the present population would be insufficient. But
+the government had already determined, that the trade should not be
+continued for such a purpose. We were no longer to continue pirates, or
+executioners for every petty tyrant in Africa, in order that every holder
+of a bit of land in our islands might cultivate the whole of his allotment;
+a work, which might require centuries. Making this exception, he would
+maintain, that no further importations were necessary. Few or no slaves had
+been imported into Antigua for many years; and he believed, that even some
+had been exported from it. As to Jamaica, although in one year fifteen
+thousand died in consequence of a hurricane and famine, the excess of
+deaths over the births during the twenty years preceding 1788 was only one
+per cent. Deducting, however, the mortality of the newly imported slaves,
+and making the calculation upon the Negros born in the island or upon those
+who had been long there, he believed the births and the deaths would be
+found equal. He had a right therefore to argue that the Negros, with better
+treatment (which the abolition would secure), would not only maintain but
+increase their population, without any aid from Africa. He would add, that
+the newly imported Africans brought with them not only disorders, which
+ravaged the plantations, but danger from the probability of insurrections.
+He wished most heartily for the total abolition of the trade. He was
+convinced, that it was both inhuman, unjust, and impolitic. This had always
+been his opinion as an individual since he was capable of forming one. It
+was his opinion then as a legislator. It was his opinion as a colonial
+proprietor; and it was his opinion as an Englishman, wishing for the
+prosperity of the British empire.
+
+The Earl of Suffolk contended, that the population of the slaves in the
+islands could be kept up by good treatment, so as to be sufficient for
+their cultivation. He entered into a detail of calculations from the year
+1772 downwards in support of this statement. He believed all the miseries
+of St. Domingo arose from the vast importation of Africans. He had such a
+deep sense of the inhumanity and injustice of the Slave-trade, that, if
+ever he wished any action of his life to be recorded, it would be that of
+the vote he should then give in support of the resolution.
+
+Lord Sidmouth said, that he agreed to the substance of the resolution, but
+yet he could not support it. Could he be convinced that the trade would be
+injurious to the cause of humanity and justice, the question with him would
+be decided; for policy could not be opposed to humanity and justice. He had
+been of opinion for the last twenty years, that the interests of the
+country and those of numerous individuals were so deeply blended with this
+traffic, that we should be very cautious how we proceeded. With respect to
+the cultivation of new lands, he would not allow a single Negro to be
+imported for such a purpose; but he must have a regard to the old
+plantations. When he found a sufficient increase in the Black population to
+continue the cultivation already established there, then, but not till
+then, he would agree to an abolition of the trade.
+
+Earl Stanhope said he would not detain their lordships long. He could not,
+however, help expressing his astonishment at what had fallen from the last
+speaker; for he had evidently confessed that the Slave-trade was inhuman
+and unjust, and then he had insinuated, that it was neither inhuman nor
+unjust to continue it. A more paradoxical or whimsical opinion, he
+believed, was never entertained, or more whimsically expressed in that
+house. The noble viscount had talked of the interests of the planters: but
+this was but a part of the subject; for surely the people of Africa were
+not to be forgotten. He did not understand the practice of complimenting
+the planters with the lives of men, women, and helpless children by
+thousands for the sake of their pecuniary advantage; and they, who adopted
+it, whatever they might think of the consistency of their own conduct,
+offered an insult to the sacred names of humanity and justice.
+
+The noble earl (Westmoreland) had asked what would be the practical effect
+of the abolition of the Slave-trade. He would inform him. It would do away
+the infamous practices, which took place in Africa; it would put an end to
+the horrors of the passage; it would save many thousands of our
+fellow-creatures from the miseries of eternal slavery; it would oblige the
+planters to treat those better, who were already in that unnatural state;
+it would increase the population of our islands; it would give a death-blow
+to the diabolical calculations, whether it was cheaper to work the Negros
+to death and recruit the gangs by fresh importations, or to work them
+moderately and to treat them kindly. He knew of no event, which would be
+attended with so many blessings.
+
+There was but one other matter, which he would notice. The noble baron
+(Hawkesbury) had asserted, that all the horrors of St. Domingo were the
+consequence of the speculative opinions, which were current in a
+neighbouring kingdom on the subject of liberty. They had, he said, no such
+origin. They were owing to two causes; first, to the vast number of Negros
+recently imported into that island; and, secondly, to a scandalous breach
+of faith by the French legislature. This legislature held out the idea not
+only of the abolition of the Slave-trade, but also of all slavery; but it
+broke its word. It held forth the rights of man to the whole human race,
+and then, in practice, it most infamously abandoned every article in these
+rights; so that it became the scorn of all the enlightened and virtuous
+part of mankind. These were the great causes of the miseries of St.
+Domingo, and not the speculative opinions of France.
+
+Earl Grosvenor could not but express the joy he felt at the hope, after all
+his disappointments, that this wicked trade would be done away. He hoped
+that His Majesty's ministers were in earnest, and that they would, early in
+the next session, take this great question up with a determination to go
+through with it; so that another year should not pass, before we extended
+the justice and humanity of the country to the helpless and unhappy
+inhabitants of Africa.
+
+Earl Fitzwilliam said he was fearful, lest the calamities of St. Domingo
+should be brought home to our own islands. We ought not, he thought, too
+hastily to adopt the resolution on that account. He should therefore
+support the previous question.
+
+Lord Ellenborough said, he was sorry to differ from his noble friend (Lord
+Sidmouth), and yet he could not help saying that if after twenty years,
+during which this question had been discussed by both Houses of Parliament,
+their Lordships' judgments were not ripe for its determination, he could
+not look with any confidence to a time, when they would be ready to decide
+it.
+
+The question then before them was short and plain. It was, whether the
+African Slave-trade was inhuman, unjust, and impolitic. If the premises
+were true, we could not too speedily bring it to a conclusion.
+
+The subject had been frequently brought before him in a way, which had
+enabled him to become acquainted with it; and he was the more anxious on
+that account to deliver his sentiments upon it as a peer of Parliament,
+without reference to any thing he had been called upon to do in the
+discharge of his professional duty. When he looked at the mode in which
+this traffic commenced, by the spoliation of the rights of a whole quarter
+of the globe; by the misery of whole nations of helpless Africans; by
+tearing them from their homes, their families, and their friends; when he
+saw the unhappy victims carried away by force; thrust into a dungeon in the
+hold of a ship, in which the interval of their passage from their native to
+a foreign land was filled up with misery, under every degree of debasement,
+and in chains; and when he saw them afterwards consigned to an eternal
+slavery; he could not but contemplate the whole system with horror. It was
+inhuman in its beginning, inhuman in its progress, and inhuman to the very
+end.
+
+Nor was it more inhuman than it was unjust. The noble earl, (Westmoreland)
+in adverting to this part of the question, had considered it as a question
+of justice between two nations. But it was a moral question. Although the
+natives of Africa might be taken by persons authorized by their own laws to
+take and dispose of them, and the practice therefore might be said to be
+legal as it respected them, yet no man could doubt, whatever ordinances
+they might have to sanction it, that it was radically, essentially, and in
+principle, unjust; and therefore there could be no excuse for us in
+continuing it. On the general principle of natural justice, which was
+paramount to all ordinances of men, it was quite impossible to defend this
+traffic; and he agreed with the noble baron (Hawkesbury) that, having
+decided that it was inhuman and unjust, we should not inquire whether it
+was impolitic. Indeed, the inquiry itself would be impious; for it was the
+common ordinance of God, that that, which was inhuman and unjust, should
+never be for the good of man. Its impolicy therefore was included in its
+injustice and its inhumanity. And he had no doubt, when the importations
+were stopped, that the planters would introduce a change of system among
+their slaves, which would increase their population, so as to render any
+further supplies from Africa unnecessary. It had been proved indeed, that
+the Negro-population in some of the islands was already in this desirable
+state. Many other happy effects would follow. As to the losses which would
+arise from the abolition of the Slave-trade, they, who were interested in
+the continuance of it, had greatly over-rated, them. When pleading formerly
+in his professional capacity for the merchants of Liverpool at their
+lordships' bar, he had often delivered statements, which he had received
+from them; and which he afterward discovered to be grossly incorrect. He
+could say from his own knowledge, that the assertion of the noble earl
+(Westmoreland), that property to the amount of a hundred millions would be
+endangered, was wild and fanciful. He would not however deny, that some
+loss might accompany the abolition; but there could be no difficulty in
+providing for it. Such a consideration ought not to be allowed to impede
+their progress in getting rid of an horrible injustice.
+
+But it had been said, that we should do but little in the cause of humanity
+by abolishing the Slave-trade; because other nations would continue it. He
+did not believe they would. He knew that America was about to give it up.
+He believed the states of Europe would give it up. But, supposing that they
+were all to continue it, would not our honour be the greater? Would not our
+virtue be the more signal? for then,
+
+                  ----"faithful we
+  Among the faithless found"----
+
+to which he would add, that undoubtedly we should diminish the evil, as far
+as the number of miserable beings was concerned, which was accustomed to be
+transported to our own colonies.
+
+Earl Spencer agreed with the noble viscount (Sidmouth) that the
+amelioration of the condition of the slaves was an object, which might be
+effected in the West Indies; but he was certain, that the most effectual
+way of improving it would be by the total and immediate abolition of the
+Slave-trade; and for that reason he would support the resolution. Had the
+resolution held out emancipation to them, it would not have had his assent;
+for it would have ill become the character of this country, if it had been
+once promised, to have withheld it from them. It was to such deception that
+the horrors of St. Domingo were to be attributed. He would not enter into
+the discussion of the general subject at present. He was convinced that the
+trade was what the resolution stated it to be, inhuman, unjust, and
+impolitic. He wished therefore, most earnestly indeed, for its abolition.
+As to the mode of effecting it, it should be such, as would be attended
+with the least inconvenience to all parties. At the same time he would not
+allow small inconveniences to stand in the way of the great claims of
+humanity, justice, and religion.
+
+The question was then put on the resolution, and carried by a majority of
+forty-one to twenty. The same address also to His Majesty, which had been
+agreed upon by the Commons, was directly afterward moved. This also was
+carried, but without the necessity of a division.
+
+The resolution and the motion having passed both Houses, one other
+parliamentary measure was yet necessary to complete the proceedings of this
+session. It was now almost universally believed, in consequence of what had
+already taken place there, that the Slave-trade had received its
+death-wound; and that it would not long survive it. It was supposed
+therefore, that the slave-merchants would, in the interim, fit out not only
+all the vessels they had, but even buy others, to make what might be called
+their last harvest. Hence extraordinary scenes of rapine, and murder, would
+be occasioned in Africa. To prevent these a new bill was necessary. This
+was accordingly introduced into the Commons. It enacted, but with one
+exception, that from and after the first of August 1806, no vessel should
+clear out for the Slave-trade, unless it should have been previously
+employed by the same owner or owners in the said trade, or should be proved
+to have been contracted for previously to the tenth of June 1806, for the
+purpose of being employed in that trade. It may now be sufficient to say
+that this bill also passed both houses of parliament; soon after which the
+session ended.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER X.
+
+_Continuation from July 18O6 to March 18O7--Death of Mr. Fox--Bill for the
+total abolition of the Slave-trade carried in the House of Lords--sent from
+thence to the Commons--amended and passed there--carried back, and passed
+with its amendments by the Lords--receives the royal assent--Reflections on
+this great event._
+
+
+It was impossible for the committee to look back to the proceedings of the
+last session, as they related to the great question under their care,
+without feeling a profusion of joy, as well as of gratitude to those, by
+whose virtuous endeavours they had taken place. But, alas, how few of our
+earthly pleasures come to us without alloy! a melancholy event succeeded.
+We had the painful intelligence, in the month of October 1806, that one of
+the oldest and warmest friends of the cause was then numbered with the
+dead.
+
+Of the character of Mr. Fox, as it related to this cause, I am bound to
+take notice. And, first, I may observe, that he professed an attachment to
+it almost as soon as it was ushered into the world. Early in the year 1788,
+when he was waited upon by a deputation of the committee, his language was,
+as has appeared in the first volume, "that he would support their object to
+its fullest extent, being convinced that there was no remedy for the evil
+but in the total abolition of the trade."
+
+His subsequent conduct evinced the sincerity of his promises. He was
+constant in his attendance in Parliament whenever the question was brought
+forward; and he never failed to exert his powerful eloquence in its favour.
+The countenance, indeed, which he gave it, was of the greatest importance
+to its welfare; for most of his parliamentary friends, who followed his
+general political sentiments, patronized it also. By the aid of these,
+joined to that of the private friends of Mr. Pitt, and of other members,
+who espoused it without reference to party, it was always so upheld, that
+after the year 1791 no one of the defeats, which it sustained, was
+disgraceful. The majority on the side of those interested in the
+continuance of the trade was always so trifling, that the abolitionists
+were preserved a formidable body, and their cause respectable.
+
+I never heard whether Mr. Fox, when he came into power, made any
+stipulations with His Majesty on the subject of the Slave-trade: but this I
+know, that he determined upon the abolition of it, if it were practicable,
+as the highest glory of his administration, and as the greatest earthly
+blessing which it was in the power of the Government to bestow; and that he
+took considerable pains to convince some of his colleagues in the cabinet
+of the propriety of the measure.
+
+When the resolution, which produced the debates in parliament, as detailed
+in the last chapter, was under contemplation, it was thought expedient that
+Mr. Fox, as the minister of state in the House of Commons, should introduce
+it himself. When applied to for this purpose he cheerfully undertook the
+office, thus acting in consistency with his public declaration in the year
+1791, "that in whatever situation he might ever be, he would use his
+warmest efforts for the promotion of this righteous cause."
+
+Before the next measure, or the bill to prevent the sailing of any new
+vessel in the trade after the first of August, was publicly disclosed, it
+was suggested to him, that the session was nearly over; that he might
+possibly weary both Houses by another motion on the subject; and that, if
+he were to lose it, or to experience a diminution of his majorities in
+either, he might injure the cause; which was then in the road to triumph.
+To this objection he replied, "that he believed both Houses were disposed
+to get rid of the trade; that his own life was precarious; that if he
+omitted to serve the injured Africans on this occasion, he might have no
+other opportunity of doing it; and that he dared not, under these
+circumstances, neglect so great a duty."
+
+This prediction relative to himself became unfortunately verified; for his
+constitution, after this, began to decline, till at length his mortal
+destiny, in the eyes of his medical attendants, was sealed. But even then,
+when removed by pain and sickness from the discussion of political
+subjects, he never forgot this cause. In his own sufferings he was not
+unmindful of those of the injured Africans. "Two things," said he, on his
+death-bed, "I wish earnestly to see accomplished--peace with Europe,--and
+the abolition of the Slave-trade." But knowing well, that we could much
+better protect ourselves against our own external enemies, than this
+helpless people against their oppressors, he added, "but of the two I wish
+the latter." These sentiments he occasionally repeated, so that the subject
+was frequently in his thoughts in his last illness. Nay, "the very hope of
+the abolition (to use the expression of Lord Howick in the House of
+Commons) quivered on his lips in the last hour of it." Nor is it
+improbable, if earthly scenes ever rise to view at that awful crisis, and
+are perceptible, that it might have occupied his mind in the last moment of
+his existence. Then indeed would joy ineffable, from a conviction of having
+prepared the way for rescuing millions of human beings from misery, have
+attended the spirit on its departure from the body; and then also would
+this spirit, most of all purified when in the contemplation of peace,
+good-will, and charity upon earth, be in the fittest state, on gliding from
+its earthly cavern, to commix with the endless ocean of benevolence and
+love.
+
+At length the session of 1807 commenced. It was judged advisable by Lord
+Grenville, that the expected motion on this subject should, contrary to the
+practice hitherto adopted, be agitated first in the Lords. Accordingly, on
+the second of January he presented a bill, called an act for the abolition
+of the Slave-trade; but he then proposed only to print it, and to let it
+lie on the table, that it might be maturely considered, before it should be
+discussed.
+
+On the fourth no less than four counsel were heard against the bill.
+
+On the fifth the debate commenced. But of this I shall give no detailed
+account; nor, indeed, of any of those, which followed it. The truth is,
+that the subject has been exhausted. They, who spoke in favour of the
+abolition, said very little that was new concerning it. They, who spoke
+against it, brought forward, as usual, nothing but negative assertions and
+fanciful conjectures. To give therefore, what was said by both parties at
+these times, would be but useless repetition[A]. To give, on the other
+hand, that which was said on one side only would appear partial. Hence I
+shall offer to the reader little more than a narrative of facts upon these
+occasions.
+
+[Footnote A: The different debates in both Houses on this occasion would
+occupy the half of another volume. This is another circumstance, which
+reconciles me to the omission. But that, which reconciles me the most is,
+that they will be soon published. In these debates justice has been done to
+every individual concerned in them.]
+
+Lord Grenville opened the debate by a very luminous speech. He was
+supported by the Duke of Glocester, the Bishop of Durham (Dr. Barrington),
+the Earls Moira, Selkirk, and Roslyn, and the Lords Holland, King, and
+Hood. The opponents of the bill were the Duke of Clarence, the Earls
+Westmoreland and St. Vincent, and the Lords Sidmouth, Eldon, and
+Hawkesbury.
+
+
+The question being called for at four o'clock in the morning, it appeared
+that the personal votes and proxies in favour of Lord Grenville's motion
+amounted to one hundred, and those against it to thirty-six. Thus passed
+the first bill in England, which decreed, that the African Slave-trade
+should cease. And here I cannot omit paying to his Highness the Duke of
+Glocester the tribute of respect, which is due to him, for having opposed
+the example of his royal relations on this subject in behalf of an helpless
+and oppressed people. The sentiments too, which he delivered on this
+occasion, ought not to be forgotten. "This trade," said he, "is contrary to
+the principles of the British constitution. It is, besides, a cruel and
+criminal traffic in the blood of my fellow-creatures. It is a foul stain on
+the national character. It is an offence to the Almighty. On every ground
+therefore on which a decision can be made; on the ground of policy, of
+liberty, of humanity, of justice, but, above all, on the ground of
+religion, I shall vote for its immediate extinction."
+
+On the tenth of February the bill was carried to the House of Commons. On
+the twentieth, counsel were heard against it; after which, by agreement,
+the second reading of it took place. On the twenty-third the question being
+put for the commitment of it, Lord Viscount Howick (now Earl Grey) began an
+eloquent speech. After he had proceeded in it some way, he begged leave to
+enter his protest against certain principles of relative justice, which had
+been laid down. "The merchants and planters," said he, "have an undoubted
+right, in common with other subjects of the realm, to demand justice at our
+hands. But that, which they denominate justice, does not correspond with
+the legitimate character of that virtue; for they call upon us to violate
+the rights of others, and to transgress our own moral duties. That, which
+they distinguish as justice, involves in itself the greatest injury to
+others. It is not in fact justice, which they demand, but--favour--and
+favour to themselves at the expense of the most grievous oppression of
+their fellow-creatures."
+
+He then argued the question upon the ground of policy. He showed by a
+number of official documents, how little this trade had contributed to the
+wealth of the nation, being but a fifty-fourth part of its export trade;
+and he contended that as four-sevenths of it had been cut off by His
+Majesty's proclamation, and the passing of the foreign Slave-bill in a
+former year, no detriment of any consequence would arise from the present
+measure.
+
+He entered into an account of the loss of seamen, and of the causes of the
+mortality, in this trade.
+
+He went largely into the subject of the Negro-population in the islands
+from official documents, giving an account of it up to the latest date. He
+pointed out the former causes of its diminution, and stated how the
+remedies for these would follow.
+
+He showed how, even if the quantity of colonial produce should be
+diminished for a time, this disadvantage would, in a variety of instances,
+be more than counterbalanced by advantages, which would not only be great
+in themselves, but permanent.
+
+He then entered into a refutation of the various objections which had been
+made to the abolition, in an eloquent and perspicuous manner; and concluded
+by appealing to the great authorities of Mr. Pitt and Mr. Fox in behalf of
+the proposed measure. "These precious ornaments, he said, of their age and
+country had examined the subject with all the force of their capacious
+minds. On this question they had dismissed all animosity--all difference of
+opinion--and had proceeded in union;--and he believed, that the best
+tribute of respect we could show, or the most splendid monument we could
+raise, to their memories, Would be by the adoption of the glorious measure
+of the abolition of the Slave-trade."
+
+Lord Howick was supported by Mr. Roscoe, who was then one of the members
+for Liverpool; by Mr. Lushington, Mr. Fawkes, Lord Mahon, Lord Milton, Sir
+John Doyle, Sir Samuel Romilly, Mr. Wilberforce, and Earl Percy, the latter
+of whom wished that a clause might be put into the bill, by which all the
+children of slaves, born after January 1810, should be made free. General
+Gascoyne and Mr. Hibbert opposed the bill. Mr. Manning hoped that
+compensation would be made to the planters in case of loss. Mr. Bathurst
+and Mr. Hiley Addington preferred a plan for gradual abolition to the
+present mode. These having spoken, it appeared on a division that there
+were for the question two hundred and eighty-three, and against it only
+sixteen.
+
+Of this majority I cannot but remark, that it was probably the largest that
+was ever announced on any occasion, where the House was called upon to
+divide. I must observe also, that there was such an enthusiasm among the
+members at this time, that there appeared to be the same kind and degree of
+feeling, as manifested itself within the same walls in the year 1788, when
+the question was first started. This enthusiasm too, which was of a moral
+nature, was so powerful, that it seemed even to extend to a conversion of
+the heart: for several of the old opponents of this righteous cause went
+away, unable to vote against it; while others of them staid in their
+places, and voted in its favour.
+
+On the twenty-seventh of February Lord Howick moved, that the House resolve
+itself into a committee on the bill for the abolition of the Slave-trade.
+Sir C. Pole, Mr. Hughan, Brown, Bathurst, Windham, and Fuller opposed the
+motion; and Sir R. Milbank, and Mr. Wynne, Barham, Courtenay, Montague,
+Jacob, Whitbread, and Herbert (of Kerry), supported it. At length the
+committee was allowed to sit _pro forma_, and Mr. Hobhouse was put into the
+chair. The bill then went through it, and, the House being resumed, the
+report was received and read.
+
+On the sixth of March, when the committee sat again, Sir C. Pole moved,
+that the year 1812 be substituted for the year 1807, as the time when the
+trade should be abolished. This amendment produced a long debate, which was
+carried on by Sir C. Pole, Mr. Fuller, Hiley Addington, Rose, Gascoyne, and
+Bathurst on one side; and by Mr. Ward, Sir P. Francis, General Vyse, Sir T.
+Turton, Mr. Whitbread, Lord Henry Petty, Mr. Canning, Stanhope, Perceval,
+and Wilberforce on the other. At length, on a division, there appeared to
+be one hundred and twenty-five against the amendment, and for it only
+seventeen. The chairman then read the bill, and it was agreed that he
+should report it with the amendments on Monday. The bill enacted, that no
+vessel should clear out for slaves from any port within the British
+dominions after the first of May 1807, and that no slave should be landed
+in the colonies after the first of March 1808.
+
+On the sixteenth of March, on the motion of Lord Henry Petty, the question
+was put, that the bill be read a third time. Mr. Hibbert, Captain Herbert,
+Mr. T.W. Plomer, Mr. Windham, and Lord Castlereagh spoke against the
+motion. Sir P. Francis, Mr. Lyttleton, Mr. H. Thornton, and Mr. Barham,
+Sheridan, and Wilberforce supported it. After this the bill was passed
+without a division[A].
+
+[Footnote A: S. Lushington, esq. M.P. for Yarmouth, gave his voluntary
+attendance and assistance to the Committee, during all these motions, and
+J. Bowdler, esquire, was elected a member of it.]
+
+On Wednesday, the eighteenth, Lord Howick, accompanied by Mr. Wilberforce
+and others, carried the bill to the Lords. Lord Grenville, on receiving it,
+moved that it should be printed, and that, if this process could be
+finished by Monday, it should be taken into consideration on that day. The
+reason of this extraordinary haste was, that His Majesty, displeased with
+the introduction of the Roman-catholic officers' bill into the Commons, had
+signified his intention to the members of the existing administration, that
+they were to be displaced.
+
+The uneasiness, which, a few days before, had sprung up among the friends
+of the abolition, on the report that this event was probable, began now to
+show itself throughout the kingdom. Letters were written from various
+parts, manifesting the greatest fear and anxiety on account of the state of
+the bill, and desiring answers of consolation. Nor was this state of the
+mind otherwise than what might have been expected upon such an occasion;
+for the bill was yet to be printed--Being an amended one, it was to be
+argued again in the Lords--It was then to receive the royal assent--All
+these operations implied time; and it was reported that the new ministry[A]
+was formed; among whom were several, who had shown a hostile disposition to
+the cause.
+
+[Footnote A: The only circumstance, which afforded comfort at this time,
+was that the honourable Spencer Perceval and Mr. Canning were included in
+it, who were warm patrons of this great measure.]
+
+On Monday, the twenty-third, the House of Lords met. Such extraordinary
+diligence had been used in printing the bill, that it was then ready. Lord
+Grenville immediately brought it forward. The Earl of Westmoreland and the
+Marquis of Sligo opposed it. The Duke of Norfolk and the Bishop of Llandaff
+(Dr. Watson) supported it. The latter said, that this great act of justice
+would be recorded in heaven. The amendments were severally adopted without
+a division. But here an omission of three words was discovered, namely,
+"country, territory, or place," which, if not rectified, might defeat the
+purposes of the bill. An amendment was immediately proposed and carried.
+Thus the bill received the last sanction of the Peers. Lord Grenville then
+congratulated the House on the completion, on its part, of the most
+glorious measure, that had ever been adopted by any legislative body in the
+world.
+
+The amendment, now mentioned, occasioned the bill to be sent back to the
+Commons. On the twenty-fourth, on the motion of Lord Howick, it was
+immediately taken into consideration there, and agreed to; and it was
+carried back to the Lords, as approved of, on the same day.
+
+But though the bill had now passed both houses, there was an awful fear
+throughout the kingdom, lest it should not receive the royal assent before
+the ministry was dissolved. This event took place the next day; for on
+Wednesday the twenty-fifth, at half past eleven in the morning; His
+Majesty's message was delivered to the different members of it, that they
+were then to wait upon him to deliver up the seals of their offices. It
+then appeared that a commission for the royal assent to this bill among
+others had been obtained. This commission was instantly opened by the Lord
+Chancellor (Erskine), who was accompanied by the Lords Holland and
+Auckland; and as the clock struck twelve, just when the sun was in its
+meridian splendour to witness this august Act, this establishment of a
+Magna Charta for Africa in Britain, and to sanction it by its most vivid
+and glorious beams, it was completed. The ceremony being over, the seals of
+the respective offices were delivered up; so that the execution of this
+commission was the last act of the administration of Lord Grenville; an
+administration, which, on account of its virtuous exertions in behalf of
+the oppressed African race, will pass to posterity, living through
+successive generations, in the love and gratitude of the most virtuous of
+mankind.
+
+Thus ended one of the most glorious contests, after a continuance for
+twenty years, of any ever carried on in any age or country. A contest, not
+of brutal violence, but of reason. A contest between those, who felt deeply
+for the happiness and the honour of their fellow-creatures, and those, who,
+through vicious custom and the impulse of avarice, had trampled under-foot
+the sacred rights of their nature, and had even attempted to efface all
+title to the divine image from their minds.
+
+Of the immense advantages of this contest I know not how to speak. Indeed,
+the very agitation of the question, which it involved, has been highly
+important. Never was the heart of man so expanded. Never were its generous
+sympathies so generally and so perseveringly excited. These sympathies,
+thus called into existence, have been useful in the preservation of a
+national virtue. For any thing we know, they may have contributed greatly
+to form a counteracting balance against the malignant spirit, generated by
+our almost incessant wars during this period, so as to have preserved us
+from barbarism.
+
+It has been useful also in the discrimination of moral character. In
+private life it has enabled us to distinguish the virtuous from the more
+vicious part of the community[A]. It has shown the general philanthropist.
+It has unmasked the vicious in spite of his pretension to virtue. It has
+afforded us the same knowledge in public life. It has separated the moral
+statesman from the wicked politician. It has shown us who, in the
+legislative and executive offices of our country are fit to save, and who
+to destroy, a nation.
+
+[Footnote A: I have had occasion to know many thousand persons in the
+course of my travels on this subject; and I can truly say, that the part,
+which these took on this great question, was always a true criterion of
+their moral character. Some indeed opposed the abolition, who seemed to be
+so respectable, that it was difficult to account for their conduct; but it
+invariably turned out in a course of time, either that they had been
+influenced by interested motives, or that they were not men of steady moral
+principle. In the year 1792, when the national enthusiasm was so great, the
+good were as distinguishable from the bad, according to their disposition
+to this great cause, as if the divine Being had marked them; or, as a
+friend of mine the other day observed, as we may suppose the sheep to be
+from the goats on the day of judgment.]
+
+It has furnished us also with important lessons. It has proved what a
+creature man is! how devoted he is to his own interest! to what a length of
+atrocity he can go, unless fortified by religious principle! But as if this
+part of the prospect would be too afflicting, it has proved to us, on the
+other hand, what a glorious instrument he may become in the hands of his
+Maker; and that a little virtue, when properly leavened, is made capable of
+counteracting the effects of a mass of vice!
+
+With respect to the end obtained by this contest, or the great measure of
+the abolition of the Slave-trade as it has now passed, I know not how to
+appreciate its importance. To our own country, indeed, it is invaluable. We
+have lived, in consequence of it, to see the day, when it has been recorded
+as a principle in our legislation, that commerce itself shall have its
+moral boundaries. We have lived to see the day, when we are likely to be
+delivered from the contagion of the most barbarous opinions. They, who
+supported this wicked traffic, virtually denied, that man was a moral
+being. They substituted the law of force for the law of reason. But the
+great Act now under our consideration, has banished the impious doctrine,
+and restored the rational creature to his moral rights. Nor is it a matter
+of less pleasing consideration, that, at this awful crisis, when the
+constitutions of kingdoms are on the point of dissolution, the stain of the
+blood of Africa is no longer upon us, or that we have been freed (alas, if
+it be not too late!) from a load of guilt, which has long hung like a
+mill-stone about our necks, ready to sink us to perdition.
+
+In tracing the measure still further, or as it will affect other lands, we
+become only the more sensible of its importance: for can we pass over to
+Africa; can we pass over to the numerous islands, the receptacles of
+miserable beings from thence; and can we call to mind the scenes of misery,
+which have been passing in each of these regions of the earth, without
+acknowledging, that one of the greatest sources of suffering to the human
+race has, as far as our own power extends, been done away? Can we pass over
+to these regions again, and contemplate the multitude of crimes, which the
+agency necessary for keeping up the barbarous system produced, without
+acknowledging, that a source of the most monstrous and extensive wickedness
+has been removed also? But here, indeed, it becomes us peculiarly to
+rejoice; for though nature shrinks from pain, and compassion is engendered
+in us when we see it become the portion of others, yet what is physical
+suffering compared with moral guilt? The misery of the oppressed is, in the
+first place, not contagious like the crime of the oppressor. Nor is the
+mischief, which it generates, either so frightful or so pernicious. The
+body, though under affliction, may retain its shape; and, if it even
+perish, what is the loss of it but of worthless dust? But when the moral
+springs of the mind are poisoned, we lose the most excellent part of the
+constitution of our nature, and the divine image is no longer perceptible
+in us. Nor are the two evils of similar duration. By a decree of
+Providence, for which we cannot be too thankful, we are made mortal. Hence
+the torments of the oppressor are but temporary; whereas the immortal part
+of us, when once corrupted, may carry its pollutions with it into another
+world.
+
+But independently of the quantity of physical suffering and the innumerable
+avenues to vice in more than a quarter of the globe, which this great
+measure will cut off, there are yet blessings, which we have reason to
+consider as likely to flow from it. Among these we cannot overlook the
+great probability, that Africa, now freed from the vicious and barbarous
+effects of this traffic, may be in a better state to comprehend and receive
+the sublime truths of the Christian religion. Nor can we overlook the
+probability, that, a new system of treatment necessarily springing up in
+our islands, the same bright sun of consolation may visit her children
+there. But here a new hope rises to our view. Who knows but that
+emancipation, like a beautiful plant, may, in its due season, rise out of
+the ashes of the abolition of the Slave-trade, and that, when its own
+intrinsic value shall be known, the seed of it may be planted in other
+lands? And looking at the subject in this point of view, we cannot but be
+struck with the wonderful concurrence of events as previously necessary for
+this purpose, namely, that two nations, England and America, the mother and
+the child, should, in the same month of the same year, have abolished this
+impious traffic; nations, which at this moment have more than a million of
+subjects within their jurisdiction to partake of the blessing; and one of
+which, on account of her local situation and increasing power, is likely in
+time to give, if not law, at least a tone to the manners and customs of the
+great continent, on which she is situated.
+
+Reader! Thou art now acquainted with the history of this contest! Rejoice
+in the manner of its termination! And, if thou feelest grateful for the
+event, retire within thy closet, and pour out thy thanksgivings to the
+Almighty for this his unspeakable act of mercy to thy oppressed
+fellow-creatures.
+
+
+
+
+THE END.
+
+
+
+
+TABLE OF CONTENTS.
+
+
+
+
+VOL. I.
+
+
+CHAP. 1. INTRODUCTION--Estimate of the evil of the Slave-trade--and of the
+blessing of the Abolition of it--Usefulness of the contemplation of this
+subject
+
+CHAP. 2. Those, who favoured the cause of the Africans previously to 1787,
+were so many necessary forerunners in it--Cardinal Ximenes--and others
+
+CHAP. 3. Forerunners continued to 1787--divided now into four
+classes--First consists of persons in England of various descriptions,
+Godwyn, Baxter, and others
+
+CHAP. 4. Second, of the Quakers in England, George Fox, and his religious
+descendants
+
+CHAP. 5. Third, of the Quakers in America--Union of these with individuals
+of other religious denominations in the same cause
+
+CHAP. 6. Facility of junction between the members of these three different
+classes
+
+CHAP. 7. Fourth consists of Dr. Peckard--then of the Author--Author wishes
+to embark in the cause--falls in with several of the members of these
+classes
+
+CHAP. 8. Fourth class continued--Langton--Baker--and others--Author now
+embarks in the cause as a business of his life
+
+CHAP. 9. Fourth class continued--Sheldon--Mackworth--and others--Author
+seeks for further information on the subject--and visits Members of
+Parliament
+
+CHAP. 10. Fourth class continued--Author enlarges his knowledge--Meeting at
+Mr. Wilberforce's--Remarkable junction of all the four classes, and a
+Committee formed out of them, in May 1787, for the Abolition of the
+Slave-trade
+
+CHAP. 11. History of the preceding classes, and of their junction, shown by
+means of a map
+
+CHAP. 12. Author endeavours to do away the charge of ostentation in
+consequence of becoming so conspicuous in this work
+
+CHAP. 13. Proceedings of the Committee--Emancipation declared to be no part
+of its object--Wrongs of Africa by Mr. Roscoe
+
+CHAP. 14. Author visits Bristol to collect information--Ill usage of seamen
+in the Slave-trade--Articles of African produce--Massacre at Calebar
+
+CHAP. 15. Mode of procuring and paying seamen in that trade--their
+mortality in it--Construction and admeasurement of Slave-ships--Difficulty
+of procuring evidence--Cases of Gardiner and Arnold
+
+CHAP. 16. Author meets with Alexander Falconbridge--visits ill-treated and
+disabled seamen--takes a mate out of one of the Slave-vessels--and puts
+another in prison for murder
+
+CHAP. 17. Visits Liverpool--Specimens of African
+produce--Dock-duties--Iron-instruments used in the traffic--His
+introduction to Mr. Norris
+
+CHAP. 18. Manner of procuring and paying seamen at Liverpool in the
+Slave-trade--their treatment and mortality--Murder of Peter
+Green--Dangerous situation of the Author in consequence of his inquiries
+
+CHAP. 19. Author proceeds to Manchester--delivers a discourse there on the
+subject of the Slave-trade--revisits Bristol--New and difficult
+situation--suddenly crosses the Severn at night--returns to London
+
+CHAP. 20. Labours of the Committee during the Author's journey--Mr. Sharp
+elected chairman--Seal engraved--Letters from different correspondents to
+the Committee
+
+CHAP. 21. Further labours of the Committee to February 1788--List of new
+Correspondents
+
+CHAP. 22. Progress of the cause to the middle of May--Petitions to
+Parliament--Author's interviews with Mr. Pitt and Mr. Grenville--Privy
+council inquire into the subject--examine Liverpool-delegates--Proceedings
+of the Committee for the abolition--Motion and debate in the House of
+Commons--Discussion of the general question postponed to the next session
+
+CHAP. 23. Progress to the middle of July--Bill to diminish the horrors of
+the Middle Passage--Evidence examined against it--Debates--Bill passed
+through both Houses--Proceedings of the Committee, and effects of them.
+
+
+
+
+VOL. II.
+
+
+CHAP. 1. Continuation from June 1758 to July 1739--Author travels in search
+of fresh evidence--Privy council resume their examinations--prepare their
+report--Proceedings of the Committee for the abolition--and of the Planters
+and others--Privy council report laid on the table of the House of
+Commons--Debate upon it--Twelve propositions--Opponents refuse to argue
+from the report--Examine new evidence of their own in the House of
+Commons--Renewal of the Middle Passage-Bill--Death and character of Ramsay
+
+CHAP. 2. Continuation from July 1789 to July 1790--Author travels to Paris
+to promote the abolition in France--His proceedings there--returns to
+England--Examination of opponents' evidence resumed in the Commons--Author
+travels in quest of new evidence on the side of the abolition--This, after
+great opposition, introduced--Renewal of the Middle Passage-Bill--Section
+of the Slave-ship--Cowper's Negro's Complaint--Wedgwood's Cameos.
+
+CHAP. 3. Continuation from July 1790 to July 1791--Author travels
+again--Examinations on the side of the abolition resumed in the
+Commons--List of those examined--Cruel circumstances of the times--Motion
+for the abolition of the trade--Debates--Motion lost--Resolutions of the
+Committee--Sierra Leone Company established
+
+CHAP. 4. Continuation from July 1791 to July 1792--Author travels
+again--People begin to leave off sugar--Petition Parliament--Motion renewed
+in the Commons--Debates--Abolition resolved upon, but not to commence till
+1796--The Lords determine upon hearing evidence on the resolution--This
+evidence introduced--Further hearing of it postponed to the next session
+
+CHAP. 5. Continuation from July 1792 to July 1793--Author travels
+again--Motion to renew the Resolution of the last year in the
+Commons--Motion lost--New motion to abolish the foreign Slave-trade--Motion
+lost--Proceedings of the Lords
+
+CHAP. 6. Continuation from July 1793 to July 1794--Author travels
+again--Motion to abolish the foreign Slave-trade renewed and carried--but
+lost in the Lords--Further proceedings there--Author, on account of
+declining health, obliged to retire from the cause
+
+CHAP. 7. Continuation from July 1794 to July 1799--Various motions within
+this period
+
+CHAP. 8. Continuation from July 1799 to July 18O5--Various motions within
+this period
+
+CHAP. 9. Continuation from July 1805 to July 1806--Author, restored, joins
+the Committee again--Death of Mr. Pitt--Foreign Slave-trade
+abolished--Resolution to take measures for the total abolition of the
+trade--Address to the King to negotiate with foreign powers for their
+concurrence in it--Motion to prevent new vessels going into the trade--all
+these carried through both Houses of Parliament
+
+CHAP. 10. Continuation from July 1806 to July 1807--Death of Mr. Fox--Bill
+for the total abolition carried in the Lords--Sent from thence to the
+Commons--amended, and passed there, and sent back to the Lords--receives
+the royal assent--Reflections on this great event
+
+
+
+
+
+End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The History of the Rise, Progress and
+Accomplishment of the Abolition of the African Slave Trade by the British Parliament (1808), by Thomas Clarkson
+
+*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ABOLITION OF THE SLAVE TRADE V.2. ***
+
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