H But the House must be aware, that there was not only an African medium, but an African logic too: it feemed to be an acknowledged maxim in the logic of Africa, that every perfon ever thought fo much of the force of the expreffions, as fince I perufed your letter. John Barnes, Efq." I am, Sir, " SIR, "I return you my fincere and hearty thanks for your polite and very obliging favour of the 25th inft. which I received upon coming to town yesterday; you have faid every thing I could defire, for the fatisfaction of my own particular feelings, and I am far from being fo unreafonable as to expect you fhould be convinced by any opinion of mine; the more efpecially, when that opinion has been contradicted by the teftimony of pofitive facts. "But though the letter which you have done me the honour to write has fet my mind perfectly at eafe, fo far as it fatisfies me that no imputation was intended against my character, yet I muft beg leave to fubmit to your own good sense, and to your feelings as a gentleman, whether fomething farther is not neceffary to remove that ftain which my reputation has actually fuffered, either by the misconception of people in the House, or by the erroneous account of your speech in the newspapers; in a cafe of fo delicate a nature as this, I would not prefume to fuggeft any particular remedy, if it were not from an apprehenfion that you might imagine I expected unreasonable conceffions, and in order to prove that I have not the most remote wish for any thing of that kind, I have taken the liberty to write underneath, what I think might be proper to infert as an article in the Diary. If this fhould meet your ideas, it will give me infinite pleasure; if not, you will lay me under a lafting obligation, by favouring me with your authority for the infertion of any other paragraph which may be more agreeable to your own feelings, and which may anfwer the purpofe defired. perfon who offered a flave for fale, had a right to fell him. However fraudulent the manner might be in which the broker had obtained the flave, if they paid him a juft price for him, Propofed for Infertion. "In the accounts given by the papers of Mr. Wilberforce's speech in the House of Commons, on Monday the 18th inftant, fome imputations are stated to have been made on the character of Mr. Barnes, as an évidence. "We have authority from Mr. Wilberforce to declare, that he had not the most remote defign of impeaching the veracity of Mr. Barnes, or of throwing any reflection on his character." SIR, Clapham, April 29, 1791. "I must repeat it, that if, as you apprehend, your reputation has fuffered in confequence of a misconception or miftatement of what fell from me the other night in the House of Commons, I am very forry for it, and I fhould be glad to remove your difquietude, if I could do it with propriety; but the mode you have fuggefted, of my authorifing the infertion of a paragraph in the newspapers, correcting their miftatement, is one which I think would be neither ferviceable to you, nor becoming for myself. I am, Sir, Your moft obedient, "On the 28th ultimo, I was obliged to go into Hampshire, and upon my return here this evening, I was forry to find by your favour of the 29th, that you did not approve the mode which I took the liberty to fuggeft, in my letter of the 27th, for the removal of any unfavourable impreffions of me, occafioned by your speech on the 18th; and as you have not thought proper to offer any other mode of doing that public juftice to my character, which the prefent cafe gives me a fair right to expect, I must take the liberty to avail myself of the only means in my power, that of publishing your letter to me of the 25th; it being my wish, however, to avoid as much as poffible whatever may in any degree hurt your feelings. I fhall delay this publication for two or three days, that if you can propofe any other expedient, more agreeVOL. XXIX. able Сс him, all was right, it was a perfectly fair bona fide tranfaction. This was not a charge brought by the witnesses for the abolition merely, but was exprefly and avowedly declared by many of the moft experienced of the witneffes against it, and denied by none. "It would have stopped my trade," said one of them, " to have afked the broker "how he came by the perfon he was offering me for fale." "We always fuppofe," faid another, the broker has a right to fell the perfon he offers us." "I never heard of "fuch a question being asked," faid a third, and in ftill tronger terms, "a man would be thought a fool that should "put fuch a queftion." Mr. Wilberforce hoped the House would be aware of the practical utility of this reasoning. It was the key-ftone that held the whole building together. By the help of this convenient principle, a flave captain might go up and down the whole coaft of Africa, and see nothing but equity and juftice; and the African Committee, repofing on this grand maxim with perfect fecurity, report gravely and formally, that they had heard but of two inftances of mifconduct in the fpace of forty years. The flave captains, however, could not be altogether abfolved, even by availing themselves to the full of this principle, excellent as it was; for depredations were frequently committed by the European fhips themselves, efpecially when they were paffing by any able to yourself, I may have the fatisfaction of adopting it in prefe "On my return home late last night, I found your letter of the zd inftant, in reply to which I can only fay, I can have no objection to your publishing my letter of the 25th of April, adding only, that in that cafe, I muft beg you to publish the whole of our correspondence: I am, Sir, (Signed) John Barnes, Efq:" And humble fervant, W. WILBERFORCE. part part of the coaft where they did not mean to continue.Hence it was, that, as feveral captains of the navy, and others, had given in evidence, the natives, who kept cautioufly aloof from the flave fhips, would never come near the men of war, till fully fatisfied they were not of the former defcription; after which they laid afide their fears, and came and continued on board with unfufpecting chearfulness. But, Mr. Wilberforce faid, he would not detain the Committee any longer on this branch of the queftion, and added, let us withdraw from this difgraceful fcene, and, in the words of an emphatic writer," turn our eyes for relief to fome ordinary wickednefs." But alas! no fuch relief was yet to be enjoyed by them: on the contrary, a ftill more dreadful fcene was opening to their view; but he had defcribed this part of the fubject fo much at large on a former occafion, that he would fpare the Committee the pain of dwelling long on it now. Let them but represent to themselves a veffel, in a fultry climate, heaped to the very brim with these unhappy wretches, torn from their homes in the way he had defcribed, and ignorant whither they were going. He fcarcely knew how to exprefs himself; he could only fay, he was perfuaded that if the Committee could be tranfported where they might behold this dreadful fpectacle, and after having taken a general furvey of its multifarious wretchednefs, if they were then to liften to each man's particular tale of forrow, they would want no other argument for the abolition. It appeared from the evidence, that in the year 1788, at the very moment when they were agitating this fubject within the walls of Parliament, all thofe dreadful occurrences which he was defcribing were actually going forward on board the flave fhips; the fame dancing in fetters, the fame finging, the fame eating by compulfion, the fame defpair, the fame infanity, and all the other abominations with which this trade was characterized. New instances occurred, wherein these wretched men (eluding the vigilance of their perfecutors, who knowing what they had to expect, had provided against it by the ufual high netting, that ftanding precaution of an African fhip) threw themselves into the fea, and more than one, when in the act of drowning, were observed to wave their hands in triumph, exulting, to use the words of an eye-witnefs, "that they had escaped." Yet thefe things, viewed through that African medium he had already named, took a different shape and colour. It was faid by an adverfe witnefs, Captain Knox, that he had no doubt "flaves lie, during the night, in tolerable comfort:" now, confidering that they were coupled in fetters, and were often fuffering under a diforder, the effects of which were too naufeous for description, in order to carrefpond with the Committee's ideas of tolerable comfort, it Cc 2 · might might feem requifite that they fhould at least have room to lie on their backs; but how, in fact were they fometimes accommodated? In one of Captain Knox's own voyages, in a veffel of 120 tons, he had 290 flaves, and a space which, according to his account, would have held 43 more, being otherwife occupied, the whole might be faid to contain 333; and with this proportion of men and tonnage, Captain Knox frankly declared, that perhaps they had not all the breadth of their backs. Yet, in another voyage, in a veffel of 108 tons, he carried 450; and in a third, of from 130 to 150 tons, he carried 6co flaves; neither fhould it be forgotten, that the number of feamen being always increased in proportion to the flaves, they alfo must have been more numerous in the two laft voyages. What, in this fituation, muft have been the comfort of the flaves, he left to the confideration and feelings of the Committee. Another inftance of this African felfdeception, was to be found on the record of the Committee, in the cafe of a Captain, of whom he had heard that he was one of the best ever engaged in that trade, and of whom Mr. Wilberforce did not doubt, that, in any other fituation, he would have been alive to the feelings of humanity; it had been afferted, that he had held hot coals to the mouth of a flave, in order to compel him to eat; but being queftioned on the circumftance, not admitting, in the fpirit of African logic, that qui facit per alium facit per fe, he denied the charge with indignation. "I did not," faid he, " and I defy any body to prove that I did." "Did you never order "fuch a thing to be done?" "Being fick in my cabin, the "chief mate and furgeon, at different times, informed me that there was a inan upon the main deck, that would nei"ther eat, drink, nor fpeak: I defired them to use every "means in their power to perfuade him to speak, and affign "reafons for his filence. I defired them to make fome of "the other flaves endeavour to make him fpeak: when I was "informed he ftill remained obftinate, and not knowing "whether it was fulkiness or infanity, I ordered the chief "mate, or furgeon, or both, to prefent him with a piece of "fire in one hand, and a piece of yam in the other, and to let 66 me know what effect that had upon him; it was reported "to me, that he took the yam and eat it, and threw the fire "overboard." This, faid Mr. Wilberforce, is eating by dureffe, if any thing can be called fo; the Captain, however, triumphs in the fuccefs of his expedient, and concludes his narrative by telling you that this very flave was afterwards fold for 40l. at Grenada. Mark here the moral of the tale, and learn the nature and the cure of fulkinefs. Mr. Wilberforce next obferved that if there could be any aggravation of the injurics inflicted by the Europeans, on the |