avating, 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