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 fin