and this expressly
without fee or reward. I accepted them most joyfully and gratefully. It
was, indeed, a most important thing, to have a station so near the enemy's
camp, where we could watch their motions, and meet any attack which might
be made from it. And this office of a sentinel Mr. Cowdroy performed with
great vigilance; and when he afterwards left Chester for Manchester, to
establish a paper there, he carried with him the same friendly disposition
towards our cause.

My first introduction at Liverpool was to William Rathbone, a member of the
religious society of the Quakers. He was the same person, who, before the
formation of our commitee, had procured me copies of several of the
muster-rolls of the slave-vessels belonging to that port, so that, though
we were not personally known, yet we were not strangers to each other.
Isaac Hadwen, a respectable member of the same society, was the person whom
I saw next. I had been introduced to him, previously to my journey, when he
was at London, at the yearly meeting of the Quakers, so that no letter to
him was necessary. As Mr. Roscoe had generously given the profits of The
Wrongs of Africa to our commitee, I made no scruple of calling upon him.
His reception of me was very friendly, and he introduced me afterwards to
Dr. Currie, who had written the preface to that poem. There was also a
fourth, upon whom I called, though I did not know him. His name was Edward
Rushton. He had been an officer in a slave-ship, but had lost his sight,
and had become an enemy to that trade. On passing through Chester, I had
heard, for the first time, that he had published a poem called West-Indian
Eclogues, with a view of making the public better acquainted with the evil
of the Slave-trade, and of exciting their indignation against it. Of the
three last it may be observed, that, having come forward thus early, as
labourers, they deserve to be put down, as I have placed them in the map,
among the forerunners and coadjutors in this great cause, for each
published his work before any efforts were made publicly, or without
knowing that any were intended. Rushton, also, had the boldness, though
then living in Liverpool, to affix his name to his work. These were the
only persons whom I knew for some time after my arrival in that place.

It may not, perhaps, be necessary to enter so largely into my proceedings
at Liverpool as at Bristol. The following account, therefore, may suffice.

In my at