d 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. It 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 anybody 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, whe