ng African traders, or
the inhabitants of our islands, a degree of perfection in morals, which
was not to be found in Great Britain itself. Would any man estimate the
character of the English nation by what was to be read in the records of
the Old Bailey? He himself, however, had lived sixteen years in the West
Indies, and he could bear testimony to the general good usage of the
slaves.

Before the agitation of this impolitic question the slaves were
contented with their situation. There was a mutual confidence between
them and their masters: and this continued to be the case till the new
doctrines were broached. But now depots of arms were necessary on every
estate; and the scene was totally reversed. Nor was their religious then
inferior to their civil state. When the English took possession of
Grenada, where his property lay, they found them baptized and instructed
in the principles of the Roman Catholic faith. The priests of that
persuasion had indeed been indefatigable in their vocation; so that
imported Africans generally obtained within twelve months a tolerable
idea of their religious duties. He had seen the slaves there go through
the public mass in a manner, and with a fervency, which would have done
credit to more civilized societies. But the case was now altered; for,
except where the Moravians had been, there was no trace in our islands
of an attention to their religious interests.

It had been said that their punishments were severe. There might be
instances of cruelty; but these were not general. Many of them were
undoubtedly ill disposed; though not more, according to their number, on
a plantation, than in a regiment, or in a ship's crew. Had we never
heard of seamen being flogged from ship to ship, or of soldiers dying in
the very act of punishment? Had we not also heard, even in this country
of boasted liberty, of seamen being seized, and carried away, when
returning from distant voyages, after an absence of many years; and this
without even being allowed to see their wives and families? As to
distressed objects, he maintained, that there was more wretchedness and
poverty in St. Giles's, than in all the West Indian islands belonging to
Great Britain.

He would now speak of the African and West Indian trades. The imports
and exports of these amounted to upwards of ten millions annually; and
they gave employment to three hundred thousand tons of shipping, and to
about twenty-five thousand seamen. Thes