h exchequer the amount that the Government was willing to
advance. It was urged, too, with some show of reason, that the
planters were not themselves responsible for the existence of slave
labor, that generations of planters had grown up under the system and
had made a profit by it during the days when civilization had not,
anywhere, set its face against slavery, and that it was hard,
therefore, to make them suffer in pocket for the recent development in
the feelings of humanity. The offer of a loan was abandoned by the
Government, and it was proposed instead that a gift of twenty millions
sterling should {199} be tendered as compensation for the losses that
the planters would be likely to undergo. This proposal, at first, met
with some opposition, and by many indeed was looked upon as an
extravagant freak of generosity; but some of the leading abolitionists
were willing to make allowance for the condition of the planters, and
most, or all, of them were prepared to make a large sacrifice for the
sake of carrying some measure which promised, even by gradual advances,
the final abolition of the slave system. We may condense into a very
brief space the remainder of the story, and merely record the fact that
the Government carried their amended measure of emancipation with its
liberal grant to the West Indian planters through both Houses of
Parliament, and that it obtained the royal assent.

[Sidenote: 1833--Slavery abolished in British colonies]

It may easily be imagined that poor King William must have had some
mental struggles before he found himself quite in a mood to grant that
assent. If the King ever had any clear and enduring opinion in his
mind, it probably was the opinion, which he had often expressed
already, against the abolition of slavery. He had, of course, a
general objection to reform of any kind, but his objection to any
reform which threatened the endurance of the slave system must have
been an article of faith with him. It was the fate of King William the
Fourth to live in a reign of reforms, not one of which would appear to
have touched his heart or been in accordance with his personal
judgment. The highest praise that history can give him is that he did
not at least, as one of his predecessors had done, set his own judgment
and his own inclination determinedly and irrevocably against the advice
of the statesmen whom he had called in to carry on the work of
administration. The King gave his a