trade would be carried on, and then the sufferings of the Africans, crammed
up in small vessels, which would be obliged to be hovering about from day
to day, to watch an opportunity of landing, would be ten times greater than
any which they now experienced in the legal trade. He was glad, however, as
the matter was to be discussed, that it had been brought forward in the
shape of distinct propositions, to be grounded upon the evidence in the
privy council report.

Mr. Fox observed, that he did not like, where he agreed as to the substance
of a measure, to differ with respect to the form of it. If, however, he
differed in any thing in the present case, it was with a view rather to
forward the business than to injure it, or to throw any thing like an
obstacle in its way. Nothing like either should come from him. What he
thought was, that all the propositions were not necessary to be voted
previously to the ultimate decision, though some of them undoubtedly were.
He considered them as of two classes: the one, alleging the grounds upon
which it was proper to proceed to the abolition; such as that the trade was
productive of inexpressible misery, in various ways, to the innocent
natives of Africa; that it was the grave of our seamen; and so on: the
other, merely answering objections which might be started, and where there
might be a difference of opinion. He was however glad that the propositions
were likely to be entered upon the journals; since, if from any misfortune
the business should be deferred, it might succeed another year. Sure he was
that it could not fail to succeed sooner or later. He highly approved of
what Mr. Pitt had said, relative to the language it became us to hold out
to foreign powers in case of a clandestine trade. With respect, however, to
the assertion of Sir William Yonge, that a clandestine trade in slaves
would be worse than a legal one, he could not admit it. Such a trade, if it
existed at all, ought only to be clandestine. A trade in human flesh and
sinews was so scandalous, that it ought not openly to be carried on by any