it was, had been carried on by the Assientos for permission of the
kings of Spain and Portugal, and engrossed in the public, so that few
Negroes were brought, and those excessive dear.

It happened, being in company with some merchants and planters of my
acquaintance, and talking of those things very earnestly, three of them
came to me the next morning, and told me they had been musing very much
upon what I had discoursed with them of, the last night, and they came
to make a secret proposal to me; and after enjoining me secrecy, they
told me, that they had a mind to fit out a ship to to Guinea; that they
had all plantations as well as I, and were straitened for nothing so
much as servants; that as it was a trade could not be carried on,
because they could not publicly sell the Negroes when they came home, so
they desired to make but one voyage, to bring the Negroes on shore
privately, and divide them among their own plantations; and in a word,
the question was, whether I would go their supercargo in the ship, to
manage the trading part upon the coast of Guinea? and they offered me
that I should have my equal share of the Negroes, without providing any
part of the stock.

This was a fair proposal, it must be confessed, had it been made to any
one that had not had a settlement and plantation of his own to look
after, which was in a fair way of coming to be very considerable, and
with a good stock upon it. But for me, that was thus entered and
established, and had nothing to do but go on as I had begun, for three
or four years more, and to have sent for the other hundred pounds from
England, and who in that time, and with that little addition, could
scarce have failed of being worth three or four thousand pounds
sterling, and that increasing too; for me to think of such a voyage, was
the most preposterous thing that ever man in such circumstances could be