brethren also, I believe," said he, "felt a little tender under those
censures; for though their people had very few slaves themselves, yet
they had been pretty considerable carriers of them to others."[32]

As the war slowly dragged itself to a close, it became increasingly
evident that a firm moral stand against slavery and the slave-trade was
not a probability. The reaction which naturally follows a period of
prolonged and exhausting strife for high political principles now set
in. The economic forces of the country, which had suffered most, sought
to recover and rearrange themselves; and all the selfish motives that
impelled a bankrupt nation to seek to gain its daily bread did not long
hesitate to demand a reopening of the profitable African slave-trade.
This demand was especially urgent from the fact that the slaves, by
pillage, flight, and actual fighting, had become so reduced in numbers
during the war that an urgent demand for more laborers was felt in the
South.

Nevertheless, the revival of the trade was naturally a matter of some
difficulty, as the West India circuit had been cut off, leaving no
resort except to contraband traffic and the direct African trade. The
English slave-trade after the peace "returned to its former state," and
was by 1784 sending 20,000 slaves annually to the West Indies.[33] Just
how large the trade to the continent was at this time there are few
means of ascertaining; it is certain that there was a general reopening
of the trade in the Carolinas and Georgia, and that the New England
traders participated in it. This traffic undoubtedly reached
considerable proportions; and through the direct African trade and the
illicit West India trade many thousands of Negroes came into the United
States during the years 1783-1787.[34]