another tree, which bore plum-puddings so very hot, and with such
exquisite proportion of sugar, fruit, &c., that we all acknowledged
it was not possible to taste anything of the kind more delicious in
England: in short, though the scurvy had made such dreadful progress
among the crew before our striking upon the ice, the supply of
vegetables, and especially the bread-fruit and pudding-fruit, put an
almost immediate stop to the distemper.

We had not proceeded thus many weeks, advancing with incredible fatigue
by continual towing, when we fell in with a fleet of Negro-men, as they
call them. These wretches, I must inform you, my dear friends, had found
means to make prizes of those vessels from some Europeans upon the coast
of Guinea, and tasting the sweets of luxury, had formed colonies in
several new discovered islands near the South Pole, where they had a
variety of plantations of such matters as would only grow in the coldest
climates. As the black inhabitants of Guinea were unsuited to the
climate and excessive cold of the country, they formed the diabolical
project of getting Christian slaves to work for them. For this purpose
they sent vessels every year to the coast of Scotland, the northern
parts of Ireland, and Wales, and were even sometimes seen off the coast
of Cornwall. And having purchased, or entrapped by fraud or violence,
a great number of men, women, and children, they proceeded with their
cargoes of human flesh to the other end of the world, and sold them to
their planters, where they were flogged into obedience, and made to work
like horses all the rest of their lives.

My blood ran cold at the idea, while every one on the island also
expressed his horror that such an iniquitous traffic should be suffered
to exist. But, except by open violence, it was found impossible to
destroy the trade, on account of a barbarous prejudice, entertained of