Let us now estimate it as it has been proved to exist in the second; or let us examine the state of the unhappy Africans reduced to slavery in this manner, while on board the vessels, which are to convey them across the ocean to other lands.

And here I must observe at once, that, as far as this part of the evil is concerned, I am at a loss to describe it.

Where shall I find words to express properly their sorrow, as arising from the reflection of being parted for ever from their friends, their relatives, and their country?
Where shall I find language to paint, in appropriate colours, the horror of mind brought on by thoughts of their future unknown destination, of which they can augur nothing but misery from all that they have yet seen?
How shall I make known their situation, while labouring, under painful disease, or while struggling in the suffocating holds of their prisons, like animals enclosed in an exhausted receiver?
How shall I describe their feelings as exposed to all the personal indignities, which lawless appetite or brutal passion may suggest?
How shall I exhibit their sufferings as determining to refuse sustenance and die, or as resolving to break their chains, and, disdaining to live as slaves, to punish their oppressors?
How shall I give an idea of their agony when under various punishments and tortures for their reputed crimes?
Indeed, every part of this subject defies my powers, and I must, therefore, satisfy myself and the reader with a general representation, or in the words of a celebrated member of Parliament, that "Never was so much human suffering condensed in so small a space." I come now to the evil, as it has been proved to arise in the third case; or to consider the situation of the unhappy victims of the trade, when their painful voyages are over, or after they have been landed upon their destined shores.

And here we are to view them, first under the degrading light of cattle: we are to see them examined, handled, selected, separated, and sold.

Alas! relatives are separated from relatives, as if, like cattle, they had no rational intellect, no power of feeling the nearness of relationship, nor sense of the duties belonging to the ties of life! We are next to see them labouring; and this for the benefit of those to whom they are under no obligation, by any law either natural or divine, to obey.