and Murray a sum of money as damages for the injury which they themselves had sustained.  This compromise was acceded to.  The men received the money, and signed the release, (of which I insisted upon a copy,) and went to sea again in another trade, thanking me for my interference in their behalf.  But by this copy, which I have now in my possession, it appears that care was taken by the captain’s attorney to render their future evidence in the case of Peter Green almost impracticable; for it was there wickedly stated, “that George Ormond and Patrick Murray did then and there bind themselves in certain penalties that they would neither encourage nor support any action at law against the said captain, by or at the suit or prosecution of any other of the seamen now or late on board the said ship, and that they released the said captain also from all manner of actions, suits, and cause and causes of action, informations, prosecutions, and other proceedings which they then had, or ever had, or could or might have, by reason of the said assaults upon their own persons, or other wrongs or injuries done by the said captain heretofore and to the date of this release[A].”

[Footnote A:  None of the nine actions before mentioned ever came to a trial; but they were all compromised by paying sums to the injured parties.]

CHAPTER XX

[Sidenote:  Labours of the committee during the author’s journey; Quakers the first to notice its institution; General Baptists the next.—­Correspondence opened with American societies for Abolition.—­First individual who addressed the committee was Mr. William Smith.—­Thanks voted to Ramsay.—­Committee prepares lists of persons to whom to send its publications; Barclay, Taylor, and Wedgewood, elected members of the committee.—­Letters from Brissot and others.—­Granville Sharp elected chairman,—­Seal ordered to be engraved.—­Letters from different correspondents, as they offered their services to the committee.]

The committee, during my absence, had attended regularly at their posts; they had been both vigilant and industrious; they were, in short, the persons who had been the means of raising the public spirit which I had observed first at Manchester, and afterwards as I journeyed on.  It will be proper, therefore, that I should now say something of their labours, and of the fruits of them:  and if, in doing this, I should be more minute for a few pages than some would wish, I must apologize for myself by saying, that there are others who would be sorry to lose the knowledge of the particular manner in which the foundation was laid, and the superstructure advanced, of a work which will make so brilliant an appearance in our history, as that of the abolition of the Slave Trade.