them, which she had thought fit from a regard to her character to abandon.  It was highly becoming Great Britain to take the lead of other nations in such a virtuous and magnificent measure, and he could not but have confidence, that they would be inclined to share the honour with us, or be pleased to follow us as their example.  If we were disposed to set about this glorious work in earnest, they might be invited to concur with us by a negotiation to be immediately opened for that purpose.  He would only now observe, before he sat down, in answer to certain ideas thrown out, that he could by no means acquiesce in any compensation for losses, which might be sustained by the people of Liverpool, or by others in any other part of the kingdom, in the execution of this just and necessary undertaking.

Sir William Yonge said, he wanted no inducement to concur with the honourable mover of the propositions, provided the latter could be fairly established, and no serious mischiefs were to arise from the abolition.  But he was apprehensive that many evils might follow, in the case of any sudden or unlooked-for decrease in the slaves.  They might be destroyed by hurricanes.  They might be swept off by many fatal disorders.  In these cases, the owners of them would not be able to fill up their places, and they who had lent money upon the lands, where the losses had happened, would foreclose their mortgages.  He was fearful also that a clandestine trade would be carried on, and then the sufferings of the Africans, crammed up in small vessels, which would be obliged to be hovering about from day to day, to watch an opportunity of landing, would be ten times greater than any which they now experienced in the legal trade.  He was glad, however, as the matter was to be discussed, that it had been brought forward in the shape of distinct propositions, to be grounded upon the evidence in the privy council report.

Mr. Fox observed, that he did not like, where he agreed as to the substance of a measure, to differ with respect to the form of it.  If, however, he differed in any thing in the present case, it was with a view rather to forward the business than to injure it, or to throw any thing like an obstacle in its way.  Nothing like either should come from him.  What he thought was, that all the propositions were not necessary to be voted previously to the ultimate decision, though some of them undoubtedly were.  He considered them as of two classes:  the one, alleging the grounds upon which it was proper to proceed to the abolition; such as that the trade was productive of inexpressible misery, in various ways, to the innocent natives of Africa; that it was the grave of our seamen; and so on:  the other, merely answering objections which might be started, and where there might be a difference of opinion.  He was however glad that the propositions were likely to be entered upon the journals; since, if from any misfortune the business should be deferred, it might succeed another year.