Page:Trials of the Slave Traders Samo, Peters and Tufft (1813).pdf/3

 any acquisition of gratification from express personal approbation. The world will always remember, and often mention, them; and it is impossible they can be forgotten by historians; for when they speak of the British legislative acts of the nineteenth century, they must dwell with delight and enthusiasm in honest praise of the names of those who contended with unrivalled eloquence, unanswerable arguments, and final success, against slavery. Besides, the reporter of these Trials, and the author of this Introduction, having no object to attain, except extending the cause of humanity, would preserve himself free from even the suspicion of adulation.

It will be found, from a perusal of these Trials, and a consideration of the country inhabited by the slave-trading delinquents, that a death-blow has been struck at that execrable traffic, throughout a great extent of the western coast of Africa.

Discovery will also be made, that notwithstanding a very short interval only has elapsed since the wisdom of parliament declared that trading in slaves should be a felony, yet the act thus declaratory has already been brought into effective and full operation, by those intrusted by the government with the important power of administering the laws of Great Britain, in a distant part of her vast dominions.

The cruelty and turpitude practised by the slave traders will also appear, and serve to add an increased horror towards that diabolical commerce,