some persons, be ascribed to the spirit of party; but thinking, as in my conscience I do, that in concluding this Treaty, every moral and religious duty has been disregarded, ought I, from any such trivial consideration, and, because I cannot blame the measure without censuring the men who are the authors of it, to refrain from expressing my real opinion? Let me rather again remind those who, thinking as ill of the Treaty as I do, are yet so far influenced by their partiality to Ministers, that they will either observe criminal silence, or give their sanction to it by their votes, that they are, indeed, acting from the worst of party motives; and let me caution all such persons how, at any future time, they receive favors at the hands of Ministers, lest their consciences should tell them that such favors have been obtained at the expense of the happiness and blood of Africa.

My honorable Friend' indeed, who practises every Christian virtue, has expressed, in strong terms, his disappointment and regret at this Treaty; but yet he has the exemplary forbearance, while he deeply deplores, not to censure the conduct of the negociator. A most remarkable instance of Christian charity it unquestionably is, for there is no individual in his Majesty's dominions, who, if in considerations of such a superior importance, we could be allowed to mix any thing which merely affected ourselves, has more reason to complain than my honorable Friend. There is no man living whom it can have robbed of a larger portion of happiness. After devoting the best part of his virtuous life to this great object; when by long continued and unwearied exertions, after repeated disappointments, and by a perseverance without example, he had, at last, at a mature period of his life, accomplished

' Mr. Wilberforce.

the object to which he had devoted all the faculties of his mind; when he was beginning to reap the full rewards of his long labors,-rewards the most congenial to his heart, and the best adapted to services such as his, the satisfaction of seeing the progress of the good of which he had been, in so great a degree, the author; while he was every year receiving from Africa and from the West Indies, the tidings of the improved condition of his fellow-creatures; while he saw in Africa the dawnings of civilization, the calm and the tranquillity which reigned in their contented villages, the instruction which was afforded to their youths, and the comforts which the light of true religion was every day diffusing among the natives; and, on the other hand, in the West Indies, the mitigation of the labors and sufferings of the Negroes, and law extending its protection to those unhappy outcasts of society; while he was cheering his mind, long depressed by the miseries which he had been compelled, for so many years, to dwell upon, with the refreshing sight of this comparative happiness, and was eagerly looking forward to the further progress of this great good, and was expecting, from still greater improvements in the moral existence of those to whom he had already been so great a benefactor, the best consolations of his declining age; what a prospect of the future has the noble Lord opened to him!--The sudden revival of this horrid traffic, upon the largest scale and in its most ferocious spirit; all his exertions and his anxieties, and his sacrifices of time, and health, and fortune, endured in vain; a renewal of the plunder and carnage, and devastation, which used to lay waste the shores of Africa; new fleets sailing across the Atlantic, freighted with human misery in every form and every degree; new markets opened, in which rational beings, like beasts of the field, are to be again exposed to public sale; the revival of a No. VIII. Pam. VOL. IV

2 F

more severe and a more cruel species of bondage, more exhausting toils, a lower species of degradation, augmented tortures; an aggravation of all the anguish of body and mind, which wastes and consumes so large a portion of our fellow-men; and the sickening certainty, that all these complicated evils tend to confirm and perpetuate and aggravate each other, and that they forebode scenes more dreadful even than those which they exhibit!

Such are the melancholy prospects which this treaty affords to those who had been earnest in procuring the Abolition, and who were pleasing themselves with the reflection of the great benefits which they had obtained for mankind, or, in other words, to the great majority of the British nation. With these prospects before us, I cannot applaud the treaty. I am desirous, with my honorable Friend, to have all the information that can throw light upon the negociation; but if that information is withheld, and I am compelled to decide with no other lights than I at present possess, I must say, that the treaty appears to me, as far as it respects the Slave Trade, to be repugnant to justice and humanity, disgraceful to the British name, and offensive in the sight of God.

THE END.

OBSERVATIONS

ON THE

BRVMAL RETREAT

OF THE

SWALLOW.

TO WHICH IS ANNEXED

A COPIOVS INDEX

TO MANY PASSAGES RELATING TO THIS BIRD,

IN THE WORKS OF ANCIENT AND MODERN AUTHORS.

BY

THOMAS FORSTER, F. L. S.

AUTHOR OF

"RESEARCHES ABOUT ATMOSPHERIC PHAENOMENA❞— "DIOSEMEA OF ARATUS,”—ete.

FOURTH EDITION, CORRECTED AND ENLARGED.

[This Edition is not published separately.]

1814.

PREFACE

TO THE FOURTH EDITION.

SINCE the publication of the third edition of this pamphlet, I have obtained additional proof of the migratory nature of the Swallow, from a new source.

Finding that the organization of the heads of birds of this genus corresponds with the notion of their possessing great power of conceiving the local situations of different countries, and finding their way about; it may be important to add this species of evidence to the mass of proof drawn from other fountains; as a means of washing away the prejudices established on the casual and rare occurrences of these birds being found under water. As, however, such facts seem to have been well authenticated in a few instances, it becomes a worthy subject of future inquiry, what causes impede their migration, and whence the birds derive their propensity to take such an occasional subterfuge?

Having alluded to a peculiarity of organization as giving peculiar propensities, it may seem necessary to explain to the reader the theory of instincts involved in this mode of accounting for the manners of animated beings. But as this would be a tedious and long circumlo