That Slavery had received its death-blow was fully believed at this time.  Africa being delivered from the traffic, the institution itself, its supplies being cut off, must necessarily wither and die.  This was the common view of the matter; and the more effectually to secure this result, negotiations were entered into with other European governments for the suppression of the trade in their dominions.  In America, the Congress of the United States passed a law prohibiting the African Slave-Trade after the year 1808, the period indicated in the Constitution,—­the law taking effect a few years later.  Napoleon, restored from his first banishment, and once more wielding the sceptre of power, caused a law to be passed forbidding the trade in the French Colonies.  The friends of the negro were everywhere high in hope that the days of Slavery were numbered.  Starved out, the monster must inevitably die.  So sure were they of this result, that in England their efforts had all along been directed against the trade.  The institution itself had been comparatively untouched.

A few years passed, and it began to be evident to those who had been active in the great conflict that the law against the Slave-Trade was less effectual than had been anticipated.  The ocean was wide, the African coast a thousand miles long, and desperate men were not wanting who were disposed to elude the statute for the sake of large gains.  Nor need they fail to secure suitable markets for the sale of their ill-gotten cargoes.  But into this part of our subject it may not be well to pry too closely.

If the friends of the African cause had supposed their work accomplished, when their first success was attained, their error was soon corrected.  It was pleasant to repose upon the laurels so dearly won; but another battle must be fought, and this necessity soon became apparent.  But a few years elapsed and the negro was again made the subject of legislative consideration.  Mr. Wilberforce was still a member of the House, though most of those with whom he had been associated at the beginning of his public life were dead.  Forty years had passed since he first took his seat, but he was ready once more to take up the cause of the defenceless.  The abuses perpetrated against the West Indian negro called loudly for Governmental interference.

Since 1807 little had been done save the passage of the Registry Bill, which had been secured by Mr. Wilberforce in 1816.  This was of the nature of an investigation into the actual state of the West India Colonies with respect to the illicit commerce in slaves.  Mild as this measure appeared, it proved the opening wedge of much that followed.  It was in fact the first of a series of movements which issued in momentous events, even the emancipation of all the slaves in the British Colonies.  The passage of this bill was followed by an increased expression of interest in the matter of Negro Slavery; this was evinced in