who had a great knowledge of the subject.  I thought it not unreasonable, that I might gain one or two good evidences out of these, as they had probably long ago left the concern, and were not now interested in the continuance of it.  But all my endeavours were fruitless.  I sent messages to them by different persons.  I met them in all ways.  I stated to them, that if there was nothing objectionable in the trade, seeing it laboured under such a stigma, they had an opportunity of coming forward and of wiping away the stain.  If, on the other hand, it was as bad as represented, then they had it in their power, by detailing the crimes which attached to it, of making some reparation, or atonement, for the part they had taken in it.  But no representations would do.  All intercourse was positively forbidden between us; and whenever they met me in the street, they shunned me as if I had been a mad dog.  I could not for some time account for the strange disposition which they thus manifested towards me; but my friends helped me to unravel it, for I was assured that one or two of them, though they went no longer to Africa as captains, were in part owners of vessels trading there; and, with respect to all of them, it might be generally said, that they had been guilty of such enormities, that they would be afraid of coming forward in the way I proposed, lest any thing should come out by which they might criminate themselves.  I was obliged then to give up all hope of getting any evidence from this quarter, and I saw but little prospect of getting it from those, who were then actually deriving their livelihood from the trade.  And yet I was determined to persevere.  For I thought that some might be found in it, who were not yet so hardened as to be incapable of being awakened on this subject.  I thought that others might be found in it, who wished to leave it upon principle, and that these would unbosom themselves to me.  And I thought it not improbable that I might fall in with others, who had come unexpectedly into a state of independence, and that these might be induced, as their livelihood would be no longer affected by giving me information, to speak the truth.

I persevered for weeks together under this hope, but could find no one of all those, who had been applied to, who would have any thing to say to me.  At length Walter Chandler had prevailed upon a young gentleman, of the name of Gardiner, who was going out as surgeon of the Pilgrim, to meet me.  The condition was, that we were to meet at the house of the former, but that we were to enter in and go out at different times, that is, we were not to be seen together.

Gardiner, on being introduced to me, said at once, that he had often wished to see me on the subject of my errand, but that the owner of the Pilgrim had pointed me out to him as a person, whom he would wish him to avoid.  He then laid open to me the different methods of obtaining slaves in Africa, as he had learned from those on board his own vessel in his first, or former, voyage.  He unfolded also the manner of their treatment in the Middle Passage, with the various distressing scenes which had occurred in it.  He stated the barbarous usage of the seamen as he had witnessed it, and concluded by saying, that there never was a subject, which demanded so loudly the interference of the legislature as that of the Slave-trade.