After the formation of the commitee[A], notice was sent to Mr. Wilberforce of the event, and a friendship began, which has continued uninterruptedly between them, from that to the present day.

[Footnote A:  All the members were of the society of the Quakers, except Mr. Sharp, Sansom, and myself.  Joseph Gurney Bevan was present on the day before this meeting.  He desired to belong to the society, but to be excused from belonging to the commitee.]

[Illustration]

[Illustration]

CHAPTER XI.

The preceding history of the different classes of the forerunners and coadjutors, to the time of the formation of the commitee, collected into one view by means of a map—­Explanation of this map—­and observations upon it.

As the preceding history of the different classes of the forerunners and coadjutors, to the time of their junction, or to the formation of the commitee, as just explained, may be thought interesting by many, I have endeavoured, by means of the annexed map, so to bring it before the reader, that he may comprehend the whole of it at a single view.

The figure beginning at A and reaching down to X represents the first class of forerunners and coadjutors up to the year 1787, as consisting of so many springs or rivulets, which assisted in making and swelling the torrent which swept away the Slave-trade.

The figure from B to C and from C to X represents the second class, or that of the Quakers in England, up to the same time.  The stream on the right-hand represents them as a body, and that on the left, the six individuals belonging to them, who formed the commitee in 1783.

The figure from B to D represents the third class, or that of the Quakers in America when joined with others in 1774.  The stream passing from D through E to X shows how this class was conveyed down, as it were, so as to unite with the second.  That passing from D to Y shows its course in its own country, to its enlargement in 1787.  And here I may observe, that as the different streams which formed a junction at X, were instrumental in producing the abolition of the Slave-trade in England, in the month of March 1807, so those, whose effects are found united at Y, contributed to produce the same event in America, in the same month of the same year.

The figure from F to X represents the fourth class up to 1787.

X represents the junction of all the four classes in the commitee instituted in London on the twenty-second day of May, 1787.

The parallel lines G, H, I, K, represent different periods of time, showing when the forerunners and coadjutors lived.  The space between G and H includes the space of fifty years, in which we find but few labourers in this cause.  That between H and I includes the same portion of time, in which we find them considerably increased, or nearly doubled.  That between I and K represents the next thirty-seven years.  But here we find their increase beyond all expectation, for we find four times more labourers in this short term, than in the whole of the preceding century.