Summary

"And my story waits like a restful beast {London, 1803}"

In London, the abolitionists begin to exhaust Aminata. She cannot believe that they want to abolish the slave trade, but not slavery outright: "I cannot speak against the slave trade without condemning slavery," she says (143). One of the leading abolitionists, Sir Stanley Hastings, tells her that the violent uprising in St. Domingue has made English people -- that is, white people --nervous about granting full freedom to black people. It is easier to ask for the elimination of the slave trade rather than the elimination of slavery altogether.

Amidst...