Into the hands of an enlightened legislature, and a beneficent public, I commit the Negro race; and may their endeavours be blest by Providence! may they tend to enlarge the circle of civilized and Christian society, and augment the commercial prosperity of the United Kingdom! APPENDIX. No. I. _To the Right Honourable Lord Viscount Howick, his Majesty's late principal Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs; shewing at one View the most simple and ready Mode of gradually and effectually abolishing the Slave Trade, and eradicating Slavery, on the Eve of his Lordship introducing the late Bill into Parliament for the Abolition of the Slate Trade_. _London, 5th February, 1807._ MY LORD, Stimulated by an ardent zeal for the political and commercial interests of my country, and animated by the principles of humanity, I venture to approach your Lordship upon a subject which, with every deference, I conceive to be of the most momentous consequence at the present conjuncture, namely, the existing state of Africa, and the relative importance of its trade to the _United Kingdom_. In my communications to your Lordship, I shall adhere to that brevity which is consistent with perspicuity, and a recognition of the importance attached to your Lordship's time and weighty engagements. If experimental knowledge, my Lord, attaches any force to the observations I now submit to your Lordship, I have to premise, that they are the result of recent personal investigation, and are a summary of remarks detailed in journals of a very excursive observation on the Windward Coast of Africa, and a peculiar facility of intercourse with the chiefs and native tribes of a widely extended circle, from which I am returned, by the West Indies, in the late fleet under the convoy of his Majesty's frigate La Seine, and Merlin sloop of war. As a preliminary introduction, permit me to refer your Lordship to the annexed copy of a letter, (Appendix No. II.) which I ventured to address to the Right Honourable the Lords Commissioners of the Admiralty, dated 1st May, ultimo, in which is exemplified the present state of commerce from the Island of Goree to Cape Palmas. Vide page 54. Conclusive as this example may be of its magnitude, yet it is infinitely below its attainable increase. The want of naval protection, and the patronage of government, has greatly fettered it, and exposed the property engaged therein, to the incursions and destructive depredations of the enemy.