A previous knowledge of these particulars is necessary for enabling the reader to form a judgment upon the two points connected with the publication of Park's Travels, which were before alluded to. With respect to the first of these questions, namely, that relative to Park's sentiments on the subject of the Abolition, the writer of this narrative, in consequence of information he has obtained from some of Park's nearest relations, is enabled to state with great confidence, that Park uniformly expressed a great abhorrence of Slavery and the Slave Trade, whenever these subjects occurred in conversation. But the same persons farther represent, that he considered the Abolition of the Slave Trade as a measure of _state policy_; for which reason he thought it would be improper for him, in any work he might give to the public, to interpose his private opinion relative to a question of such importance, and which was then under the consideration of the Legislature. Whatever may be thought of the correctness of this opinion, it is necessary to observe that the rule which he thus prescribed for his own conduct, was not strictly adhered to; or rather, that the system of neutrality which he professed, had, in a certain degree, the effect of a declaration of opinion. From the time of the publication of Park's Travels, his name was constantly mentioned in the list of persons conversant with Africa, who were not friendly to the Abolition; and his authority was always appealed to with some triumph by the advocates of the Slave Trade: and this, apparently, with good reason. For, although the author avowedly abstained from giving an explicit opinion as to the effects of that traffic, yet the general tone of his work appeared to leave no doubt with regard to his real sentiments; and indeed the _silence_ of so intelligent a traveller relative to a subject which must necessarily have engaged so much of his attention, was in itself a sufficient proof, of a bias existing in the mind of the writer, unfavourable to the Abolition. For to what other cause could it be attributed, that the Slave Trade was never once mentioned in Park's book as having the smallest share in promoting the barbarism and internal disorders of the African Continent? Or, that in his pathetic description of the miseries endured by the caravan of slaves which the author accompanied from Kamalia to the Gambia (a journey of five hundred miles), not the slightest allusion was made to the obvious and immediate cause of these sufferings, the demand for slaves on the coast?--It must further be recollected, that the Slave Trade, at the time when Park wrote, had engaged universal attention, and was become the subject of much controversy and public discussion; yet this topic, of so much interest and importance, occurs only once in the course of these Travels; and is then hastily dismissed with a slight and unmeaning observation.