good work by a resolution to disown all such as
continued to be engaged in it. Occasionally the question was brought
before magistrates, whether a slave became entitled to his liberty
upon landing in England. In 1765 Granville Sharp came forward as the
protector of a negro, who, having been abandoned and cast upon the
world in disease and misery by his owner, was healed and assisted
through the charity of Mr. Sharp's brother. Recovering his value
with his health, he was claimed and seized by his master, and would
have been shipped to the colonies, as many Africans were, but for
the prompt and resolute interference of Mr. Sharp. In several
similar cases the same gentleman came forward successfully; but the
general question was not determined, or even argued, until 1772,
when the celebrated case of the negro Somerset was brought before
the Court of King's Bench, which adjudged, after a deliberate
hearing, that in England the right of the master over the slave
could not be maintained. The general question was afterward, in
1778, decided still more absolutely by the Scotch Courts, in the
case of Wedderburn _vs._ Knight. In 1783 an event occurred well
qualified to rouse the feelings of the nation, and call its
attention to the atrocities of which the slave trade was the cause
and pretext. An action was brought by certain underwriters against
the owners of the ship Zong, on the ground that the captain had
caused 132 weak, sickly slaves to be thrown overboard for the
purpose of claiming their value, for which the plaintiffs would not
have been liable if the cargo had died a natural death. The fact of
the drowning was admitted, and defended on the plea that want of
water had rendered it necessary, though it appeared that the crew
had not been put upon short allowance. It now seems incredible that
no criminal proceeding should have been instituted against the
perpetrators of this wholesale murder.

In 1785 the Vice-chancellor of Cambridge proposed as the subject for
the Bachelor's Prize Essay, the question, Is it allowable to enslave
men without their consent? Thomas Clarkson, who had gained the prize
in the preceding year, again became a candidate. Conceiving that the
thesis, though couched in general terms, had an especial reference
to the African slave trade, he went to London to make inquiries on
the subject. Investigation brought under his view a mass of
cruelties and abominations which engrossed his thoughts and shocked