lled at the desperation of then opponents. The Rev.
Martin Bolzius, one of the most active supporters of the trustees,
wrote those gentlemen on May 3, 1748:--

"Things being now in such a melancholy state, I must humbly
beseech your honors, not to regard any more our of our
friend's petitions against negroes."

The Rev. George Whitefield and James Habersham used their utmost
influence upon the trustees to obtain a modification of the
prohibition against "the use of negroes." On the 6th of December,
1748, Rev. Whitefield, speaking of a plantation and Negroes he had
purchased, wrote the trustees:--

"Upwards of five thousand pounds have been expended in that
undertaking, and yet very little proficiency made in the
cultivation of my tract of land, and that entirely owing to
the necessity I lay under of making use of white hands. Had
a negro been allowed, I should now have had a sufficiency to
support a great many orphans, without expending above half
the sum which has been laid out. An unwillingness to let so
good a design drop, and having a rational conviction that it
must necessarily, if some other method was not fixed upon to
prevent it--these two considerations, honoured gentlemen,
prevailed on me about two years ago, through the bounty of
my good friends, to purchase a plantation in South Carolina,
where negroes are allowed. Blessed be God, this plantation
has succeeded; and though at present I have only eight
working hands, yet in all probability there will be more
raised in one year, and with a quarter the expense, than has
been produced at Bethesda for several years last past. This
confirms me in the opinion I have entertained for a long
time, that _Georgia never can or will be a flourishing
province without negroes are allowed_."[519]

The sentiment in favor of the importation of Negro slaves had become
well-nigh unanimous. The trustees began to waver. On the 10th of
January, 1749, another petition was presented to the trustees. It was
carefully drawn, and set forth the restrictions under which slaves
should be introduced. On the 16th of May following, it was read to the
trustees; and they resolved to have it "presented to His Majesty in
council." They also asked that the prohibition against the
introduction of Negroes, passed in "1735, be repealed." The Earl of
Shaftesbury, at the head of a spe