tion and the emancipation!
This is unquestionable, and it is decisive.

As soon as it began to be perceived that such was likely to be the
result of the abolition in regard to the emancipation, Mr. Stephen's
authority with his coadjutors, always high, rose in proportion to the
confirmations which the event had lent his predictions; and his zealous
endeavours and unwearied labours for the subversion of the accursed
system became both more extensive and more effectual. If, however,
strict justice requires the tribute which we have paid to this eminent
person's distinguished services, justice also renders it imperative on
the historian of the Abolition in all its branches, to record an error
into which he fell. Having originally maintained that the traffic would
survive the Act of 1807, in which he was right, that Act only imposing
pecuniary penalties, he persisted in the same opinion after the Act of
1811 had made slave-trading a felony; and long after it had been
effectually put down in the British dominions, he continued to maintain
that it was carried on nearly as much as ever, reasoning upon
calculations drawn from the island returns. Hence he insisted upon a
general Registry Act, as essential to prevent the continuance of an
importation which had little or no real existence. The importance of
such a measure was undeniable, with a view to secure the good treatment
of the negroes in the islands; but the extinction of the Slave Trade had
long before been effectually accomplished.

In the efforts to obtain Negro Emancipation, all the Abolitionists were
now prepared to join. The conduct of the Colonial Assemblies having long
shown the fallacy of those expectations which had been entertained of
the good work being done in the islands as soon as the supply of new
hands should be stopped by the Abolition, there remained no longer any
doubt whatever, that the mother country alone could abate a nuisance
hateful in the sight of God and man. Constant opportunities were
therefore offered to agitate this great question, which was taken up by
the enlightened, the humane, and the religious, all over the empire.

The magnitude of the subject was indeed worthy of all the interest it
excited. The destiny of nearly a million of human beings--nay, the
question whether they should be treated as men with rational souls, or
as the beasts which perish--should enjoy the liberty to which all God's
creatures are entitled, as of right, or be h