This distribution had not been long begun, before I witnessed its
effects. The virtuous Abbe Gregoire, and several members of the National
Assembly, called upon me. The section of the slave-ship, it appeared,
had been the means of drawing them towards me. They wished for more
accurate information concerning it. Indeed, it made its impression upon
all who saw it. The Bishop of Chartres once told me, that, when he first
espoused our cause, he did it at once; for it seemed obvious to him that
no one could, under the Christian dispensation, hold another as his
slave; and it was no less obvious, where such an unnatural state
existed, that there would be great abuses; but that, nevertheless, he
had not given credit to all the tales which had been related of the
Slave Trade, till he had seen this plate; after which there was nothing
so barbarous which might not readily be believed. The Archbishop of Aix,
when I first showed him the same plate, was so struck with horror, that
he could scarcely speak: and when Mirabeau first saw it, he was so
impressed by it, that he ordered a mechanic to make a model of it in
wood, at a considerable expense. This model he kept afterwards in his
dining-room.
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