Robert Hall, Leicester, to Thomas Babington, 16 February 1824.

[This letter and the following concern the Address on Slavery that Hall prepared for the Leicester Auxiliary of the Anti-Slavery Society, of which Babington was the Chairman and had commented upon the draft.  Hall is responding to some changes, as well  as the suggestion that he should put his name to the Address.  He was hesitant to do that, and the Address was  published in 1824 without his name.]

16 Feb.y  1824  

My dear Sir

  I resign the dispersal of all that belongs to the Address to your disposal.  From the moment I wrote it, I considered [it] as the property of the Society, for whose benefit, or rather for the promotion of whose object it was composed.  You my dear Sir are the faithful judge of the proper method of procedure in this case, & I doubt not that the Committee no less than myself will cheerfully acquiesce in the measure you have adopted. 

  The most material correction as appears to me is at the foot of page 13 where the matter of fact is erroneously stated, the former error in the same page is an error of the press.  I am a little surprised at your objecting to the [illegible word] statement page 15, as it seems to be merely natural or necessary inference from the premises, but you have probably reasons for objecting to it, I am not aware of.  But in this & in every other particular, I submit entirely to your judgment.  It is certainly  a pity anything should be found that may suggest matters of cavil, or that is liable to be confuted, & I am sorry on this account, the address was not not more nicely sanctioned by the Committee.  I suspected, when I saw it in print that the statement in pg. 13 was inaccurate, as it would scarce consist with a legal state of society.  Wishing you every possible degree [of success] in this & in all your other meritorious exertions.  I am dear Sir with much esteem,

Yours most sincerely

Robert Hall

Text: Babington MSS, 20/52, Trinity College Library, Cambridge.