Many tried to insult me, but to no purpose.
In all these discussions I found the great advantage of having brought Mr.
Falconbridge with me from Bristol: for he was always at the table; and when my opponents, with a disdainful look, tried to ridicule my knowledge, among those present, by asking me if I had ever been on the coast of Africa myself, he used generally to reply, "But I have.

I know all your proceedings there, and that his statements are true." These and other words put in by him, who was an athletic and resolute-looking man, were of great service to me.

All disinterested persons, of whom there were four or five daily in the room, were uniformly convinced by our arguments, and took our part, and some of them very warmly.

Day after day we beat our opponents out of the field, as many of the company acknowledged, to their no small mortification, in their presence.

Thus, while we served the cause by discovering all that could be said against it, we served it by giving numerous individuals proper ideas concerning it, and of interesting them in our favour.
The second effect which I experienced was, that from this time I could never get any one to come forward as an evidence to serve the cause.