ABSTRACT
First published in The Examiner, IV, 4 August 1811, pp. 491–3. An exchange of letters on this essay (with Benjamin Robert Haydon writing as ‘An English Student’ among others; see Woodring, p. 46) occurs in the next few issues (pp. 566, 579–81, 592–3, 596–600, 611–16, 628–9). Hunt made clear his hatred of the slave trade in the first month of The Examiner’s life in The Examiner, I, 10 January 1808, pp. 17–18. He has a number of comments on the portrayal of figures of African descent on stage; see, for example, The Examiner, I, 6 March 1808, pp. 157–8; and 31 July 1808, pp. 490–2, and above, pp. 64–8. See also ‘The Negro Boy’, Vol. 5, pp. 6–7.
