Addressed to the British Parliament, this abolitionist narrative of the life and travels of the former slave Olaudah Equiano was designed: "to excite in your august assemblies a sense of compassion for the miseries which the Slave-Trade has entailed on my unfortunate countrymen" (iii). Describing himself as "an unlettered African" (iv), Equiano intends in writing this memoir to promote "the interests of humanity" (3), rather than his own literary reputation. The first volume describes his kidnapping and sale as a slave in Africa, the middle passage, the "injustice and insanity" (218) of an American plantation, and his many voyages on board navy and merchant ships in the mid-eighteenth century. The second volume describes how Equiano purchased his freedom, his subsequent voyage to England, his travels and employment as a free man, and his evangelical conversion. He concludes of the slave trade: "Surely this traffic cannot be good, which spreads like a pestilence, and taints what it touches!" (vol. I, 223), and calld for its abolition: "I hope the slave trade will be abolished [...] In a short time one sentiment alone will prevail, from motives of interest as well as justice and humanity" (vol. II, 252-53).