He therefore reveals to Buxton a conversation with Stephen three weeks earlier, in which he had tried to impress him with the harm he inflicting on Black people by introducing dissension into the Society, and asked what his father and Wilberforce would think of his action. Stephen insisted that he had been insulted and that he would prefer for every enslaved person to remain enslaved rather than see his honour compromised. To show good will towards Stokes, he would refrain from sending a challenge to Buxton, although this offer did not extend to other members of the committee. A subsequent letter had failed in its purpose. Stokes mentions having shown Macaulay's letter and Buxton's to Forster. In a postscript, he describes an interview with John Reddie, who was acting as an intermediary with Stephen and who had persuaded him to break with a certain Captain Roke and renounce his hostile measures. In this interview, the terms were outlined by Reddie for the withdrawal of the letters because George Stephen claimed that before 16 Dec, he had informed Buxton that they were confidential. In return, he would neither publish nor refer to them again, but if anyone felt injured by what he had already published, they should now take that matter up with him as though none of the rest of the controversy had happened. The following day, Stokes planned lay the whole conversation before the committee.